christians say jesus died so that their sins may be forgiven.
they liken this to how the jews used to kill lambs after they all touched his head and said their sins, which of course transfered their sins into the lamb.
so the fundamental thing to learn from this particular facet of the mythology is that god is ok with the fact that you sin. this is reassuring and would certainly encourage and confirm membership. i also agree that its ok to slip rarely.
christians: what good is it when born agains say that the most important thing that you need to believe is that jesus died so that you can get away with sinning
i know what your going to say. thats not the main message of christianity. the main message is the golden rule. good. so why do you allow this other myth that completely contradicts the first one. not only do you allow it, you squeeze it and repeat it and suck all the rhetoric you possibly can out of it.
and many people really will say that believing in jesus is the most important thing. they say that it matters at all. i dont get it.
love the golden rule, not something that doesnt even make sense. or explain to me exactly what is the benefit to christianity that believing in god’s mercy brings. why is it so good that it is the focus of the biggest most horrifying image of pain and suffering in all of your churches? why doesnt he smile from a chair instead of grimace from a cross? what good does that bring? guilt?
There was an old crucifix in my local church when I was a child that frightened me every time I had to pass it and in a way it has left a troubling mark on me. I don’t know how wide spread this is in none catholic communities but there is another icon of Christ almost equal in popularity call, ‘The Sacred Heart of Jesus’. In Ireland if you’re a catholic you must have both of these otherwise you’re not keeping the faith. The idea being each shows the key points about Jesus, his suffering and his compassion.
I think Jesus is a great myth and while there is evidence to prove there was a real life Jesus I think folklore has blown the facts about him way out of perspective. The picture of the one we know and love comes mostly from the 4 gospels, which were written about 130 years after the man died by people who had at best third to forth hand knowledge. They were also written by supports of the notion that he was God, and they themselves were most lightly following some derived teaching of Paul. Paul was travelling to and from Hellenistic societies and that influenced how Paul taught the teaching of Jesus. He became a character like you would read about in the old books by Homer; A man, a myth, a legend of epic proportions. But because this story didn’t fit well with the Jewish history, i.e. the only one god belief, they had to come up with the idea of the trinity to fix this plot hole. Most of the work done by the Catholic Church is done to fix plot holes in the original bible (a bit like George Lucas and his start wars trilogy and in his case introduce new ones).
If you want to understand religion you have to remove yourself from it, read some books by Joseph Campbell (the hero’s quest, the masks of god) his books are all very good. Images and words, they’re all just icons trying to portray an idea, something that latches onto your subconscious mind making us want more or gives us hope. Religion at its best is about hope and peace, but the majority of the time it ends up being about war and hate. History proves this point so let’s not dwell on it.
Okay back to the point, all religions see their competition as Paganism. It’s a complete joke to watch those people going around trying to convert others. Why is one group of Pagans better then another? As objectively, everybody is a Pagan! There’s no such thing as one Truth or one Religion, these are just ideas people wished were true. I love watching the zombie masses going to mass every Sunday morning, the look in their eyes as they pray to the heavens. Be it the cross, a wall or an even just a direction it’s all stupidly. Everybody is always asking God for this or that; God do this for me, God do that for me! There worse then little whiney kids no wonder he doesn’t listen.
I can’t wait till we’re free from the shackles of religion! But I won’t see it in my life time. Just look at the Jews and Palestinians two groups of people both holding onto a national identity; they look to the past to valid their future! We spend all our time dividing people into groups when everybody is just the same. It’s sickening to watch as the world turns that more and more people find new reasons to see differences when we should just forget about it move on and see everybody just as an individual. It’s the small mind Pagans that are the trouble. Closed minds about how the world should be, if it’s not in the canon of laws or scripture it’s evil. Its pigheaded ignorance that’s encouraged to a level I just can come to comprehend! ‘Seek and you shall find’, instead of seeking for truth they give at the first hurdle! They take what ever pack of lies they enjoy the sound of most then proclaim it as God’s undivided truth! Haha!
Christianity is a terrible religion, and it is a form of control. It is here, just to keep people in order. Jesus did not teach Christianity… Paul first taught it, and then the Popes & Priests, and then the early Protestants, and then the dimwitted evangelicals. Christianity is SO FAR away from what Jesus originally taught, that is does not resemble who he truly was, as an important figure in history.
And of course, as you said, there are attributes of Paganism that are found in modern Christianity. As for example: Praying to the Saints. It is the same thing as praying to the ‘gods.’ Except for Catholics, the Saints are just ‘gods’ without the capital ‘G’.
Actually, it was Paul who began spreading the belief throughout the known world which would constitute him as the first evangelist. It was Peter who decided to concentrate his power of control by forming a center of iconic materialism, the church. In this sense, it was Peter who created Catholicism, and Paul who spread the word in a fashion to lead to the creation of just about every other denomination.
As for the similarities to paganism, it could be determined that as a cheap ruse, the festivals of Pan, among other rituals or celebrations, were converted to Christianity so that conversion of the masses would be acceptably easier.
Consider for a moment, if you were to convert to a new religion, wouldn’t you be more willing to join with something that shared similar beliefs, and worked with your religious calender…?