Faith and Ignorance

Peace.

This morning on my commute to work, I got into a religious conversation with this dude I carpool with. He knows I'm a 5%er and I know he is a minister. (No the kind that has a church, but the kind that serves under another) He and I have found an easy comfort with tolerance for each others lifestyles. He is impressed with the amount of Bible and my 1 of Christianity. I have always maintained that when I was savage, I was a very knowledgeable savage. I try not to let the conversation go too far in either direction. Well this morning it did.

When I was a Christian, I attended church like crazy, but I also attended Christian and Catholic schools. Anyone who has ever attended either KNOWS the the primary goals of said institutions is to turn out good Christians. There was intense indoctrination... I mean classes regarding the tenets of faith. I have often wondered how could any one be a good Christian without all the intense focus.

I had a Religion teacher in the 10th grade, Fr Bradley, who told me it was ok for me to have doubts. He said those doubts would lead me to do my own research and that would always bring me back to God. He was right. Teehee. See? Devils can speak the truth. I had another teacher confirm that sin is anything that goes against your conscience. Can you imagine how freeing those particular bits of advice were? It has always allowed me the freedom to not be afraid to explore and experiment.

Anywho... Me and the friend got to talking about the virgin birth and the resurrection. And I told him that I never bought into those two beliefs. To me they seemed like a ploy to make the Christian God look better than any of the other Gods that were being worshiped at the time. I was more impressed that Jesus took an ass-whipping for folks he didn't know, who might have not been born yet all while being the Son of god. He could, theoretically, at anytime gotten up and bounced. I wish folks would read their Bibles with some objectivity they would see that Jesus never came to bring salvation to the gentiles. He came to reform the Jews. He didn't care one way or the other whether gentiles caught his words. Yeah, he shared social equality with them, but who exclusively builds within their own group?

Jews have never disputed the existence of "other" gods. They just claim that their god is the best. The early Christian movement was not about converting the gentiles to Christianity. Christianity is not even a term they used. The disciples that walked with our righteous brother in the physical, had no intention of starting a NEW religion. There was nothing wrong with there old one. In fact there were insisting that gentiles who wanted to get on board covert to Judaism. It was Paul who argued against that rule. Paul knew that grown gentile men would have a problem with being circumcised... and they should. Paul and Peter actually argued about this. And Peter won... briefly. Peter was left in charge of the official movement (making him the 1st pope) until he was martyred. This didn't stop Paul. He started his own churches (epistles). And eventually these gentiles out numbered the Jews and BOOM you have Christianity.

My carpooler could not dispute any of this. I was pulling out scripture out of my ass. It kind of felt good to show and prove this with his own Bible. He countered me with something I could not fight..... Faith. The substance of things hoped for the evidence of things not seen. Faith trumps proof every time. Because faith doesn't need anything for it to be real for the people that have it. He said that he doesn't allow himself to believe anything that goes against what he has already set in his mind. He said I allowed outside things to interfere with my faith and that's why I lost it. He prays for me daily. I had nothing.

I had nothing because there was nothing to be said. This is a grown assed 50 something year old man, that would probably kick my ass rather than to look at his Bible in a critical way. Yes, I showed him in his own Bible where I based my information on, but he was unwilling to accept it. And why? Because he believes that faith is it's own reward. WOW... this is why Christianity is the big money maker it is now a days. It's sells NOTHING to the masses and in turn the masses reward it with 10% sometimes more of their salary.

I suppose I shall wait to see if we will still carpool. I must say I am disappointed. Disappointed because nothing this grown man will ever say to me will hold any water since I bear witness that he needs no proof to lay his life down for something. I would be a 10%er if I used that to my advantage.



Peace