Wednesday, February 13, 2013

The Walking Dead







That doesn't leave any other legitimate options.




This is where things start unraveling for me.



Why not?




How very odd!





Well, yeah.  Ok, here goes...





Poor, blind Pharisees.





  1. I've always had a level of distrust in the Bible...because it's the Word of God, as "TOLD to" and WRITTEN BY MAN!

    Reminds me of the old joke where them monk is translating the original scrolls and starts bawling his eyes out, because it was originally "celebrate" instead of "celibate" LOL

    1. Don't get me wrong...there's so much good there! But, like with anything in life, you need to sift through it and use your head AND heart.

  2. The trouble with Christianity began with the original followers of Christ. Immediately following Christ's death the disagreements began on how to continue. For some (Peter) it was all about the church. Forcing conformity to his way of following the plan. For others, like Paul, it was still about getting the message out. In other words, from the very start, some followers manipulated the message to their own ends. Considering that many of the Dead Sea scrolls were written 100 to 150 years after the events they proclaim, that leaves plenty of time for revision before the stuff is even on paper. Then look at who has taken the task of translation over the years and see each massaging their agenda into the work. It's a wonder that there is any relevant information in the Bible at all.
    As you can probably guess I'm in the 'not divinely inspired bible' camp and the 'Jesus was a holy man but still human' camp. I don't believe that a real God's message would need to be written down but would be encoded into our soul. I don't believe that God (an omniscient, omnipotent creator being) micromanages freewill. You want to lie, cheat, steal, kill, or use a holy book to manipulate the masses then go right ahead. God can't stop you or else he would be acting against his greatest gift... Freedom of Choice. I also believe that a being of that magnitude would have better things to do with his time.
    Assuming that we were created, we were created with all the tools we would ever need to experience this (or any) life. I think the biggest flaw of Christianity is the assumption of a single lifespan then eternal judgement. It makes more sense to me that a God like that would create his people as explorers rather than followers. With an eternal, reincarnating soul, the need for God to get involved would be 0. Without the fear of death and damnation, the soul is free to seek and learn. The soul is also free of the pressing need to be right. When people aren't worried about saving each other's soul, they won't feel the need to kill another for praying differently.
    Plus it really pisses me off when people give credit to an undeserving god. Humans do magnificent things. Humans do awful things. NOT Satan. NOT God. HUMANS. I believe in the possibility of miracles, I just believe that those are either actual coincidence or a localized manipulation of existing forces (mostly Will and Probability). Magic, if you will. I don't see a need to muck up the gloriously simple magnificence of reality by throwing in external forces.
    I'm not saying God does not exist. I am saying that whatever happens in your life, it won't make a difference to an omnipotent being. God doesn't care if you live or die, if you are happy or sad, or if you become a martyr or murderer. Even if he did he couldn't do anything about it without breaking his promise to us. If you assume that we only live one life, then it's going to be a scary, confusing life.
    This Walking Dead phenomenon you speak of, in my opinion, is testament to how confused the religion has become. People of the church are reacting to the fear of punishment instilled in them and miss the glory of experience that life has to offer.

    1. I don't think I'm so cynical yet to assign selfish motives to the church founders; I still believe their disagreement was really just on how to proceed to get out "The Good Word", not so much for personal's a subtle distinction, and I may be misreading what you're saying when you say their "own ends".

      I do completely agree on massaging the data; the King James translators may have given us a comprehensive book out of it all, but the bias and positions from it have done so much damage over the years it's a wonder any good came from it the Spirit using a cracked pot and getting a full cup of tea from it instead of it being a total wash.

      I believe in ultimate Free Will; as such, God does not micromanage, nor would He encode anything into our souls. We're clean slates; we have to be. One thing that's in the Bible and consistently presented is Free Will.

      One of the biggest flaws I find in Christian thinking is the reprehensible use of circuitous logic: People give credit to God for good things humans do, because the exercise of free will came from God, the moral turpitude to do right follows God's plan, therefore the ultimate responsibility is God's, so they give credit to God for what good a man might do. It's similar to how an abused woman says it's her fault when a man beats her or her kids, to use a negative example. Think Life of Brian: "I'm not the Messiah!" "The Messiah denies himself!" "He's the Messiah!"

      I don't mean to be a complete downer. The church I just stopped going to did a fantastic job of reaching out to people because it was the right thing to do; reward of any type didn't enter into it from the pastor's was just right. I didn't leave because of him; I left because I can no longer trust the overall Christian institution (ALL of the Church as a whole).

  3. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

  4. I was just looking back over your blog to see if you had posted anything new and noticed that my comment was removed by a blog administrator. Honestly I don't remember what I posted but I would like to know what was so offensive about it as to warrant deleting. If my opinions offend you, its your blog and I have no problem not posting anymore. But it totally throws me off finding out months after an incident that someone was mad at me and didn't let me know or know why. If I'm fucking up I need to know about it because this is the kind of shit that prevents friendship. I am a reasonable individual with an opinion on things and a vested interest in the spiritual progress of my friends. Contrary to what some may believe, I am neither an intentional troll nor an asshole and am earnestly flabberghasted when taken as such.

    1. I messaged you about it; it showed up as a duplicate, so I deleted the duplicate. You could have just asked; thanks for the benefit of the doubt.

  5. Please accept my apology, James. Just that... my bad.

    In the interest of understanding: When I started writing that comment my intent was to add at the end a disclaimer in case it was just that sort of thing. You know, "If I fucked up tell me but if this was some sort of error then nevermind." That really was my intent. That being said, I woke up this morning after 12 days of mania to the feeling of dread that accompanies the onset of a 'Bad Day'(I imagine you know what I mean by that). I started digging around the internet to find something to make me feel better about my life. That led me to checking on my friends which led me to the blog. I didn't assume that it was any sort of intentional issue but it did worry me that it might be. So I commented just to see (see the intent quote above). As I was typing, my clouded brain decided it would be a good idea to explain how I was feeling and why I was responding in the first place. Several encounters in my recent past have me hypersensitive about people's perception of me and that kind of took over. By the end I had completely gone off track and forgot to include the disclaimer part.

    If I had realized how off I was mentally I wouldn't have commented in the first place. I hate to think about how much of my interactions I fuck up because of clouded thinking but I know it happens all the time. That is why I'm so sensitive to finding things out way after the fact. Because by then it is usually too late to fix it. I reread stuff I post several times before and after I submit so as to not cause negativity of any type but still I seem to accomplish just that. It bothers me. I'm told constantly to have faith and trust in myself. I don't. And this type of shit is why. Again, my bad. Please don't hold it against me.

    1. We're good. Honestly, I owe you one too. Contacting you privately.


    If you get a chance, I am interested in your feedback after watching this!

    1. That was fascinating. The issue I have with interpreting prophetic writings is that everything is perfectly clear in hindsight, and the human mind tends to want to "retcon" (retroactive continuity) things in order to force an understandable sense to them. I'm also suspicious by nature; if something that long running and detailed fits so perfectly, it tends to make me leery of it, especially coming from a religious text that has been retconned so much as to be an entirely different book.

      Not to mention the historical rift between Catholic and Protestant makes anything one says about the other automatically suspect. Cuz, really...they love each other SO MUCH, right?!

      I'm skeptical without more information or evidence from an independent and unbiased source.