One of the problems I have with religion... wait a minute... I’ve got a number of problems with religion and I think I’ll cover them all here today. It’s a perfect time to discuss something like this; given that the world’s priciest drag queen is doing his “King of Hearts” tour of America in the Elvis-mobile.
Religions are all based on principles, set down in laws and theories of behavior delivered by the founders and then pounded out into the hard metal of enduring time. The priest class gets into the act about as soon as the founder is sent on his way by the preexisting Pharisee class through whatever Sanhedrin they’re operating... or it might be bad food; as is attributed to the passing of Buddha, or poison as is associated with Mohammed. You check the histories in the mythologies and you get the idea.
The priest class sets up a schematic which, coincidentally is designed to transfer the operation of the founder’s power to their intermediary operations as they negotiate between God and man all the little niceties that are required for the smooth functioning of the operation, which amounts to a business no different than any other company or corporation you may be familiar with. So... in the space of a couple of hearts-beats lawyers appear as well and the priests and the lawyers manipulate their siphon machines for the benefit of those closest to the trough.
This is a little cynical, I know. Many churches and members under the umbrella of the greater corporation do outstanding work. At the same time, many members and churches engage in missionary work promising violence or with-holding food in order to quicken the conversion. Then there’s always the threat of hellfire before and afterward. So, maybe the good and the bad cancel each other out while the ugly remains untouched in the hard drive.
You’d be a fool (my opinion) to believe that governments and religions and corporations do not engage in a conspiracy of control for your attention, your freedom, your sweat and blood and the fruits of your labors.
Okay... that’s one of the problems that I have with religion, or several of the problems I have as parts of the central problem. Another problem I have is the ridiculous outfits of some of the religious heads. I think the purpose is to lend majesty to the weight of the office they occupy. To a sane person it looks like the rank vanity of deluded mortals appearing in dreadful musical theater while viewed on bad LSD. Its purpose is to lend to the atmosphere of mystery which is the main product that religion sells. Mystery is a great product because no one knows what it is and it’s easy to sell according to whatever fears and desires you may be preying on; or is that praying on? Some Christian sects will promise you eternity in Heaven if you leave them all your goods on departure. I’m assuming you need to have some amount of goods otherwise you’re flying economy class and you’ll be getting the full body cavity search on the higher planes; presuming you are going in that direction.
The chief by product of religion is hypocrisy along with profit and perpetuating the organism. Survival is as much a priority of soulless enterprise as it is in any life form capable of recognizing threat. So it is that you get the obfuscator in chief of the pedophile scandal now operating as Pope and wringing his hands about what a tragedy it was while he was the main force behind its continuance. Religion gives us many terrible ironies and this is only one of them. Yackety yack, don’t look back.
This is the age of bad religion. Well... it has pretty much always been that age. But in this age it is the major mechanism that drives the war machine. You could say that the psychopaths are merely using this because it’s a great hot button for encouraging the canon fodder to die uselessly once again while they fatten their wide asses off of human misery. You could say that and it is probably true but it’s still the big clarion cry with the most amount of face time at the moment.
If The Pope was just performing in the longest running Broadway musical of all time then that might be fine as mere fatuous entertainment but he’s a player in the whole game and he’s got about as much connection to and the same relationship to God as... the fabled devil.
All the religious scams that are about as efficient and user friendly as Best Buy just go on spinning their web of disinformation along with governments and corporations ...and the web that binds you into a hallucinating belief in anything they do is all spun out of the strange sexual orgies that they participate in with each other. Don’t think about it. It’s not a pleasant image. They are joined in present time with the new breed of rip-off which is the majority of New Age operations and Scientology and any system that has got you putting fruit and children’s bodies out in ceramic dishes to appease the God of Blood and Thunder.
The kicker is... there really is a divine agency. I know this to be so. I know it... not believe... know- beyond a shadow of a doubt due to personal experience that perpetuates from one day to the other. This is the good news because ultimate karma takes care of these thieves, liars and murderers in good time. Unfortunately it doesn’t accomplish it until enormous harm gets done and that, I suspect, is because so many people are waiting in line to replace these people and would love to do the same thing to their fellows, given the power and opportunity. That’s the key. People stupid enough to believe in this rubbish are also often venal enough to want to practice the same things that they are suffering now. This is why dumbing down and propaganda, mumbo jumbo, mystical hand signs and outfits from “Priscilla, Queen of the Desert” are employed as they are.
Meanwhile, all of these religions and governments and corporations send out the message that we should respectively, love each other as ourselves (probably not loving ourselves accounts for a problem here), obey the law and be a good citizen ...and practice able dealing for fair profit when... when... their closest connections to any of these things occurs when they are mouthing the words.
There have, maybe, been good Pope’s. There has certainly been bad Pope’s but I suspect this one is one of the bad ones. Millions of people will go on attributing divine agency to this over dressed clown. Millions of people think George W. Bush is a Christian. Millions of people believe lies and order their lives according to these lies and would love to be among the people spreading these lies because there’s nothing like being in a position of power for being able to exercise all of the worst traits in the human spectrum.
I’ve got no good words, or the usual upbeat closure that often attends my posts, to offer you today except to use your common sense and to realize that we, the mass of humanity are the real power. If we would stop supporting these religions, governments and corporations they would have to change the way they do ‘business’. If we shut off their water they run dry. Until humanity realizes this they will be sheared and slaughtered and sold to their fellows as packaged meat. I suspect they are going to have to be pushed into terrible desperation to get their priorities right. It’s a crying shame but that is the way it is.
For those of us who can see, I suspect we are doing what we can. It’s not a requirement that we win the battle. What is required is that we did the best we could manage. The battle against ignorance has raged through recorded time and ignorance has generally won. However... it would have been a lot worse and possibly over already if so many of us had not striven (often at the cost of the life) to hold out a lantern and a helping hand to each other. If you are looking for the essential element that religion distorts for a profit. If you are looking for that mysterious force that can transform your life and the lives of others, I suggest you look into your own heart where it has always lived. Call it what you will. Call it God or Love. Call it Truth or what have you... it’s there and you’re good to go when you find it. You don't need a priest class to bugger your beliefs.
'Right Thru My Heart' is track no. 5 of 12 on Visible's 2007 album 'Almost A Capella'
Lyrics (pops up)
63 comments:
Amen. You speak the truth. I’m rarely at a loss for words, but I couldn’t add anything to your comments.
Fud
Les, this is not up to your usual high standard. I will confess that, as a Catholic who admires and respects the Pope, I too have had qualms about seeing him pictured with Bush. Nevertheless, we should not forget that the Pope has always condemned the war in Iraq. I wish he had done so now in public.
Now is not the time to attack religion. We need to have a source of moral authority not connected with the government and the bankers. It is true that this moral authority has sometimes betrayed itself and let us down. But the answer is not to throw out the moral authority but make it honest and better through devotion to truth and integrity. For without a concept of moral authority neither devotion to truth or integrity have any meaning whatsoever - and that is why it is important to continue to give it some support despite its failings. A flawed structure is better than no structure at all. And no structure at all is the condition which the forces of evil are aiming at - because when that happens, there is really no brake at all to "Might Makes Right."
"The kicker is there really is a divine agency."
That's an interesting statement, since really everything we believe we know requires an animism to aid in our belief. One simply cannot even take a single unthinking step without some danger of falling and disappearing into an abyss.
It is more difficult to know any god, than it is to know our moral mission here. We all would be moral should we find out how.
The moral imperative of life is to live a life that detracts not at all from the lives available to those who will follow us into this world.
By focusing upon what we will collectively bequeath to the future, we can make for a better world.
But, ironically, such a world is met mostly by accepting the very real probability anything that we proactively do, other than to tell everyone else to stop doing the insanely immoral things they're doing, is likely to lead to a worsened world.
Don Robertson, The American Philosopher
Catholic church...systematically covering up sexual and mental abuse for years...reassigning offending priests rather than turn them in to authorities for prosecution...pay outs over a BILLION dollars to make up for it. It's too bad there isn't a hell for all those responsible. Moral authority my ass.
Its smoke AND mirrors.
"I suggest you look into your own heart where it has always lived. Call it what you will. Call it God or Love. Call it Truth or what have you… it’s there and you’re good to go when you find it. You don't need a priest class to bugger your beliefs."
you got it les.. elegantly simple.
top of the top10 of my asschapped gripes w/instutionalized/organized religion.
THE LIE - that you must seek without and beg for the greatest gift you innately possess - God Within.
second runner up
THE LIE - original sin.
2000 years. 2 THOUSAND YEARS!
i have a few comments for caryl..
"Now is not the time to attack religion. "
oh no, caryl?.. religion has always been on the attack of anything and anyone that endangered it's powerbase and/or it's mind/soul lock on humanity.. let's revisit a few of those shall we? the 'so called' pelegian heresy, the inquisitions, the cathars, the druid, the library of alexandria, the entire mezo-amer indian cultures... did i miss anybody?
i think it's long past time for pay-back, even if only in print.
since its unholy inception your snarling cult of death has left its horrorstricken and charred mark on this earth. since at least the early 400's (recorded) my people have fought your arrogant bloodthirsty cult...i'm still here to say........
it can bite my heretical pagan ass.
you think religion is not connected to the gov/bankers?
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! that's hilarious! you can't honestly tell me, you've never even studied the history of your own church???!!!!
"For without a concept of moral authority neither devotion to truth or integrity have any meaning whatsoever "
so, lemme get this straight???
from the vacuity of your rudderless originally sinning soul.......
you, admire and give absolute control of your immortal soul and probably those of your children to........
a nazi in a fish hat who wears red silk shoes in public, has the audacity to call himself "god's regent on earth and presumes ownership of it in entirety" presiding over an institution who throughout its recorded history has raped, pillaged and burned it's way round the globe, most lately having been outted as the largest pedophile ring on the planet?
that's some external moral authority ya got there, caryl.
i wish you luck w/that. :)
The truthfulness of your writing shines through again Les.
Where is the hope for any sort of decent future for the world when the majority of the population believes in (as Susanna says) the tooth fairy in one form or other.
As long as ‘we the people’ give our power to these people our lives will continue to not be our own. Maybe we do this on purpose so we can excuse whatever we do with ‘God made me do it / the devil made me do it’. No excuse!
Tony
caryl
You don't need to belong to a group and let it dictate what to believe to believe in Our Creator.
Joseph Ratzinger (God’s rottweiler) belonged to the Hitler Youth Movement for goodness sake!
Pope Benedict XVI
Tony
"Let my ROD and STAFF be a comfort unto THEE"
Comfort? Hell, sounds downright painful to me.
The buggery and greed that has consumed the Vatican for so long had its start back in the 12th century, when the Vatican made it illegal for priests to marry.
Up till then, priests could and did marry.
See, the Vatican was adding up its gold coins and realized that when priest died, they left their wealth to their immediate family.
To avoid such bad manners in the future, the Vatican made it a mortal sin and a crime for a priest to get married, so that when the priest expired, his loot would go to the Vatican.
When the misogynists in the Vatican made the beautiful act of love between a man and a woman illegal, then what followed was predictable.
Centuries upon centuries of priests, looking for an outlet for their biological urges, turning to homosexuality and pedophilia.
Just like the modern church.
If the Vatican was truly sorry for what they had engaged in, they'd let wanted pedophiles like the former Boston Cardinal Law pay for his crimes in court and not hide behind the pope's skirts.
But that would take rational thought and an entity that says you'll go to Hell for sleeping with your girlfriend but get promoted for raping altar boys is anything but rational.
Considering the ooooo.1% chance that hell exists, in which ever form you choose (as described by NDE's), if time stops in the next life, then everything we do now depends on what awaits me in the next life. If indeed there was a hell created for lucifer and his fallen comrads, it's people like Howard Storm who break it down to how you and me will go where our heart is.
I myself have met just as many atheist assholes [who preach their non-beliefs more so] than those I have known who are simple minded Sunday Christians. It's an awful risk no matter how many zero's one puts in front of it. If it's real, than what was the harm in looking for answers instead of building walls?
Miracles do happen.
I myself hope America (the Darth Vadar of this world) finds in it's heart or what's left in it's head, a sense of right and wrong.
The Pope and the RCC have about as much moral authority and integrity as the Devil himself. In fact, they are veiled (in fancy garb and ritual 'voodoo') agents of the Devil. The winged dragon is part of the Papal crest - BUT, the fact that religion (particularly the Catholic religion) is the opiate of the masses does NOT invalidate the Deity of the Christ. The Truth and The Life is found in Him, alone. Religion does not enter into the equation.
Who invited the Pope to America to opiate (spiritually dumb down) the American people? Very likely Zionists had something to do with it. They serve the same master (Mammon and his demonic alien race).
Furthermore, the True Light will NEVER be found by looking within. There is no Light within unless it is put there first by the Grace of God - that's what being 'born again from Above' means.
Sorry, Charley - I mean Les! ;)
I'll do a little answering here;
Caryl, your argument seems to imply that we need corrupt institutions to keep us enslaved and in fear because the alternative is more frightening. That's the very argument they use to keep us enslaved.
You will note that I said this in the post;
"we, the mass of humanity are the real power. If we would stop supporting these religions, governments and corporations they would have to change the way they do ‘business’. If we shut off their water they run dry."
I realize that civilization needs institutions but that does not mean that they can't be held accountable and that is pretty much where I am at. As an individual I need no church because I live in one. I need no religion because my life is one. And I in I one and one should be assumed. God and Man are unique counterpoints and indispensable one to the other. One might say they are interchangeable. More heresy, no doubt.
Godsend, if you knew what you were talking about you would be dangerous. So... I take it that the kingdom of heaven is NOT within us? Emmanuel is not emanuel? If God speaks to our hearts he is doing it from some enormous distance by virtue of some spiritual Skype?
It's not a bad idea to use common sense when considering spiritual truth. There is nothing true about spiritual realities that does not adhere to scientific law; once science has gotten around to discovering it and the day will come when the scientist will look across the gulf of the unknown and see the poet, the mystic, the philosopher and himself, waving back with a smile on their faces.
Anyway, talking to you is like talking to a brick wall. You will find that water is harder than stone. In the meantime, I'll be about my business, whatever that is.
If one has not figured out by the time they are 10 years old that religion is the ultimate-dare I say it-evil, then you never will. But once you are brainwashed you (with extremely rare exception) stay in such a deluded and programmed state for life.
Les hit the nail on the head when he said that most of the time ignorance wins out. We humans must be the most ignorant species ever to walk the planet. One might claim that we have come up with so many inventions and technologies etc. but our criminal and murdering ways (precipitated by adherence to religious dogma) cancels out any progress we humans have accomplished. And when it comes to outright ignorance americans (with the exception of a micro percentage) take the cake every time. I`ve met enough to safely come to that conclusion.
I wonder if after that sicko in that funky robe meets with that "christian" bush if he`ll hook up with some of his pedophile counterparts in america and maybe have one big child raping broohaha before he hops back on his plane (piloted by god, no less) and heads home.
Religion: Merely Attempt To Lead Humble Volk Who Otherwise Have Difficulty
(Apollonian, 20 Apr 08)
Well see, reason for "religion" is so few people are very good at strictest reason, logic, and science. Even the best make mistakes. Thus most people need leadership, this in name and style of "religion," again.
So note "religion" isn't necessarily something mystic--even REASON itself is a religion of a sort.
Note then Christian New Testament (NT) is primarily LITERATURE meant to commemorate great heroic battle of truth vs. such brilliantly organized Jew lies (beginning with "ohhhhh, we're soooo persecuted..."--self-pity evolving then to murderous self-righteousness) and conspiracy institutionalized in Pharisees and their Talmud (later formally written out by 500 AD--see RevisionistHistory.org, TruthTellers.org, and Come-and-hear.com for good Talmudic expo).
Note again specific fundamental Christian precept: nothing less than absolute anti-Pharisaism, anti-Talmud, as Gosp. MARK 7:1-8. Unless u are absolutely ANTI-SEMITIC, U AIN'T NO "CHRISTIAN," pilgrim. So don't pretend u can't figure out what Christianity is or is supposed to be: it's meant to exterminate Judaism, nothing else, nothing less. And such Christian anti-semitism is how u can spot the false Christians who refuse to face this necessarily anti-semitic fact.
Observe nowadays Jew bankers have literally BOUGHT gentile liars (Hagee, Pat Robertson, Franklin Graham, and entire Roman Catholic officialdom, to name only a few) to preach subservience to Jews and Israel in guise of "Judeo-Christianity" (JC--see Whtt.org and TruthTellers.org for expo/ref. on JC heresy), whence it is asserted, for primary example, "Jesus was Jew" (note Jew and Judean are NOT same things).
For the Pharisees then, as now, maintained that definitive fundamental cultural basis of lies (subjectivism) by which practical instrument of fraud (indeed, nothing less than INSTITUTIONALIZED fraud) and fractional-reserve money and banking essentially ruled and affected the earth then as now (Jew bankers). See RealityZone.com for expo/ref. on Federal Reserve Bank (Fed) counterfeiting fraud/conspiracy.
For note "truth" requires an objective (hence Greek/Aristotelian) reality by which objectivity there is criterion by which to PROVE/verify such truth. For any idiot can babble, insist, assert, and declaim. But truth is what corresponds in an objective reality (science). Without that objective reality, ANYTHING GOES, and whatever anyone says is both true and false at same time.
Truth which can't be demonstrated is just someone's opinion--which opinions are cheap, like elbows, as everyone has.
But as Greeks teach regarding Tragedy, life sucks, and even if/when Christian heroes win, driving Jew bankers fm proverbial "temple," the lately triumphant victors inevitably degenerate in cyclic fashion historically, insisting their word is now latest "truth." And since Jews are topmost liars, who worship lies, so co-ordinated and well-organized, they quickly elbow out the gentile pikers, or as usual, just buy them off.
Thus lies most often rule the earth, and as Jews (Talmudists) are most effective, most brilliantly organized in-bred family/race of liars, they naturally dominate, this reflected/verified in history. Observe Jew historian, Bernard Lazare ("Antisemitism"), himself admits Jew bankers have dominated West since 14th cent.
Only rarely does truth seem to win, even briefly, as when the liars and Pharisaics fall to in-fighting among themselves which then allows a briefly successful revolution--but which then degenerates as in "Decline of the West," by Oswald Spengler.
Presently truth threatens to regain ascendancy by means of MIGHTY INTERNET, latest Harris Poll indicating over 50% of people mistrusting "Jews-media" (see Natall.com, "Who Rules America?" for expo/ref. on Jew media monopoly), only 30% trusting, 40% preferring Internet as source of news.
CONCLUSION: Such then is the controversy of "religion," merely the ritualized battleground within the minds of volk wherein truth fights its lonely battle against lies and Jews. Honest elections and death to the Fed. Apollonian.
Well Les,
About Stregth In Numbers
I remember when I was 17 there was this older guy who said he'd take on me and my friend in a unsanctioned fight. We were both very strong and in shape, about 5'9 160lbs. He was 6'2 205 and tough like a special forces guy.
No matter who went first, or who he turned his attention to first, caught some serious knock out shots.
It becomes harder to think about kicking someone elses ass when you're in intense pain.
We knew he could kill either one of us first and then direct his attention to the other and kill him second.
We got banged around real good and slinked away.
And this guy was our friend.
So lets say we were ten, even then the first few to attack would surely die and we'd never know if anyone followed. Those that didn't act would be weaker because they lost us, and the big guy would be more confident.
I call this my fighter's dilemma
Ahh religion the greatest mind control scam ever conceived and hijacked by "elites" long ago. Imagine the followers will censor themselves and just sit back no matter how bad it gets because that is the will of some benevolent sky dwelling being like the beer commercial would say "brilliant"!
Catholocism is a sickness. I hate to be so blunt but there is no other way to say it. It's mind-boggling that any sane human being stomach the history of the Catholic church and still in good conscience call themselves a Catholic. It's like trying to rationalize slavery. Some traditions aren't worth keeping.
Your words are encouraging your readers to awake from a slumber which has been in most humans for millennia. It's happening with increasing speed thanks to you and to many others who have found the Way before. Because of a perceived danger to the establishment some were accused of heresy or treason or whatever else to have a pretext to kill, or imprison or commit them. Nevertheless the process of progressive acceleration of the ability to find inspiration deriving from the activity of the eternal spiritual self present in all men is finally threatening the survival of the established powers. More and more men/women are now experiencing a revival of their consciousness which will soon transform the controlling malicious structures that are crumbling all around the world.
Thank you, Les8
Your words are encouraging your readers to awake from a slumber which has been in most humans for millennia. It's happening with increasing speed thanks to you and to many others who have found the Way before. Because of a perceived danger to the establishment some were accused of heresy or treason or whatever else to have a pretext to kill, or imprison or commit them. Nevertheless the process of progressive acceleration of the ability to find inspiration deriving from the activity of the eternal spiritual self present in all men is finally threatening the survival of the established powers. More and more men/women are now experiencing a revival of their consciousness which will soon transform the controlling malicious structures that are crumbling all around the world.
Thank you, Les
Goffredo
Les, you don't know what you're talking about - but you are not dangerous, just Self-deceived! :) There is nothing common-sense, natural or scientific about anything spiritual. Trust me! :)
You must learn to pay attention to details, Les. The kingdom of Heaven is within us AFTER it has been placed there by the Grace of God.
One more time, just for you:
"No one comes to the Father except through Me"
Now let that sink in (to your heart, not your mind). Remember, spiritual awakening MUST precede mental (natural) understanding - and it CAN'T be Self-induced. THAT is the great spiritual law.
"You MUST be born again from Above" - THEN (afterwards) the kingdom of Heaven will be within you. :) Got it? Pray without ceasing.
I wish I could say with certitude that god exists, alas I can't. Although being an atheist is probably just as anthropocentric as being religious, another thought brings me great comfort in times of despair (like all the time nowadays). When thinking just how rediculous the concept of an afterlife is, it is no more preposterous than the idea of being born in the first place. In other words, no one knows any more about why we are here than anyone else. Funny hats aside.
Woody's Secret -> http://www.woodyguthrie.org/biography/woodysez.htm
The three words that says it all :)
It has been my experience that spiritually aware people don't do religion.
Religion appears to be something graspable for those who have no idea about the depths within.
Because of this there is fear and then obviously with the fear comes the belief that this will protect them.
When I had my first child, a young mother, I realised how much it meant to my mother in law (a very pious soul) to have her grandchildren christened. So we had an agreement that they could be baptised and she could take them to church if they chose to go with her.
So off to the interview I go. Very large church, huge congregation.
The head honcho takes one look at me and with absolute derision snarls out his nostril "I suppose you believe in reincarnation".
I answered that it was not something one believed in but was rather something that one was aware of.
He stood up banged his fist on the table and called me a heretic and then went on to say that there was a time that I would have been burnt on the stake.
Of course I was unshaken, kind of what I had expected, but the interesting thing was it shattered my mother in laws belief in the church. She felt that instead of decrying something he should investigate it and the more she looked at her beloved, the more she saw blindness.
Occasionally we do get spiritual people in religious office. Desmond Tutu being one. But they are few and far between. But make no mistake I think the energy they harness and release is part of what will make the evil collapse.
Does anyone think that Ratz went "hunting" with Shrub and Drainey?
Hey Les, folks,
You're perfectly right of course. I dismiss all religion as power-structures run on fairy tales. I'm about as ex as an ex-catholic gets.
But the flipside of this coin is that the Catholic church is definitely on the media's list of 'those we must hate'. Muslims are top of the list, with Russia and China next. The reason we're all so familiar with the sins of the Catholic church is because the media so relentlessly harps on it. This isn't an accident. I ain't giving the Datholic church a free pass. The media stories are true. But I really hate having to shake my fist in anger because a media puppet string has jerked it there. Do you know what I mean?
And the flipside of the flipside is the Pope's seeking of an audience with the bankers in NY. I reckon it's always significant who visits whom. For instance our PM had to go to Rupert, not the other way round. And the Pope had to go to the bankers. That rotten kikz is right as usual. And wouldn't you love to have been a fly on that particular synagogue wall!
And otherwise, I don't know that religion is so different from everything else. Money and debt is a belief system only ever so slightly different from religion. I reckon I could mount a case that most everything in modern society requires some variation in belief. Soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan are there because they believe in their governments and in what their governments and the media told them.
I figure if you're going to abandon beliefs why just stop at religion?
Les, I have been reading your blog for a while now, and this marks the first time I have left a comment to any blog ever! Thanks for a very eloquent commentry. It appears we have a similar understanding and are closer to the truth than most.
Your comment about a divine agency; I found interesting, particularly in reference to my understanding. You mentioned a knowing rather than a belief. I do not believe (and nor should anyone else) in anything but in myself. The day I stopped believing in anything and scrapped the word, marked the beginning of an incredable journey of truth and understanding. Belief is for the blind! Why believe when you can know... all one has to do is admit they don't know and the answer will present itself.
I know there is no god, but at the same time; we are god.
I prefer the word LOVE.
Thanks Les, what the world be if it weren't for the love we truth seekers offer!
I have a new essay Here and I think it relates in a certain way with this one but more along the lines of how I understand things which may not be all that much.
First you state the truth that most of the "so called" Chrisitan sheeple would love to have the opportunity to exploit their fellow man, as they are being exploited. Then you ask them to open their hearts and become the opposite of that! Are you on mushrooms or something?
Let me lay some facts on you. Lucifer is the group conciousness of the Jews. The Infinite Creator, who is both formless and timeless and gave humanity free will, has no natural enemies. Christians are phoney baloney hypocrites and always have been.
Finally, humanity is its own worse enemy and will no doubt annihilate itself. The human race should be living in paradise, and have created through free will a living Hell. This is actually quite amusing to me.
My suggestion to you, anonymous, is that you more carefully read what is written and then you won''t make statements about things in the post that never got said. Read carefully the ideas and words that you attribute to me and see if they say what you say they said. I am certain you will find that you assumed things I didn't say. Nowhere are Christians singled out as opposed to other folk in this regard and if you think what I said doesn't apply on a universal constant to humanity then you haven't been paying attention to the world around you. Furthermore, you might want to pay attention to your own comments in the context of what you reply to.
I could dissect your commentary but I think it doesn't require that because most of the people that read here will get a vivid enough picture without my parsing the mix.
Do you know what it looks like when an anonymous person goes swaggering though a comments section with your brand of imperiousness? It's like a fly buzzing on a summer afternoon. You know it's there but it doesn't mean anything; there's a lot more to the afternoon than the buzzing of a fly.
LOL, you are a funny guy Les! Love it! Rest assured Benedict is controlled by the Mossad...who do you think put the moles into the church in order to expose the priests 'funny op too'...
The only things I really like about the catholic church: crackers, holy water and candles 'romantic..'
I grew up around priests and is an ugly sight as well as those guys... surrounding them...I liked Benedict 'he has my Fathers name' but when I saw him 'and all of his faces (more than facebook)come off that plane and bow to Bush well that was the statement 'am sure the Jews/Zionists want many enlightened folks to see...'that flipped the switch and the light was stronger than mega laser!
Yes, Benedict is just another clown in the circus not unlike those he co-mingles with! And yes, he is tapped into the spirit world by default; hopefully he has some good friends there too.
Peace be with the reader.
It is unfortunate, yet true, than the vast majority of human beings are mentally disabled. The blind are leading the blind. Natural man has fabricated an artificial world of his own, a world that is completely divorced from reality. A world that cannot continue to exist, a world that is now in a process of disintegration. The writing is on the wall for all those who have eyes to see. Those who live in black holes, are totally oblivious of what is happening.
It is also unfortunate, yet true, that religion has failed to come to the rescue. It has failed because the soul of man is corrupted, and religion is a product of the corrupted mindset . A corrupted soul cannot know that it is corrupted. It can only feed on its own corruption. Irrational man is lost in his own duality. He is, and at the same time, he is not, he is a paradox.In order to live, he must first die, however, because he cannot know that he is dead, he is bound to suffer.
He will continue to suffer until such time that he accepts in faith that he is dead, that his mind is corrupted. Alternatively, until the time comes when he is forced to comes face to face with this inconvenient reality, the Truth. The time has come.
This is the message that has been
ignored from generation to generation, and this is why the darkness has reigned for so long. The good news is that it is daybreak.
It is only by the grace of our Father that we are able to see the depravity of the human soul. It is unfortunate, yet true, that as Les writes:
"...they are going to have to be pushed into terrible desperation to get their priorities right. It’s a crying shame but that is the way it is."
The Faithful Witness
I'm not certain what to make of you Les. In your last post you refered to Dean Kamen and his brilliance with technology and his philanthopist nature. Now you are going on with your religion or anti-religion ideologies. I wonder what you think of humans interfering with the natural process of life (which in the end is the ultimate truth - see Walt Whitman Book 16 or 17 of Leaves of Grass). Love is but a word much as religion is just a word or a body of words - the product of those words are the truth. Mother Nature never lies.
Your right in that Catholicism is corrupted but then again so is Judaism, Buddhism, Islam, Jainism, Evangelical Christianity, Confucionism, etcetera...oh and lets not forget that the secular world is just has corrupted.
I once had a girlfriend who insisted on telling me that we use the word love several times a day. Well the knives are still in my back after she made off with a good Mormon. According to them, if she is a good Mormon she is promised the status of a God to another planet somewhere in the Universe. (Spiritual Overlord perhaps...God, i doubt it).
And that is just one of the knives that have left me scarred.(Yes i am bitter).
Words are cheap.
To go off topic a bit. I watched Alex Jones' latest rant here and it suddenly dawned on me that maybe someday the spirit of truth will avenge the current oppression that i am surviving.
I commented before that it is not the filthy elite that are the root of my problems and pains as much as it is the decision making skills or judgements of the middle class. AJ seems to be having a hard time convincing them of their coming faith has the financiers battle for supremacy and to me (for now ) it seems that their blindness may bring them down to my level of oppression(what's worst - oppression in a rich country that your forefathers died in battle for or oppression in a poor country?).
Again you have the macro problem pinned, but i am a micro unit in that whole and i will never take another bullet for some faction (middle class swine - you sold me out ) that will undoubtedly use that freedom to enslave me.
I guess in the end it's each demon for him or herself.
Again goes one, saying,
What will ye give me, and I will deliver this man unto you?
And they make the covenant and pay the pieces of silver
When they decide to sell you out they will weave their words with mastery and enslave themselves to the truths of those words but that truth is not truth and the natural balance will someday show the real nature of those words.
Amen. You speak the truth. I’m rarely at a loss for words, but I couldn’t add anything to your comments.
Fud
Yeah Les, like my words exactly, sorta more or less, I think Yuh know what I mean.
I am intensely interested in this area, where politics meets religion in the present mess. I feel it’s the only place to start to fix the spiralling pile of bloodsodden body parts. And the only place we can have a dialogue on this is on the internet. No other space gives room enough to hear us all. I’m so glad you have started a thread on this. Thank you.
There is about to be a Nuclear War. Another Holocaust, greater than the others in the 20th Century, is being erected on the altar of “religion”. Greater even than the current Atrocity of Mind Boggling proportions in the Middle East taking place right this minute. We must, as an internet community, try to stop this war which will exterminate us all. And it is my firm belief that we are being manipulated through “religion”. To win, it is we the people who must set the terms to make dialogue the weapon.
In the beginning was the Word. And the Word was God.
There is much to be said, but first let us set the terms of the debate.
Let us put ourselves in the minds of our opponents in order to frame a conversation on religion. I am not an aethist, or Christian, or Catholic or Judaic thinker. I am interested in this subject as the root of the dialogue between East and West, North and South. The Global Dialogue. *It is “they” who have brought the context: Axis of Evil. It is a battle between Good and Evil.
Mere talk of “religion” shows the “war of terror” is working. This storyline was old hat for many decades until the arrival of a so- called Born Again Christian to the supreme throne of globalised insanity, and a convert to Catholicism in the form of the hideous strutting Blair.
The very fact that we are being asked to dissect religion, to ask about (or even question) another’s God — the very presumption of “Is his God as good as mine?” — to judge, equate, give support or take it away, all are reflections of the new Global Debate we are supposed to be having in order to herald a “New” religion, whose form is as yet unknown and due to emerge in some vast orgy of self-flagellation or Rapture for the lucky few.
How utterly manipulated we are.
This is not a criticism of your raising this as an issue. Ethics and morality are paramount in this Dialogue. It is indeed at the top of the (whose?) agenda. But beware, the globalists will be happy if we allow them to dominate in this debate by spreading the confusion of a multitude of “beliefs”.
This is the first huge great mistake we could make. The politicians and propaganda masters very much want us to argue about religion, because there +are+ no answers. The only answer is a political one.
I'll give you an example of a trap I spotted on this board higher up:
Godsend said:
“Furthermore, the True Light will NEVER be found by looking within. There is no Light within unless it is put there first by the Grace of God — that's what being 'born again from Above' means.”
What you say is contradictory. Until God puts the living spark or Divine True Light there you cannot find it there?
For me the Divine Spark is there from the moment there is Life. God is Life. (Of course, then you can argue that Evil people have no life, they are dead, if you like —that would be nice! — If true we wouldn’t have all these problems.)
To say NEVER is not logical. It is an absolute which you have arbitrarily introduced to suggest that Les is looking for Divine Light without God’s permission.
What an odd view.
If I say you’re wrong (I believe you are), then you are right to say it is I who am wrong, for no man has the “right” to say another man is “wrong” when we speak in terms of another’s beliefs about God.
And there it starts. The cyclical no-win argument. It is only in the affairs of man —politics/behaviour/action— where I am permitted to speak of “right” and “wrong”, for example, policies. I may not say if you are wrong or not about your “religious” beliefs. They are yours, and therefore inalienable. You may not say whether Les is wrong either, for what do you know of God that you can speak for him (Les) or Him (God)?
Of course, if you get involved in another’s beliefs and pretend to dictate what those must be, then you “sin” by assuming you “know” what his God is. None of us can enter the mind, or beliefs, of another. For this reason we separate religion from politics. We cannot enter the mind, but we can restrict the actions and behaviour of man.
However, we must talk about religion because we are forced and manipulated to do so. Then to win* we must control the weight of the debate.
The Global Dialogue must be about very primitive ideas, otherwise we lose*. “They” have taken us back 5,000-10,000 years before the birth of Christ. So, cancel out all the progress and enlightenment since then. Several thousands of years of “civilization” have been erased from humanity’s hard disc in about eight years (at least from my point on the green pea), as I watch a barbarism reminiscent of the worst savage tribes of stone age man come hurtling at us from the future, throwing us back —way, way back— to the mental state of Cavemen (no offence to our original ancestors if they were, in fact, more advanced than Bush$Co).
Are we really this barbaric to wipe out all the political reasoning of hundreds of years since the Renaissance? The thousands of words of the great development of Mankind and his Global Literature of great and divine books burned on an EIGHT YEAR INQUISITION? Do we +again+, after all this time, reargue the benefits of diplomacy and dialogue on the altar of rational thought or stab and murder and offer blood sacrifices more akin to the ritualistic antics of a subhuman species?
Americans have a divided society. We now have a divided world. Those who see how simple the equation is, and those who don’t. Those who see the Truth and those who don't.
And if we have to go back to the scriptures to prove it, then we should:
Thou shalt not kill.
+ nine others.
-----------------
*”Win”, “Lose” and Judo: defence tactics are to let the opponent come at you (use their argument), and then use their own body weight to bring them to the ground, by going with them, not against.
Hi Les
I just wanted to say that I appreciate your writing skill very much.
I was like caryl at one time. I also attended Catholic school. There's hell on earth for you. Sadism at its finest. But I left Catholicism when I was 12, right after my earthly father passed away, and began my own long search for the truth. I was also like Godsend for a brief moment in time, approximately two years, if that's brief. You are right about him: they are like talking to a brick wall, but that's what brainwashing does to people. Born-againers hate reason and love their simplistic "I'm right and you're wrong" mentality. I was disillusioned rather quickly with them. They spout off things about Jesus but don't do what he taught. Heck, they don't even read the gospels, just cling to cliches and read Paul, Paul and more Paul, the first subversive of the teachings of Jesus.
Anyway, I could rant about that stuff for what seems an endless amount of time, but why waste my life on them?
You said that we find truth, God, Love, whatever you want to call it, within ourselves. Nail on the head, so to speak.
I don't know if you've ever read any of the works of Alice Miller. I've just started reading them recently. Adds a great psychological dimension to what we are dealing with and why it stubbornly persists. I would recommend her books to all thinkers. Not you, though, Godsend. Stick to your cliches if it gets you through your day. The Kingdom of Heaven IS within you. Seek it, find it and live it.
Peace.
Les, the more I read what you have to say, the more I see that I am not alone in my thoughts. Every time I tell people that humans are primative and superstitious, I invariably use religion as THE example. First let us realize that there is no connection in reality between god, and religion. I like you believe in "god", although I don't pretend to understand the nature of god like those in religion do. I know that god is a mystery and the answer to a mystery is I don't know. For what ever reason I believe that humans posess an inate belief in somthing greater than ourselvs, a creative force, if you will, that to this day remains a mystery. However, somewhere along the line a tribes mog ur, or village shaman, or medicine man, claimed to have spoken to this power and knew what it/he/she wanted. Religion was born. A tool to utilize this inate belief to manipulate and motivate groups of people. It was easily bought into because people were simple minded, and they all had this belief that they could not discribe, and wanted a way to express it. Today however, we are scientifically informed, and many of the things that were attributed to "god", now have a simply explained scientific origin, yet we still believe in the primitive and superstitious stories of religion. Humans can't seem to step back and see that religion was not created by god but by man. Every word in every religious text has been written by man, and as such is subject to all of our human failings, and fears, and prejudices, and worst of all our deliberate machanations in order to manipulate and control. Religion and nationalism are the two remaining non essential methods of motivating large groups of people to do war on other people. Non essential, meaning not food or water or other nessary for life reasons, although we are seeing the beginnings of those, but I digress. Religion is not used to bring people together, but rather to turn them against one another, and to justify doing things that a true belief in decency would not allow us to otherwise do. We do not, as one of the other posters here said, need religion as some kind of moral compass. We as humans know what is good and decent, what is "right and wrong", and we don't need religion to tell us what they are. After all, every time we have seen or heard what they are it was a human that wrote or spoke them. We know and it was god, who or what ever god may be, that gave us that knowlege. Unfortunatly like every thing else we've been given, we have found a way to misuse and abuse it and today religion is one of the tools that we use to do that. Yes, we are primitive and superstitious, but I see the glimmers of hope in articles such as yours, that we may someday be able to step beyoud religion, and into the true realm of spirituallity. Until then, god be with you.
For anyone interested, this was the Walt Whitman poem i was referring to before.
Poem of the Sayers of the Words of the Earth.
Re dodgyone's posted quotation from Woody Guthrie . . .
W O W , i thought i 'didn't like' Woody Guthrie, and now i see that was my ego farting in the direction of something & someone it felt threatened by. i promise it/i/we won't do that again.
thanks dodgyone for posting
ellis t
Outstanding blog. I just discovered this yesterday, so give me some time to get up to speed, but from the few things I've read, you seem to know the score pretty much across the board. Maybe a tad to lenient on the "jews per se" kind of thing. I agree with you that, you know, Mr. and Mrs. Jabowitz down the street aren't engaged in a conspiracy for world domination. But if you're still looking the other way when it comes to so-called "anti-semitism" as a very long-lived societal problem, I think you might want to do a little more reading in that direction. Have you read Douglas Reed's "Controversy of Zion," for instance?
Jews know the score. Don't go letting the poor suffering jews all off the hook just because it rubs your sentiments the wrong way to think that regular people could actually believe they are the chosen ones as a group, and that that group is highly clannish and self-serving. -- Kevin MacDonald, have you read him? I can give you a very succinct crash course in that stuff, and it would probably begin with the Holocaust. If you're going to bash people like Chomsky and so forth for their posturing, but then you yourself haven't got the guts to look squarely at the Holocaust, and want to call the current junta a bunch of "Nazis," then it's just pure hypocrisy. I'm sure most jews believe the Holocaust happened, just like everybody else. But unfortunately for truth, it didn't. Douglas Reed was at pains to show how this group was deliberately molded into a force for everything that's coming to fruition now. How they were confined to ghettos and taught to hate and fear the goyim by their Rabbis. If we're going to oppose this very long-running plan for a New World Order, then we have to deal with all of it. Not just Israelis and Neocons, but Freemasons -- like our Founding Fathers, the lovely men -- and so on. We have to expose all of their lies, or we'll continue to exist in a landscape of them, and they will be used strategically against us. Even though we can bring something as obvious as 9/11 into the open, it won't be enough. You won't be able to pin down the blame where it lies.
Hallo Les :)
Great piece. And much needed.
Bad religion? Isn't that redundant. ha,aha
As for this: "The chief by product of religion is hypocrisy ..." Yup. Which caused me to think about the primary products of religion: Guilt, Lies and Threats! Can you get any more dysfunctional than that.
I can't stand even the sight of that Ratsinger, he so repulses me. What a scum bag. Anyone who can defend that lizard knowing his history with the agents of pedophilia is highly suspect in my books.
p.s. Why do Catholics always feel the need to confess? ha,ha Could it be all that guilt-trippin' they're inundated with? Methinks so. And thank Jesus I'm an ex-Catholic. No guilt or guilt-trips for me. Non merci ;)
**************
Caryl,
I have a source of moral authority Thank you very much! And it's got nothing to do with Ratz-boy or some long corrupted church. Fuck that! Since I can think for myself, my source of moral authority comes directly from The Source, no intermediaries required.
And I had to scoff/laugh at your comment that this piece of Les' isn't up to his usual high standard. Don't you actually mean that it isn't up to yours? ha, ha
Geeze Caryl, could you be a little more mealy-mouthed /
passive-aggressive?
*****************
kikz,
I love this kikz-ass part of yer comment:
a nazi in a fish hat who wears red silk shoes in public, has the audacity to call himself "god's regent on earth and presumes ownership of it in entirety" presiding over an institution who throughout its recorded history has raped, pillaged and burned it's way round the globe, most lately having been outted as the largest pedophile ring on the planet?
Spot on. And funny to boot. Ta,
And hey, did you ever notice that he (and bishops or cardinals sometimes too I think) sometimes wears a yamalka, Jewish headgear? What's up with that? Did he wear one of those for his meeting with the bankers? ha,aha
****************
HeyZeus,
Alice Miller is a genius! I'd say she's one-in-a-million but she's even rarer than that :) btw, people who are fond of dabbling in psychology, including those who wax on about organic portals and soulless humans really ought to read Miller. Imo, they could benefit much from her insights, especially her compassion which is woefully lacking in many, including many of the dabblers.
**************
So...until some priest or pope or preacher or rabbi or imam or dalai lama can make a tree... until then I (too) will stick with what I know.
Hasta luego kiddies,
No worries ellis t , when les said God or Love as in If you are looking for that mysterious force that can transform your life and the lives of others, I suggest you look into your own heart where it has always lived. Call it what you will. Call it God or Love. Call it Truth or what have you… it’s there and you’re good to go when you find it. You don't need a priest class to bugger your beliefs. it brought to mind that the bible says God is Love and I remembered Woody's thoughts from a while back, and knowing that les likes Woody's songs he might find his take on that to be of interest. Once you accept the fact then all the words of all the religions amount to less than those three words.
IB
Thanks for the Walt Whitman poem.
Have decided to take the kids to the dam on a picnic.
We will read it by the still water whilst munching on the last of this seasons grapes.
Thank you for the inspiration.
susannah
For those who believe they can replace religion with science, it is important to know that science has also become a religion.
" It is ironical that, in the very field in which Science has claimed superiority to Theology, for example - in the abandoning of dogma and the granting of absolute freedom to criticism - the positions are now reversed. Science will not tolerate criticism of special relativity, while Theology talks freely about the death of God, religionless Christianity, and so on." H.Dingle
Well, since Godsend's not doing a great job in defense of Christianity, let me try.
Last Friday, my wife made the all-night trip from the Boston area to a village in the Dominican Republic, as part of a week-long 12-person mission team from our Vineyard church of about 200. Half of their checked luggage is made up clothes, toys, eyeglasses, etc. for the kids, and church members are paying for about 30 of these kids to go to school. She's been working with two international microlending agencies to meet with the village leaders, who will hopefully finance small businesses there to get some of them out of poverty. And yes, they will be singing worship songs in Spanish, praying for the sick, and preaching the Gospel.
I don't believe they will be withholding any food aid, however, or giving sterilizing vaccines, or whatever your readers may be imagining or muttering under their breath about now.
As I recall, one of the planks of the Illuminati charter is to destroy all religions. Before you shout for joy, consider that the best way to do it (besides Bush's holy war against Islam), is to infiltrate, corrupt, and disgrace them, like they do so well with other organizations. And maybe use their control of the media to trumpet this.
I would argue that what my wife is doing is an example of undefiled Christian faith, which - no surprise - doesn't get a lot of press coverage. By contrast, Dean Kamen has received a lot of press coverage for his miraculous mystery water purifier, which is supposed to save the world once he can get the $100K cost down to $1K. I remember the Segway hype too. Let him have the glory after he does it, not before.
"By their fruits you will know them".
Chapter Four of Spiritual Survival in a Temporal World is Here
It's an online book that I am writing about how to not only get by but to improve your life.
That's wonderful that your wife is engaged in an effort to help others. I worked in Christian missions some years ago, working with alcoholics and drug addicts and the homeless and in my travels I have come across many people in many religions and have found that variations on ALL of them do good work now and again. I've also found that most of the time they do it because it makes them feel good, and secondarily because it actually helps someone else.
I'm also aware of Franklin Graham and all the rest of the scoundrels working the Iraq War and the missionary zeal of hypocritical Christians who want to spread not Christ's message but rather the American Imperial Christian message. I'm aware of the rapture junkies and the Hagee's and the rest too, so I'll stick with what I said.
People who are helping are usually under the radar and it isn't about trumpeting "all the great work we are doing" among the oppressed who are often oppressed because the American corporate system enslaved the country in debt while plundering their resources.
Unless you can be aware of these arguments I don't see where your example cancels out the multitude of examples to the contrary.
I was very moved by that men's Christian group from one of the Carolinas that went down to Katrina-land and did so many powerful things to help out. They were remarkable.
Your comments on Kamen are not only wrong and dis-informational but gratuitous as well. The so called 'hype' about the Segway is belied by its increasing use all over the world; get you facts straight before you speak. Also, his water-cure system, The Slingshot, has received almost no media coverage at all which was the point of the article and which is detailed in the link given in the article.
I'm all for helping people out and I am a firm believer in the message of Christ. I have to call them as I see them though and it is impossible for me to be comprehensive in my usual 1500 words. I'm not a prophet nor a fountain of endless truth. I'm just some guy who's got a few things to say about the darkness at work and there's a plenty of it in the Christian system and they don't need the efforts of the elite to be blamed for their shortcomings.
The fact is that The Aquarian Age is on the way and a whole new understanding is going to replace the old order just like it did when Christian symbols were grafted on to the preceding order the last time two thousand years ago.
It's not just about breaking down and composting the corruptions of the past, it's about ushering in the new age of brotherhood and understanding and despite appearances it is on the way, thank god.
"Believe nothing merely because you have been told it. Do not believe what your teacher tells you merely out of respect for the teacher. But whatsoever, after due examination and analysis, you find to be kind, conducive to the good, the benefit, the welfare of all beings -- that doctrine believe and cling to, and take it as your guide." -- Buddha [Gautama Siddharta] (563 - 483 BC).
I find it strange that people can come here and lecture Les on spirituality. I've had my life changed more profoundly in a spiritual way from what I have read at Visible Origami than by all the spiritual books I have read by anyone else in my life and I have read a lot of spiritual books.
I've experienced more truth at this blog about world conditions than I have anywhere else that I have read about them. I guess it is to be expected that when people feel that their cherished edifices have been rocked that they will forget all about the good they've received and just go on the attack.
I don't know why Godsend comes here in the first place. I suspect it is because he knows that he is hearing the truth but he won't admit it to himself. I've yet to see anyone perceptibly refute anything I've ever read here and I'm not anticipating that it is going to happen soon.
I don't tell you often enough Les how much I appreciate what you do. I hope you will think of this as one of those occasions.
Bradley
from duke's H.Dingle quote: "Science will not tolerate criticism of special relativity."
or -- criticism of the big bang, or of the standard view of "AIDS" and "HIV," or of the idea that evolution depends entirely on mindless random genetic accidents, or of the idea that comets are made of ice, or of the idea that all the humans in the new world are descended from people who walked across the "bering land bridge," or of the idea that gravitation is the only force that operates over large interstellar distances, or the idea that the gigantic stones for ancient monuments like the pyramids and Tiahuanaco were shaped by semi-savages in loincloths who heated the stones up with charcoal and dropped copper balls onto them to make them fracture, or the idea that the sphinx is about 4,500 years old, or . . .
if you raise your hand in science class there's a lot of topics you better not ask any probing questions about!
ellis t
This post reminds me of my most recent blog entry:
Parasites
Oh, thank God for the Buddha, ha ha.
Any leader of a religion (I use that term ironically) who says one oughtn't to automatically believe what one is told (by whomever) is my kind of guy.
PS Without wishing to be seen as a defender of the church I'd merely like to say that I did most of high-school in a Catholic school and it was not a terrible experience. Most of the teachers were lay but there were several priests teaching also. They ran the gamut from self-impressed prigs to the most perfectly wonderful people. The lay teachers likewise. In no way could my education there be described as inculcation. In fact they taught us to think freely and sure enough I ran with it and ceased being a Catholic. I recall one priest who said things not unlike the Buddha quote above. I shall never forget that moment when that light went off it my head.
I do know of perfectly wicked priests. One helped trash my parent's marriage by sleeping with my mother. I wouldn't make to much of this because in the case of my mother those in the priesthood were comfortably outnumbered by those not in it.
But this event was perfectly unconnected to my schooling. The priests of my high-school, along with my father, are responsible for me not being a drone. And frankly I have to thank them.
What Bradley @8:16 pm said :)
No major disagreements with your response, Les, (except for the personal snipes) but a few clarifications are in order.
There's no question that atrocities have been done in the name of religion (the Inquisition, the Crusades can be added to your list), but of course though who perpetrate these crimes really aren't adhering to the core values. In fact in these examples, they're antithetical to those values, and they deceive many.
This is nothing new. Jesus railed against the hypocrisy and crimes of the Pharisees, the religious leaders of the day.
The problem I was addressing is that so few people (on this blog, anyway) seem to be able to distinguish the genuine from the counterfeit. This is largely because there are so many prominent counterfeits in the world and in the news. From your discussion, I think you see the difference, as do I.
A bank teller can more easily spot a forgery because they handle currency all day long. But someone visiting here from abroad really can't discern a fake, because they don't have any experience at all with the authentic.
In this analogy, the bank teller is the person familiar with the true tenants of the faith. In my case, this is Christianity, but the same could be said of other religions. I think most true Muslims would say that suicide bombers and madrassas that teach hate are not really consistent with the Koran.
Finally, regarding Dean Kamen, three weeks ago he was on the Colbert Report showing the Slingshot and making wild promises but giving no details, either technical or business-related, which seemed suspicious to me. A few days later I saw another report on Slingshot that provided the cost data, and how it needed to be reduced 100-fold to become viable. As it happens, I own an engineering and manufacturing company, an that sounds like a pipe dream to me.
I've followed Kamen's work for years, and I am an admirer of his inventions and philanthropy. I'm not an admirer of his hubris. He's adopted the Edison R&D model, complete with showmanship. Maybe it will help him sell it. IMHO, he should have been talking with customers and investors first, and deployed something at least (100 units for a year?) before doing the talk show circuit - to protect his own reputation at least.
Anyway, I wish him well. It would certainly be good if he was successful in addressing this huge global problem. But I'd prefer the approach of the founder of freerice.com - also widely covered in the press, but after he made a difference.
Peace be with the reader.
It is clear that there is a great deal of confusion about the message according
to the gospel. Here is a short summary
for those who have eyes that can see:
Man is not born with a corrupt nature.
The new born baby is a perfect human
being, without blemish, a spiritual being. So the idea of being born corrupt is a fallacy perpetuated by pseudo Christians.
Man is born into a corrupt system, and for this reason he is coerced by outside forces to lose his true identity, by taking on an identity outside of himself. He has become a second hander, his mind is now corrupted. At this stage the individual has become "The darkness that feeds on the darkness in itself."
In order for the individual to restore his mind, the self has to die. The person has to give up his false self, and as the Son of man said the first time he came, the individual has to "be born again".This is difficult because the individual tends to protect himself, instead of confessing in faith that he is corrupted. A person has to die before he can be resurrected(restored).
The Faithful Witness
electro, I'm making a wild guess here - you'd have to be a yank, wouldn't you?
Tony
Tony - you mean a Yankee? I suppose so.. What gave it away? Was it my first post about my wife flying out of Boston?
electro
No, it was the twaddle you wrote in the last post (God's given me a secret power to see these things).
Well, it's not really a secret power more of an 'Everything that a Yank speaks is bullshit' kind of message from beyond.
In fact, to me, you sound like a 'not so crazy' godsend.
No, look electro, I apologise for the above.
As I mention to godsend, you are here for a reason, learn from the experience.
May your god give you eyes to see. No that’s not what I wanted to say.
May the mind your Creator has given you be used. That’s better.
I’m really sorry for the confusion above electro, it’s just that I’m trying to think like you and godsend and it doesn’t f***ing work!
Answer me this, ‘Why is it that I think that people like you are the ruination of this world’?
Could it be that you are condescending ‘No major disagreements with your response, Les’, as if!
Could it be your petulance ‘except for the personal snipes’, diddums is offended – there, there.
Could it be your brilliant investigative powers ‘There's no question that atrocities have been done in the name of religion’, you shine brother!
Could it be your deductive insight ‘they're antithetical to those values, and they deceive many’, brilliant! I assume you are educated; you should know better. Shame.
(In capital letters) Why go on!
Tony
ps. Yank was the terminology and it’s derogatory!
pps. Look at this Les; someone has roused my ire.
OOPS, i got one strategic number mixed up -- here it is AGAIN, with that fixed. Sorry for posting two times, and the first one would be OK with me to delete -- ellis
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electro said: "So few people (on this blog, anyway) seem to be able to distinguish the genuine from the counterfeit."
let me give it a shot.
here are three things which offical christianity says are all interconnected, in so many ways that they are totally inseparable -- but which, IMO, have NO necessary connection at all:
1) the christian church as an ongoing organization
2) jesus
3) christ
#3 is real, in fact it is THE reality, except that it's false to say that it's THE reality, because THE reality can't be named, not even by calling it "christ" (nor by calling it "THE reality"!) This unnameable reality is the SAME reality attained by highly perfected human beings, no matter what cultural or religious background they may come from. #3 has nothing whatsoever to do with "salvation" in the standard, traditional christian sense.
#2 was one of two things. He may have been a real person who was A christ, meaning a fully or very highly realized human being. (Wherease the idea of "THE" christ is something the church made up on purpose to trick people, more on this below.) And as a real person who was A christ, his teaching was entirely devoted to waking ordinary not-yet-christ humans up to the reality that THEY were and are inherently christs too, and that they were and are fully capable of realizing and expressing that, just as jesus himself was doing. jesus never taught that he was divine . . . except in the REAL sense in which human being itself IS divine. The OTHER possibility i see regarding #2 is that he was a fictional character who (in the fictional story) teaches the very same things that a REAL jesus-who-was-A-christ would have taught. Such a fictional character would have been the invention of a human or humans who were really christs themselves and were creating a fictional figure to use for teaching purposes. Personally i tend to believe that jesus was an actual person. Whether #2 was an actual person or a fictional character, jesus is in no way to be blamed for christianity.
#1, christianity, was founded by people pretending to follow and implement the real teachings of jesus (see above, under #2) . . . while in fact what they were really doing was to kill those teachings off, and bury all memory of them under layers of intentional dis-interpretation of what he actually said, and even more layers of doctrines that are wholly made-up: original sin, damnation unless jesus saves you, the idea that jesus is divine and human beings are not, the doctrine that reincarnation is a false teaching and that when people die they either go to heaven or hell or purgatory, the idea that jesus's blood somehow "atones" for sins of other people, the idea that there's nothing BUT jesus's blood that can do that, the teaching that people are in danger of eternal torture unless they join the church by getting baptized and unless they pass the same fear on to their children by baptizing them and indoctrinating them . . .
i have to stop because this is getting too long. Check out a book by Marcello Craveri called "The Live of Jesus" for a concise description of how and when the key "teachings" of the christian church came into being. (NONE of them came from the actual #2!)
but it is really necessary to mention one more VERY key teaching of the church -- some version of which is included in every sectarian variety of christianity that exists -- namely, that all or some selection of the ideas listed above (none of which have ANYTHING to do with jesus except that they totally frustrate what he was really teaching!) are taught to be THE ONLY TRUTH.
that's the key piece of mental technology which made possible the crusades, the witch hunts, and the inquisition(s).
now electro says that the people "who perpetrate these crimes really aren't adhering to the core values."
on the contrary. "adhering to the core values" of christianity is exactly what they are and have been doing, century after century. Especially the core value which says that christianity is the only truth! What the crusades, witch hunts, and inquisitions were, is the total, deliberate expression of that core value of christianity!
Meanwhile, those same people were and are totally confused in regard to what is actually the core value of everything, namely item #3 -- although they and their actions are perfect expressions of #3. (Because #3 is what expresses EVERYTHING, not just nice things.) And #3 is precisely what was deliberately excluded from christian teaching at its beginning and has stayed excluded down to the present day.
ellis t
I have experienced epiphanies, mind-altering, life-altering, life-shaping ones. For the sake of brevity I won't go into them here. Let me only say that though the experiences were akin to being "reborn" they had nada to do with any religion, church, dogma, etc.
I detest religion. I do. As far as I'm concerned they are all nothing but trouble. And I have no qualms or hesitation about saying that either. No more than I would by saying that I detest pedophilia and pedophiles, for example.
You do not have to be religious to be decent. And you do not have to be religious to teach others (children for e.g.) to be/become decent either. You only have to be decent. It's that simple really. As another poster mentioned (sorry have no time now to review all the posts). Right from wrong. Basic decency. Compassion. Kind.
Some of you seem to think that only Christians are charitable. How about Jews? Muslims? Whatever!
btw, Les you said a mouthful when you mentioned something about people not loving themselves. Religions (in particular) do not speak the whole truth, not even close. They all talk a good game. Mixing universal truths and lessons of decency with so much garbage that in my opinion it's is a freakin' Miracle, a divine act of Grace (God/Creation) when a person can actually escape the mind-numbing, brainwashing, neuroses-inducing, even psychoses-inducing effects of religious indoctrination and survive intact and healthy!
And yes of course --duuh-- you will find some decent souls among the religious ones. But they are not decent because they are attached to or identify with any particular religion but because they choose to be decent. And btw, if that's the case, then they are "decent" for the wrong reasons; meaning that they're doing good deeds because of fear of punishment and hoping to be rewarded or receive approval. They're pretending. Which makes them fearful hypocrites. And there are plenty of people like that! Plenty.
As for that person who attempts to "clarify" godsend, well godsend speaks plainly, articulately and clearly enough. And he's a broken-record, always parroting that we'll only be saved by and thru Jesus the Christ. How does that require "clarification", huh?!
As for the (thinly veiled) sarcastic remarks about only "some" being able to distinguish between a counterfeit thing and the genuine article, well I got news for you! A three-year-old can spot a liar or a bullshitter. And if you don't know that yet, you need to get out more.
I was 5 years old, and in grade one of public, Catholic school. I vividly recall (even now, decades after the fact) raising my hand to ask the teacher (nun/sister) about contradictions in religion class. Specifically how earlier we were told that God loves and made everyone, everywhere. And there we were only a day or two later being told that only Catholics, and in fact only Good Catholics get to heaven. Even good people who weren't Catholic...well it was pitiful really, their misfortune for not having been born into a Catholic family! And when I'd persist in my questions because the answers were illogical and made no sense, were even awful to contemplate...well I got beaten bloody on more than one occasion for asking. They called it corporal punishment. I call it child abuse. Fortunately it's now recognized for what it really is (child abuse) and it's illegal in many places. Thank God for that!
But make no mistake, this sort of exclusive, divisive, and bigoted shit is being taught to this very day. (See godsend's posts for perfect illustrations of this crap.) And they still use threats, guilt, and fear to brainwash children into religions.
I can guarantee that it's also being taught this way by Jews and Muslims, and every other cult you can name! And let's not overlook the science cultists, which Ellis t astutely mentioned.
All goddamned cultists, if you ask me. All goddamned.
Nature holds all that we really need including all the answers to our questions. Some of which (seem to) remain mysterious, and that's just fine with me. But it is Nature. If only we'd respect and heed her/it more. Then we might have a chance. We ignore nature at our peril, and I don't only refer to our bodies, and physical lives either.
later,
how ironic that 'western science' and 'western religion' end up proving the same thing: "White people will believe anything!"
ellis t
Tony, that's one crazy rant!
You said, Answer me this, ‘Why is it that I think that people like you are the ruination of this world’?
Hmm, maybe demonic possession? Sorry, it's premature to suggest that.
It's interesting that you used the term 'this world'. Satan is 'the god of this world' (2 Cor.4:4), and the world is condemned already, which is why God sent his Son (John 3:16-19). So maybe in that way, I am trying to ruin Satan's plans for this world (to the extent possible).
Does it make you crazy that my wife ("people like me") is taking action to help the destitute to get out of poverty? Does that ruin the way you would like this world to be?
We're actually more focused on the 'next world', which I suspect you have no interest in, or knowledge of. Maybe that's the real reason for the disconnect.
Still more misleading quoted drivel from a fairytale.
Shame, electro, shame.
Tony
This is so obvious....sad but obvious...change will happen, but only at the edge of a sword or muzzle of a gun....and it will be a brave and vilified few that start it. 85 percent will watch as the committed last flail against the 'machine'. The 'machine' that will be made up of unknowing gatekeepers from that other 85 percent population. The 'machine' is so perverse and corrupt and has been for ages it will take a world shaking effort to knock them loose and then fall from their grip for a short period of time until other trolls like them take the lead again....the price of freedom will always be constant vigilance...active and re-active vigilance...
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