April Fools...
My friends, in the spirit of April Fools Day, that special time each year when the proverbial wool is pulled over your eyes and SURPRISE!! You're the butt of the joke...
well, no one pulls more wool over people's eyes and punks them better than the church and its friend religion. So I dedicate this blog..ode the church.
You know, there is nothing like the experience of abandoning the rigid confines of your belief system. I am beginning to accept that it will take a lifetime for me to detox from what has been drilled into me since the day I was born. As I write this, I am still going through changes in my belief system. As for me, I am beginning to welcome the gospel of "I don't know".
Such a scary place, isn't it?
I mean, religion is all about certainty. 100% certainty. You can't doubt it-even for a sliver of a second. ...And if you do doubt it has to make what you already believe even stronger. But who really knows what happens after you die? Really?
Look, I can take the theory about the heaven/hell afterlife. I mean, this world sucks so bad, life is so unfair, who WOULDN"T want a better place to go to after they die? The t-shirt just can't be right....let's hope not.
It's bad enough allowing yourself to question everything you have been told. Much of it is stuff you believe on a subconscious level, so it feels like you are unraveling the deepest fibers of your being. You feel like the mummies in one of those old cartoons-you know, the ones who peel off everything only to find nothing underneath. Religion is the foundation of the family, our culture, our moral boundaries. It is frightening to even CONSIDER questioning the bible or whether the story about Jesus is real. Most of us were taught that if we didn't swallow it all whole we were on our way to hell with gasoline undies.
The fear of God sending me to hell was a big motivator over the years. I remember being six years old and lying in bed, afraid of "dying before I wake" because the Lord might not take my soul. I don't know about you, but the idea of burning in tortured agony while being sodomized by big burly demons was too much to bear for me.
And ironically, this God of love that was always being preached about seemed anxious to send me there. At the very least his hands were tied on a technicality [in the case I dell short of heaven's requirements] But I guess that type of behavior is to be expected from a God who is extrememly jealous, petty, narcissitic, controlling, who needs to be both constantly worshipped and who demands all of my money, time, and everything else that makes me happy.
And what adds salt to the wound is that no one cheers you on as you begin your quest for free-thinking individuality. They literally abandon you and go on as if you never existed. I can tell you stories about this topic. My landlord slash best friend slash roommate threw me out on the street once I told her i was leaving the church. You see, I still wrestle with the coldheartedness of people who consider themselves religious. People who claim to know this all-loving God are the most unloving of all. And I know I am not an isolated case. But it amazes me even now that you could climb mount everst together, deliver someone's baby, and then turn right around and discard them like yesterday's mail. This supposedly is God's will. If you're not on his team, then f$^*& you!
really God? Maybe it's me, but it seems like a contradiction.
It is terrifying that politicians openly profess their fundamentalist-and ridiculous-religious beliefs. I never realized how much conservative christianity was involved in our nation's politics! But, it's hard enough breaking free from it all, isn't it? What people don't realize is how deep religion is embedded with our culture, with our individual thinking and with our decisions.
Religious people have a special weirdness about them. Quick story: I contacted a woman on facebook that I used to be close with in the church. I loved this girl. I took a few years to get back in touch, because I needed to detox from that whole world. I also needed to seperate myself from church to find out who I really was friends with and who I wasn't. The church tells you who are your brothers & sisters in christ and there is no orgaic process of getting to know someone. You had to accept everyone whether or not you liked them.
When she heard from me, her response was excited. She missed me, she wrote. Where are you?...but then, then...she started playing games. It turned out she was still in the church and thought it was "cute" to send me everyone on the church roster-including the cult leaders-so they could "friend" me. I let her know that I just wanted to reconnect with her and gave her my number. I also asked for hers-several times. She kept dodging the question and continued sending me "church friends" saying that was what I asked her to do.
Well, I had to defriend her, folks. Her actions showed that she held no interest in genuine friendship apart from church-and it's too bad.
Being in that churchy world makes you weird-and socially illiterate. It's as if God gives you special permission to be an asshole. You live in this bubble, even though you are involved in work, school, and other things that on the outside seem normal. Yes, for those of us who have journeyed out, it will be a lifelong process to decontaminate our souls, our minds and our hearts from the claws of religion.
well, no one pulls more wool over people's eyes and punks them better than the church and its friend religion. So I dedicate this blog..ode the church.
You know, there is nothing like the experience of abandoning the rigid confines of your belief system. I am beginning to accept that it will take a lifetime for me to detox from what has been drilled into me since the day I was born. As I write this, I am still going through changes in my belief system. As for me, I am beginning to welcome the gospel of "I don't know".
Such a scary place, isn't it?
I mean, religion is all about certainty. 100% certainty. You can't doubt it-even for a sliver of a second. ...And if you do doubt it has to make what you already believe even stronger. But who really knows what happens after you die? Really?
Look, I can take the theory about the heaven/hell afterlife. I mean, this world sucks so bad, life is so unfair, who WOULDN"T want a better place to go to after they die? The t-shirt just can't be right....let's hope not.
It's bad enough allowing yourself to question everything you have been told. Much of it is stuff you believe on a subconscious level, so it feels like you are unraveling the deepest fibers of your being. You feel like the mummies in one of those old cartoons-you know, the ones who peel off everything only to find nothing underneath. Religion is the foundation of the family, our culture, our moral boundaries. It is frightening to even CONSIDER questioning the bible or whether the story about Jesus is real. Most of us were taught that if we didn't swallow it all whole we were on our way to hell with gasoline undies.
The fear of God sending me to hell was a big motivator over the years. I remember being six years old and lying in bed, afraid of "dying before I wake" because the Lord might not take my soul. I don't know about you, but the idea of burning in tortured agony while being sodomized by big burly demons was too much to bear for me.
And ironically, this God of love that was always being preached about seemed anxious to send me there. At the very least his hands were tied on a technicality [in the case I dell short of heaven's requirements] But I guess that type of behavior is to be expected from a God who is extrememly jealous, petty, narcissitic, controlling, who needs to be both constantly worshipped and who demands all of my money, time, and everything else that makes me happy.
And what adds salt to the wound is that no one cheers you on as you begin your quest for free-thinking individuality. They literally abandon you and go on as if you never existed. I can tell you stories about this topic. My landlord slash best friend slash roommate threw me out on the street once I told her i was leaving the church. You see, I still wrestle with the coldheartedness of people who consider themselves religious. People who claim to know this all-loving God are the most unloving of all. And I know I am not an isolated case. But it amazes me even now that you could climb mount everst together, deliver someone's baby, and then turn right around and discard them like yesterday's mail. This supposedly is God's will. If you're not on his team, then f$^*& you!
really God? Maybe it's me, but it seems like a contradiction.
It is terrifying that politicians openly profess their fundamentalist-and ridiculous-religious beliefs. I never realized how much conservative christianity was involved in our nation's politics! But, it's hard enough breaking free from it all, isn't it? What people don't realize is how deep religion is embedded with our culture, with our individual thinking and with our decisions.
Religious people have a special weirdness about them. Quick story: I contacted a woman on facebook that I used to be close with in the church. I loved this girl. I took a few years to get back in touch, because I needed to detox from that whole world. I also needed to seperate myself from church to find out who I really was friends with and who I wasn't. The church tells you who are your brothers & sisters in christ and there is no orgaic process of getting to know someone. You had to accept everyone whether or not you liked them.
When she heard from me, her response was excited. She missed me, she wrote. Where are you?...but then, then...she started playing games. It turned out she was still in the church and thought it was "cute" to send me everyone on the church roster-including the cult leaders-so they could "friend" me. I let her know that I just wanted to reconnect with her and gave her my number. I also asked for hers-several times. She kept dodging the question and continued sending me "church friends" saying that was what I asked her to do.
Well, I had to defriend her, folks. Her actions showed that she held no interest in genuine friendship apart from church-and it's too bad.
Being in that churchy world makes you weird-and socially illiterate. It's as if God gives you special permission to be an asshole. You live in this bubble, even though you are involved in work, school, and other things that on the outside seem normal. Yes, for those of us who have journeyed out, it will be a lifelong process to decontaminate our souls, our minds and our hearts from the claws of religion.
Comments
Post a Comment