Oh,
Snap!
 If
I could snap my fingers and remove all memory
of religion from the face of the Earth, do you
know what would happen?
Day One: No religion.
Day Two: Millions of religions.
The reason for that is simple... people have
an inherent need to 'believe', not just in Jesus
or Mohammed or the Flying Spaghetti monster,
just in something 'else'. It's partly genetic
and partly because science has reached the point
where it's indecipherable to the general public...
you know, the ones who still think Fox News is
news.
Unfortunately, this
need to have the world explained in something
other than peer-reviewed methodologies makes
huge swaths of the population gullible targets
for the types of people
who would happily invent new dogmas as a
means to fleece their new flocks.
But that's just how religion works. Trust me,
Jesus didn't say "I want a massive theocracy
set up in Italy in a huge palace stuffed with
gold where one guy in a dress and a big pointy
hat will talk to my Dad and interpret his message.
Oh, yeah, the guy can also sexually molest
your kids all he wants, so just shut up and fork
'em over."
As I recall, the Big J-man advised
us to just be nice to our neighbors, especially
the poor, and everything would generally work
out for the best. End of story. Unfortunately,
that just made the poor a moral commodity as
most
monies allocated by the altrustic to help the
downtrodden is funneled through, you guessed
it, the Church.
And if you don't have a pot to piss in yourself? Why send cash or checks to the
address at the bottom of the screen, beloved, and Jesus will bring good fortune
to you, Hallelujah!
Ugh.
Because of advances in technology which have
occurred only in the past 50 years we know that
this world,
this universe, wasn't made in seven days
by some
grumpy,
avuncular
white
guy sitting in the clouds deciding if you should
burn in lakes of fire for
all eternity for wearing two types of cloth or
eating the wrong hors 'd'oeuvre on the wrong
day of the week. We can actually see, with the
aid
of advanced imaging
techiniques,
that
it's
still
under construction,
and being torn asunder, by physical
forces that science is trying desperately to
understand.
Look at it this way.... going by the empirical
data your chances of going to Mars, though miniscule,
are infinitely greater than that of your going
to
Heaven. I know which line I prefer to be standing
in.
-------
I Can't HEAR You!
Does
Raging Pencils ever give you pause for thought?
Do the cartoons or the Rants make you want to
kick the dog or send me
flowers?
Do you
ever wish you could share a thoughtful rebuttal
about the subject matter I mangle three times
a week?
I've occasionally considered adding a comment
widget to this web site but then I remember the
sage wisdom of Dallas Cowboys coach Tom Landry,
who used to say... "There
are three things that can happen when you pass
a
football,
and two of them are
bad."
I feel the same way about comments on a
site like this. They'll either be praise
(that I honestly feel awkward about), unrelieved
trollery
or, worst of all, sincere opinion.
(Baddum-shhh!)
To be honest, adding a modern comment tool to the architecture of this site is
outside
of my
current technical capabilities, but I'll be delighted to showcase any emails
you send my way which advance the discussion. Heck, I'll even let you say things
about
my
mother
if you're creative enough.
So go for it. Release those inner tensions. Just be sure to spell it correctly
or else the Grammar Nazis will getcha.
PS, Thanks, Bob.
=lefty=
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