[img]583|left|Eric L. Wattree||no_popup[/img]Every Sunday, preachers across this country are preaching about hell and damnation. They claim that if we don't repent and change our ways, we are going to die and suffer hell's fury throughout eternity. While a powerful pitch, that is not actually how things work.
True that bad behavior will cause us to suffer, but our suffering doesn't begin after we die; bad behavior creates our hell right here on earth. Clear evidence is that we are currently living in the pits of hell.
When God created man, he created him to be complete and self-sufficient. He gave man all the tools to survive, just as he provided birds with the sense to fly south in the winter, and the instinct to know exactly what direction to fly. Similarly, God provided man with a mind allowing him to create his own destiny, and a conscience that constantly reminds him of right from wrong. God incorporated his word and his will within us. It is called “common sense.”
But man has allowed other men to circumvent God's gift to humanity. We have allowed godless, greedy and self-serving men to gain control over our minds by convincing us that we can only know God through them, and that God has made them the gatekeepers of his kingdom. To bypass our God-given common sense, they convinced us that to even question their word is to smite God's will, resulting in the most severe punishment.
They Will Believe Almost Anything
Through this device they have convinced the gullible to worship man over God, to be content to sacrifice themselves and their families on the promise that they will be rewarded when they die. Convinced they must pay homage to the powerful to please God, this is why the poor and undereducated are experiencing pure hell on earth.
The gullible have been persuaded to embrace hypocrisy, which is causing us to cut our throats. While they claim God wants us to love our neighbor, hatred of our neighbor is driving our foreign and our domestic policy. This nation has been convinced God frowns upon our failure to protect the rich and that our urge to protect our families represents the evils of “socialism.” Two years ago, $711 billion, 18 percent of our entire budget, went towards this “Christian” nation's capacity to kill others while middle-class families have lost their jobs, their homes and poor people are starving. Where were the Tea Baggers then?
They tell us it was God's will to send poor and middle-class kids to war against a country that did nothing to us, without the necessary equipment to protect their lives. It also was God's will to make these kids pay for the equipment that had to be cut from their wounded bodies as they lay on the battlefield and forced them to pay for their own hospital meals while they recuperated.
While it is merely curious how they can get poor and middle-class white people to buy into this scam, it is astonishing how they can get Black people to believe that a white man with blue eyes and flowing blond hair was born in the desert to a woman who never had sex, especially since Black people were taught this while they were tied up next to the mules.
It shows if you can get people to fear the bogeyman (the devil) as children, then continue the lie long enough, passionately enough, you can get people to believe in anything. It doesn't hurt if you have opportunists in their own community getting rich off the lie.
No Need for an Intermediary
The Christian Bible says, “Know the truth, and the truth shall set you free.” Good advice. People need to understand the bogeyman is not going to get you for questioning a lie. The only bogeyman is man himself. Don't be afraid to use common sense. God does not need an intermediary. He is not saying anything to any other man that he's not saying to you.
I am not saying all religious people are liars. Some honorable, well-meaning people are devout Christians, Muslims and followers of other faiths. They should ask themselves one question: When embracing the dogma related by man, are they worshiping God or man? God doesn't need a Cadillac.
While not religious, I keep man out of my relationship with God. I am very spiritual. The God I believe in would never say that it is all right to go to another country and kill a million people just because they have oil and don't believe what I believe. Neither would he approve of torturing other men as long as I call it an “enhanced interrogation technique.” He certainly wouldn't say that I should condemn an entire religious group based on the actions of a few criminals who happened to be of that faith.
My God suggested that I ask the following question: He pointed out that it was “Christians” who enslaved and lynched Black people in the South. Does that mean that Black people should burn Bibles and prohibit Christian churches from being built in the 'hood?
Think about that.
Mr. Wattree may be contacted at wattree.blogspot.com or Ewattree@Gmail.com
Religious bigotry: It’s not that I hate everyone who doesn’t look, think, and act like me – it’s just that God does
