At the end of a long drive, the clouds were rather peculiar. Straight ahead, far far away it looked like some odd thing in the air. My mind couldn't decide what it was - a demon, an alien spaceship - but my first thought was "finally!". To my inner eye I saw war and magic, death and heroism. Then I realized it was an odd cloud, radically different than the surrounding ones but a cloud nonetheless. And I wondered, finally what? Finally war? Finally death? But it seems my naive heart would rather suffer those things to get something more.
Also, another baptism for me, and when I was sitting there I was for a moment tempted into the lull of organized religion. Then almost like a voice saying to me: it's your immortal soul you gamble with, you think you'd be shown mercy for chosing what everyone else believe because you're afraid to be wrong?
The ripples of time in stone
2 months ago
3 comments:
Of course you'd be saved, the important part is saying the magic words.
This comment brought to you, courtesy of Tim LaHaye.
A thought I'm playing with in regards to organized religion: It's actually pretty sad that the institution overshadows the message, because the initial message - in each of them - must have been pretty good. The big world religions, after all, originally became big because they made sense - because a lot of people heard them being preached and said "This makes sense. This feels right."
Then they grew from "big" to "world-spanning" because of the institutions that grew out of them, of course - but my point is, at one point they were selected because they were the best. The teachings of Jesus made more sense to more people than the worship of Jupiter - if that hadn't been the case, we would've seen a world-spanning Church of Jupiter instead.
I agree with you, on some level at least. But one can also look at it as every religion being a "brand" fighting for a "market share", while they all sell the exact same product. I think the essential question lies in the "product" and sure, examining the "brands" might give me clues, but I don't think they'll give me the answer. They're too busy minding their business to even have an answer. They'll have the answer that gives them the biggest share. Who says that the right answer considering gods, is the answer that "feels the best"? Or the one that catches most popularity? Who says that humanity is even physically capable of understanding the truth? We search, and I believe each one should make that search in peace without being pressured by the "big brands with influence and power".
This is a too big discussion to have here though, I could fill a book with it. In the end, I hope I will be able and allowed to chose what I believe in, and not what the world is trying to force feed me to think that I believe, even if the two leads to exactly the same thing.
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