Monday, August 14, 2006

I don't know

I don’t know how you write on a regular basis, without getting pompous and in love with your own words.

Lets try to swallow it whole. Noah, who built an ark, and got a pair of every animal in the world on it. As reasonable people, we are not going to buy that. Take the main premise of the new testament, jesus is the son of god, a human not like any other human. Sorry, not going to buy that. Not accepting either of those stories, that would pretty much rule out a bible written by god.

There are a lot of true things in Christianity. Unfortunately it is not the main beliefs.

The main story, an entirely righteous man is put to death by a government and crowd of people. Right there you have a very profound idea. A man so pure that he offends the status quo not just a little, but put to death by cruel torture. A man who says blessed are the meek is put to death by the strong.

The life of jesus is a testament of testing and faith. He is true to his ideals. He tells peter to put away the sword. He says to turn the other cheek, to render unto Caesar. He erupts at the commercialization of the faith. This is a man of principle, someone who has found his own understanding. Likely he has been misquoted. Chances are near 100%. Assume he was a human like you, and give up trying to hold on to a single all too convenient answer to everything. Reclaim the initiative. You neither need to be saved, nor could you by someone else. There is no logical mechanism between believing jesus was sent here by your god and that belief itself being your salvation from eternal torture. That’s just silly.

Through the years the clergy and priesthood have contemplated jesus life and found many good teachings and woven them into Christianity. Compassion for all, whether poor, sick, hungry, Everyone has value. If you do it to the least of these, you do it to me. Love and responsibility, the temptations of life should be examined. The structure of society should protect the poor, the leaders should bow to a higher power. Western civilization can count its strength related to its partnership with the church. The church has usually had more of a direct impact on the citizens than the government. It’s the church more than government that has civilized and founded customs.

Society needs a re-newed institution. Salvation is not dependent on believing that truth happened back when over there. This is getting to be too heavy to carry. Truth is not local and its not an event in time. Its right now, right here. Relax. Its at hand.