Religious Fundamentalism and Violence

[Guest Wildbomb 4:20]

This is merely my research paper for a class I had to take at Emerson College. I wanted to see what people thought about it, considering nobody ever read it besides the grad student teacher. Plus, with all the talk about the Middle East, Islam, and violence, I figured it's a timely post.

 

 

 

I Can See Through You, I Know the Real You–

Religious Fundamentalism

The term religious fundamentalism has become a hot-button word in today’s world, due to the Islamic extremists who helped carry out the September 11th terrorist attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people. These were people that, according to newscasts, believed their religion was telling them to kill as many “infidels” as possible. But what are their true beliefs? Obviously, we will never know their absolute motive; the extremists died in the attacks. But along these same terms, religious fundamentalism does not have a true definition. Is it merely an extreme devotion to faith, or is there something more sinister lying underneath the surface? As with most ideologies, religious fundamentalism has two sides. But unlike most, these two sides work together to provide both benefits and drawbacks. But as shown throughout history, and in the film The Boondock Saints, the ideology of religious fundamentalism leads to both nonviolent and violent destruction of culture.

Because of the recent press coverage of the Middle East following the September 11th terrorist attacks, one could potentially think religious fundamentalism is a recent issue. History, though, shows fundamentalism reaching far deeper. Jesus was crucified to absolve humanity for their sins. Yet he was also crucified by the notoriously brutal Pontius Pilate due to Jesus’ beliefs. In the Middle Ages, the Crusades were conducted in order to convert more people to Catholicism. Many churches, including my own denomination of faith, the Episcopal Church, followed Martin Luther and created the entire Protestant groups of religions. The Puritans, though, felt that the Protestant and Catholic religions were far too liberal, and wound up moving to America in order to practice religious tolerance.

Unfortunately, history has also shown us that religious tolerance and fundamentalism do not flow together. The Puritans may have moved to America to practice religion freely, but once they had established themselves in both Plimoth and the Massachusetts Bay Colony, the Puritans refused to allow tolerance themselves. Roger Williams was banished from the Massachusetts Bay Colony for criticizing the Puritan church. “He preached...always at odds with the structured Puritans. When he was about to be deported back to England, he fled southwest...and named his settlement Providence in thanks to God” (“Roger Williams Biography”). The people who left England because of persecution of religion were now doing the same. Literature from the era also reflected this thought process. Nathaniel Hawthorne’s classic novel The Scarlet Letter points out numerous flaws in Puritan culture, including religious intolerance and the absolute, totalitarian regime that wanted strict obedience. The roots of religious fundamentalism run deep in the city of Boston, as well as in the framework of America.

However, it is also apparent that American culture is quick to blame fundamentalism on extremists from other lands. Whether evangelical Protestants, fundamentalist Catholics, or extremist Muslims, the system remains the same; groups claim their religion is the only one that can be allowed for eternal salvation, and that the text for their respective religion is interpreted literally. For example, Christians believe that the Bible must be interpreted literally when it comes to homosexuals having the right to marry. According to Leviticus 18:22, “Thou shalt not lie with mankind as with womankind; it is abomination” (King James Bible). Because the Bible must be taken literally, there is no discussion. The Bible says that it is a sin, and therefore, the act is not allowed into culture. But if the Bible is to be taken completely literally, then there are other acts that can not be allowed into culture. Leviticus 19 forbids the eating of anything with the blood still in it, tattoos, or the cutting of hair or beard. Yet fundamentalists don’t argue that people need to keep their hair long, grow out their beards, or stop eating the rare prime rib. Instead, these people want to pick and choose which verses of the Bible to apply to their own agenda, depending on how it fits. Therefore, religious fundamentalism is not based upon the literal interpretations of the word of God through religious text; instead, it is based upon a moral code, developed without the texts, that then uses quotes out of context in order to rule society.

This is not to say, though, that religious fundamentalism is always a destructive cause. On occasion, it provides a sense of security for those that believe in it. During the 1960s and 1970s, there was much violence and tension in the Middle East. These clashes were typically between Arab countries in the region and Israel, which was carved out of Palestinian and Arab lands after World War II. However, religious fundamentalism in the Arab sections appealed to the people, as shown by an article in America:

Where modern culture had an alien tenor, fundamentalists provided meaning and spirituality that was accessible to the people...fundamentalism summoned young people from spectator status to an

active participation in their culture and, more to the point, gave them a

sense of meaning and purpose, something none of their leader’s tried to do (3).

Religious fundamentalism can provide a culture and stability that nobody else has to offer, thus making it enticing for people to join. This is shown in the city of Boston today, with more college students than ever before converting to evangelical Christianity: “There are 15 evangelical Christian fellowship groups at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology alone...a June [2003] Gallup Poll found that 41 percent of Americans identified themselves as ‘evangelical’ or ‘born-again’” (Swidey 14). Religious fundamentalism allows for people to become active in society, instead of being unmotivated.

However, because religious fundamentalism is so restrictive on its beliefs, it rejects everyone else it finds, just as the Puritans did in the 1500s and 1600s in England. More often than not, though, this intolerance will result in nonviolent confrontation of beliefs, as shown in Neil Swidey’s Boston Globe article on evangelical college students, stating that preachers send “the message that eternal salvation is open only to those who line up behind them and Jesus Christ. Yet in this hub of liberal, I’m-OK-you’re-OK-we’re all-OK higher education, the pull grows stronger for this conservative, our-way-is-the-highway evangelism” (14). With the belief that eternal salvation is only open to those who believe the same as them, religious fundamentalists will try to spread the word to “save our souls.”

One of the more telling examples of the fundamentalist belief on eternal salvation is the book series Left Behind. Written by Tim LaHaye and Jerry B. Jenkins, the fictional series based upon the Gospels is second best selling fiction series in America, trailing only the Harry Potter franchise. A New York Times article cites that the first eleven books in the series sold more than forty million copies. However, the series teaches a dangerous fiction leading to the second coming of Christ: “The fictional Antichrist...rises to power as head of the United Nations. He signs a peace treaty with Israel, setting off a seven-year countdown to the Second Coming...” (Kirkpatrick). Jesus will also strike vengeance upon nonbelievers, according to the book series. The book states in the final days,

‘Tens of thousands of foot soldiers dropped their weapons, grabbed their

heads or their chests, fell to their knees, and writhed as they were invisibly

sliced asunder...Their innards and entrails gushed to the desert floor, and

as those around them turned to run, they too were slain, their blood

pooling and rising in the unforgiving brightness of God’ (Fitzpatrick).

The series, with its excessive violence, culminating in the passage mentioned above, shows a vengeful God that everyone must fear. The people that need to be most worried are Jews; fundamentalist Christianity still holds Judaism responsible for the death of Jesus, and all Jews should be punished for their crime.

But it is not the projected violence by God that needs to be feared. Rather, it is the violence caused by fundamentalists themselves. The September 11th terrorist attacks were an exception to the rule, based upon the sheer scale of them. However, the film The Boondock Saints shows all of the aspects of religious fundamentalism: the development of the ideology, intolerance, and violence. Filmed in 1999 and released by Twentieth Century Fox in 2001, the film follows the brothers Connor and Murphy McManus, Irish immigrants living in South Boston. According to one film review,

Having killed Russian mobsters in self defense...the brothers are praised as “saints” in the Boston Herald. Realizing their newfound skills as vigilantes, the brothers use their language skills to penetrate the Russian Mafia’s upper echelon...the brothers’ religious convictions are

that they are avenging angels ridding God’s world of bad people (Koehler 58).

To explain the plot simply, the brothers believe that they are the Biblical Angels of Death and need to carry out God’s wrath for Him. They kill for what they claim is religious intent. All those who are evil should be executed.

The McManus brothers are the rule, rather than the exception, when it comes to becoming a believer in religious fundamentalism. The two brothers open the film dressed entirely in black, smoking cigarettes after visiting church. The sermon the brothers listen to at the church is moving, commemorating the anniversary of a young girl’s death: “Now we must all fear evil men. But there is another kind of evil, which we must fear most. And that is the indifference of good men” (Duffy). At the point of the film it appears in, the sermon appears to be unimportant, just as unimportant as the two brothers appear to be. However, most fundamentalists will have one of these moments in which something rings true within them, bringing them to their belief. Swidey writes about one such college student in his Globe article, where Fred Lee had “a friend hand him a book called The Case for Christ, a defense of Christianity by former Chicago Tribune investigative journalist Lee Stroubel. The book persuaded him that the Bible is true...[he] called his mom. ‘I told her, ‘I’ve become a Christian. But please don’t tell Dad’” (14). This sermon is the brothers calling to the radical Catholicism that they believe, and in turn, will carry out God’s command through vigilante justice.

Through this sermon, the brothers immerse themselves in the roles of the Biblical Angels of Death. In the film, the duo have two true mass-killing scenes in which they use full religious practices. Connor and Murphy have a prayer that they state before killing their official target:

And shepherds we shall be

For thee my Lord for thee

Power hath descended forth from thy hand

So our feet my swiftly carry out thy command

And we shall flow a river unto thee

And teeming with souls shall it ever be

In nomine patri, et fili, et spiritus sancti (Duffy).

Translated to English, the last part is “In name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.” The brothers prayer reflects upon Job, which speaks of the Angels of Death. The two also put pennies over the eyes on those that they have killed. In Greek mythology, the coins were needed to pay Charon, the ferryman for the dead to Hades. “He only accepts the dead that are buried or burned with the proper rites, and if the pay him for their passage” (Lindemans). The brothers are meticulous, making sure to include religion in all of their killings. On the surface, the brothers appear to be killing in God’s name and only executing those who are truly deserving of death.

However, the intentions of the brothers is not one for God and for the improvement of society; instead, it is for themselves. Connor and Murphy McManus kill people not for their sins, as they proclaim to be doing, but for their own personal benefit. For instance, the brothers first killings involved nine members of the Russian mafia. As it turns out, they have killed the head of the East Coast operations. But instead of being happy over that, the brothers turn. “I wonder what is in that briefcase over there?” (Duffy). The briefcase contains hundreds of thousands of dollars. Murphy turns to his brother and says, “I love our new job.” The brothers reap the benefits of their work, not by being satisfied with the killings, but with the profit that comes from it.

The hypocrisy of religious fundamentalism reaches a climax at the same time the climax of the film occurs. In the final scenes, the brothers rejoin their father, who shares their same fundamentalist beliefs. The three invade a courtroom to reveal their existence to the general public, delivering a speech: “It’s your corrupt we claim. It is your evil that will be sought by us! With every breath we shall hunt them down. Each day we will spill their blood till it rains down from the skies” (Duffy). Up until this point in the courtroom, the brothers can believably be the Angels of Death, as explained by the Book of Job. They are the executioners. Yet the remainder of their dialogue is rooted in the hypocrisy of fundamentalism:

Do not kill, do not rape, do not steal. These are principles which every man of every faith can embrace! These are not polite suggestions. These are cores of behavior, and those of you that ignore them will pay the dearest cost! There are varying degrees of evil. For if you do, one day you will look behind you, and you will see we three. And we will send you to whatever god you wish (Duffy).

The first line alone provides plenty of holes in the McManus’ fundamentalist beliefs. “Do not kill.” The brothers have killed a total of twenty people in the film, including the mafia boss in the courtroom they kill after the aforementioned dialogue. “Do not rape.” During a shooting at a porn shop, the brother’s accomplice plays with the naked breast of a porn star who passed out during the killing. “Do not steal.” The brothers stole from the mafia, as well as the two men who they unintentionally killed at the start of the film. Apparently, “these are codes which every man of every faith can embrace,” save for the Boondock Saints themselves.

The effect that religious fundamentalism has on society after a vicious string of attacks is a division among the public. In the film, the attacks are covered in a news segment, which then conveys public opinion. It’s split down the middle: some people want to join the Saints, some feel that they are protected, while others question the validity of the Saints being judge, jury, and executioner. Others fear for their lives (Duffy). Fundamentalists always receive support from people, no matter what their intentions or beliefs are, across all religions. “Remember the Branch Davidians in Texas, Baruch Goldstein...and of course, Osama bin Laden” (“Islam and Modernity” 3). The general population fears for their lives, and in extreme cases, such as Naziism, people will convert in order to hang on to their lives. The McManus family has the potential to be as powerful. “‘How far are we going to take this?’ ‘The question is not how far. The question is, do you possess the constitution, the depth of faith, to go as far as needed?’”(Duffy). Just how far will the McManus family take their Sainthood? That appears to be answered in a sequel to be released next year, tentatively titled All Saints Day.

Religious fundamentalism has a detrimental effect on society, both in nonviolent and violent forms. The Boondock Saints is a fictional example of what can happen when extremists hide under the guise of religion in order to justify morality. Yet September 11th is the real deal. Religion has the possibility to unite, but as evidenced with the controversy surrounding both the current military conflict in the Middle East and the one in Massachusetts over gay marriage, it can divide. Fundamentalism is also involved in politics; the Christian right is a large voter bloc that Republicans are currently pandering to for the sole purpose of remaining in office. The current President, during his election campaign, announced that his favorite philosopher of all time was Jesus Christ. Culture is saturated in religion. Yet fundamentalism has proved yet again that anything in excess is an evil. “But I’m on the outside / I’m looking in / I can see through you / See your true colors / ‘Cause inside you’re ugly / I can see through you / See to the real you” (Lewis). Religious fundamentalism, when used by extremists, is hypocrisy at its best.

[Guest MikeSC]

Good paper, actually. If a bad grade is given, I could not imagine why. Very solid and your conclusions seem well-reasoned and sound.

 

My view on violent religious fundamentalism is that they pervert and twist the message to suit their desires and their goals. You definitely explained it well with the "Boondock Saints" description.

 

ONLY real difference I have is the comparison of Nazism to religious fundamentalism. Nazism was more a cult of personality than anything. The party strove to abolish religion --- to remove a "higher law" than the party's. Fundamentalists --- for all of their flaws --- try to find a way to link their beliefs to "God's law".

-=Mike

[Spicy McHaggis 0]

Pretty much agree except for the typical Crusades bs.

[Firestarter 0]

"Come with me, where chains will never bind you

All your grief, at last, at last behind you

Lord in Heaven, look down on him in mercy -

Forgive me all my trespasses and take me to your glory.

Take my hand; I'll lead you to salvation..."

[Guest SP-1]

The problem with the view that those Levitical verses must be interpreted that way is that they are taken out of context for the most part. There are cultural, historical, and ceremonial applications there that often changed or shifted in importance when Jesus fulfilled his purposes.

 

Also, "Left Behind" is a fictional interpretation of Revelations and a few scant other scriptures. Much of what happens in there is not scriptural, and is not in the Bible, at least not in the ways it is presented there. I wouldn't judge Christianity by it, or Christian beleifs, since the fictional aspect and the interpretive aspect overrides actual Christian doctrine. Unless, of course, it's okay to judge the entire Arab race based on the actions of the men who beheaded that contractor.

 

The paper is good. It lacks a true Christian perspective and interprets some things wrong, but it's well written and I'm sure a secular professor would have no problem giving you a fantastic grade.

[Highland 0]

Informative and thoughtful, I liked it.

[Your Paragon of Virtue 0]

The problem with the view that those Levitical verses must be interpreted that way is that they are taken out of context for the most part. There are cultural, historical, and ceremonial applications there that often changed or shifted in importance when Jesus fulfilled his purposes.

 

Also, "Left Behind" is a fictional interpretation of Revelations and a few scant other scriptures. Much of what happens in there is not scriptural, and is not in the Bible, at least not in the ways it is presented there. I wouldn't judge Christianity by it, or Christian beleifs, since the fictional aspect and the interpretive aspect overrides actual Christian doctrine. Unless, of course, it's okay to judge the entire Arab race based on the actions of the men who beheaded that contractor.

 

The paper is good. It lacks a true Christian perspective and interprets some things wrong, but it's well written and I'm sure a secular professor would have no problem giving you a fantastic grade.

Isn't the whole point that fundamentalists take these things out of context, and that's the whole BASIS of everything he's trying to say? Obviously it's misinterpreted, we know that already. That's the point.

[Guest SP-1]

Not all the time. Fundamental extremists sometimes do it. But being fundamentalist isn't automatically being in that mindset. The Levitical laws are taken out of context on both sides. There's a correct, contextual way to read the Bible, and let the Bible interpret itself. Which it does pretty well.

[Guest Wildbomb 4:20]

To answer to some points made:

 

1. The paper was given an A- by a devout Catholic graduate student. Strange, I know. She thinks feminism is amazing yet is pro-life. I don't know.

 

2. The connection I tried to make was that religious fundamentalism can help develop activity in both mind and spirit, but the extremists who use it as a guise to justify their own moralities often will use it for violent purposes. I used the film just to make things fun.

 

3. I think the main point here is that with this belief system instilled in a region, it is damndably difficult to wind up ridding the region of it. Hence the difficulty in the Middle East, but also if it were to take root here in America. I'd like to think it wouldn't, but you just never know.

[Guest MikeSC]

3. I think the main point here is that with this belief system instilled in a region, it is damndably difficult to wind up ridding the region of it. Hence the difficulty in the Middle East, but also if it were to take root here in America. I'd like to think it wouldn't, but you just never know.

Legit question --- WHY did America manage to get past the religious intolerance of the Puritans while the Middle East cannot?

 

Was it due to the differences in Western v Arab civilization?'

-=Mike

[Highland 0]

3. I think the main point here is that with this belief system instilled in a region, it is damndably difficult to wind up ridding the region of it. Hence the difficulty in the Middle East, but also if it were to take root here in America. I'd like to think it wouldn't, but you just never know.

Legit question --- WHY did America manage to get past the religious intolerance of the Puritans while the Middle East cannot?

 

Was it due to the differences in Western v Arab civilization?'

-=Mike

It was probably due to the massive influx of differing cultures coming into America and gradually changing the social and religious fabric.

The Middle East just hasn't had nearly the same level of cross-cultural co-integration.

[Guest Wildbomb 4:20]

Hereby bumped due to the other thread.

 

I think the question Mike posed over four months ago still lingers: Why can some cultures, such as the United States, seemingly get past it's extremely religious roots, while others, like the Middle East, remain mired in beliefs that haven't evolved in over 2000 years?

 

--Ryan

[Guest Shoes Head]

Because swimming pools, naked women, and fast cars tend to make people say "Fuck religion."

[CheesalaIsGood 0]

Speaking of the current state of religious thought....

 

According to the same site bootlegs of The Passion are selling quite well in the Middle East. Go figure.

 

 

 

 

A healthy dose of Jesus?

"I'm Juxtaposing" by Eightheadz, creator of 8BM.com

 

After watching Passion of the Christ I have a few questions.

One.

Why did the “Jewish religious establishment” feel that they needed to pay Judas to find Jesus anyway?

Was Jesus preaching in secret? Was he a fugitive of the law? I never got the impression that he was teaching in back rooms and in poorly lit basements under a whisper. He was supposed to be out in the open, standing on a hill and gathering hundreds if not thousands of people around him.

But if he was so open about his teachings, then they wouldn’t have had to pay anyone to tell them where he was going to be now would they?

They could have just arrested him after one of his sermons.

Not only did they have to pay Judas to find him but they didn’t even know what Jesus looked like. Judas had to kiss him on the cheek so the thugs that the "Jewish religious establishment" sent to arrest him would even know which hippie to rough up.

They actually asked Judas, “how will we know who he is.”

That is when Judas came up with the homoerotic idea to plant big wet one on Jesus.

So it is safe to assume that Jesus wasn’t some superstar pop icon like some people would want you to believe.

The fact is that people didn’t even know what the fuck he looked like.

Not even his enemies.

Think about that for a second.

If you let Christians tell the story he was the most popular thing since Manna.

If he had it like that I doubt it would have been a problem to just arrest him whenever he was out and about preaching to thousands of disenfranchised Jews hanging on his every word.

If he was that sweet they wouldn’t have needed Judas’ help in finding him and could’ve saved 30 silver pieces?

Two.

This brings me to my next problem, the beat down.

Seriously Mel, are we supposed to walk away from that thinking that the Romans put a little something special on that ass whupping that they served Jesus that day?

I am sure Jesus wasn’t the first or the last criminal to catch an ass kicking like that.

In terms of beat downs, people have gotten much worse around the world before Jesus and since Jesus for much less.

Genghis Khan once poured hot silver in someone’s eyes and ears for stealing his tribute.

That was worse.

Stealing Genghis Khan’s shit I think is also much worse than just saying that you have a better way of looking at things and turning over a few tables at a synagogue.

Hell, African American slaves were beaten to death not just beaten bad enough to still have the strength to carry a 500 pound cross a few miles on his back through the streets then up the side of a friggin mountain.

How can others go through much worse than Jesus ever did and yet Jesus’ ass kicking is enough to cleanse us of our sins?

I guess when you are the self-proclaimed son of man you’ve earned the right get off light.

Hell, at the rate that we charge up debt for being inhumane towards one another humanity would have been right back where we all started before they pushed that thorn crown into his forehead.

Three.

Another problem I had with the movie was Jesus’ arrogance.

Actually this was a huge problem I had.

That is right, I said arrogance.

After the first wave of beat downs with those sticks, did you notice that they quit beating him once he fell to his knees?

They only brought out the heavy artillery (cat o-nine-tails) once Jesus stood up defiantly like, “what? That’s all you’ve got?”

In the immortal words of Marsellus Wallace talking to Butch in Pulp Fiction … “Fuck pride.”

Jesus should have just acted like he passed out.

That’s what I would have done.

In my opinion standing up after all of that was the equivalent of playing "Fuck the Police” at volume ten when you get pulled over by the police for drunk driving.

I’m sorry. It’s hard for me to be sympathetic towards someone when I see that. That is what I call “asking for it.”

Then again I am not the savior of mankind. Maybe being the savior of mankind dictates that you flip your nose up at the establishment every chance you get.

This would go along way to explaining why I am not the savior of mankind.

I kept yelling at the screen, “stay down…stay down…”.

Then again I was saying that and I know how the story ends so what does that say about me?

To me it seemed like Jesus had umpteenth opportunities to get out of that whole situation if he wanted but it looked like his ego kept getting in the way.

How many times did people ask him simple, direct questions where if he would have just opened his mouth and explained himself, instead of acting like he was too good to answer them, they could have cleared all of this up in no time?

I know he wanted to be all defiant in front of the guys that were railroading him but give me a break.

Pride is a motherfucker ain’t it? Apparently even for Jesus.

See that is why I was a little confused when he said, “God why have thou art forsaken me” it was like it was just sinking in that he was pretty much fucked.

It took getting nailed up on a cross for that?

If I were Jesus I would've said that "why have thou art forsaken me” line right about the time that I saw the crowd cheering for Bar'Abbas over me.

It was almost like he thought God would have saved him way before he was nailed on that cross. Like that whole time he was expecting the cavalry to arrive and now he realizes once he is up there that they ain’t coming.

Maybe that is why he was acting so defiant, he must’ve been expecting God to strike everybody down with lighting bolts the whole time he was being biggety with everyone.

Well maybe God did give him an out.

God gave him Pontius Pilot and Herod. What bigger out did you need? God could have given him for Los Angeles Police chief Darryl Gates.

See where I am going with this?

Both Pontius and Herod found no reason to harm. If Jesus would have just sucked up his pride a little bit and explained himself he could have be released unscathed, but he didn’t say anything. He just sat there defiantly and let things follow their course. Which is fine, if that is how you wanted things to go down, but then why are you crying about it on the cross once the end is near like someone (God) was “forsaking you”?

Read the Bible, Herod was actually a fan of Jesus. All he wanted was to see Jesus perform a few magic tricks. Read him a fortune or something. Herod definitely would have let Jesus walk.

Four.

My last problem with the film is that the story of Jesus seems to be, at least from my view, a condemnation of capital punishment.

And I know that wasn’t Mel Gibson’s intent considering he’d kill anything but an unborn fetus.

I am sure the conservatives of the world would disagree with me, but what I felt appalled people in that film, at least the people that were appalled, was not that this was being done to Jesus per se, but that this level of inhumanity was being done to anyone.

When homey got pissed off at the Roman thugs mercilessly kicking Jesus he stopped the Roman soldiers by declaring that he wouldn’t carry the cross a step further if they didn’t stop kicking Jesus ass.

He didn’t know who the fuck Jesus was. He just knew that what they were doing was pretty fucked up.

See that film was pretty accurate in my assessment as to how we feel today about our convicted felons today.

When it comes to convicted felons, whether it was in Israel 2000 years ago or in any state penitentiary anywhere in the world we feel like we have the right to do anything we want to someone once they have been convicted in the eyes of the law.

How many conservatives complain that convicted criminals have televisions when they shouldn’t, books when they shouldn’t, three meals a day when they shouldn’t?

How much sympathy does a convicted felon get when he complains about getting raped in jail?

That all comes with the territory, right?

The court said that they were guilty.

Even if you are innocent of these particular charges you must’ve done something otherwise you wouldn’t be in this position right?

Isn’t that the line of logic they use?

The story of Jesus , or at least the story of Jesus told by Mel Gibson is about how inhumane we can be to the people that we judge. It is a condemnation of capital punishment as much as it is anything else.

I would say that this is especially true for the Passion of the Christ which really isn’t so much a story about anything after 30 minutes into it.

What really confused me was at the end of the movie when a tear drop from God comes falling down to the earth and starts an earthquake.

What’s God sad about?

If God didn’t want Jesus to be killed then he could have done something about it. Better yet, if he didn’t want Jesus to be killed he could have chosen some other way for Jesus to pay for our salvation.

He was a carpenter. He could have repaired front porches for people for no charge or something until the humanities debt was paid off.

God is God after all isn’t he?

God by definition means that you get to make the rules as you see fit.

And if he (God) chose not to do anything to prevent what Jesus went through from going down because what happened to Jesus had to be done then what the hell are you crying for?

Surely God had the gift of foresight. He knew exactly how it was going to go down. What, it just hurt to see it all play out? That is what foresight is. You see it ahead of time.

The Rabbis and the Romans were just doing his bidding. They were fulfilling prophesy. They were just playing their role. Without them, Jesus doesn’t die for our sins and everyone is still fucked. I’d say that they deserve a star on the Hollywood walk of fame. Without them, I wouldn’t be able to tell a priest on my death bed that I am sorry for writing this article and be forgiven and still get into heaven.

Besides, you’re crying for only son and all you could muster up was one single tear? It must be a man thing because mother Mary was totally fucked up about it.

She had snot coming out of her nose and everything. She was crying so hard that her eyes were red. I guess mothers take the execution of their sons a lot harder than fathers.

Either that or what they say is true, “Mother’s baby, father’s maybe.”

 

 

 

http://eightballmagazine.com/diatribes/vol...iatribes483.htm

[Guest Wildbomb 4:20]

Just a thought: you may want to quote next time.

 

It's intriguing to see that the film is selling so well.

 

But I don't think anyone here, nor over there, for that matter, can probably explain why the evolution of the Middle East, in terms of both cultural and technological, lags so far behind the other "major" religions in developed areas. I think it might have to do with the lack of assimilation, but perhaps also with the way government has worked there.

 

Anyways...

 

--Ryan

[Guest MikeSC]

Even more baffling, when you consider how far ahead they were of everybody else until the Enlightenment.

-=Mike

[Guest Shoes Head]

But I don't think anyone here, nor over there, for that matter, can probably explain why the evolution of the Middle East, in terms of both cultural and technological, lags so far behind the other "major" religions in developed areas.

Nope. As a nation's economy progresses into a profitable first world one, you'll notice the people abandon their belief systems in pursuit of all that glitters.

[Guest Wildbomb 4:20]

It definitely didn't work out that way in the first hundred years or so of the United States. And, you'll find, that there is a growing number of evangelicals in the Northeast, one of the richest sections of the U.S.

 

I don't know why, just stating what there is.

[Guest Shoes Head]

So you mean to tell me the majority of the population in the northeast regularly attends sunday services, pays tide, abstains from premarital sex and keeps a limited divorce rate? No, they don't. The "evangelicals" are a vocal minority. Look at the wild lifestyle of the roaring twenties as compared to the "Lord Jesus help me I'm so poor" depression and tell me a profitable economy doesn't impact the populace's religious conviction.

 

It's because you don't have time for "god(s)" when you're too busy snorting coke off tits.

[Guest Wildbomb 4:20]

No, I won't say that the majority does. But oh, wait...let's look at the statistic back from the paper:

 

There are 15 evangelical Christian fellowship groups at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology alone...a June [2003] Gallup Poll found that 41 percent of Americans identified themselves as ‘evangelical’ or ‘born-again’

 

Bold added for emphasis. Somehow, the United States is also returning to a more rigid structure in terms of clothing, at least, in my mind. I think conservatism, in some ways, are closely related in terms to church teachings. This isn't always a bad thing, mind you, but hey, that whole faith dictating policy thing doesn't seem to work in the Middle East. Why would it here?

 

I'm just a skeptic hippie (copyright, kkk 2004) anyways, so what are you going to do. I just find it slightly ironic.

 

--Ryan

...and as TheSmartMarks turns...

[Guest SP-1]

What's intriguiging about that article is that, for all of its attempt to treat God personally, it still fails to do so. I also like how it seems to take the drop of rain/teardrop bit as if it were a relay of a documented theological/supernatural/physical phenomenon when it is clearly an artistic addition of Gibson and co.