Piety made me insane. Religion is a brain-devouring cancer.

[worrywart]

This will be a peek into one of my neuroses.

I was raised Christian and still am a (reluctant) Christian. I was reared in puritanical morality. I was raised to be obedient, to fathers, teachers, pastors, the State. When puberty came, with the lust for life and the healthy rebellion that accompanies it, I began to download countless obscure mp3s and arcane video game ROMs. I live in a third would country. Media is expensive here, particularly the esoteric media I like to consume. But thanks to piracy my pop culture erudition was quickly expanding. The flower of my soul was blossoming beautifully. Strange shapes and novel hues. We are all singular specimens as we follow our bliss. Here and nowhere else lies the glory of Creation.

Then came the night terrors. I rebuked the spectre in the name of Jesus and it fled. Then I knew I had to make a bonfire of the vanities. All those pre-baptism testimonies had fed me the script. My Radiohead and Pixies CDs and my Castlevania and Final Fantasy games went into the flames and my media collection was deleted into oblivion. I was 16. A few years later I learned that a lot of pious Christians do listen to secular bands and play vydia. That there's no need for such strictness. So I decided to get back into those things. But I had to pirate. I asked my pastors and my online Christian father figures what I should do. They all said it's a sin because of Romans 13. A passage I wish I could rip from the Bible and burn. I would strangle the apostle Paul to death if I could. The scrawny rambling weirdo.

That's the verdict with all the Christian luminaries. The simpering Protestant pastors and the Catholic priests in their solemn cassocks. They all sternly forbid file-sharing. I thought Christians were supposed to share but turns out it's against the law. John MacArthur outright said somewhere that Christians in the USSR should follow Soviet laws with utmost strictness. Which is insanity. Those laws are not meant to be followed. All Soviet citizens knew it. These laws are de jure but not the facto. How does this low IQ old geezer pastor does not know this. Probably because he's a low IQ old geezer. And yet he's a leader with a numerous flock. And there are many like him. Blind leading the blind.

Zizek the shrewd communist luminary talks about this. Some laws back in socialist Eastern Europe were not meant to be heeded. But nobody said so. You had to know it. That's what Zizek says. There's the law on paper and there's the tacit law and the tacit law is this: you do not follow the law on paper. A matter of survival. No one talks about it, everybody knows it. I tried talking about this subject with Christians online. Lenghty debates. What a bunch of f%cking lemmings. You can't get a single point into their thick skulls. They cling to the Normie Catechism tooth and nail. Treat you a leper if you stray one inch. "It's wrong because it's wrong and you know it."

Those Christians are mostly American, by the way. Most Christians on the anglophone internet are. And this has stoked my hate for America. I used to love America and I now hate it. The fascination is gone. A country of hard-hearted boors. Philistines and Pharisees the lot of them. The Christians anyway. I'm beginning to sympathize with liberals. Never thought the day would come.

Anyway my scrupulosity has grown byzantine. It's grown so bad I want to kill myself. I feel guilty for everything but I know my guilt is ridiculous. I feel guilty for pirating Windows but I know Bill Gates is outright killing millions and millions of people. I know my guilt is ret@rded. This causes me great shame. My dignity is gone. It has been destroyed. Cannot even walk with good posture. I am a downcast man. Cast into the pit of ignominy. A promising youth turned neurotic wreck.

The guilt has grown weird. A tyrant in my brain, a sadistic superego. Because I know too well that the law is aligned with the beast system, I feel guilty when wandering into vaguely clandestine places. I feel guilty for using Yandex or buying things at stores in the outskirts of the city. This is a ret@rded guilt. It should be the other way around. My conscience should approve of using the clandestine website and helping the little store. But my conscience is ret@rded. Forgive my language. Only harsh language is faithful to reality here. I don't want to soften it. I want to be sincere. It was made ret@rded by Christianity. Christianity has implanted a cruel and inhuman tyrant in my mind. If an activity is noble and worth pursuing this tyrant will punish me. If the activity is base and vulgar and a complete waste of time the tyrant will leave me alone.

Jesus thundered against the Pharisees but the Pharisees were simply pious Jews. Today's pious Catholics are exactly like the Pharisees of Gospel times, obsessed with rules and ever scowling at those who would transgress the smallest of those rules. But where's the new Jesus who will set them straight? Around Jesus' new religion a new Pharisaism coalesced. Who is the new prophet who will splinter this stultifying crust that has accrued around the core of Jesus' message? Who will rail against pastors who pontificate against jaywalking even as they live in sumptuous mansions? Against the priests who pontificate against file-sharing even as their seminary colleagues thrust their boners into little boys' mouths? I have to use strong language. Let's not temper the language. Let's speak like the Old Testament prophets. Let's use blunt words. Let's paint a realistic picture so that the truth may set us free. Who will deliver Christian morality from the smegma of scrupulosity that now covers its every jot and tittle and restore it to a true law of love rather than scruple, of empathy rather than stiff-lipped legalism?

Zoom out and the pattern becomes clear. Religions are traps. Burning gospels of love soon wax cold and turn to stone, tablets of stone, hard and heavy decalogues with their endless webs of talmudic implications. Endless chains of moralistic implications which are the chains of a prison. Syllogism by syllogism Catholic moralists arrive at the conclusion that every act that can be named is a sin. A sin to then be classified into mortal or venial. Holiness is self-obliteration. No new prophet will arrive to overthrow the current system. Jesus might as well be an alien. Christianity might as well be an alien deception. And so here we are. Remain a mere pew-warmer and you stay within the walls of orthodoxy, but follow the religion as strictly as you can and you end up a lunatic. And then you begin to wonder if this Jesus guy is really all that loving. Something here is off. There's something wrong with Christianity.

 

[Momma]

I’m sorry. I hope that’s ok to say. This is such a difficult way to grow up. I’m just sorry; and I believe you are going to heal fully. Peace.

 

[Perry Staltic]

I love how you write; good command of English and excellent expression of thoughts. Jesus came to set you free and not be bound up by these monsters. He hates the works of Pharisees and Nicolaitans who put his children into bondage for their own glory by teaching the commandments of men that in effect nullify the commandments of God, and who scour the earth for converts to make them two-fold more the children of hell than they are. The prophets are arising to witness that their system will be overthrown and destroyed. Soon. You may be one of them. Don't discard the faith. The law is faith and love.

 

[Momma]

This is about one minute long. It’s about religion being the final blasphemy. Google was watching my content I suppose, since I’ve never seen this before. I send to encourage you.


View: https://youtube.com/shorts/8CvAAuYcQZs?feature=share

 

[Blossom]

Our enemy loves sowing confusion and attacking humanity. Especially Christians/Christianity. Remember to not look to any man (human) for your salvation but only Christ himself. Certainly God can and does use others to help us and the world but there are also many well intentioned yet delusional people spreading lies and doing satans bidding without even realizing it. I personally pray for guidance, protection and Our Father’s Will each day and it helps. We need to stay humble because that’s keeps us from falling into pride which his another favorite tactic of the evil one.

 

[Warrior]

But where's the new Jesus who will set them straight? Around Jesus' new religion a new Pharisaism coalesced. Who is the new prophet who will splinter this stultifying crust that has accrued around the core of Jesus' message?

Wouldn't that technically make him the anti-christ and have all the true believers screeching in his presence? Especially if he, like the one who came before him, says the exact opposite of the accepted ways and teachings with the intent or reforming that which initially led you to think like this.

I do like the fact you're thinking though. Its a great habit that I fully encourage.

 

[Perry Staltic]

But I had to pirate. I asked my pastors and my online Christian father figures what I should do. They all said it's a sin because of Romans 13. A passage I wish I could rip from the Bible and burn. I would strangle the apostle Paul to death if I could. The scrawny rambling weirdo.

Paul was an effing genius. How anyone can turn copying software into sin using 1 Corinthians 13 boggles my mind. It would be like saying you're sinning if you sing a song someone else wrote.

If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but I do not have love, I have become as sounding brass or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophecies, and know all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so as to move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. And if I give out all my goods, and if I deliver my body that I be burned, but I do not have love, I am not profited anything. Love has patience, is kind; love is not envious; love is not vain, is not puffed up; does not behave indecently, does not pursue its own things, is not easily provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices in the truth. Love quietly covers all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails. But if there are prophecies, they will be caused to cease; if tongues, they shall cease; if knowledge, it will be caused to cease. For we know in part, and we prophesy in part; but when the perfect thing comes, then that which is in part will be caused to cease. When I was an infant, I spoke as an infant, I thought as an infant, I reasoned as an infant. But when I became a man, I caused to cease the things of the infant. For now we see through a mirror in dimness, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I will fully know even as I also was fully known. And now faith, hope, and love, these three things remain; but the greatest of these is love. 1 Corinthians 13

 

[Limon9]

Paul was a master shitposter and much smarter than your pastors.

The Irony of Romans 13
Novum Testamentum. Jul 2004;46(3):209-228. Carter TL.

"Paul himself had suffered numerous imprisonments and countless floggings, not to mention being stoned (2 Cor. 11:23-25). Some of these incidents may have been the result of 'mob rule', but others would have been official punishments, meted out by those in authority."

"When the straightforward meaning of a text is recognisably implausible or unacceptable, that is one of the signals that may alert the reader or audience to the presence of irony.'7 A word may be used in a context which renders unlikely or implausible the "dictionary definition" of the term, so that its normal meaning is subverted, or even reversed. Other signals for the presence of irony include the use of over- or understatement, the presence of factual or logical errors, an inappropriate use of style, or the basing of conclusions on overtly spurious reasoning."

"The use of irony in the latter part of the first century AD is spelt out by Quintilian: "[it is] important to bear in mind not merely what is said but about whom it is said, since what is said may in another context be literally true. It is permissible to censure with counterfeited praiseand praise under a pretence of blame."'9 According to Quintilian, the use of irony involves saying the opposite of what one means, so that the meaning conflicts with the language adopted. Irony may assume the tone of command or concession. It may entail mock self-disparagement, attributing to oneself the faults of one's opponents, or alternatively one may attribute to one's opponents good qualities that they do not actually possess; the latter technique is especially effective if the ironist possesses those qualities which are apparently conceded to the opponents."

"Paul himself was no stranger to the use of irony: he clearly employs this rhetorical device in the Corinthian correspondence, particularly in 1 Cor. 1-4 and 2 Cor. 10-13, where he engages in ironic, mock self- disparagement.21 More recently, Nanos has argued for the presence of irony in Gal. 1:6-9, claiming that Paul uses irony when he refers to the message of those influencing the Galatians as "good news".22 It should occasion no surprise to unearth irony in these, the most polemical of Paul's letters, since irony is an ideal rhetorical weapon for attacking one's opponents."

"Rom. 12-13 contains general paraenesis, which is bracketed by the exhortations to adopt a distinctive lifestyle in relation to the present age in Rom. 12:1-2 and 13:11-14; these paragraphs function as an inclusio, suggesting that the intervening passage should be read as an exhortation on how Christians should conduct themselves in an evil age which is passing away. 12:3-8 portrays the church as the body of Christ, and this is followed by a series of exhortations grouped under the heading,"Let love be sincere"(12:9-13).38 Catchword connection appears to link 12:13b and 12:14a, as Paul moves from pursuing hospitality to blessing one's persecutors. 12:15-16 then appear to focus on internal relations within the church again (does Paul have in mind the victims of persecution?), before Paul returns to relationships with outsiders in 12:17-21. Because Rom. 13:1-7 lacks any eschatological qualification, these verses have been identified as a foreign body in the letter,39 and the work of an interpolator has been suspected.40 However, an ironic reading of these verses locates them securely within the eschatological inclusio of 12:1-2 and 13:11-14, which subverts the apparent commendation of the authorities of 13:1-7: Paul only seems to grant the authorities an unconditional status: in reality they belong to the present age of darkness which is passing away. Furthermore, with reference to the immediate context, the move from considering how one should respond to one's enemies outside the church (12:17-21) to how one should relate to the authorities (13:1-7) is a natural one, if believers suffered at the authorities' hands.41 An ironic reading of Rom. 13:1-7, which portrays the authorities as enemies rather than as friends, provides a secure link with the preceding paragraph."

"Insofar as the poor were affected by taxes, it is appropriate to accept Tacitus' account, which suggests that Nero attempted to alleviate the burden of taxation suffered by the poor, since this corresponds well with what is known of Nero's desire to be popular with the masses, and so is historically plausible. The responsibility for the unfair taxation system thus rested, not primarily with the emperor, but with those who were responsible for collecting the taxes, whose rapacity was notorious. This is the background against which Paul's commendation of paying taxes needs to be read. It is the reputed dishonesty of Roman tax collectors that makes Paul's designation of them as λειτουργοὶ Θεοῦ all the more surprising."

"On the one hand it is apparent that the noun λειτουργοὶ could be used of a "public servant" who discharged a service to the state.61 If, as is possible, such service was given free of charge,62 then there is an inescapable element of irony in Paul's choice of this term to denote tax collectors, who were notorious for lining their pockets at others' expense. On the other hand,the phrase λειτουργοὶ Θεοῦ has inescapably cultic overtones.63 Citing Rom. 12:1, Dunn suggests that Paul's use of this phrase constitutes "a further reminder that the division between sacred and secular has been broken down".64 It is certainly the case that, if Paul had wanted to present the tax collectors as God's servants, he could scarcely have found a stronger way of putting it. Yet this would seem to be a clear case of Paul's language straining against the context in which it has been placed. Whereas the context suggests that λειτουργοὶ bears the normal secular meaning of "officials", the combination of words λειτουργοὶ Θεοῦ would normally bear the cultic meaning, "God's priests", especially for readers familiar with the LXX. Since that is such an inappropriate designation for the officials in question, it not surprising that this translation is not generally adopted. Yet may well be that Paul deliberately selected a cultic term to denote the tax collectors in order to guide his readers to an ironic interpretation of the passage: the lack of correspondence between the language Paul employs and the reality to which it refers is intended to signal the presence of irony. In this case, the designation of rapacious tax collectors as "God's priests" is a case of hyperbole: the use of religious language to denote the activity of the tax collectors stretches the meaning of the language to breaking point and highlights the way in which the tax collectors fail to live up to the designation applied to them.The discrepancy is intentional: God's priests? Nothing could have been further from the truth!"

"When read against the social context of the original readers of Paul's letter, it is apparentthat the way in which political power was exercised in Rome would not have predisposed Paul's readers simply to accept what the apostle wrote at face value. The lack of correspondence between his words and the reality to which they referred was too great. This points in the direction of the rhetorical use of verbal irony, where the tension between the words and the reality they denote can be enough to reverse the plain meaning of the text. In Rom. 13:1-7, Paul's commendation of the authorities is sufficiently overstated for his readers to understand it as a covert exposure of the shortcomings of Roman rule: the apostle adopts the ironic policy of "blaming through apparent praise."

". . . perhaps the greatest irony of Rom. 13 lies in the fact that Paul's ironic meaning has generally been missed, with the result that Rom. 13 has been used to support regimes every bit as corrupt and oppressive and hostile to Christianity as the Roman Empire in the days of Nero."

 

[OccamzRazer]

Jesus thundered against the Pharisees but the Pharisees were simply pious Jews. Today's pious Catholics are exactly like the Pharisees of Gospel times, obsessed with rules and ever scowling at those who would transgress the smallest of those rules. But where's the new Jesus who will set them straight? Around Jesus' new religion a new Pharisaism coalesced. Who is the new prophet who will splinter this stultifying crust that has accrued around the core of Jesus' message?

Really, really good thoughts.

 

[OccamzRazer]

@madman

Hope you feel better soon!

 

[kyle]

View: https://youtu.be/V5Jba8_4KMA


The main point is if someone asks forgiveness, they are given it. If someone keeps beating themselves up it is on one level rejecting forgiveness. God is not being the tyrant, that person is to themselves.

 

[yerrag]

This will be a peek into one of my neuroses.

I was raised Christian and still am a (reluctant) Christian. I was reared in puritanical morality. I was raised to be obedient, to fathers, teachers, pastors, the State. When puberty came, with the lust for life and the healthy rebellion that accompanies it, I began to download countless obscure mp3s and arcane video game ROMs. I live in a third would country. Media is expensive here, particularly the esoteric media I like to consume. But thanks to piracy my pop culture erudition was quickly expanding. The flower of my soul was blossoming beautifully. Strange shapes and novel hues. We are all singular specimens as we follow our bliss. Here and nowhere else lies the glory of Creation.

Then came the night terrors. I rebuked the spectre in the name of Jesus and it fled. Then I knew I had to make a bonfire of the vanities. All those pre-baptism testimonies had fed me the script. My Radiohead and Pixies CDs and my Castlevania and Final Fantasy games went into the flames and my media collection was deleted into oblivion. I was 16. A few years later I learned that a lot of pious Christians do listen to secular bands and play vydia. That there's no need for such strictness. So I decided to get back into those things. But I had to pirate. I asked my pastors and my online Christian father figures what I should do. They all said it's a sin because of Romans 13. A passage I wish I could rip from the Bible and burn. I would strangle the apostle Paul to death if I could. The scrawny rambling weirdo.

That's the verdict with all the Christian luminaries. The simpering Protestant pastors and the Catholic priests in their solemn cassocks. They all sternly forbid file-sharing. I thought Christians were supposed to share but turns out it's against the law. John MacArthur outright said somewhere that Christians in the USSR should follow Soviet laws with utmost strictness. Which is insanity. Those laws are not meant to be followed. All Soviet citizens knew it. These laws are de jure but not the facto. How does this low IQ old geezer pastor does not know this. Probably because he's a low IQ old geezer. And yet he's a leader with a numerous flock. And there are many like him. Blind leading the blind.

Zizek the shrewd communist luminary talks about this. Some laws back in socialist Eastern Europe were not meant to be heeded. But nobody said so. You had to know it. That's what Zizek says. There's the law on paper and there's the tacit law and the tacit law is this: you do not follow the law on paper. A matter of survival. No one talks about it, everybody knows it. I tried talking about this subject with Christians online. Lenghty debates. What a bunch of f%cking lemmings. You can't get a single point into their thick skulls. They cling to the Normie Catechism tooth and nail. Treat you a leper if you stray one inch. "It's wrong because it's wrong and you know it."

Those Christians are mostly American, by the way. Most Christians on the anglophone internet are. And this has stoked my hate for America. I used to love America and I now hate it. The fascination is gone. A country of hard-hearted boors. Philistines and Pharisees the lot of them. The Christians anyway. I'm beginning to sympathize with liberals. Never thought the day would come.

Anyway my scrupulosity has grown byzantine. It's grown so bad I want to kill myself. I feel guilty for everything but I know my guilt is ridiculous. I feel guilty for pirating Windows but I know Bill Gates is outright killing millions and millions of people. I know my guilt is ret@rded. This causes me great shame. My dignity is gone. It has been destroyed. Cannot even walk with good posture. I am a downcast man. Cast into the pit of ignominy. A promising youth turned neurotic wreck.

The guilt has grown weird. A tyrant in my brain, a sadistic superego. Because I know too well that the law is aligned with the beast system, I feel guilty when wandering into vaguely clandestine places. I feel guilty for using Yandex or buying things at stores in the outskirts of the city. This is a ret@rded guilt. It should be the other way around. My conscience should approve of using the clandestine website and helping the little store. But my conscience is ret@rded. Forgive my language. Only harsh language is faithful to reality here. I don't want to soften it. I want to be sincere. It was made ret@rded by Christianity. Christianity has implanted a cruel and inhuman tyrant in my mind. If an activity is noble and worth pursuing this tyrant will punish me. If the activity is base and vulgar and a complete waste of time the tyrant will leave me alone.

Jesus thundered against the Pharisees but the Pharisees were simply pious Jews. Today's pious Catholics are exactly like the Pharisees of Gospel times, obsessed with rules and ever scowling at those who would transgress the smallest of those rules. But where's the new Jesus who will set them straight? Around Jesus' new religion a new Pharisaism coalesced. Who is the new prophet who will splinter this stultifying crust that has accrued around the core of Jesus' message? Who will rail against pastors who pontificate against jaywalking even as they live in sumptuous mansions? Against the priests who pontificate against file-sharing even as their seminary colleagues thrust their boners into little boys' mouths? I have to use strong language. Let's not temper the language. Let's speak like the Old Testament prophets. Let's use blunt words. Let's paint a realistic picture so that the truth may set us free. Who will deliver Christian morality from the smegma of scrupulosity that now covers its every jot and tittle and restore it to a true law of love rather than scruple, of empathy rather than stiff-lipped legalism?

Zoom out and the pattern becomes clear. Religions are traps. Burning gospels of love soon wax cold and turn to stone, tablets of stone, hard and heavy decalogues with their endless webs of talmudic implications. Endless chains of moralistic implications which are the chains of a prison. Syllogism by syllogism Catholic moralists arrive at the conclusion that every act that can be named is a sin. A sin to then be classified into mortal or venial. Holiness is self-obliteration. No new prophet will arrive to overthrow the current system. Jesus might as well be an alien. Christianity might as well be an alien deception. And so here we are. Remain a mere pew-warmer and you stay within the walls of orthodoxy, but follow the religion as strictly as you can and you end up a lunatic. And then you begin to wonder if this Jesus guy is really all that loving. Something here is off. There's something wrong with Christianity.

Religion has very little to do with the Spirit.

It does things based on the letter of the law.

It does not abide by the spirit of the law.

The law is natural law, the law of nature and the law God gives to use through the Holy Spirit.

With the Spirit, you have courage and you have wisdom.

Be guided well.

 

[PeskyPeater]

I can be very simple about this: Monotheism is a scam. You are being duped. It is hiding truth.

Boom, lets go!

https://www.youtube.com/@kronos-7628

Full text of "The Saturn Myth - David N. Talbott"

 

[AlaskaJono]

@madman You have moved on. That is your good fortune. We all have imperfect upbringings, so if you are still are Christian, just do it yourself. As @yerrag stated, religion is not necessarily Spirituality. Usually it is not. Religion has succumbed to greed, money, deception, they have gone astray often. Follow the Teaching of Jesus, if that is what you hold most in your heart.

Being a spiritual person has nothing to do with a church. Never has and never will. No one or group can be a gatekeeper for you, that alone is a deception in my opinion. Be strong, forgive, be compassionate, and move on as you will have greater connection and more possibilities. I stated this recently in another thread, a friend said to me years ago, "Trust God, Love People". We do our best.

 

[Hugh Johnson]

This will be a peek into one of my neuroses.

I was raised Christian and still am a (reluctant) Christian. I was reared in puritanical morality. I was raised to be obedient, to fathers, teachers, pastors, the State. When puberty came, with the lust for life and the healthy rebellion that accompanies it, I began to download countless obscure mp3s and arcane video game ROMs. I live in a third would country. Media is expensive here, particularly the esoteric media I like to consume. But thanks to piracy my pop culture erudition was quickly expanding. The flower of my soul was blossoming beautifully. Strange shapes and novel hues. We are all singular specimens as we follow our bliss. Here and nowhere else lies the glory of Creation.

Then came the night terrors. I rebuked the spectre in the name of Jesus and it fled. Then I knew I had to make a bonfire of the vanities. All those pre-baptism testimonies had fed me the script. My Radiohead and Pixies CDs and my Castlevania and Final Fantasy games went into the flames and my media collection was deleted into oblivion. I was 16. A few years later I learned that a lot of pious Christians do listen to secular bands and play vydia. That there's no need for such strictness. So I decided to get back into those things. But I had to pirate. I asked my pastors and my online Christian father figures what I should do. They all said it's a sin because of Romans 13. A passage I wish I could rip from the Bible and burn. I would strangle the apostle Paul to death if I could. The scrawny rambling weirdo.

That's the verdict with all the Christian luminaries. The simpering Protestant pastors and the Catholic priests in their solemn cassocks. They all sternly forbid file-sharing. I thought Christians were supposed to share but turns out it's against the law. John MacArthur outright said somewhere that Christians in the USSR should follow Soviet laws with utmost strictness. Which is insanity. Those laws are not meant to be followed. All Soviet citizens knew it. These laws are de jure but not the facto. How does this low IQ old geezer pastor does not know this. Probably because he's a low IQ old geezer. And yet he's a leader with a numerous flock. And there are many like him. Blind leading the blind.

Zizek the shrewd communist luminary talks about this. Some laws back in socialist Eastern Europe were not meant to be heeded. But nobody said so. You had to know it. That's what Zizek says. There's the law on paper and there's the tacit law and the tacit law is this: you do not follow the law on paper. A matter of survival. No one talks about it, everybody knows it. I tried talking about this subject with Christians online. Lenghty debates. What a bunch of f%cking lemmings. You can't get a single point into their thick skulls. They cling to the Normie Catechism tooth and nail. Treat you a leper if you stray one inch. "It's wrong because it's wrong and you know it."

Those Christians are mostly American, by the way. Most Christians on the anglophone internet are. And this has stoked my hate for America. I used to love America and I now hate it. The fascination is gone. A country of hard-hearted boors. Philistines and Pharisees the lot of them. The Christians anyway. I'm beginning to sympathize with liberals. Never thought the day would come.

Anyway my scrupulosity has grown byzantine. It's grown so bad I want to kill myself. I feel guilty for everything but I know my guilt is ridiculous. I feel guilty for pirating Windows but I know Bill Gates is outright killing millions and millions of people. I know my guilt is ret@rded. This causes me great shame. My dignity is gone. It has been destroyed. Cannot even walk with good posture. I am a downcast man. Cast into the pit of ignominy. A promising youth turned neurotic wreck.

The guilt has grown weird. A tyrant in my brain, a sadistic superego. Because I know too well that the law is aligned with the beast system, I feel guilty when wandering into vaguely clandestine places. I feel guilty for using Yandex or buying things at stores in the outskirts of the city. This is a ret@rded guilt. It should be the other way around. My conscience should approve of using the clandestine website and helping the little store. But my conscience is ret@rded. Forgive my language. Only harsh language is faithful to reality here. I don't want to soften it. I want to be sincere. It was made ret@rded by Christianity. Christianity has implanted a cruel and inhuman tyrant in my mind. If an activity is noble and worth pursuing this tyrant will punish me. If the activity is base and vulgar and a complete waste of time the tyrant will leave me alone.

Jesus thundered against the Pharisees but the Pharisees were simply pious Jews. Today's pious Catholics are exactly like the Pharisees of Gospel times, obsessed with rules and ever scowling at those who would transgress the smallest of those rules. But where's the new Jesus who will set them straight? Around Jesus' new religion a new Pharisaism coalesced. Who is the new prophet who will splinter this stultifying crust that has accrued around the core of Jesus' message? Who will rail against pastors who pontificate against jaywalking even as they live in sumptuous mansions? Against the priests who pontificate against file-sharing even as their seminary colleagues thrust their boners into little boys' mouths? I have to use strong language. Let's not temper the language. Let's speak like the Old Testament prophets. Let's use blunt words. Let's paint a realistic picture so that the truth may set us free. Who will deliver Christian morality from the smegma of scrupulosity that now covers its every jot and tittle and restore it to a true law of love rather than scruple, of empathy rather than stiff-lipped legalism?

Zoom out and the pattern becomes clear. Religions are traps. Burning gospels of love soon wax cold and turn to stone, tablets of stone, hard and heavy decalogues with their endless webs of talmudic implications. Endless chains of moralistic implications which are the chains of a prison. Syllogism by syllogism Catholic moralists arrive at the conclusion that every act that can be named is a sin. A sin to then be classified into mortal or venial. Holiness is self-obliteration. No new prophet will arrive to overthrow the current system. Jesus might as well be an alien. Christianity might as well be an alien deception. And so here we are. Remain a mere pew-warmer and you stay within the walls of orthodoxy, but follow the religion as strictly as you can and you end up a lunatic. And then you begin to wonder if this Jesus guy is really all that loving. Something here is off. There's something wrong with Christianity.

I can feel where you are coming from, and I agree with your conclusions. I have sought answers to the same questions, though from a different path. And I would share what few answers I found if you wish to consider them.

 

[Perry Staltic]

Being a spiritual person has nothing to do with a church. Never has and never will.

I wouldn't put it that way. The church is Christ's body; its members are connected to one another and function best when together. Going it alone is a contingency response to maintain purity and faith in the midst of apostasy and uncircumcised-in-heart church goers. It's a bug, not a feature, so to speak.

 

[yerrag]

I wouldn't put it that way. The church is Christ's body; its members are connected to one another and function best when together. Going it alone is a contingency response to maintain purity and faith in the midst of apostasy and uncircumcised-in-heart church goers. It's a bug, not a feature, so to speak.

When the spirit, mind,.and body are one, there is unity. What one thinks, one says, one does so in unison.

How the church can be this way, can be so before political considerations seep right in. But humanity is flawed, and the church cannot mend this. It is more realistic to see the flaw of humanity personified in the church. The flaw is the corruption that is in our nature as a collection of individuals, with the worst in us doing his best (in the worst way) to game the system to his advantage.

It would be a matter of short order to turn any institution, with the best and most noble intentions, to become only a shadow of its best intentions. Instead of the church being a moderating influence on a capricious state, it turns into an apologist for all the evil actions done by the state.

The church, in practice, is not the body of Christ. It only feigns being so.

 

[Perry Staltic]

The church, in practice, is not the body of Christ. It only feigns being so.

To a large degree, but not universally true. There are faithful churches

 

[Blossom]

To a large degree, but not universally true. There are faithful churches

Yes, perhaps hard to find these days but they still exist and it’s worth the effort to search for one. We were called to be in communion/community.

 

[AlaskaJono]

When the spirit, mind,.and body are one, there is unity. What one thinks, one says, one does so in unison.

How the church can be this way, can be so before political considerations seep right in. But humanity is flawed, and the church cannot mend this. It is more realistic to see the flaw of humanity personified in the church. The flaw is the corruption that is in our nature as a collection of individuals, with the worst in us doing his best (in the worst way) to game the system to his advantage.

It would be a matter of short order to turn any institution, with the best and most noble intentions, to become only a shadow of its best intentions. Instead of the church being a moderating influence on a capricious state, it turns into an apologist for all the evil actions done by the state.

The church, in practice, is not the body of Christ. It only feigns being so.

This, in my opinion, is the main point regarding most religious institutions from all styles, Hinduism, Buddhist, etc.. I would say that humans are flawed, or rather deluded, and we become more whole by facing our dark or negative side, and then growing. If the 'Church' is the body of JC, then why does the Vatican sit on top of treasures worth Billions or Trillions? Why does that Catholic Church support the destruction of the 'Orthodox Church'.

There wasn't a formal 'Church' related to JC until one of the Big meetings around 200AD. You know, to get the whole organization under one roof. Nothing to do with spiritual matters, just control. Anyhow, I am bowing out of this thread, and wish you well! Safe travels.