**Disclaimer: The following post is inflammatory and might offend some of my readers. It's about my personal opinions and is not an attack on anyone, so don't send me any hate emails after you read it or else I'll accuse you of exactly what I wrote about.
I was watching an interview with Brad Pitt and Bill Maher and I decided that I now idolize Brad Pitt. That's a biggee coming from me. But the things he said were so in line with my own thoughts and beliefs that I just had to start seeing him in a different light. He is an incredible humanitarian; he lives part of his life in the French Quarter in New Orleans, helping poor people and helping to rebuild people's lives. He gives more back in terms of being a good, decent man than most who claim to be "good christians". And he rejects christianity based on logic.
He talked about the legalization of marijuana and we all know how I feel about that one. Our government can't get their shit together enough to generate income from any other source other than unfair, unprecedented and unbelievable taxation, so why not at least use some creative thought to develop other sources of that taxable revenue? Study after study after study has shown the benefits of marijuana and have pretty much disproven so much of the rhetoric and false information out there. The only reason there is a "war" against it now is because the wrong people are making profits off of it, including the government. Just not the American People.
Many would read this and believe I'm a stoner, but in fact, I am not. At all. I am simply sick and tired of having to maintain a certain public position that goes against what I believe. I am sick and tired of having to forego my personal opinions on stuff just so I don't offend someone who knows me. Well fuck it; this is my blog, and this is how I feel. Legalize marijuana, allow pot bars and tax the hell out of it just like we do alcohol. We'll be rolling in money in about 24 hours and our healthcare crisis *might* be solved.
The other thing Brad talked about was religion, another seriously sore sticking point for me. I especially love it how people who are religious have no problem letting others know it, like they have to advertize that they are in some special club. BUT - let someone like ME make a comment about how I don't believe in religion, how I think the whole Jesus is the son of god myth is a load of ignorant crap, and I get attacked from all angles. THAT is the part I am sick of. I don't attack people for THEIR beliefs, so why do they feel the need to attack me for mine?
Being a "christian" does NOT make you a good person. I see so many people using it as a crutch for their bad behavior. If you can't consciously decide to make good decisions in your life and to try to be a good person without church, then I don't think there's much hope for you. I read all the time about how people go to church and try so hard "for their kids". Well let me tell you, if having kids wasn't a good enough reason to get your shit together and be a good person, well I don't think god or jesus or even allah is going to help you there. Stop using it as an excuse; get your life together, work hard, love hard and be a good friend or shut the hell up, because you ain't gettin' into that place you call heaven by making excuses in your life about how you are always trying so hard to be a good person!
I HATE the hypocracy of it all.
And, again, thinking it's a load of crap is MY opinion; it's not a personal attack on anyone else, it's a statement that reflects my logical, 40-year evaluation of my experience with God and the Universe.
Brad said he thought it didn't make sense, either. And that is my view. You might as well believe in Santa Clause or the Easter Bunny.
Having said that, I do believe Jesus was a man. I believe he might have even been an evolved human, someone of higher morality and intelligence, to whom humans were naturally drawn. I believe he probably went on to have a family and I believe that any God who would have his own child nailed to some cross is no god I want to believe in. To me, that is a directly antagonistic position to what god is supposed to represent.
I believe Jesus was a real man, who had sex and loved women and raised a family. Hell, he was a carpenter and that's pretty hot! :)
Whenever I make this argument, I am told, "but he died for our sins!". Come on, does that really make sense? Wouldn't it make more sense to just believe that god expects us to be kind to each other, to try your best to be a good person, to try to make society a reflection of good instead of evil? Is it really believable that the crucifixion of one person absolves the rest of us from being crappy people?
It's not that I don't believe in a higher being; it's that I believe that there is more logic to it than the myth. I believe there is a god; but I can't answer what it is, or how it works. What I do know is that nature is incredibly complex and any creator of it all MUST be a scientist. You just can't go from creating the universe to nailing your son to a cross.
It just doesn't make sense to me.
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