Tammy, I just don't know sometimes.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. - Former televangelist Tammy Faye Messner said doctors have stopped treating her cancer and that her weight has dropped to 65 pounds. In a letter posted Tuesday on her Web site, Messner thanked her "faithful friends" for sending her flowers, cards and gifts as she battles cancer for a third time. The 65-year-old Charlotte resident was first diagnosed with colon cancer in 1996, and she announced in 2004 that the disease had spread to her lungs. "The doctors have stopped trying to treat the cancer and so now it's up to God and my faith. And that's enough!" she wrote.

I suppose it will have to be enough, Tammy. Meanwhile, those who figure that God will provide may be either dumbfounded or extraordinarily philosophical over the events that have transpired over one of "God's Children".

It's hard to figure sometimes, this whole God and Heaven deal. Regardless of what you may think of Tammy and her opinions of the hereafter or her life here, this is a little too much for anyone to go through, and it makes me sad. What it does - mostly - is put a big X in the square over the part of the questionnaire that asks, "Do you find life to be an arbitrary and random sequence of events?" Yes. X.

For those in the God's Children camp, I have to ask you how you rationalize something as heinous as this. After all, what's the point of serving God if you are only going to wind up with colon cancer? On the other hand, if a better life awaits Tammy and her ilk, should she really be sad that her doctors have discontinued treatment? Why does the Pope ride around in that big bullet-proof vehicle if the afterlife is supposed to be full of glory? Is all that Heavenly afterlife worth 3 years of painful agony? Shouldn't a kind and loving God be all about caring for his children? Evil bastards like Fidel Castro and George W. Bush live long and profitable lives, while kind and loving souls like Dale Earnhardt crash into walls. It doesn't make sense.

Maybe that's the point?

You sure ask a lot of questions for someone from New Jersey.

"I am down weight-wise to 65 pounds, and look like a scarecrow. I need God's miracle to swallow," she said in her latest posting. "I look at young people and wish with all my heart for just one day of 'feeling great.'"

Isn't that what we all hope for, Tammy? Godspeed to you - if that is the best thing.
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