Flying Zombies
The man Jesus purportedly died and came back to life. It was also said that he ascended into the sky a few weeks later. Ergo, a flying zombie.
I used to believe in flying zombies. Many of my friends and family still do. What is it about religion that causes otherwise reasonable people to suspend that critical faculty when it comes to religious mythology?
Literal Mythology
These themes occur in every religion around the world. Holy traditions are littered with stories of virgins giving birth, flying entities, risings from the dead, and magical creation stories. To assume any one of these is unique to a single religion (I’m looking at you, Christians), or that centuries of earlier myths somehow point towards a single religion (you know who you are), is the adult equivalent of the child who plugs his ears yelling, “I can’t hear you!”
Why is it that religions so easily accept supernatural stories originating in their own belief system, while declaring all others ludicrous? Faith, says the preacher.
Filling our Cups with Faith
The answer always seems to come down to one of faith. To believe the extraordinary without any evidence. In today’s world, such acceptance of hearsay is largely laughed at – granted it was written after 100 CE or so, or doesn’t involve an image of Mary on a pancake. Besides the writers for the Enquirer, who today would actually accept the story from a 12 year old pregnant girl that she was impregnated by a ghost and has never had sex? If I swear on my life that I have just heard words of wisdom from the lips of a talking donkey, who is going to believe me?
Yet when such a story originates in the context of the religion of choice, that bullshit meter is suddenly turned off. The masses seem ready to believe anything, and all the more so when they congregate together and are moved by the spirit.
But where does the acceptance of miraculous tales end? If the pastor tells me to keep an open mind and accept all such stories by faith, how can I then say that all tales in my particular belief system are real, while your crazy beliefs are not? Why is it so hard for religious people to scrutinize their own beliefs with the same damning eye they give to all others?
Having spent most of my life as a fundamentalist Christian, I still have trouble answering those questions. There really isn’t any reason to it. You assume that there is a god directing your beliefs and that he wouldn’t lie to you. You assume the pastor and your parents wouldn’t lie to you, and your inner circle of comfort is confirmed because we all share the same beliefs that separate us from the *ahem* worldly.
We seldomly attended any biblically-acclaimed miracle with critical analyzation. While we wholeheartedly accepted the myths, we were taught never to question such holy occurances that laid within the foundation of our beliefs. No one in their right mind would question such truths. In all my years of believing, I never acknowledged logic or thinking contradictory to the bible. But any time there was something in science that we saw as offering proof of biblical stories, we latched right on.
Without giving a shred of thought to other religious claims, we labeled them false and expected others to at least give us the decency of listening to our myths.
At One with a Feeling
I guess the determining factor for me, and many other Christians, was that I felt the truth at the very core of my being. I knew in my heart of hearts that I was talking to a living god. The pure conviction in my heart along with the acceptance by the others in my religion was all the proof I needed.
This inner circle of acceptance and the delusion of a one-on-one connection with a deity gives the mirage of authority to the holder of any belief. But when it comes down to it, that’s all that’s really there. Wishful thinking.
However much we might hope, Mohammed never flew to Jerusalem on a horse, L. Ron Hubbard was always a science fiction author, and a man named Jesus, had he ever lived, is still dead.
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
Where does critical thinking go when an adult that had no religion, finds jesus? I asked my sister why she believes in a god. Her response was, “I have felt the holy spirit, I know he’s real.” Well, I have felt goose bumps and an emotionally charged moment, more than once in my life. But that’s what it was, emotions, simple as that.
[...] guilted into pressing our truth on those less fortunate souls who didn’t believe in flying zombies. If we weren’t out there winning souls, we were doing something wrong and god would spit us [...]
Evangelical Atheism « No Gods Allowed said this on October 23, 2007 at 12:00 am |
Man so your an atheist I get it! If I grew up with some of the crap you grew up with I probably would have been an atheist as well. Like that BS creationist theory about the golden dome …
But why do you go out of your way to disclaim religion! You have absolutely no bases to make your claims on except that “I come from a religious family”.
Ah shame, poor thing!
Frankly I think your a bloody idiot but I can’t make up my mind whether to blame you or blame your father for raising a son that believes in science above all things else but yet can’t approach the subject of religion and faith from a scientists point of view. And because I know, as is evident from most of your posts, that you do not know the basics of being a scientist I’ll take it onto myself to tell you … simply put it is to experiment and make experiment of EVERYTHING!!
I’m a scientist better yet a mathematician and I have made it my mission in life to find the Truth. I have put myself out there beyond the unknown willing to learn more and experience whatever life had to offer.
I know a couple of atheists very intelligent men all of them either studied physics or mathematics (and even they will have a gag at your childish and completely baseless blog).
They have gone as far as to say that “We’ve looked for God but found Him to be nowhere.” What total and utter BS! To those atheists out there I want to say that you haven’t even scratched the surface of that search!
If you don’t believe in God and thus not in the devil then you have absolutely nothing to fear about. So why don’t YOU put yourselves out there like good scientists and EXPERIMENT!!
If you could not find God then go search for the devil! Only then will I tell you that, “Indeed you’ve exhausted the search!” and thus you can believe what the hell ever you want to and post the crap away!
For the devil you will find and in the darkness you’ll come to know the Light.
Ps. Sorry for the bad language, I felt it necessary to drive home what I said
[...] Damned Atheists October 23rd, 2007 — Reinhart I happen to stumble on a blog No Gods Allowed << Flying Zombie So this guy actually claims Jesus to be a zombie! Nice one, it follows of course that I am [...]
Those Damned Atheists « My Soul Full Truth said this on October 23, 2007 at 10:36 am |