The Bible

I don't know how else to say this but, I was just thinking the other day while in the bathroom that the Bible is like a comic book.  This idea was based on the cartoon I saw on Facebook once, and that I reposed of course, that trying to prove god with the bible is like trying to prove Superman with a comic book and it's all true!

Comic books depict entertaining (and sometimes not so much) stories about fictional characters that go through different adventures and some of them are series in which if you don't read the previous comic, you won't get the last one.  And the bible, the koran and most other mythical "scriptures" share certain characteristics with comic books, except in the bible comic, humankind is the lowest of the low for "betraying the Creator".  Isn't that sensationalistic and exciting? It sounds very exciting to me!

When God becomes disappointed in his own creation, he casts them out of the garden of Eden and makes them work to survive, it gives the women painful birth-giving and it gives men the burden of a job; I guess the writer didn't like working that much. Later, God gets angry again and wipes out almost every living thing on the land, saving only a handful of them along with two or seven specimens from the rest of the species. And stories like these can be found all over the bible; the Joseph story is quite good too. I must admit some were written with a lot of imagination and good taste; I do appreciate a good book whenever I come across one; except later, it goes on to listing boring genealogies of more fictional characters and sends “down” more prophets and then the stories and commandments contradict one another in some instances and that’s when it gets kind of boring because inconsistencies in a story are of bad taste.  Too many characters, too many stories in an ancient language that is hard on the mind; but then again, I found Harry Potter hard to read too, so I may not be a very good reader after all.

But in the end, if we read the Bible like a comic book, it may sometimes be boring and obnoxious, but if we remove the crappy stories and keep the good ones, the literary content could be great! And what makes the Bible a great peace of literature is the fact that it involves you and me in the story, we are part of it! Too bad that we don’t get to share the powers of the Almighty Yahweh or a character with my name parts the waters of the sea with a stick or brings down a temple with his bare hands or kills a giant with a stone.

I think I’ll start reading the book of the dead from the Egyptians now, I’ve heard it’s got some pretty good stuff too; I hope it’s more entertaining than the boring stories of the bible, but only the boring ones, I’ll keep the good ones  J

How religion works

Jesus: You are sick!!
Me: I feel fine
Jesus: No! You are most definitely sick and in desperate need of medical attention.
Me: But I feel ok, I don't have any simptoms and I've been doing my checkups once every six months as I should. I shower every day, I take vitamins and I exercise one hour a day. I'm ok Jesus, really, I feel fine.
Jesus: No son, you don't understand. You're sick because I'm God and I said you're sick.  I created the universe and everything in it and I don't lie. When I say you're sick it's because you're sick!
Me: Can you prove that I'm sick?
Jesus: How dare you asking questions! You're sick and that's it!! You need medicine right now!
Me: Now that you mention it, sometimes when I get up in the morning, one of my arms is numb. But only the one I was sleeping on top of, the other is fine.
Jesus: See, I told you you were sick. Now you need to do this rite to get well...
Me: Whoa!! Wait a second... You said I need medical attention.
Jesus: No I didn't! I never lie! Don't you ever ask questions or say that I contradict myself ever again!!
Me: Ok, sorry Jesus.
Jesus: Ok, so here's the rite: You will go and tell everybody about what I just told you now and tell everyone that they're all sick.
Me: (thinking: But I'm not sick, he's telling me I'm sick, he just contradicted himself once and I don't see anybody around me who is sick!)
Jesus: Then you will ask for money from everybody...
Me: Whoa!! What makes you think they'll give me money?
Jesus: Trust me, once you tell them they're all sick and that you have the cure to their illness, they'll give you money.  I've done this many times before.
Me: Ok
Jesus: Then you're going to build tall buildings and hire a bunch of prophets...
Me: Prophets!!?? Where am I going to get prophets from?
Jesus: Shut up and listen (translated: Have faith).  These prophets will place their hands on the sick people, because everybody is sick, and the sick people will heal by just believing that I did it!!
Me: One question: What is the name of that sickness people are sick from?
Jesus: It's called sin. It means a transgression of the law I have placed upon you.
Me: Law??!! You keep coming up with the craziest shit man!!
Jesus: HOW DARE YOU!! Shut up before I smite you right where you stand! That kind of language is unacceptable!! You must always agree to everything I say because I am your God.
Me: (Thinking: This guy is insane and violent!)
Jesus: Anyway, going back to my plan...
Me: (Thinking: Plan? Making people think they're sick when they're not, getting their money to build tall buildings and pay prophets to heal a make-believe illness and call this a plan?... This guy is really deluded!!)
Jesus: ... Once you have these buildings built and the prophets hired, you'll call them churches.  And you will place ads using the money the people gave you to attract more people to come in and hear what you have to say...
Me: I got another question: I thought these people were sick and they needed medicine...
Jesus: I'm getting to that, hold on (again, have faith).  Then once you tell all these people to practice the following rite: They will all bow down their heads believing in me and nothing else, then they will think inside their heads and they will speak outloud the following prayer: "Dear heavenly father, please forgive me of my illness and please cleanse me from it. In the name of Jesus, Amen."
Me: So... What happens if I get thousands of people in these buildings and they all give me money? Don't you think I could become corrupted and use that money for whatever I want instead of building more buildings and placing more and more ads?
Jesus: Nah! You'll be so scared of me that you won't dare doing that.
Me: Won't you smite me if I do that?
Jesus: Don't worry about it ok? (... Yes, I know, have faith)
Me: And that's it? Is that going to heal all of us from sin?
Jesus: Yes!! That's it!! You're getting it.
Me: What happens if people doesn't join my church and they don't believe in you?
Jesus: Then they will certainly die the death of the soul.
Me: Soul? That's a new one... What is the soul?
Jesus: It's when they don't believe there is a soul and they die, they die and go to a place of eternal torture...
Me: Isn't that a little harsh? I mean, these people are sick, they need help and to be free from sin, which I have convinced everyone of, no work or participation on your part; even though they're in good health, they have to believe me when I talk about you to follow the laws you have placed arbitrarily and without anyone's conscent or general agreement but yours; plus after doing all this work many will not believe and you will torture them forever? Besides not helping them by providing participation in the making of fair laws, you will cast them off even after the trauma of dying the three-dimensional life?
Jesus: How dare you talk to me like that!! That's how it is because I said so... Period!!
Me: What do I do if they ask for proof or your existence?
Jesus: Just tell them ...
Me: I know, I know, have faith... I'm out...
Jesus: You can't go, I haven't given you permission to go, you'll be breaking my laws and you'll be tortured forever!!
Me: ...That's according to you, according to me, I'll be happy and healthy because so far, you haven't provided a shred of evidence that I'm sick or that anybody's sick. You've been only talking about death, torture, money and buildings!! I don't buy it...

Quite popular!

I've come across too many instances to ignore this "issue" (if you can call it that).
I find it so interesting that people have such a strange concept of the unknown.  "I don't understand why or how things started or happen, so, I'll fill my ignorance with a mythical (biblical, koranic (is that a word?) or the god of your choice) human-created character from old times to make some sense of things."
I fail miserably to see how filling our ignorance with god, zeus, allah, superman, batman or the flying spaghetti monster is going to answer anything or enhance our lives; on the contrary, it only adds to the problem because now we have to understand and explain the existence of such creator.  And due to the creator's complexities, there must be a creator for him/her/it.
If the "creation" is so damn perfect, why do we die from sickness? Why is there sickness or evil in the first place?  I haven't heard a coherent answer to these questions so far from any theist.  They all resort to the good-old "how can I question the will of god?" which doesn't answer anything at all and it does absolutely nothing to enhance our understanding of the world as we know it.
Now it turns out that according to Francis S. Collins (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_Collins) his god of the gaps is so concerned about our species and puny little planet that started the Big Bang and is now orchestrating evolution with complete disregard for the 98% of the other species that did not make it through the evolutionary process, including dinosaurs and of course the famous dodo (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodo).
Again, this conclusion only raises more and more questions that are now part of the mythical field because there is no god to study, investigate, ask questions to or even prove his/her/its existence!
"You can't disprove it", neither can you disprove the orbiting teapot or the existence of the Flying Spaghetti Monster and his Noodly Appendages which created us and is worthy of our worship (being sarcastic here of course!)
"It's a matter of faith", which is another excuse that only deviates the attention from the unanswerable questions about the mythical god who is supposed to be responsible for the creation of the Universe.
When are we going to wake up to reality and understand that there is no god?  I guess the people who survived the death process (yes, death is a process which has many consequences to the brain chemistry, research has found solid explanations to the death process: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/04/100408-near-death-experiences-blood-carbon-dioxide/.  Consider too that only a small percentage of people who's heart has stopped experience a near-death experience) should have some knowledge about the afterlife, but they really never went there because their brain activity didn't cease completely, so to really know what happens after we die cannot be investigated and because of this fact it cannot be accepted as true.
The so-called self-proclaimed "prophets" seem to share some interesting characteristics: Ignorant, from a desolate part of the world and some could even be considered just plain crazy.  Are we so gullible to believe the teachings of a crazy dude in the dessert than a person who has done research for many years?  Now, there are some crazy scientists who still believe the "prophets'" fairy-tales for a reason that is beyond me; but there is hope because this is the exception within the community of scientists and not the rule (http://www.nwcreation.net/atheism.html).
It would be wonderful if we all realized that what we do here and now is the only thing that matters instead of wasting valuable and non-recoverable time praising and singing up to the sky in a senseless effort to reach a non-existing entity.  Those resources and intelligent minds could have been used towards research or creation of new and innovative technologies that will make our lives better and/or would improve our communities, schools and population in general.
Have we realized yet that mega-churches and the organized crime have very little differences?: Make an offer to the community which cannot be refused: "Do as I say or die in hell, but if you listen to me you'll have the greatest riches."  Isn't that the same offering the organized crime is giving our youth?  "If you don't distribute my drugs, I'll kill your family and I'll leave you last, but if you do, I'll make you rich!"  How is that different from "Preach my book to everyone and pay me 10% of all your income plus other generous offerings or stay alive in torture and pain for all eternity, but of course, if you do what I tell you, you'll be super rich in heaven!" Am I the only one here who can see through the "Offer you can't refuse"?
I hope some day we'll have no religion and we'll learn to accept the truth even if we don't like it.  I'd rather take the truth as it is, even if I don't like it (of course, I would love to really know that I'll have 72 beautiful girls in a heaven that is paved with gold and there's no suffering and only harmony and happiness, but what good is that promise if it isn't true and tangible?) instead of imagining that Superman will come here and weed out all the evil and give me happiness for no reward whatsoever.
For the longest time, I tried to make sense of the teachings of the Bible (why is that in capital letters? Just throwing a question up in the air) but I couldn't.  It just doesn't make any sense that the wrathful father would have a merciful son that was never born a spirit nor it was created by the father, but just "was" just like the father and the holy ghost and that all these characters are not three, but one and that there's organizations and philosophers still trying to make any sense of this debacle.  But it doesn't stop there, these three-to-one gods (wait, I thought Christianity was a monotheistic religion) decided to make rules for humankind to break, so that there would be the need for forgiveness because this three-to-one gods are all wrathful and despise sin, which are offenses to the rules they gave humanity to break... on purpose.  Then this three-to-one gods send a savior to reach "down" and rescue humanity from the sin this mythical character created.
But instead of making things simple and just erradicating all evil and creating a heaven on earth and making the beloved "children of god" happy for all eternity and providing all things needed, like food, water (did you know that only 1% of all the water in this planet is potable? Some merciful and intelligent god that would make such stupid proportions considering that he/she/it knew we'd be 7 billion inhabitants in the world this year) and a perfect weather, with no need for horrible sex (having sex with just any woman without the marriage ritual is a sin, some intelligent god!) and with enough resources to support all of us with plenty of resources, he/she/it decides to have his/her/its creation suffer throughout their lives in this world for no apparent reason or purpose.
Things only make sense when we step away from mythology and set foot on this earth and this three-dimensional reality which tells me that I'm part of a species in this world and that there are other species that I could be dinner to and that I'm consuming other species for the sole purpose of survival.  When I understand that I can then see that I need to take care of that species I'm consuming because my survival depends on theirs and with this information I can make important and life-preserving decisions which would be impossible to make if I had a blinder of religion over my eyes and I was only looking forward to the afterlife with complete disregard for the issues at hand.
People, please make sense!!