may VBS be with you...

so after last week's sermon (if you are rooted in the laws and love of christ, the arrow may shoot past your head but you won't feel it) and after this week of vacation bible school for my children (god is good, all the time...) i find myself again being quite cynical and feeling as if my family has been brainwashed.

obviously i was affected by the storm, i'm sure i've posted about it before and if not, i won't now because i'd actually like to sleep tonight.

but.. i still just feel like our perceptions of 'the force' are way off base. i think everyone's perception is wrong. we give it too much credit, i can't see how it's all-knowing, all-powerful and all-loving. if those things were true.. if they were all true how could such horror be allowed to go on? and that 'free will' crap is bull shit. i know i have free will but my daddy would never allow me to be in a situation that would kill us if he were all-powerful.

it just doesn't add up.

and then there we are, sitting in church - and i'm listening to everyone reciting the apostles' creed - sounding like robots, you know? do they know what they're saying? surely they must, but they say it with so little life and emotion.. they sound like robots.

and when is this maker of heaven and earth going to stop allowing the people who worship him the most to suffer and the absolute innocent - babies - to stop being murdered and abused and used in potical and religious wars?

he can't. and he isn't going to keep us safe - it's our responsibility to keep our children and ourselves safe. truly, if he can't keep a baby or an innocent child safe, that speaks volumes about the burden and expectations we put on this thing that probably doesn't even exist.

and yet day in and day out, people everyday praise god and praise jesus for all of the good things in their lives. and they continue to go to the salon to get a pedicure when taht $45 could be used to feed a family..

i'm just done with it. i just - sick of it all.

 

Christianity, in theory, is a nice thing. But there are very few true Christians out there and they more than likely won't be found at a church.

 

If you put faith into an external, such as a diety, whos actual existence could be questioned then you leave yourself open to being dissapointed when your prayers go unanswered, because he is not there and you are only talking to your conciousness and motivated by intuition. Or, When you see too much injustice or hate in the world, which is caused by the most powerful and twisted of humankind and not a god.

If there was a god, we are clearly not worthy of being his people, neither are the jews. We're all a load of sinners; murderers and criminals. There is something wrong with our self-serving ways, but, it can at least be blamed on things like TV and world events, because the people at the top, are self-serving and it flows down through the chain. Sadly, You and I can't do anything, people will be the way they are because this is what we've been led to be.

Now we need someone at the top who acts in genuine good and peaceful intentions, and not for monetary gain or leverage of power. I'm not sure if we will get that any time soon.

Greed is our undoing.

 

this is true, and for some reason i allow myself to fall back into the old patterns of belief over and over again. and then i become disappointed as you mentioned (or furious). the question is raising children in this world - and what you choose to expose them to. my parents exposed me to everything, kept me out of mainstream 'church' and i didn't have any real friends until high school. and not even then, really - i couldn't fit into any mold at all. i see this happening with my children now, as well. and although i know it's more important that they know the truth, i also know that i wasn't well-rounded enough to understand what all of the little robots had been programmed to believe. so i'm faced with figuring out a way to teach my children what the robots are programmed to believe but do it in a way that they can be respectful of those beliefs. hopefully their respect will be greater than mine. and all of this, wrapped up with a nice, big shiny alabama bible belt bow.

 

Wow ImP, you have become so wonderfully eloquent and fluent in your religious cynism.

You know my story.
Cliff notes version for anyone that doesn't- I was an ordained minister for 15 years. Lots of disappointments, that culminated in in my being ex-communicated from a church for the sin of exposing embezzlement by reporting it to the district attorney. As you know I am fairly cynical when it comes to organized religion. As you also know, I am not cynical about what I consider a very real God. Actually, my anger and distrust of religion has made me MORE a Jesus Freak, not less.

I am aware that probably makes me the biggest hypocrite that you have ever met, but I at least know that and don't deny it.

I would suggest one thing to you - stop looking for some church to "explain it all to you" and simply start reading some of the New Testament every day. Don't read it critically, just read it. Start with the book of John. Read it several times until it makes sense. The take a walk on the wild side, and attend services in a church that is not liturgical. Don't go to some Universalist tree hugging place, just to something that is a little different from what you have done in the past

As far as "different", take a look at this site. It is a bunch of kids from my old church in Birmingham. Probably not a person there over 25 years old. They hate theology and ritual, and are just loving people. It's a whole new slant on the idea of "get in the pit and try to love someone." I think maybe they have it figured out.

http://www.whosoeverministries.net/tp40/Default.asp?ID=42876




.

 

thanks for replying, o-bear-won..

that still doesn't explain the pain and suffering. if you want to believe in jesus and god and that you're safe, go ahead.

i'll take my pain and suffering without any added disappointment, thank you very much.

oh, i tried the link - that guy acts like an amway salesman.

 

A Church for people who hate Church.

http://potw.news.yahoo.com/s/potw/20253/jesus-laughed;_ylt=AsN_ZowDQz5z313DWL0HM0YKwId4

 

that actually looked non-amway-salesmanish. i couldn't help but laugh. looks like they're having a lot of fun.

 

Just have faith in yourself.

 

Disorder just curious how do you believe the world came about. And what exsisted before matter. In a universe exsisting of space and stars minerals elements blackholes and life. Where did it come from where did it start?

 

No one can answer that question and prove their answer.

Christians believe in god because they are afraid to die and can't think for themselves.

I pratice self worship and free will. I guess I am a Satanist according to the christfucks.

The christfucks will say the word, "freewill" and it is such irony coming such ignorant people. Freewill means you can chose. According to 'god' if you chose not to accept him, you must be against him and therefore won't be allowed in 'heaven'.

 

I've already writen about this in a really epic post when I first came back to the board, it was some musings/rantings about life, politics, religions and origins etc.

Basically, in a nutshell, I believe that evolution was only half successful and a lot of research points to humans being 'different' genetically from everything else on the planet to the point that its almost as if we were put here, or 'injected' into the life that was on this planet. I believe in alien origins and a there being some great destiny for mankind in space, in a very sci-fi kind of vein.

But the problem is of course, how do you get everyone to start co-operating? How do you unite people who have argued for centuries and have the choice not to co-operate, because of many many differences, including religion? Its a tough call to make.

A prosperous and united mankind that starts expending its resources outwards instead of inwards would be really good. Corruption, evil and greed are the things I don't like.

We sadly have more of the latter in charge right now.

As to the universe and other mysteries, I hope we can understand once we start knowing more about dark matter and black holes and the likes.

 

"No one can answer that question and prove their answer."

No the answer is as obvious as the nose on your face but it freaks a lot of people out they simply are in denial. Am I chatting with you and you with me. Can you prove it? Can you prove you exist? Animals, trees, buildings, roads, automobiles. Do they really exist?

Prove it.

Pretty deep their Dis you see my perspective of the whole religious thing is that there simply has to be a creator there is no other explanation available from a million extremely intelligent philosophers throughout time. Something had to pre-exist. Life was created by a divine being. But take that and break away from traditional religious creeds, traditions and what have you that are of their own making. Understand that the Bible is a great and fascinating story to be read with the mindset of curiosity to learn, open your mind to be enlightened and come up with your own perception.

And there is absolutely no reason I can think of that extra terrestrial beings cannot be a part of the whole big picture. The bible teaches in parable for instance the struggle of walking the narrow path not always being the easiest way but the most rewarding way. Who is to say that path is restricted to being only in this galaxy?

 

There could be a creator (or creators) but don't rule out entirely that there are reactions, chemical or otherwise. What happened on earth at the beginning, which was noxious, dark and stormy with a lot of lightning, most likely helped start life at the bacteria and micro-organism level which led onto the scientific/Darwin theories, of fish growing legs and then moving up, etc etc

The Earth is the perfect distance from the sun to recieve both warmth and light, beneficial to growth in all living things. (the warmth especially useful to us mammals who do not retain enough body heat due to lack of fur)

There is something wrong becuause of what we are, compared to the rest of nature and animals. We are not in balance and we destroy or eat everything. We arn't supposed to be here, I am certain of it.
But we are the only beings which use tools to create even more advanced tools and after all this time on the planet we have evolved at a staggering rate.

Our closest living relative is the monkey (or ape or whatever) They have been known to use tools, like sharp rocks for simple tasks, opening foods and such. But, its like as if something/somebody has come along, taken the monkey as a template, because it is the most similar in genetics, it is bipedal, intelligent and social, and then injected an even higher intelligence into the coding creating the first humans.

Part of the reason I feel so strongly about this is, becasue of UFO's and alien studies in general.. Why is this the biggest secret? Why are they hiding everything about these visitors?
The spectacle of aliens and UFO's have been around with us for a few millenia. Was the star of bethlehem a star? Then why did it appear to move? Or was it just really early (uninformed) sightings of a shooting star. Who knows really, but it seems to be the ultimate taboo. Who can really discern the truth from this blanket of lies.

I think we are being bred for war, the whole new world order thing isnt just about money, its about making us into cloned, warrior drone slaves. Money is just a leverage device.

I think we are a warrior, or bodyguard race to another more intelligent race. Created specifically for the purpose.

Either way, something big is unfolding.

 

I'm with ya only a few ever so important degrees of seperation.

We should have never ate that damn apple.

It's scary when mankind creats such as this:

http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x157l2_bugatti-veyron-at-top-speed

 

Top Gear = Top Show


Oh yeah don't worry about dangerous cars. We have killer robots now.

Google SWORD robot

http://www.defenselink.mil/transformation/articles/2004-12/ta120604c.html

http://www.technovelgy.com/ct/Science-Fiction-News.asp?NewsNum=320



Terminator here we come!

 

i think i'm tired of trying to figure it all out. nothing makes sense, nothing seems right ... maybe when it's over, it's just over. of course that doesn't explain the ghost in my office that said 'anna lee is here' last week. that was interesting. but still, i find more peace in relinquishing the thought that there is 'something' than i do holding on to it and trying to learn more about it.

 

That's actually one of the tenents of faith of Satanism.

Never worked.

Never has, never will.

 

well, aren't you a ray of sunshine tonight?

edit: and besides, how can having faith in yourself be a challenge of faith (satan)? damn, if your god doesn't want you to have faith in yourself, that's crazy. he did, afterall create you in his image. i could go on more about this and probably more eloquently except that the trazadone is lulling me to sleep.

 

It's only post industrial revolution humans who are a problem. Before that we lived in harmony with the planet for thousands of years.