Matthew Carpenter wrote: > > You may think, but there are certainly those who "am" and don't. We are > by default are like sheep. It takes concerted effort to turn that > gray-matter into a thinking machine, and unfortunately there are not many > in this age which will do so.
Unfortunately, the current reigning religion in this part of the world has always been numbered with those who prefer not have the common man think. Don't think. Just believe what the shaman, priest, televanglist says is in the book and paradise is yours. Never mind injustice. The bad guys will get theirs in the next world, so just go along with the political corruption, greed, environmental destruction and whatever is necessary to make the payments on the SUV. In the Middle Ages we had the "Great Chain of Being." So what if the local noble had raped your daughter on her wedding night and driven off the village herd to pay for a celebration when his son became of age to join the family firm of Robber Baron and Son, Ltd. If you were a serf God had put you on the bottom of the chain just as he had placed the baron on the top. To question your place was to question God. To demand justice was presumption to take into man's hands that which was God's. Later, we had John Calvin, who preached "never mind what Christ said about the rich not getting into paradise." The real truth is that God already knows who will be saved and who will not. Therefore it is only logical to believe that God pours his blessings on those predestined few and the mark of God's favor was riches. A real double banger. No thought required and God's blessings on riches swindled from the undestined. That mindless theology of greed still survives today in the heresy of the Protestant Work Ethic. Along with Creationism, which is an attack on all sciences that dare to claim that the universe was created before 4004 BC Aug. 4th at 10:04 am. Couple this with the current efforts by right wing non-christian fundamentalists to stifle stem cell research. So what if a cure for cancer can be found or new organ produced. The pain, suffering and death is acceptable as long as fundamentalist religious beliefs aren't questioned. Then there is the Church's objection to in vitro fertilization because somehow the soul can only be fused with the embryo in a womb not in glass ware. Then let us not forget the Holocaust. At the time, Christianity claimed that the Jews were an accursed race because they had killed Christ. Funny I always thought it was Romans (Italians). But the Pope was Italian so it must have that the entire population of Judah dropped into Jerusalem to demand Christ's death from the innocent Romans. Therefore it was ok to murder a few million decedents on the theory the sons bear the guilt of the fathers. That by the way is called a Bill of Attainer and is outlawed by the U.S. Constitution. A case where man appears to be more just than the God he prays to. _______________________________________________ Linux-users mailing list - http://linux-sxs.org/mailman/listinfo/linux-users Subscribe/Unsubscribe info, Archives,and Digests are located at the above URL.
