Pharyngula

That holy flail

Posted by PZ Myers on October 30, 2007
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Guilt-ridden Christian: If I don’t obey God, he’s going to make me suffer for all eternity.

Evil-angelical Christian: I don’t make you obey God, I’ll be responsible for your eternal suffering.

That link will take you to a despicably manipulative video on GodTube — a dramatized letter from Hell in which a young fellow about to be thrown into the Lake of Fire screams at his still living, Christian friend for not doing enough to save him. It is genuinely vile. It is an attempt to turn a positive social value, friendship, into a rationale for browbeating people into abandoning reason and accepting a superstitious lie.

Christianity is all about death, suffering, fear, guilt, and coercion. It’s a damnable doctrine that preys on the good people want to do and turns it into a corrupting servility to a wretched dogma.

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Comments

  1. #1 David Marjanovi?, OM
    October 30, 2007

    Well then, notthedroids, give us the peace, love, and understanding version, if it exists.

    It does exist. It’s the version of (arguably) Catholicism where hell is consciously (!) self-chosen isolation from God and probably empty, and the devil most likely does not exist in the first place. It’s quite common in Europe.

    (I’ve left it because it still hangs in the air. I’m not capable of believing without evidence.)

  2. #2 David Marjanovi?, OM
    October 30, 2007

    Every mural of damnation I’ve ever seen has a line of sinners walking placidly towards the fire where some angel pushes them in.

    Is that protestant or something? In Catholic depictions you only ever see devils. That said, most of them are between 300 and 800 years old, and I don’t think any are younger than 300.

    And Dustin for Molly. Just to be on the safe side. :-> Besides, he still isn’t in the Order.

    Hey, did you forget all those godless scientists you’ll find down there? I call dibs on them for my Army of Darkness!

    Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated.

    <switch universe>

    <Imperial March>

  3. #3 David Marjanovi?, OM
    October 30, 2007

    Why would God create it if it’s going to be empty?

    Tsss. How silly, asking a question on why God would or would not do something. God’s Ways are ineffable.
    :-)

  4. #4 David Marjanovi?, OM
    October 30, 2007

    Oh yeah, that’s what I should have thought of first.

    HOW ARE YOU GENTLEMEN !!
    ALL YOUR BASE ARE BELONG TO US.
    YOU ARE ON THE WAY TO DESTRUCTION.

    YOU HAVE NO CHANCE TO SURVIVE MAKE YOUR TIME.
    HA HA HA HA ….

    Here is the whole thing.

    FOR GREAT JUSTICE.

  5. #5 David Marjanovi?, OM
    October 30, 2007

    I do not believe such a cruel and capricious being exists, but if they did I end up in the lake no matter what, because I could never honestly love that sort of God.

    This simply bears repeating.

    just as Jerry Falwell is doubtless now doing

    If you say “doubtless”, you aren’t an agnostic! :-)

    I’d rather my best friend had stopped me from drinking and driving, to be perfectly honest….

    ROTFL!!! That’s the obvious point, and it took all the way to comment 107 for someone to see it…

  6. #6 David Marjanovi?, OM
    October 30, 2007

    Quick, everyone who’s ever had their opinion changed by a blog post raise their hand!

    Me. Can’t remember any specific incident, but it does happen once in a while.

    We are also reminded regularly that several deconversions have happened because of this blog.

  7. #7 David Marjanovi?, OM
    October 30, 2007

    Well, you self-proclaimed Knight of God, I read those same quotes and am left seriously considering the possibility that Thomas Aquinas was actually writing a satire, Terry Pratchett-style. His Aristotelian logic is funny.

    BTW, what if the Sumerians were right? Then your shadow will eat mud in the dark, depressing underworld for all eternity — no matter what you faith, no matter what your works. Go ahead, disprove that.

  8. #8 David Marjanovi?, OM
    October 30, 2007

    I rather think you an

    Equus Puga

    A what horse?

  9. #9 ?????? ?????????? ?????????
    October 31, 2007

    I forgot YouTube. YouTube is also a potentially valid medium for conversion and revelatory experiences. And television.

    Dustin, you forgot “?????? ??????!”

  10. #10 David Marjanovi?, OM
    October 31, 2007

    Comment 240 has saved my day! That’s the right attitude! I’m still laughing! :-D :-D :-D :-D :-D

    so…

    horse ass (without the possessive)

    >horse’s ass

    i figured it would be obvious.

    Oh, that’s not obvious at all, because it isn’t how Latin works. Either you use the genitive, “horse’s ass”: puga equi (word order unimportant). Or you use the compound noun, “horse ass” (note that this is a single word, in spite of being written with a space in the middle): Latin is bad at compounding, but equopuga would probably have been understood.

    And they’re supposed to be delighted to observe these tortures?

    Indirectly. They’re supposed to be delighted in their own fate, by comparing it “perfectly” to the tortures they’re “perfectly” observing. That’s in the part before the boldened text.

    It’s Aristotelian logic again. The point of the whole Summa Theologica is to demonstrate that 1) Aristotelian philosophy and Christianity don’t contradict each other and 2) Christianity is utterly logical. With some distortions to both Aristotelian philosophy and Christianity, it succeeds in both…

    Latin word order is almost infinitely flexible.

    Not “almost”.

    And in this heaven/hell Muzak plays non-stop. Heaven/hell is kinda like being locked eternally in a shopping mall. Which place it is for you depends on your taste or lack thereof.

    NNNNNNNNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!

    I’m not sure, but the Sumerian underworld could be preferable.

    I particularly liked how the poor damned soul could smell both the sulfur AND the brimstone.

    ROTFL!!!

    The lake of fire,the book of life,the accountant’s bridge,and the concept of purgatory are all the original ideas of Zoroaster.

    What! Even purgatory?

  11. #11 David Marjanovi?, OM
    October 31, 2007

    Much of what you all talk about is 14th century Catholicism.It has little to do with genuine spirituality.

    You say “spirituality” as if it were a good thing…

    but rather than to say, I don’t believe that this is the explanation or it’s contrary, shouldn’t the default position be, “Perhaps”.

    Is it falsifiable?

    If not, the default position is “pffft”.

  12. #12 David Marjanovi?, OM
    October 31, 2007

    Now ask yourself the oposite, how plausible is it that it will never happen.

    Go back 100 years. Hey, just go back 50 years. And then try to predict the present. I wish you much fun. Wishing you good luck would be sadistic of me.

    Go back 1000 years. Why try to predict the present? Why bother?

  13. #13 ?????? ????????????
    November 1, 2007

    …and her “eyeballs can kill” post.

    Well… they can!

  14. #14 David Marjanovi?, OM
    November 1, 2007

    Ichtyic, you are right, it’s not falsifiable, but it’s also not a scientific theory.

    Not “also”. That is why it isn’t science.

    It’s also why the strong anthropic principle isn’t science. It’s religion. (It’s also not needed to explain anything.)

    ————–

    Dies irae, dies illa,
    Solvet saeclum in favilla,
    Teste David cum Sibylla.
    Quantum tremor est futurus,
    Quando judex est venturus,
    Cuncta stricte discussurus.

    The day of wrath, that day,
    Will dissolve the century (everything that isn’t eternal?) into ash,
    ???by means of the witness David with Sibylla???.
    How much trembling is to happen
    when the judge is to come
    and to strictly beat everything apart.

    And there shall be great smashing, utter trouncing, and pure pwnage, and there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth…

    Pretty scary stuff.

    Have you seen Conan the Destroyer?

    —————

    Yes, “almost”. I was going to write “is infinitely flexible” before it occurred to me that a preposition always precedes the noun it governs (or, at least, that the violation of this order is so rare that I’ve never seen it happen).

    Good point. I wouldn’t be surprised if it happens in poetry anyway (the occasional postposition wouldn’t be hard to understand), but I can’t think of an example, and I haven’t found any here. But then, it seems prepositions are rare in Latin poetry in the first place! :-)

    Apparently, however, there is at least one language in Australia that has prepositions and can put them anywhere.

    ————-

    J Myers, one or two more comments like 304, and you get your first Molly nomination.

  15. #15 David Marjanovi?, OM
    November 1, 2007

    Sorry, it’s not simply ash, but ash that is still glowing.

  16. #16 David Marjanovi?, OM
    November 1, 2007

    Oh, the good old abl. abs…. long time no see!

    I Hope You Like Text

    :-D