DO YOU REALLY BELIEVE ANY OF THIS?

The Bible has the following either implied or stated as fact:

Our universe was spoken into existence out of nothing…by a floaty thing  in the sky
Plants were created before the sun was.
The first man was created from dust.
The first woman was made from a rib taken from the first man. (we both have the same number of ribs however)
They are in a garden that has ‘magic’ fruit, to make people live forever and be smart.
There is a talking snake.  (did it have legs I wonder)
Incest was used to jump start the population.
There are Angels…good and bad…and demons.
There are giants and Unicorns.
There are witches, wizards and magicians.
There are bad Angels that rape human women.
Human pregnancy/reproduction is possible with no human father. (just like some of the other gods around the time of Jesus).
People can rise from the grave and walk the streets. (Zombies anyone?)
People live as long as 900+ years.
Dinosaurs and people lived together.
God commits genocide by flooding the earth and only saving 8 humans. (apparently the thought of just starting completely over never occurred to Him)
God makes the Sun stay in the sky so a human battle can be completed.
There is a talking, burning bush somewhere in the mountains of the Sinai desert .
There is a talking donkey.
People (other than Moses) can change wooden staffs into live snakes
A man sees Jesus in a beam of light…and all of Jesus’ thoughts and wishes are downloaded to him. (Hollywood Blvd. anybody?)
There is a man that lives inside a fish for 3 days.
Insects are said to have 4 legs (would a God REALLY be this stupid??)
The cure for leprosy is dove blood sprinkled on the toes (REALLY??)
If you position mating livestock in front of a stripped stick, they will produce stripped offspring.

Today we can actually disprove most of these Biblical assertions/stories.

Do mainline Christians really believe any of this is true?  Or is it just the fundamentalists wackos among us.

Republican Right Wing Religionists At It Again

Some really strange and evil thinking going on in Washington these days…and it’s all coming from Republican legislators

From Psychology Today by Dave Noise, March 13, 2011

“E Pluribus Unum has never been considered controversial. The motto, which is Latin for “out of many, one,” was adopted by the Founding Fathers in 1782 as part of the Great Seal of the United States, intended to represent the federal nature of the nation – out of many states, one country. The framers sharply disputed many issues in the formation of the nation, but E Pluribus Unum was not one of them.”

I admit I’ve never thought about the motto, I understand it and believe it fits our country perfectly, but I’d never much thought of it.

“Not so fast. The Religious Right, led by Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minnesota) and the Congressional Prayer Caucus (yes, our government actually has a Congressional Prayer Caucus), wants you to know that E Pluribus Unum is, well, almost un-American.” My emphasis.

“The CPC, a leading voice of religious conservatism on Capitol Hill, recently wrote a letter to President Barack Obama, chastising him for referring to the motto E Pluribus Unum. The letter may very well reflect a new milestone in the culture wars, for never before has E Pluribus Unum been portrayed as controversial. But according to the CPC, Obama’s reference to E Pluribus Unum amounts to an anti-God statement. See the letter here.”

So let me get this straight…the president mentioning the US motto E Pluribus Unum is somehow sacrilegious or blasphemy???  And to top all that they want the president to issue a corrected version

 “With all the credibility of public figures who believe the world is only six thousand years old, the caucus wants Obama to “issue a correction.” Apparently, referring to the E Pluribus Unum motto is now sacrilege in the Christian right’s America. They also say Obama isn’t mentioning God enough in his speeches and that he shouldn’t refer to “inalienable rights” without mentioning that they come from God.”

So now Republican legislators want to be able to control how the president thinks and presents ideas and policies.  It’s not enough that they have made a practice of opposing every damn thing the man says and tries to do…now they want control of his mind and speech.  They embarrass me and I feel they are destroying what little sanity still remains in political life in America.  They can’t come out and say the man is a N***er…that would be racist, so they publicly attack the man relentlessly (and call him names in small little social circles) and unfairly in any other way they can.  The Republicans are spoiled, child like, evil demons who aren’t getting their way and are having a hissy fit.  They are like our own little group of political terrorists.

I have never been so mad at politicians in my life…

Revolution anyone? ™
.

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No Visible Means of Scientific Support

Quote of the day

“But, Gods, gods, angels, demons, devil, heaven, hell, people formed from dust or ribs, the dead rising, water walking, transformation of water into an alcohol, millions of animal species on a boat, etc., etc., defies mans experience, observations and understanding of natural law. It has no visible means of scientific support.  I am not skeptical about it having occurred; I reject it entirely. I am a person who respects the laws of the natural universe and whose thinking is grounded in reality.
Please don’t call me a religious skeptic.  To quote Katherine Hepburn: “I am an atheist and that’s it.” The atheist Camel Chronicles, Dromedary Hump, BookSurge Publishing, 2009

What can be asserted without proof can be dismissed without proof. – Christopher Hitchens

Demons and Devils and Popes, Bishops and Priests

“All the fathers of the church believed in devils. All the saints won their crowns by overcoming devils. All the popes and cardinals, bishops and priests, believed in devils. Most of their time was occupied in fighting devils. The whole Catholic world, from the lowest layman to the highest priest, believed in devils. They proved the existence of devils by the New Testament. They knew that these devils were citizens of hell. They knew that Satan was their king. They knew that hell was made for the Devil and his angels.”

As late as the middle of the sixteenth century, every infant that was baptized was, by that ceremony, freed from a devil. When the holy water was applied the priest said: “I command thee, thou unclean spirit, in the name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, that thou come out and depart from this infant, whom our Lord Jesus Christ has vouchsafed to call to his holy baptism, to be made a member of his body, and of his holy congregation.” At that time the fathers — the theologians, the commentators — agreed that unbaptized children, including those that were born dead, went to hell.

And these same fathers — theologians and commentators — said: “God is love.”

These babes were pure as Pity’s tears, innocent as their mother’s loving smiles, and yet the makers of our creeds believed and taught that leering, unclean fiends inhabited their dimpled flesh. O, the unscarchable riches of Christianity!

For many centuries the church filled the world with devils — with malicious spirits that caused storm and tempest, disease, accident and death — that filled the night with visions of despair; with prophecies that drove the dreamers mad. These devils assumed a thousand forms — countless disguises in their efforts to capture souls and destroy the church. They deceived sometimes the wisest and the best, made priests forget their vows. They melted virtue’s snow in passion’s fire, and in cunning ways entrapped and smirched the innocent and good. These devils gave witches and wizards their supernatural powers, and told them the secrets of the future.

Millions of men and women were destroyed because they had sold themselves to the Devil.

No man has genius enough to describe the agonies that have been inflicted on innocent men and women because of this absurd belief. How it darkened the mind, hardened the heart, and poisoned life! It made the Universe a madhouse presided over by an insane God.

Think! Why would a merciful God allow his children to be the victims of devils? Why would a decent God allow his worshipers to believe in devils, and by reason of that belief to persecute, torture and burn their fellow-men?

Christians did not ask these questions. They believed the Bible; they had confidence in the words of Christ.

How did your Devil, who was at one time an angel of light, come to sin? There was no other devil to tempt him. He was in perfectly good society — in the company of God — of the Trinity. All of his associates were perfect. How did he fall? He knew that God was infinite, and yet he waged war against him and induced about a third of the angels to volunteer. He knew that he could not succeed; knew that he would be defeated and cast out; knew that he was fighting for failure.

Why did God create those angels, knowing that they would rebel? Why did he deliberately sow the seeds of discord in heaven, knowing that he would cast them into the lake of eternal fire — knowing that for them he would create the eternal prison, whose dungeons would echo forever the sobs and shrieks of endless pain?
Robert Ingersoll late 1800’s

Remember people God never changes and he is a God of love….right….right???

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Is Christianity Doomed?

Christians nowadays are in a very unstable position although they will deny it strongly.  Arguing philosophy and exegesis of the Bible is pretty much a waste of time now.  The thing that is killing religion in our times is science and the unstoppable uncovering of evidence that disproves most of the foundation of all religions. Judaism, Islam and Christianity are all irrevocably tied to the Bible. All that believers in Yahweh, Elohim, Jehovah, or Allah can do nowadays is say they don’t believe the sciences that contradict their theology.

The believers in God have to deny that we can accurately date tens of thousands of artifacts and human bones and artwork and structures that are scattered all over the earth and give live testimony to our civilizations verrry looong past.  The many evidences we have for our past are real and tangible and their provenance can be scientifically proven…and there is so much of it.  The followers of God and Allah sometimes say that it doesn’t matter what evidence there is, God is outside of the evidence and cannot be proven…or disproven.

Perhaps true.  But, what can be proven beyond a doubt, is that certain things that are described in the infallible ‘Word of God’ inspired Bible are not true and not infallible or factual and that a lot of the stories are not to be trusted as actually happening.  Another thing that stands out is the actual explanation of the supposedly unfolding drama is stupid. The most stupid part is that Satan knows he will fail because it’s part of the drama that God set up…preordained from the very beginning if you will.

If you believe the story of Gods plan you have to accept the fact that God actually created this WHOLE drama from the beginning. He created all Evil, Satan, the Demons, He set up the Fall, giving us Original Sin, He was the playwright, the creator of unimaginable human suffering and death. A loving God creates two humans and actually sets them up for failure and then kicks them out of his care and lets these poor people try to survive with nothing…that part of the story is both scary and a not very bright explanation of a Gods actions.  Wake up Christians…A true humane God would not do these things.

Some things to consider:

1.       We know that the flood described in the Bible never happened.

2.        We know that humans and civilizations were spread all over the earth in the time of the deluge and  Tower of Babel.

3.       We know that Neanderthals were walking the earth for tens of thousands of years before a supposed Adam and Eve were created.

4.       We know that Homo sapiens or ‘modern humans’ were walking the earth tens of thousands of years before the Biblical folklore was even thought of.

5.       We know that Moses did not write the Pentateuch.

6.       We know, although fundamentalists deny it, that there are many, many contradictions and falsehoods in the scripture.

7.       We know that the Hebrews conception of ‘God’ changed mightily over the years. They once had a pantheon of gods and worshiped idols at late as 500BCE.

8.       There is no evidence outside the Bible, in other historic documents or the archeological record, for a mass migration from Egypt involving hundreds of thousands of people.

9.       No evidence for Joshua’s knocking down of Jericho’s walls or destruction of Ai and other cities.

10.   Archeologists also have discovered that most of the large Canaanite towns that were supposedly destroyed by invading Israelites were either not destroyed at all or were destroyed by “Sea People”-Philistines, or others.

Just the first 4 things above are enough to prove the Bible false.

Religion is a construct of the human mind…its explanation of creation is a story from a very old tribe
of Sheep/Goat herders, in the language, and with the worldview, of the times it was written in.  The Old and New Testament scriptures are very different views of God, and how he treats and interacts with humans…they are not compatible…and not ‘Gods’ word.

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God is Magic

If you believe in the Christian God, Jesus, and the Bible, ipso facto you believe in magic; you therefore have to believe in Demons, Spirits, Ghosts, Angels, and supernatural stuff.

Have you ever seen any proof for the above mentioned phenomena?  Has anyone you know well…ever seen any evidence for magic, and can they prove it?

Has there ever been any real history of any people using or controlling magic?

Magic is just like UFO’s…lots of talk, but never any real proofs.

I think the Christian God just went away…long ago…or maybe never was.

For latest post go: Here

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Migratory Humans in North America

Very interesting site with a long list of dates and probable happenings up and down the Mexican, California, Oregon, Washington, and British Colombian coast from a Veeerryyy long time ago. Evidences of Man/Women traveling around this part of the planet from more than 20,000 years ago…way more. The Chinese, Japanese, and other Asiatic people were no doubt visiting and settling in North America, long before the white Europeans came to the East coast.  http://www.telusplanet.net/dgarneau/indian2.htm

I don’t think the last story has been written about the many travels and accomplishments of ancient man/women across the time stream of this earth.

The Biblical story of human Genesis purported to be some 6,000 years ago in the Middle East has occupied and limited our vision for way too much time.  It has caused so much doubt of what the scientists have been saying for hundreds of years. We need to listen to them, as they are telling the real story of humanity.

Humans have accomplished so much more than a lot of people think. We have traveled the globe from early on; invented so much, so early on, but religion keeps trying to hold us back, to stop the advances, to saddle us with non-existent magic and supernatural and demons and the sins (?) of our fore-fathers.

Well anyway, check out the site when you have time, it has some really interesting time-lines. When you come across the geological sea level data, think about all the Native American flood myths.

For latest post go: Here

John 3:16 For God So Loved…

John 3:16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”

God gave his Son. Not Himself, but His Son…to our world…well actually to the Middle East.

Now I suppose Jesus would be Holy, after all he was created by God…wait a minute…so were we!

So were the angels and demons and Satan.

So was the Holy Spirit…so was everything.

Are we all Holy? Are we all God; as Jesus is in the trinity?

Do you suppose He created them (Jesus, angels, demons, Satan, Holy Spirit, etc.) all at the same time or separately? If He created them separately, as it seems He would, then it seems that they are separate creations. A result of His magic…not actually “of” Himself, but of His magic…His spoken or imagined words…much as he is said to have created our universe.

Why does He keep killing us? Well actually, except for not interfering with evil (which He directly created), he hasn’t directly killed anyone (that I know of) for about 4,000 years…more or less.

Do you suppose He stopped because Paul told Him to? Bad image and all that…gotta get that “Loving God” thing going.

Boy, this sure gets confusing.

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Angels, Demons, and Satan

“The opposite of the religious fanatic is not the fanatical atheist but the gentle cynic who cares not whether there is a god or not. Eric Hoffer

I have asked some very religious people I know if they believe in demons and angels. 100% of them said they believed, but had not experienced sightings. I have been reading about demons and angels off and on for years; and of course there is all the TV series’ and movies that have explored the subject for years. What really is up here? Just what are demons and angels and how do they affect the ‘Real World.’

Demonic supernatural powers are believed to include fabrication, psychokinesis, levitation, divination, possession, seduction, ESP, telepathy, witchcraft, and curses, as well as binding, making contracts, controlling the classical elements, animal control, and provocation. Demons use variants and combinations of these powers to harass, demoralize, confuse, and disorient the victim, or the willing subject of demonic interest.
Wikipedia, retrieved 3.11.08, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_demonology

The New Testament mentions a number of times in which Jesus drove out demons from diseased persons. There seemed to be lots of demons in the time of Jesus.

• Matthew 7:21-23: Many will drive out demons in Jesus’ name (also Mark 16:17; Luke 10:17; Acts 5:16; 8:7).
• Matthew 8:14-17: Jesus healed many demon-possessed (also Mark 1:29-39; Luke 4:33-41).
• Matthew 8:28-34: Jesus sent a herd of demons from two men into a herd of about two thousand pigs (also Mark 5:1-20; Luke 8:26-39, both referring to only one man).
• Matthew 9:32-34: Jesus made a demon-possessed and mute man speak; the Pharisees said it was by the power of Beelzebub (also Mark 3:20-22).
• Matthew 10:1-8: The Twelve Apostles given the authority to drive out evil spirits (also Mark 3:15; 6:7; 6:13; Luke 9:1; 10:17).
• Matthew 11:16-19: “this generation” said that John the Baptist was possessed by a demon (also Luke 7:31-35).
• Matthew 12:22-32: Jesus healed a demon-possessed blind and dumb man (also Luke 11:14-23; 12:10; Mark 3:20-30).
• Matthew 12:43-45: Jesus told an allegory of nasty spirits coming back home, that is to the human body where they have lived before (also Luke 11:24-26).
• Matthew 15:21-28: Jesus expelled a demon from the body of the daughter of a Canaanite woman (also Mark 7:24-30).
• Matthew 17:14-21: Jesus healed a lunatic by driving out a demon from him (also Mark 9:14-29; Luke 9:37-49).
• Mark 1:21-28: Jesus expelled a nasty spirit from a man (also Luke 4:31-37).
• Mark 9:38-40: A non-Christian is seen driving out demons in Jesus’ name (also Luke 9:49-50).
• Mark 16:9: Jesus had driven seven demons out of Mary Magdalene (also Luke 8:2).
• Luke 7:21: Many people are cleansed from evil spirits by Jesus.
• Luke 13:10-17: Jesus expelled a spirit of disease from the body of a woman on the Sabbath.
• Luke 13:31-32: Jesus continued to cast out demons even though Herod Antipas wanted to kill him.
• Luke 22:3: Satan entered into Judas Iscariot (also John 13:27).
• John 7:20: A “crowd of Jews” that wanted to kill Jesus said he was demon-possessed.
• John 8:48-52: “The Jews” said Jesus was a Samaritan and demon-possessed.
• John 10:20-21: Many Jews said Jesus was raving mad and demon-possessed; others said he was not.
• Acts 5:3: Satan filled the heart of Ananias.
• Acts 5:16: The Apostles healed those tormented by evil spirits.
• Acts 8:6-8: At the teaching of Philip the Evangelist in Samaria, evil spirits came out of many.
• Acts 8:18-19: Simon Magus offered to buy the power of Laying on of hands.
• Acts 10:38: St. Peter said Jesus healed all who were under the power of the devil.
• Acts 16:16-24: Paul and Silas were imprisoned for driving a future-telling spirit out of a slave girl.
• Acts 19:11-12: Handkerchiefs and aprons touched by Paul cured illness and drove out evil spirits.
• Acts 19:13-20: Seven sons of Sceva attempted to drive out evil spirits by saying: “In the name of Jesus, they were unsuccessful and were actually driven from that house by the possessed.
• Revelation 18:2: The Whore of Babylon is a home for demons, evil spirits and unclean birds.”
  Wikipedia 3.11.08 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demon_possession

Regarding Angels: Some secular scholars believe that Judeo-Christianity owes a great debt to Zoroastrianism in regards to the introduction of angelology and demonology, as well as the fallen angel Satan as the ultimate agent of evil, comparing him to the evil spirit Ahriman. As the Iranian Avestan and Vedic traditions and also other branches of Indo-European mythologies show, the notion of demons had existed long before. Wikipedia 3.11.08 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angels

Could this be another example of the church integrating pagan beliefs into their theology, like they did with the Trinity??

A Gallup poll, conducted in 2004 says that belief in angels and demons is on the rise in the United States. In 1994, 72% of Americans said they believed in angels; in 2004 78% indicated belief in angels.
Belief in the devil is rising even faster; increasing from 55% in 1990 to 70% in 2004.
Gallup Poll News Service, May 25, 2004.

Canada and the UK are more skeptical however. A Gallup poll in November of 2004 showed that 56% of Canadians and 36% of Britons believe in angels and 37% of Canadians and 29% of Britons believe in the devil. Gallup Poll News Service, November 16, 2004.

The difference in believing in Angels and Satan is kind of weird. Do people think of them as coming from different realms? It seems to me the logical way to think of this is; if you believe in Angels, you ought to believe in Satan. After all, they supposedly come from the same source. Probably comes from that unique ability humans have of holding two contradictory beliefs and being able to rationalize it.

“We must question the story logic of having an all-knowing all-powerful God, who creates faulty humans, and then blames them for his own mistakes.” – Gene Roddenberry

Do we have any official, recognized sightings of either Angels or demons on record anywhere? Does anyone out there have film or tape of the Devil torturing someone? Does some secret government agency go around investigating sightings of Angels and demons, like Project Bluebook did for UFOs ? Think about it; at one time our government actually considered that flying saucers might be real. They have never even considered Angels or demons. They realized the stupidity of such an endeavor.