Jesus of Nazareth, known as "J-dogg" by some

[On his way out]

In my experience, even among decent Catholics, the idea of people’s most hated ideological and moral enemies going to hell gives them a certain thrill. Nietzsche had his theory of ressentiment—the lurid, undignified pleasure taken from getting religious revenge. Hence his notion of Christianity originating as a "chandala" cult: the lowly, the slaves, the prostitutes, and the loonies could all look forward to having their ultimate revenge on the Romans on the Day of Judgment.

You bang this drum a lot and I can't claim your experience, but again it's way off what I hear. It sounds like you stumbled into the abbey of St Gollum, archsmiter of the successful. There is far less talk of hell among Christians these days. Even classic evocations like Dante or the Jesuit in Joyce are not targeted at enjoying revenge on one's oppressors, but warnings for oneself. Lawrence acknowledges there is a tenderer, nobler form of Christianity which he sees as more Jesus and less Revelation John. Can I encourage Lucifer Sam to set the controls for the heart of the Son?

 

[Lucifer Sam]

No worries LS, formerly I AM. My irritation is unintended. Yet why refer to me as "anon"? My tag is "On his way out", my title "Guest". It has not changed. There are plenty of "Anons" on the site- to my knowledge none have compared the Gospels to the Mozpels (favourably at least).

An “anon” for me is any unregistered account. It makes sense if someone just wants to make a post or two and never be heard from again, but otherwise, in terms of “netiquette,” it seems a little rude. You can’t see other people rating your posts interesting or funny etc., nor can you kindly (or unkindly) rate ours. And as an anon your posts have to languish until they get moderator approval, but I think if you valued us you would want us to see your posts as you make them. But maybe I’m missing something. What advantages are there to remaining unregistered?

Is it eternal? Mt 10.28 says fear him who can destroy body and soul in hell. Mt 25:46 does refer to eternal punishment- is this an exaggeration like the "uncountable" multitude of Revelation 7:9? But if it is eternal, I don't think that invalidates the penalty. Most of our societies that reject the death penalty happily continue with life imprisonment, often with sentences for hundreds of years. In either case, hell is best avoided.

Yes, but hundreds of years is still a finite penalty. Even if a person committed the absolute maximum amount of evil anyone could possibly fit into a human life span, it would still not merit a punishment where billions of years of torture is just a tiny drop in the ocean of it. There’s also the fact monsters are made, not born. God would know every last mitigating factor that went into why a person became a monster, so he more than anyone else would have reason to ultimately forgive.

 

[Lucifer Sam]

never heard of her. Is one holy simply because it’s stated on a t-shirt? And the need to broadcast it by wearing it, may point to something they are actually lacking in their life?

Foolish holy? ‘Look at me’ holy?
Not wholly holy, but in part holy? Harmless holy?

Though, maybe I shouldn’t have spoken on the behalf of all non-dualists, lol. But for me, it’s not the persons separate self that would be considered holy, that’s not to say that I would condemn it as entirely evil. I would think it depends on what their actions are motivated by, in order to label it holy or not.

Though I guess the word holy may have different meanings for most.

I didn’t know who Noa Tishby was either, until nicky wire’s legs developed a crush on her. She’s an Israeli actress and a cheerleader on social media for the destruction of Gaza. I've also noticed she sometimes appears as a guest on Fox News to give an update on how anyone who criticizes Israel is an anti-Semite.

As for Allen Ginsberg, maybe he was more a pantheist than a non-dualist. But if “everything is holy,” then wouldn’t holy just be redundant? It would mean nothing is profane, so holy would be a meaningless concept.

 

[DreamingofStew]

Jesus Christ appears to combine two very oddly matched roles: healer and judge.

Having said that, I am not sure what the West, formerly known as Christendom, is going to do without him. We have bombers on the right side, loonies on the left, and the rest of us are stuck in the middle, increasingly without JC.

 

[Lucifer Sam]

 

[ZOOM FROM GLOOM]

I didn’t know who Noa Tishby was either, until nicky wire’s legs developed a crush on her. She’s an Israeli actress and a cheerleader on social media for the destruction of Gaza. I've also noticed she sometimes appears as a guest on Fox News to give an update on how anyone who criticizes Israel is an anti-Semite.

Hmmm.

In general, it’s unfortunate that social media has given such an easy way to have a platform and make one suddenly believe that they are important. Though, unsurprisingly, the uglier one is, the farther reach they’ll gain.

Though, I always found people that work in politics directly very unattractive, and I don’t mean simply appearances.

As for Allen Ginsberg, maybe he was more a pantheist than a non-dualist. But if “everything is holy,” then wouldn’t holy just be redundant? It would mean nothing is profane, so holy would be a meaningless concept.

Yes good point. Ginsberg wrote that in 1955, so I’m not sure at all if even he at that time knew what he was talking about, or if he would even choose a single label.

Even with the contradiction. I believe it’s a better point of view to take, in regards to seeing value and importance in the everyday.

 

[On his way out]

An “anon” for me is any unregistered account. It makes sense if someone just wants to make a post or two and never be heard from again, but otherwise, in terms of “netiquette,” it seems a little rude. You can’t see other people rating your posts interesting or funny etc., nor can you kindly (or unkindly) rate ours. And as an anon your posts have to languish until they get moderator approval, but I think if you valued us you would want us to see your posts as you make them. But maybe I’m missing something. What advantages are there to remaining unregistered?

Thank you for taking the time. The short explanation is I like to minimise my digital footprint, within reason. The rudeness of posting as a guest eludes me. You have listed things I miss out on, which sounds like my concern rather than your loss, except perhaps my rating of others' posts. I can still comment on posts. Horace suggested his work lie nine years before publishing. A few hours' delay for my post is fine with me and I don't see how it undervalues the reader.
Surely changing a username midstream is far more difficult for others? Which is not to say you don't have your own good reasons for it.

God would know every last mitigating factor that went into why a person became a monster, so he more than anyone else would have reason to ultimately forgive.

This goes back to downgrading free will doesn't it? Moral monsters are surely made by choice, not circumstance.

 

[nicky wire's legs]

Hmmm.

In general, it’s unfortunate that social media has given such an easy way to have a platform and make one suddenly believe that they are important. Though, unsurprisingly, the uglier one is, the farther reach they’ll gain.

Though, I always found people that work in politics directly very unattractive, and I don’t mean simply appearances.



Yes good point. Ginsberg wrote that in 1955, so I’m not sure at all if even he at that time knew what he was talking about, or if he would even choose a single label.

Even with the contradiction. I believe it’s a better point of view to take, in regards to seeing value and importance in the everyday.

Noa tishby is not just an influencer. She's an Israeli actress and producer turned Israel's special envoy for combating anti-semitism and has written a comprehensive book about Israel. She's very accomplished and knows what she's talking about.

 

[nicky wire's legs]

Though I've always known who she was in a non-political sense because I used to like this Israeli jewelry company Michal negrin and she was the model for that

 

[nicky wire's legs]

I don't really like that jewelry so much anymore, for the record. I was going through a phase.

 

[Lucifer Sam]

Thank you for taking the time. The short explanation is I like to minimise my digital footprint, within reason. The rudeness of posting as a guest eludes me. You have listed things I miss out on, which sounds like my concern rather than your loss, except perhaps my rating of others' posts. I can still comment on posts. Horace suggested his work lie nine years before publishing. A few hours' delay for my post is fine with me and I don't see how it undervalues the reader.

I’d say you missing out on our reactions is our loss as well as yours, because we’re trying to tell you something with them. On a forum that offers it, the ratings system is a nice shorthand. Slightly off-topic, but I miss the options for “insightful” and “troll” (not that the latter would apply to you. Just in general). You’re right about the delay, it’s hardly the rudest thing in the world, and completely negligible in reality, but in the abstract promptness is a virtue. The letter kills, but the spirit gives life.

This goes back to downgrading free will doesn't it? Moral monsters are surely made by choice, not circumstance.

I don’t think it downgrades free will so much as it qualifies it. A moral monster would be someone who, say, tortures animals and rapes children. Those are things they choose to do, but what makes them want to do them in the first place? Surely some circumstances (whether genetic or conditioned) have conspired to make those things gratifying to the person. Most of us don’t have those urges at all. The thought never even occurs because the impulse isn’t there. It's Schopenhauer’s formula: “man can do what he wills, but he cannot will what he wills.”

Even most people who eat meat don’t say they enjoy the fact that animals are tortured for their food. They just say, “circle of life, bro. Top of the food chain.” They frame the torture as a naturalistic moral neutral—they’re as innocent in their own mind as a lion killing a gazelle. They’re trying to get rid of the cognitive dissonance. Which is different from a person who distinctly gets gratification from animal torture for its own sake, or is sexually attracted to children. An omniscient God would know how and why these derangements occur.

 

[The Wild Turkey]

The Wild T GOD has come!
"Movin' 'round the world, movin' like a great big beautiful Bird!"

 

[goinghome]

Yes, but hundreds of years is still a finite penalty. Even if a person committed the absolute maximum amount of evil anyone could possibly fit into a human life span, it would still not merit a punishment where billions of years of torture is just a tiny drop in the ocean of it. There’s also the fact monsters are made, not born. God would know every last mitigating factor that went into why a person became a monster, so he more than anyone else would have reason to ultimately forgive.

Did you see the new thread about Darling I Hug a Pillow, pointing out an omitted a lyric/verse which, on the album lyrics sheet, reads: "Roll and then rage and then roar for one hour, for 55 million years hence you will lie down as powder."

What do you think happens to the powder once the 55 million years has passed?! Does it strike you as a persuasively seductive line?

Jesus Christ appears to combine two very oddly matched roles: healer and judge.

Having said that, I am not sure what the West, formerly known as Christendom, is going to do without him. We have bombers on the right side, loonies on the left, and the rest of us are stuck in the middle, increasingly without JC.

That Gravenhurst song is sweet. I recently attended a funeral service where the priest compared Jesus to a live performer bringing God into ordinary everyday life with the human touch. I was quite impressed.

A spate of testimonies claiming reversion or conversion to Christianity has begun to erupt. You're not the only one wondering, where are we now. For example, the writer of a book called The New Atheism Hoax accuses the key figures of promoting war, among other ills:

...the two surviving New Atheists—Dawkins and Dennett—have been rather quiet about the Gaza genocide. Dawkins signed an open letter in support of Israel’s supposed right of self-defense, which in reality no country has while it illegally occupies another. But he has not written or tweeted about it, as far as I know. Harris, on the other hand, has published thousands of words on the subject (transcripts from his podcast). If his previous record is anything to go by, prepare, dear reader, to be twisted into logical pretzels and to be lied to by omission.

With the exception of Hitchens whom, in his final years, became a right-winger, the attention of liberals was diverted by the seductive, anti-religiosity of the New Atheists. Instead of analyzing the world through the only lens that matters—realpolitik—progressives were invited to divide the world into the simple dialectics promoted by George W. Bush and Osama bin Laden’s speechwriters: that of a “clash of civilizations,” to use a phrase popularized by Samuel P. Huntington.

For the New Atheists’ many critics who spent time trying to argue points of logic, none seemed to notice that the Four Horsemen had perpetrated an intellectual hoax by systematically misrepresenting their own sources.

 

[nicky wire's legs]

The Wild T GOD has come!
"Movin' 'round the world, movin' like a great big beautiful Bird!"

All hail the Wild T God!!

 

[Lucifer Sam]

Did you see the new thread about Darling I Hug a Pillow, pointing out an omitted a lyric/verse which, on the album lyrics sheet, reads: "Roll and then rage and then roar for one hour, for 55 million years hence you will lie down as powder."

What do you think happens to the powder once the 55 million years has passed?! Does it strike you as a persuasively seductive line?

That's a very good lyric, but I doubt it could redeem what I consider one of Morrissey's worst-ever songs. Taking it literally, I don't know what happens to the powder, but I assume the dust of a corpse is recycled into other matter over a few hundred years, unless one is mummified or fossilized or otherwise preserved.

As I understand it, matter is finite, so everything (material) that is, has been part of everything that came before it. "We're all stardust," say the gooey romantics. I don't particularly care what the atoms of my body were in the past or will be in the future. After I'm gone some of them will probably become part of other sentient suffering organisms, but that won't be my fault.

 

[Lucifer Sam]

Nick Cave is a dork.

 

[nicky wire's legs]

Nick Cave is a dork.

What the...?! explain yourself!

 

[Lucifer Sam]

What the...?! explain yourself!

Well, I didn't think much of the new song the Wild Turkey posted, and I also think it's cute how a millionaire rock star can't resist "the ringing intensity of Christ." I'll even pay Samsa a compliment here: that sounds like a Samsa-ism. Plus he goo-goo'ed about creation and the pneuma in that silly anti-AI letter read by Stephen Fry. I'll bet Nick Cave has pre-ordered the new Jordan Peterson book, We Who Wrestle With God, which itself almost sounds like an AI-generated Nick Cave song title. I don't know. You live long enough, and all this nonsense becomes tiresome.

 

[nicky wire's legs]

Well, I didn't think much of the new song the Wild Turkey posted, and I also think it's cute how a millionaire rock star can't resist "the ringing intensity of Christ." I'll even pay Samsa a compliment here: that sounds like a Samsa-ism. Plus he goo-goo'ed about creation and the pneuma in that silly anti-AI letter read by Stephen Fry. I'll bet Nick Cave has pre-ordered the new Jordan Peterson book, We Who Wrestle With God, which itself almost sounds like an AI-generated Nick Cave song title. I don't know. You live long enough, and all this nonsense becomes tiresome.

Well the thing is, you're not the authority on what is and what isn't cool. In your view being old equals being uninspired by life so maybe you just can't handle it that nick cave still finds inspiration in life.

 

[Lucifer Sam]

Well the thing is, you're not the authority on what is and what isn't cool. In your view being old equals being uninspired by life so maybe you just can't handle it that nick cave still finds inspiration in life.

The authority on what’s cool is everyone and no one, because cool is subjective. Look, if Nick Cave likes Christianity because J-dogg gives him “inspiration in life,” I can handle that. Do what you will, Nick Cave, as you make your blah late-period music. But I can still think it’s dorky. “Oh, you silly old man …”