The Hayseed & the Hasid (or why organized religion can suck)
Muttley
Spirit, Zeus, whatever you call him or her is shaking his or her head
at the idiocy on this planet. All these automatons programmed to
think "my way's better than yours...neener neener" have been at each
others' throats for several millenia...Crusades, Inquisitions, witch
burnings, jihads, ethnic cleansing and genocide all in the name of
"God". Even today from the Balkans to the Middle East, the Caucasus
to Kashmir, and between Mount Bethel and Temple Kol Emeth in East
Cobb, sheer lunacy rules.
This local issue really takes the cake though. Jews & Christians are
the DOS & Windows of religions yet they're still suffering from BSOD's
all the time. With so much commonality what's the problem? You've
got one man who believes in the Old Testament and Jesus as the Messiah
refusing to let another man who believes in the Old Testament and
Jesus as a great teacher speak, sermonize, whatever, from the sanctity
of the consecrated pulpit.
<gratuitous Homer mode>
"Mmmm, consecrated pulpit..."
<\Homer mode>
"Dishonoring Christ?" What a load of tripe! Sure he has every right
to refuse the rabbi just as I have every right to call the bumpkin an
idiot (as many United Methodists have). Pulpit, lectern, address,
sermon what's the damn difference? Are Jew Cooties going to infect
the glorious, consecrated pulpit thereafter? It probably took Peter,
Paul & Mary (the Saints) to hold back Jesus (former Jew, current
deity) from sending a bolt of lightning into that precious pulpit. "I
am the Light of the world, and I consecrate and incinerate you sucka!"
Hasn't anyone ever heard a baccalaureate address? Fer chrissakes
they're far closer to a Tony Robbins speech than a seder. Is there
some fear of the rabbi attempting a mass conversion and circumcising
them on the altar? I can see all these Walton kids coming out with
the funny hats and little curls. Oy vey.
As a pseudo-lapsed Catholic I don't get all the hubbub. Though I had
12 years of Catholic education that I treasure...mostly for the
discipline and the emphasis on spelling...I don't agree with many
arbitrary aspects of organized religion, be it Catholicism,
Protestantism, Judaism, etc. I don't think God really cares if I'm
not there every Sunday, ate meat on Friday in Lent, or even if I
worshipped in a different way. IMO there's more than one way to
Salvation, Nirvana, or Heaven. I just don't believe that remote tribe
#1 is saved while remote tribe #2 is damned because the "chosen"
denomination missionaries only made one stop (the Jews don't get to
skate by here either...their "God's chosen people" moniker is a bunch
of crap also). As long as you are a generally good person who helps
others more than harming them I don't see why you shouldn't be
rewarded in the end. A blanket banishment for not performing a
certain laundry list of insignificant duties or for those not being
born (again) into the correct culture seems rather petty and not at
all how I envision the divine to be.
Muttley
Willie B
"Muttley" <mut...@dastardly.duo> wrote in message
news:t2gget4fdtcikm78r...@4ax.com...
> I can't help but think that God, Jesus, Yahweh, Allah, Ra, the Great
> Spirit, Zeus, whatever you call him or her is shaking his or her head
> at the idiocy on this planet. All these automatons programmed to
> think "my way's better than yours...neener neener" have been at each
> others' throats for several millenia...
Well said!
Willie
Andy Walton
<mut...@dastardly.duo> wrote:
:I can't help but think that God, Jesus, Yahweh, Allah, Ra, the Great
:Spirit, Zeus, whatever you call him or her is shaking his or her head
:at the idiocy on this planet.
If an omnipotent supreme being is surprised and dismayed by the behavior
of his creations in a universe of his making, I don't want to hire Him as
an architect or engineer.
:Even today from the Balkans to the Middle East, the Caucasus
:to Kashmir, and between Mount Bethel and Temple Kol Emeth in East
:Cobb, sheer lunacy rules.
How may people have been murdered, raped, tortured, and driven from their
homes in East Cobb? Let's try to be a little less hysterical, please. It's
not a holy war. It's a fundamental difference of philosophy, hashed out in
the public eye. These disagreements are not only healthy but essential in
a democratic society that takes pride in its freedom of speech and belief.
Not every disagreement is a war, and not every controversy is a crisis.
:This local issue really takes the cake though. Jews & Christians are
:the DOS & Windows of religions yet they're still suffering from BSOD's
:all the time. With so much commonality what's the problem?
You come up with the Microsoft analogy, yet you can't see the obvious
answer? When has Microsoft ever issued a new release that didn't have
compatibility issues with the last version? There are, of course, serious
conflicts between Judaism -4000, Christianity 0, and Islam 900.
PeoplesTemple 1978, AumShinrikyo 1994, and HeavensGate 1996 were not
compatible with anything, failed to launch new product lines, and fell out
of the product line pretty quickly.
--
"We are born in an age when only the dull are treated seriously, and I
live in terror of not being misunderstood." -- Oscar Wilde
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Andy Walton * att...@mindspring.com * http://atticus.home.mindspring.com/