Jesus
Rides the #7 Train
By Mickey Z.
01 November, 2007
Countercurrents.org
I’m riding a rush hour
#7 train from Queens to Manhattan when suddenly: I sense danger. My
eyes dart to the left. No more than 15 feet from me, a woman is in possession
of that common haven for misplaced trust: a bible.
Some years ago, comparative
study of religious attitudes found that nearly 75 percent of Americans
literally believe in religious “miracles” and the “devil”;
only 9 percent of Americans accepted Darwinian evolution while about
half the population believed in divine-guided evolution; 40 percent
thought the earth was created about 6000 years ago.
Nowhere else in the industrial
world can such pre-Enlightenment levels as this be found. The development
of highly irrational and self-destructive attitudes is one of the consequences
of the growing alienation and isolation of people I am wallowing in
right now on the #7. Indoctrinated to leave governing to the people
who we’re told can actually “handle” it, we’ve
almost given up demanding results from our leaders. Instead, we take
State Department press releases and New York Times editorials at face
value and end up directing our pleas for help to the heavens instead
of to the people we voted into office.
But that is the penultimate
function of religion, isn’t it? It supplies a “carved-in-stone”
set of laws to save us from the hardship of thinking for ourselves.
Instead we look to media-created stars like the Pope or the Dalai Lama
to confirm our self-doubt.
The followers of any religion
are pacified not by having their abject circumstances changed, but by
being taught ways to tolerate the intolerable. Organized religion—fueled
by all our doubts, fears, and repressed desires—gives some meaning
to their perpetual suffering. So, in the name of endless suffering,
here are some probing questions for the next bible-thumper you encounter:
* If your god is all-knowing,
why do you need to pray in order to let him know what you want?
* For that matter, if he already knows what’s going to happen,
what good is prayer anyway?
* If your god sent his son to earth to save it, and there’s life
on other planets, did he send the same son to those other planets or
does he have other kids to spare?
* By the way, why did he pick Nazareth in the first place? I mean, it
wasn’t exactly Times Square. This choice made the spread of Christianity
a rather laborious project, wouldn’t you say? And why did he wait
so long? Did your god not care about the generations that came before
Jesus?
* Then, when Jesus supposedly came back from the grave, he still didn’t
announce it far and wide. Hey, if your god is so omnipotent, why did
he hatch such a hare-brained scheme to begin with?
* Finally, here’s a favorite: Who would win in a fight, Jesus
Christ or Godzilla?
My guess is that the giant lizard would blast JC with the atomic breath,
not realizing that Jesus would rise again three days later. This pattern
would repeat itself a few times until JC looked skyward and turned the
Pacific Ocean into wine. Godzilla would partake in a sip or two and
upon seeing his opponent strolling on the water, check into reptile
wing of the Betty Ford Clinic.
TKO: Jesus.
Mickey Z. can be found on the Web at http://www.mickey.net
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