Re: The "Who is God?" Tirade

Mark,

maybe living in the Bible Belt - certainly one of the worst places of religious
intolerance in the western hemisphere - has somehow influenced your point of
view towards religion in general and Christian believes in particular.  But
even if I consider this background of yours, I can hardly believe that an
intelligent being like you can publicly write such mindless and hateful
statements like you did.

Remember that I do not want to promote any form of belief, but I am willing to
defend my and other people's religious background against nonsense like you
spread recently.

Re:

> let me say this: for a religion which claims to be
> completely and utterly devoted to the truth (the word "gospel" means
> literally "the truth"), calling itself literally "the word of God," any
> dilution of its rites or teachings or spiritual values (all of which I see
> affected) make it null and void.

Mark, no religion possesses an objective truth because all statements about
supernatural beings, life after death, etc. are in no ways provable.  (I know
that there have been many attempts to prove the existence of God, but none of
them can withstand a sceptical logic.)  Religions can only offer consistent
teachings about supernatural matters, nothing more.  It is up to you whether to
believe them or to doubt.

So, if some official or some follower of a religion claims to know the `truth'
when speaking to a non-believer, then he/she is either a) naive or b) a blind
fanatic.  If you have encountered such preachers of truth all too often in your
life, then I feel sorry for you, but this bad experience doesn't give you the
right to generalize and to attack all followers of certain believes at once.

As for the word `gospel':  I think everybody knows that it means `good spell'
which is supposed to be a translation of Latin `evangelium' (or better: Greek
`eu-angelion').  The ethymological legend that `gospel' = `God's spell' is
again an issue of the narrow-minded brains of your preachers of truth.

If there really were only one truth and only one way to express it, then you
might argue that changes of religious rites (or dilutions, as you put it),
lessen the value of the religion in question.  But this isn't the case.  There
are many ways to express the same teachings, and even if also the teachings
differ somehow, they still can refer to the same spiritual value.

Thus, a change of rite will never make a religion null and void, unless perhaps
for fanatic followers or fanatic enemies of that religion.

> You see that I don't agree with that. If you call it a horse and it's really
> a donkey, then you're lying to yourself and everyone else, AND perpetuating
> the lie through generations. Until no one recognizes that it IS a lie. And
> that is what has happened.

A change of rite isn't a lie at all.  It is only a new convention, nothing
else.  No one ever claimed that every Christian rite was invented by Christians
- - quite the contrary.  Hence, detecting similarities to other religions or even
tracing back certain elements of rite to them doesn't affect the value of
Christian belief at all.  It is interesting to know, yes, but not of any
importance.

> Truth is the word they chose to use. So it is the best standard to hold them
> to.

`Truth' is perhaps the words some idiots in the Bible Belt use way to often.
It should be handled with care when comparing different religions.

> >   (2)  The Apocryphal and Christian supplement:  Even if you have to suffer
> >   from inevitable injustice, illness, or pain, accepting these hardships
> >   without superfluous complaint will preserve your dignity and peace of
> >   heart.
>
> A philosophy of sheep. Translates well to: don't worry, put up with
> suffering, don't bitch about someone stealing from you or hurting you and
> your family, take it in stride and know that God's gonna reward you in the
> end.

You are completely wrong, perhaps because you have missed the word
`inevitable'.  No one tells you not to make use of your umbrella only because
the rain is God's will.  Quite the contrary, you are obliged to avoid all
unnecessary suffering, and to defend yourself and your family if possible.  But
once you have no chance to escape an evil, then - according to the philosphy
mentioned above - you should bear it with grace.  (Other religions suggest
wailing in this case, or explaining your fate as consequence of your own
mistakes.  So if you don't like this solution, you still have the choice...)

> Now, does this seem suspiciously like something the government might
> approve of? To keep the people in line and happy in their poverty?

I agree with you that there have been a lot of misinterpretations of the
philosophy mentioned above in Christian history.  I will tell you the story of
the most prominent example:  By interpreting the letters of Apostle Paul too
literally, Luther indeed taught that you have to obey secular authorities no
matter what.  Now it came to happen that most of the high-ranked German
officers who planned to remove Hitler from power in 1944 were Lutherans, and
they had a very hard time before they finally decided that they had to kill
him.  This was the ethically correct decision, and this experience caused the
Lutheran Church to revise their principles concerning unconditional obedience
after the war.  (The fact that the attempt on Hitlers life of July 20, 1944
failed had other reasons than that.  Because Rommel had been seriously injured
during an allied air-raid in France short time before, Stauffenberg - being the
only other popular officer - couldn't make a suicidal attack as originally
planned but had to survive the assissination in order to take over the
government.  Being alone with the bomb and his advisers, Hitler was just
lucky...)

The answer to your question is no.  If your government makes nonsense, show
resistence.  Show legal resistence as long as the government itself doesn't
behave illegally.  In extreme cases like described above, kill your tyrants.
But if you don't have a chance to withstand your government's injustice, then
bear it with grace.

> Oh, and let's not forget: don't seek revenge. Turn the other cheek. Vengence
> is mine, sayth the Lord. All I can say is: Baaahhh! Baaah!

Total misinterpretation of yours.  When you are a helpless victim of torture
and get slapped in the face, turn the other cheek.  Don't curse your torturer
but trust in a higher justice than the secular one.  That's it.

As for revenge, I think we agree that blood feud and things like that are not
desirable.  If someone hurts you and you are able to strike back, then think
twice before doing so:  Maybe it might be better for your own dignity to calm
down and to settle the problem in a civilized manner than just letting your
rage become the better of you.

> The Universal Mind gave us instincts and the means to survive. And the Xtian
> faith says to deny these things.

Not at all.  Only to handle them with care, because sometimes they might be
mistaken.

> We're talking about the main two holidays here.
> AND how many falsehoods are there for each one we spot?

Firstly, Christianity has three main holidays, the third one being Whitsunday.

Secondly, as far as the other two are concerned, there are only two non-Roman
pagan elements in Christian rite:  That's the tree on Christmas and the large
fire on Easter.  All the rest you were talking about (presents, Santa Claus,
fertility symbols) are traditions outside of the churches.  They can be traced
back to the same pagan cult, but they have nothing to do with today's Christian
rite.

So, if your whole tirade against Christianity is based only on Christmas
trees in and Easter fires in front of churches, then it really is a poor one.

> Here's an easy one for you: proof of evolution (which is denied by the Xtian
> faith).

Nonsense.  Most Christian denominations accept the results and the reasonable
theories of modern science.  Science doesn't affect religion at all, because
the two of them are dealing with completely different subjects:  Science deals
with matter whereas religion cares for the welfare of human souls.

> However, 99% of the Xtians I've
> met haven't studied any others and refuse to when I suggest it.

Time for you to meet some open-minded Christians.  Here is one.

Cheers,

Bernd