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LadyEllen -> RE: Should I Poke the Biblethumper? (7/30/2006 1:46:25 AM)
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One should only poke a Bible thumper when nearly done through. Allow 25 minutes per pound, and then poke - if the juices run clear you're OK. (Sorry if someone's beaten me to that - dont have time this morning to check the whole thread)
I dont mind anyone being religious, but having spent 25 years studying different religions, I think I am probably well enough equipped to know that the one I chose is just as valid as the one from another culture that many in our culture assume I should choose or should have chosen.
Its a curious thing christianity - no one cannot agree with, even love Jesus for what he is reported to have said and done in the gospels (even if we know that much of whats there is lifted from other earlier sources, and that the "surviving" gospels dont include everything attributed to him). The problem is all the other stuff - the OT and the stuff in the NT that follows the gospels - that is used as the basis for churchianity - a form a fascism specifically designed to keep populations under control rather than bring them closer to God, and also to ensure a healthy crop of bible-thumpers in every generation to perpetrate and continue that control, as well as preferably to expand it.
Not many people realise that the bible was not written that way from the start, and that originally there were many diverse sects of christianity, each with their own gospels. The bible as it is, was formulated specifically to "prove" the veracity of a single one of these sects and thence to destroy all others by threat of, or actual violence. Its only in more recent centuries that some texts and viewpoints of these other sects have been discovered - to us, they dont seem that heretical, but I guess back then, as now for these bible enthusiasts, anything divergent from the "truth" was evil, thus justifying the breach of several commandments and every teaching of Jesus to overcome them.
The sad thing about religious conflict and these people who try to convert others all the time, is that all true religion in the end is about one thing - that we are all One in God. Thus it comes down to a choice similar to which flavour ice cream would you like? when it comes to religion. Not everyone likes the flavour you love, so why make them eat it - unless of course you can throw away or poison all the other flavours beforehand, because you know whats best for others is your choice and no other? Destroying others' ice cream factories might have been possible in those early days, but today we all have tasted something of their wares and realise that ice cream is just ice cream, whatever flavour we prefer.
My advice, if you like ice cream at all, is to try as many flavours as you can - sooner or later you will find the one for you. Dont let anyone make that choice for you, as in the end we are each personally responsible for ourselves - if you're daft enough to take the flavour offered to you, just because its offered, its you that may suffer indigestion later, not the ice cream seller.
E
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