Consider Christianity. A world-wide belief system, two thousand years in the making. Both the source of humanity’s most despicable behaviour and the inspiration for some of its greatest art and architecture. It is the collective name for a belief system consisting of more than 30,000 variations; each of which alleges to be the truth.
Christianity’s central tenet for most of it’s 30,000 variations is that: the omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent creator of the universe – the one and only true God – impregnated a virgin human woman who bore God’s only son – who is partly God Himself. This son was later tortured and murdered but was resurrected three days after his human death. He later ascended bodily into heaven and now sits at the right hand of God. Humanity is born into sin because the original man who was personally created by God from dirt went against God’s express instructions and attained forbidden knowledge by eating the fruit of a tree that bestows knowledge of good and evil on the person who consumes its fruit, which was placed nearby by God himself. This original ‘sin’ affects all of this man’s descendants – which includes all of humanity on earth today – which condemns every human being to eternal damnation – eternal torture in a spiritual placed called Hell. That is, unless we – humans – accept that God’s son was and is real, was tortured and murdered on our behalf – was sacrificed and died on behalf of us so that our sins could be forgiven – and was resurrected and is alive again.
For the sake of argument let’s assume that this central tenet of Christianity is absolutely true.
Given that God – as defined above – is the first and final authority in the entire Universe and is the creator of all – natural and unnatural – laws, a number of the choices made by this deity is rather curious. It strikes me as rather odd that given every available option – and to God, every option is available by definition – He chose scapegoating as the one and only way for humans to have our sins forgiven and receive salvation.
Scapegoating: (from the verb “to scapegoat”) is the practice of singling out any party for unmerited negative treatment or blame as a scapegoat.
Scapegoat: (in the Bible) A goat sent into the wilderness after the Jewish chief priest had symbolically laid the sins of the people upon it (Lev. 16)
Salvation: (Latin salvatio; Greek sōtēria; Hebrew yeshu’ah) is being saved or protected from harm or being saved or delivered from some dire situation. In religion, salvation is stated as the saving of the soul from sin and its consequences.
Sin: In Abrahamic contexts, sin is the act of violating God’s will.
This choice of path to salvation (deliverance from sin and its consequences) is especially curious because God is the final judge, jury and authority in existence. God is the final authority, the only decider, the only decision maker when it comes to the salvation or damnation of a human being (and literally everything else in the Universe). There exists, by definition, nothing else which makes the binary choice between the eternal torture and eternal salvation of a human soul. Any requirement to attain salvation then exists purely to influence or finalise the decision that God makes; to fulfil or not the requirements set by God which are used by God to determine the outcome of the decision of salvation or damnation. The requirements for salvation are defined by the final authority – God – and by definition cannot be influenced by anything else.
Why, with every possible option available to him, did he choose not only a heinously barbaric act but even more perplexingly required that He himself – in human form – be tortured and murdered through that particular barbaric act? Why does God require that He be tortured and temporarily killed to appease himself? Why does God require that He in human form be made a scapegoat upon which all the sins – human actions that contract His will – of the entire world be heaped before being – bodily – killed. What is it about this masochistic/sadistic theatrical that gives God the ability to grant salvation over damnation?
Given that God is omnipotent, nothing can dictate anything to God and any decision made by God can only be influenced by God and anything that is, is only so because God chose for it to be so. Given that, God then had the choice between forgiving everybody whole-sale or requiring that he in human form be tortured and murdered and He chose the barbaric option. Why? He had the choice between forgiving Adam or condemning billions to eternal torture and yet chose eternal torture. He had the choice between requiring a three week fast followed by the sacrifice of a person’s favourite pet after painting their house green and living in a swamp for six months while learning to recite the bible forwards and backwards in three languages to attain salvation or requiring that the human form of himself be tortured and murdered. He has the option to require absolutely any arbitrary thing – help other people, make the world a better place, sing Kumbaja at dawn for three days on a mountain top – or have himself tortured and killed and for some bizarre reason he chooses the sado-masochistic scapegoating option of torture and deicide.
Why?
Given the definition of God, there is only one possible answer: it’s what He wants.
He wants billions to be tortured for eternity since by definition he can not want it and by definition will have it. He wanted to be tortured and murdered since by definition he could have not wanted it. He wants his existence to be as vague and questionable as possible. He wants people to suffer precisely as much as they suffer now and then to continue to suffer even more after they die by being tortured in Hell for eternity. He wants all of this since he has the option and power to want something different and have it; to have absolutely anything whichever way He pleases.
This level of malevolence is truly awe inspiring. Two billion people choose to worship this travesty of a being as the pinnacle of morality. Can there be anything more disturbing?
There is, of course, a much simpler explanation than living in a Universe which was designed and is directed by the most evil super being imaginable: we live in a Universe in which it is possible for humanity to imagine such an awe inspiringly evil super being.
I wonder what it means for us? That we are so willing to subjugate ourselves to the terrible mental fabrications of primitive people?
Matthew 6:26 Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?
Matthew 6:26 Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?
Matthew 19:14 But Jesus said, Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me: for of such is the kingdom of heaven.
From the picture it looks to me like the heavenly father is certainly helping a fowl of the air to get a meal. I guess the bit that says “Suffer the little children” was meant literally.
Is asking the creator of the universe his preference for a beverage ‘testing’ him? If it is, why is that? If it isn’t, would a random sample of 10,000 Christians return the same answer?
The belief that a walking dead Jewish deity who was his own father although he always existed, commits suicide by cop, although he didn’t really die, in order to give himself permission not to send you to an eternal place of torture that he created for you, but instead to make you live forever if you symbolically eat his flesh, drink his blood, and telepathically promise him you accept him as your master, so he can cleanse you of an evil force that is present in mankind because a rib-woman and a mud-man were convinced by a talking snake to eat from a magical tree. — Anon.
Man, I so wish I had written that. Absolute genius.
Jesus. Because believing in the Easter Bunny is just silly.
So. Easter. I wasn’t going to bother writing about it but here I am. The idiocy is so thick in the air I just can’t help myself.
Easter. What is it?
It’s a mid-spring pagan festival co-opted by Christianity, pretty much like every other Christian holiday and ritual. Yea, Christians, followers of the most unoriginal creator of the universe imaginable, might (or might not) be surprised to know that the whole death and resurrection thing is in fact quite a bit older than the badly recorded travesty that they’re fawning over this weekend – where I am forced to see it. And be reminded of just how much ridiculousness people actually claim to believe. (Edit: check out Easter isn’t a Christian holiday either at Atheism Resource)
So, the plagiarism aside, what’s Christian Easter about? Let me tell you.
Easter is the celebration of the torture, execution, temporary ‘death’ and resurrection of the human incarnation of the creator of the universe. The omniscient, omnipotent, omnibenevolent creator of the universe, God if you will, needed to have himself tortured and temporarily killed by his errant creations so that he could be convinced to create a loop-hole in the rules he created himself so that he could be convinced to forgive his creations for being the way he created them, having known how they would turn out before he created them, so that he wouldn’t be forced by himself to torture them for eternity.
Seriously. It’s THAT ludicrous. I have some questions:
God is omnipotent – why didn’t he just forgive people without having himself tortured and temporarily killed?
God is omniscient – if he knows everything to be known, he knows he’s going to be resurrected less than 72 hours later. How is that a sacrifice? It’s not even an inconvenience for an almighty super being.
God is omnibenevolent – why does he torture people for eternity?
God is omnipotent – why not just unmake Satan?
God is omniscient – if he knows a person is going to be bad before he creates them and that he will be torturing them for eternity… how is that unlike breeding cats for the sole purpose of burning them alive?
Dear merciful Christ, why are people so incredibly stupid? But thanks for the public holidays, appreciate it.
Christianity Disproved: This site almost makes me want to stop blogging. Why? Because it covers just about everything just about perfectly. It is beautifully laid out and brilliantly presented.
I guess the only thing remaining is to ridicule those who still believe in these arse-backwards superstitions. Somebody has to do it. If more people did it, perhaps there’d be less idiocy around.
I had a bit of a laugh today when my wife pointed out this status from a Facebook friend of ours. I find it terribly amusing and not just a little bit ironic.
I will never again in my life drink a Red Bull. It is one thing to have fun with ads, but completely unacceptable to depict the Jesus, whom a large number of us on this planet consider to be the Son of God in such a manner.
Seems a bit like a Muslim sentiment no? Isn’t that amusing.
The Red Bull energy drink’s “Jesus walks on water” campaign should be cancelled, the SA Catholic Bishops’ Conference (SACBC) said on Tuesday.
“We question the timing of the release of the advert – which seems to be part of an international campaign,” spokesperson Cardinal Wilfred Napier said in a statement.
“While the Red Bull adverts are characterised by their cleverness, we believe that Red Bull South Africa have overstepped a mark.”
Napier said the SACBC welcomed the halting of the campaign, but asked Red Bull SA to cancel it completely.
…
And now… for the horror video. Are, you, ready, for… RED BULL JESUS!
Well torture my ass and condemn me to hell. The horror. Red Bull Jesus.
Haha that’s pretty funny – I love it! I think the advert is great. Of course, I may be biased. Red Bull is, after all, the greatest drink the world has ever beheld.
You see, here is the problem. I asked ANOTHER Christian what he thought of the advert. And THAT Christian loved it. Both Christians talk to Jesus. Christian B reckons Jesus doesn’t have a problem with the ad. Christian A is royally pissed off.
So my question is… which one of them is lying? I mean, before approving it or decrying it… surely they bothered to get the opinion of the figmentperson deity on who’s behalf they are doing it right? Yea… right.
The religious will never cease to amuse me. Brain. Fail.
One happy dude, grass and sunshine... does not a personal relationship make.
If I had a dollar for every time I’ve read or heard from Christians that they have “a personal relationship” with Jesus Christ I would probably not be writing this on account of the unimaginable wealth I would have accumulated. You see, Christians love saying it:
I have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.
or
Getting to know Christ.
or
Jesus is my best friend!
Yeah, OK, let’s see about that.
Right, so first stop is the dictionary to get what the words officially mean:
per·son·al [pur-suh-nl]
adjective
1. of, pertaining to, or coming as from a particular person; individual; private: a personal opinion.
2. relating to, directed to, or intended for a particular person: a personal favor; one’s personal life; a letter marked “Personal.”
3. intended for use by one person: a personal car.
4. referring or directed to a particular person in a disparaging or offensive sense or manner, usually involving character, behavior, appearance, etc.: personal remarks.
5. making personal remarks or attacks: to become personal in a dispute.
re·la·tion·ship [ri-ley-shuhn-ship]
noun
1. a connection, association, or involvement.
2. connection between persons by blood or marriage.
3. an emotional or other connection between people: the relationship between teachers and students.
4. a sexual involvement; affair.
So the dictionary definition of “personal relationship” is essentially that Christians say they believe that they have “a connection, association, or involvement” with the creator of the universe that is “of, pertaining to, or coming as from a particular person; individual;”.
Some examples of personal relationships could be between:
a man and his wife
a mother and her daughter
two friends
siblings
All of the aforementioned have several things in common but one thing is crucial, without which a relationship cannot and does not exist: communication. For a relationship to be personal in nature, the communication has to be bidirectional. Both parties in the relationship must be able to take part, share ideas and convey and effect the emotional content of the communication in the relationship for it to be considered personal.
As any married man knows (or should know…), without communication a marriage disintegrates rather rapidly. If there is no (or bad) communication between a mother and a daughter, their relationship disintegrates. Can two people who do not communicate (to give or interchange thoughts, feelings, information, or the like, by writing, speaking, etc.) really be considered friends? Perhaps for a time, even a really long time, after communication ceases but to become friends there had to have been communication and interaction first – you cannot become friends with a person with whom you have never communicated in any way.
There has to be bidirectional communication, discourse, the exchange of ideas, for a relationship to be considered personal.
A person could zealously read every single article that a writer publishes without the writer ever being aware of that person’s existence. While the interaction between a writer and a reader can be considered a relationship, it cannot be considered a personal relationship. I have read a great many of Christopher Hitchens’ articles and books and while I wish that I had a personal relationship with him I cannot say that I did. The man did not know I existed.
This is not to say that every person in this kind of relationship is rational about it and accepts that an admired celebrity is not a friend of theirs.
My wife has a relationship with a woman (I hesitate to call her a friend, at least, not any more) who gets obsessed with celebrities and in some cases ends up stalking them. She’s had restraining orders taken out against her; one by a well known cricket player in particular. This is a great example of a relationship that exists and is a personal relationship in the mind of one person but most certainly is not a personal relationship in the mind of the other. Any rational person looking at the situation would agree that there most certainly is no personal relationship between my wife’s acquaintance and the celebrities that she is obsessed with.
There can’t be a personal relationship without bidirectional communication, without the ability to freely share ideas, get feedback and have shared knowledge.
A relationship between two people can be considered personal if:
bidirectional communication occurs – both parties are transmitters as well as receivers
thoughts and ideas are shared – the parties have shared knowledge
both parties receive feedback to their transmissions
Personal relationships are fundamental to human beings. So important, in fact, that for the first several years of our lives personal relationships are the only way for us to learn anything at all. In the beginning of a person’s life, they learn from their parents, siblings, aunts, uncles. Family, through very personal relationships, teach you the things you need know to survive very early on. A little later – and any parent can relate to this – come a flood of ‘why’ questions from a child. A child wants to know something so it transmits its request to its parent or to another who is in a personal relationship with the child. Usually (ok, sometimes) the other party responds to the query by transmitting a response to the child and this back and forth continues and the child learns, gains knowledge it did not have before.
Happily, this interaction provides us with a simple but effective way to define and test if a relationship: a) exists and if it can be b) considered personal.
For example, let’s test if I have a personal relationship with my wife. To do that, I need to answer a couple of simple questions.
Does my wife communicate with me?
Why, yes, this morning she told me she was going to the shop and that she would be back in about half an hour. I went upstairs a couple of minutes after she told me this, to fetch a hot cross bun. I found that my wife was indeed not in the house. About half an hour later my wife came down-stairs. I asked her if she went to the shop and she replied that she had and told me what she bought.
My wife transmitted information to me. I transmitted information and a request for information to her. I received feedback on my request and gained knowledge.
Do I have a relationship with my wife? Clearly, yes I do.
My wife is studying linguistics. While watching television last night she commented on the way the narrator spoke in the program we were watching; she said the show had an interesting ‘register’. I did not know what ‘register’ meant in this context so I asked her to explain it to me. ‘Register’, she said, was the type of language that being used and how the language was used to convey something. For example, using ‘father’ in formal situations and not ‘dad’ which is more informal or how one could stick to prescribed grammar or not depending on the situation or the tone one was trying to convey.
I lacked the specific knowledge of what ‘register’ meant in that context and transmitted a request to my wife upon which I received feedback from her which added to or increased my knowledge. I verified this newly acquired knowledge that I gained from my wife by reading Wikipedia – it agrees.
Do I have a personal relationship with my wife? Undeniably, yes I do.
I could easily test this empirically. And, as it happens, people do sometimes have to prove, empirically, that they have a personal relationship with another person. Let’s say for argument’s sake that I wanted to convince an immigration official that I had a personal relationship with my wife. How would I go about that?
Happily, immigration officials of the United States of America (and many other countries) do this kind of thing every single day of the week. They check to make sure that when people claim that they are married, that they really do have a personal relationship with that person; that they are telling the truth. In fact, the legality of immigration by marriage rests almost entirely on this principle: being able to prove you have a personal relationship with another person.
For those who don’t know how this works, it’s pretty simple: get a bunch of photos of them together, get some legal documents, preferably financial that show their names together, some documents that show they’ve lived together and get the two people who claim to have a personal relationship in two separate rooms, ask them the same questions about each other and see if they come up with the same answers. It’s depressingly easy to test. In the end, all they are doing is checking if a reasonable amount of reasonably exclusive shared knowledge exists and that each person really knows the things they should know if the relationship is real.
So, how do we apply these widely accepted standards to test if a personal relationship exists between a Christian and the alleged super being they worship?
First, we need to define some of the properties of this super being, Jesus Christ. Happily and fortunately, Christians have done the job for us many times over. Here are the properties of Jesus Christ as described by a Christian website backed up by the Christian Bible that was allegedly written by the Christian’s creator of the universe himself:
Omniscience (all-knowing) – John 16:30 the apostle John affirms of Jesus, “Now we can see that you know all things.
Omnipresence (all-present) – Jesus said in Matthew 28:20, “Surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
Omnipotence (all-powerful) – All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me,” Jesus said in Matthew 28:18
Eternality (no beginning or end) – John 1:1declares of Jesus, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”
Immutability (unchanging) – Hebrews 13:8 says, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.
Can’t argue with that right?
So Jesus is omniscient, he knows everything. This is excellent news! Let’s test this relationship thing!
One might have a conversation with a Christians that goes something like this…
A note for Jesus to read...
If you happen to be a Christian, please speak to this Jesus Christ, who is omniscient and all-powerful by your own admission, and ask him to tell you what the sentence is that I wrote on a folded piece of paper that is on my desk marked “For Jesus Christ 0x001”. It should be a breeze. Write the sentence in the comments below.
Ah, but it doesn’t work like that, I hear a Christian snort. Why not? Can’t test the almighty like that, even to save the soul of an atheist? Ok. Fine.
How about asking Jesus Christ, omniscient son of the almighty creator of the universe how to cure cancer and save millions from dying unimaginably horrible deaths? No?
Then, ask Jesus Christ for a way we can get rid of Malaria without irreversibly damaging the environment? No? Cure for HIV? No?
How about asking Jesus Christ how to fit gravity into the Standard Model of Particle Physics? No? The solution to Goldbach’s conjecture perhaps? No?
But you have a personal relationship with this omniscience being? If you can’t get this being who, by your own definition knows the answers to these questions, to answer any of them, how do you know you have a relationship with it? How do you know? Something other than gaining useful knowledge that you didn’t have before must have convinced you then? What is that thing? You speak to Jesus Christ and he speaks back to you (except he can’t actually answer any useful questions)? Fine, I’ll go with that.
What does Jesus Christ sound like? What accent does he have? What is the tone of his voice? He spoke English to you? American English, Australian English, New Zealand English, South African English, British English, which one? What were the exact words he used when he spoke to you, quote them, verbatim.
Oh, I see, it doesn’t work like that either. Fine, I have one last test, one that no Christian can possibly deny is appropriate since it’s what they do every day of their lives and go to church for.
Speak to Jesus and ask him what he wants. Simple right? Surely he can communicate to you what he actually wants you to do? I mean, that’s pretty basic right? Jesus surely is able to let you, his follower and friend know what it is that he wants you do to?
I ask because not so long ago there were some inter-Christian issues at a church in Auckland city. One Christian sect put up a Christmas poster showing Mary with a pregnancy test. Another Christian sect thought this was terrible blasphemy and tore the poster down. Once sect didn’t believe it was blasphemy, the other did believe it most definitely was blasphemy. Both sects claim to have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.
Pray to Jesus now and get him to tell you which sect what right and which sect was wrong. Write the answer in the comments below. Preferably quote the actual words used by Jesus Christ to tell you this.
No?
Ok, take three Christians (hell, take three from the same Church) and put them in three separate rooms and ask each of them the same set of questions to ask Jesus Christ with whom all three have ‘a personal relationship’ and see if the answers match.
They won’t. Do you know why? Because Christians do not have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ, whether he exists or not. They do not have shared knowledge. Not even a functionally retarded immigration official would be convinced.
You can’t get knowledge you didn’t have from Jesus Christ by asking him a specific question with a specific answer, you can’t say what he sounds like, which words he uses in which context and two Christians asking the same vague question don’t even get the same vague answer.
Even when the alleged communication is about a fundamental part of Christianity and the answer only has to be a vague guidance feeling, an internal yes or no feeling, a completely unprovable hunch or an urge, it is still inconsistent and different even between a small group of similar Christians. How, after all, can there be 38,000 denominations of Christianity if they all speak to the same deity and have the same manual as reference? Does Jesus have the worst case of split personality the universe has ever seen? A terrible memory perhaps?
‘But the Bible’ one might say.
No, even if Jesus exists and the Bible happens to be true, one does not have a personal relationship with somebody from a one way transmission, especially a single book at least a thousand seven hundred years old. I don’t think I have a personal relationship with William Shakespeare, do you? I don’t believe I have a personal relationship with any author that I’ve never met, at all. Who does? The insane? Those who are on drugs? Does any normal, well-adjusted person think they have a relationship with another person who does not take part in any communication what so ever, aside from a single book written nigh on two millennia ago (that contradicts itself hundreds of times, has fabrications, provably so and isn’t supported by modern archeology performed by people who have a vested interest in proving the book true with empirical evidence)?
I have bad news for those who believe they have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. Science, reason and empirical evidence say no.
One Furious Llama 
Adverts, indignation and a little problem.
I had a bit of a laugh today when my wife pointed out this status from a Facebook friend of ours. I find it terribly amusing and not just a little bit ironic.
Seems a bit like a Muslim sentiment no? Isn’t that amusing.
The indignation comes from a Red Bull advert. It seems the poor guy had his sensibilities insulted when he read this article on South Africa’s News 24 site: http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/Jesus-ad-doesnt-fly-with-Catholics-20120313 and then watched the horrifyingly offensive video.
And now… for the horror video. Are, you, ready, for… RED BULL JESUS!
Well torture my ass and condemn me to hell. The horror. Red Bull Jesus.
Haha that’s pretty funny – I love it! I think the advert is great. Of course, I may be biased. Red Bull is, after all, the greatest drink the world has ever beheld.
You see, here is the problem. I asked ANOTHER Christian what he thought of the advert. And THAT Christian loved it. Both Christians talk to Jesus. Christian B reckons Jesus doesn’t have a problem with the ad. Christian A is royally pissed off.
So my question is… which one of them is lying? I mean, before approving it or decrying it… surely they bothered to get the opinion of the
figmentpersondeity on who’s behalf they are doing it right? Yea… right.The religious will never cease to amuse me. Brain. Fail.
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