by Yukon Jack
The Eternal Wellspring of Hope trumps any evidence. The fact that there is absolutely not the slightest piece of evidence matters not, because humans want to believe. The Gospels give billions of people hope of a better life, in the afterlife. Add to that the promise of eternal life and you got a package deal, the car and a 10 year warranty to boot.
If you break down this religious stuff, disassemble the components to see how it works, humans have invented religions for one, and only one reason. They are sentient, meaning self aware that they are alive and do not want to die. They fear death, death is non-existence, and if you know you are alive, well who wants to not exist? So one promise religion makes is that with belief alone you can beat death.
Be sure to realize there is no evidence that anyone can beat death, but billions of people do believe and it is the main reason why the Gospels are so popular. Jesus beat death, and if you believe in him, you too can beat death. So when it comes to the Palestinians, they matter not, because the Christians want heaven so much, they have collectively decided to back Jews because Jesus was a Jew. And if some Palestinians have to be slaughtered, so what, if I’m going to heaven for all eternity to be with Jesus, and a few eggs have to be cracked, so be it. Christians, for that reason, are indifferent to the total humiliation and slaughter of the Palestinians. They have their eyes on the prize.
But that is not all, the other big reason the Gospels sell is because of hope of a better life. Life sucks, let’s face it, most people hate their jobs, the stress, taxes, relationships, and life in general. So the other big promise of the Gospels is that in the next life, heaven, it is perfection, no worries, no job, don’t have to work, no taxes, no suffering of any kind. With that promise, humans can then tolerate the horrible conditions on earth, because you see, all they have to do is reach the goal post, die and go to heaven – for all eternity. Hope is the cope dope while on earth.
Never mind, as you say, any proof. There is no proof, but belief goes on and what the believers really don’t like, is the naysayers like you and me. The reason why is that the doubter, the rational argument weakens their faith and belief, and they sure as hell do not want that. This is IMO why atheists are persecuted and even called “antichrists”. The thinking atheist is the mortal enemy to the faithful believing theist. Thus, anyone using reason and logic is held in contempt and will have venom spit their way. No religion can survive two words: “PROVE IT”.
What the preacher is doing is selling hope. The job of the preacher is to convince the flock of the literalness of the Gospels, because if you find one error the whole yarn could unravel. Reason is the mortal enemy of faith the sheep are told, and that is true. So another thing the believers do is exclude any non-believers from their fold, and this is a big deal, to maintain faith, the believers are very exclusionistic, they do not want to mingle with any other faith or non-faith persons. The preacher sells heaven, collects the money upfront, and never has to deliver the car. Because when you are dead, how can you sue? You can not, and so the preaching business is full of money grubbing charlatans, making outrageous claims, to collect mucho shekels.
How the Gospels sells Jesus power to beat death needs to be mentioned, Jesus starts out with small miracles, like the loaves and fishes, then the miracles increase in absurdity, he walks on water, makes the blind see, raises Lazarus from the dead. Then the big grand finale (con job), Jesus beats death himself, comes back to life, and if you believe that, you too can beat death. So the religious pitch is very clear, if you believe Jesus could raise himself from the dead, so you too will beat death by believing in him. Of course there is exactly zero evidence any of it could be true, just have to believe, so to convince you of the whopper ressurection, Jesus does a whole bunch of miracles, to convince you that he could come back to life.
So a quick recap, humans want to believe, which means the Gospels will probably never go away until humans go away (like if we are replaced by robots). The reason for religion, and why only humans have religion, is because humans are fully sentient. All one has to do is look at the Gorilla and wonder why Gorillas have no need for god to figure out why we humans are so damn weird, to believe in god and fantastic claims of afterlife. Humans are also not fit, they are domesticated. Humans have to get jobs to get money to buy food. No other animals has to do that, because all of the wild animals are fit – fit meaning they fit into the environment and just eat everything around them, and have fur and no need for houses or cars or bank accounts.
The most amazing thing about religion is that it actually has convinced billions of people that they can beat death – without any real evidence to proving it true – religion is a sales job, it convinces you of a narrative found in a book. It is not like God Almighty opening up the heavens and telling you any of this, the whole story is in a book. Thus this Gospel story held in “reverence”. But you see, it is all just make believe. Every single thing in the Gospels is fiction, Jesus is fiction, his miracles are fiction, his apostles are fiction, the very writers of the story, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John are also fiction. Afterlife is fiction, the soul is fiction, the ability to survive death is fiction. All of it is 100% fiction and I am just a greatest of heretics for saying the obvious, a blasphemer, that in earlier times would of surely been burned at the stake.
I don’t care about religious threats, what I care about is how religion is playing out in end times, the believers are voting a certain way to make their beliefs come true. They will destroy the entire earth to prove that their god and beliefs are true, so with great delight they love all this death and destruction around Israel, because you see, it is prophecy coming true. But it isn’t, what is really happening is that they are willfully making their horrid beliefs come true. Christians are allied with Israel because it will force their savior to come back, or so they think. But since Jesus was never real, he can not come back, thus they will have to double down on their insanity again and again until the whole world blows up. That is the threat they pose us.
