I noticed a picture of Jesus on the desk of a co-worker recently and couldn't help but wonder what the point of such a picture was.
The crucifix is a gruesome depiction of the brutal murder of an alleged "god-man," that is supposed to strike both horror into any good Christian as well as happiness for the fact that Jesus was so brutally murdered for the sake of our own miserable souls. And out of this truly macabre mix of horror and happiness, we are supposed to feel love for the lunatic who allowed himself to die a miserable death, just so we could be "free" from sin.
Never the fact that no one was ever actually "freed" from anything, or that Christians have often run amuck in the world practicing a religion that looks like it came more from Charles Manson than Jesus Christ. Indeed, is there a single Aryan or Nazi who has ever lived that did NOT identify as being a Christian?
Nor have I ever seen a person who keeps a picture of Jesus that does not resemble their own ethnicity. I'm sure it happens, in those countries that the US has conquered and colonized for example, but it is probably pretty rare.
Yet we are still left to wonder what the point of the picture is exactly. Does it make us feel more contrite? More humble? More reverent or forgiving? For the sake of argument, let us assume that it does do all of these things (I actually think it not only does NONE of these things, but in fact only makes it impossible for ANYONE who claims to be a Christian to ever even practice such things).
But for everything it DOES, does it not simultaneously create an opposite revulsion for anything that is contrary to it?
If you had never been taught to believe that Bible can show the divine morality of racism and slavery, for example, or to truly passionately HATE all those who engage in what you alone may define as "fornication" and "perversion," especially those god damned homosexuals!!! Would the world NOT be a better place?
Is it not the TEACHING of such hatreds and fears that create far, far more evil in the world, than that we should simply accept that people are simply different?
Is it not simply the means by which men try to pretend they have a special knowledge they know damn well they most definitely do NOT have, but pretend they do nevertheless, just so they can obtain power and hold positions of authority over others? True, they may actually "believe" they are helping "save souls," but that would be exactly what Satan would WANT them to belive they were doing, in persecuting all those who they feel are morally corrupt.
After all, if YOU were the devil, wouldn't convincing people that they were "like God, knowing right from wrong," be the easiest way to convince people to commit ever sin and inflict every suffering on others conceivable? Is that not EXACTLY what religion has been used for? And is that not EXACTLY what the serpent promised in the garden of Eden?
The crucifix is a gruesome depiction of the brutal murder of an alleged "god-man," that is supposed to strike both horror into any good Christian as well as happiness for the fact that Jesus was so brutally murdered for the sake of our own miserable souls. And out of this truly macabre mix of horror and happiness, we are supposed to feel love for the lunatic who allowed himself to die a miserable death, just so we could be "free" from sin.
Never the fact that no one was ever actually "freed" from anything, or that Christians have often run amuck in the world practicing a religion that looks like it came more from Charles Manson than Jesus Christ. Indeed, is there a single Aryan or Nazi who has ever lived that did NOT identify as being a Christian?
Nor have I ever seen a person who keeps a picture of Jesus that does not resemble their own ethnicity. I'm sure it happens, in those countries that the US has conquered and colonized for example, but it is probably pretty rare.
Yet we are still left to wonder what the point of the picture is exactly. Does it make us feel more contrite? More humble? More reverent or forgiving? For the sake of argument, let us assume that it does do all of these things (I actually think it not only does NONE of these things, but in fact only makes it impossible for ANYONE who claims to be a Christian to ever even practice such things).
But for everything it DOES, does it not simultaneously create an opposite revulsion for anything that is contrary to it?
If you had never been taught to believe that Bible can show the divine morality of racism and slavery, for example, or to truly passionately HATE all those who engage in what you alone may define as "fornication" and "perversion," especially those god damned homosexuals!!! Would the world NOT be a better place?
Is it not the TEACHING of such hatreds and fears that create far, far more evil in the world, than that we should simply accept that people are simply different?
Is it not simply the means by which men try to pretend they have a special knowledge they know damn well they most definitely do NOT have, but pretend they do nevertheless, just so they can obtain power and hold positions of authority over others? True, they may actually "believe" they are helping "save souls," but that would be exactly what Satan would WANT them to belive they were doing, in persecuting all those who they feel are morally corrupt.
After all, if YOU were the devil, wouldn't convincing people that they were "like God, knowing right from wrong," be the easiest way to convince people to commit ever sin and inflict every suffering on others conceivable? Is that not EXACTLY what religion has been used for? And is that not EXACTLY what the serpent promised in the garden of Eden?
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