Singing Along

I FULLY ANTICIPATE that at this week's gospel sing-along get-together we will again sing the praises of the poor man who was tortured to death that whosoever worships him will be saved from the eternal fires of hell, comforted by the fact that the torture, after all was said and done, was only temporary, and that the poor man's sacrifice was only that he lost a weekend. So was he or was he not God? Was he merely human? They discussed this as the Council of Nicea, in present day Turkey, in teh year of our Lord three twenty five A.D., and split the difference; he was both. Joshua ben Joseph, elected through the demmocratc process to the office of God, but keeping his hat in the human ring, so to speak. I'm good to go with all that; its the washing away my sins in blood that disconcerts, nay, repulses me. Several thousand years ago, all over the world, pre scientific societies decided that the only way to explain existence was to assume that an all powerful anthropomorphic being in the sky, or atop Mt. Olympus, pulled the strings, that hewas a meat eater, and that to offer him the blood sacrific of virgin human flesh would placate his anger. God, feeding upon human flesh. Like a little known song lyric says: "You can keep the cross, just give us Jesus". There are approximately fifteen hundred organized religions in the United States, about half of which are Christian denominations. We know this because they are registered with the government for purposes of tax evasion. Globally, there are in excess of four thousand religions. let us assume for the sake of conciliation that they are all conduits to what Einstein called "the old eternal genius who built the world". there are as many ways to the mountain top as there are people making the climb. I would just as soon attend an islamic service and sing Islamic songs, if there were any. Goethe said it best. (Goethe said many things best). "When I realized that everyone invents his own religion, I decided to invent mine". Or einstein: "My religiosity consists in humble admiration of the infinitely superior spirit which reveals itself in what little we, with our weak and transitory understanding, can comprehend of reality. I cannot conceive of a personal God who would sit in judgment over creatures of his own creation. Morality is of the umtost imortance, for mankind, but not for God." for me, the notion of an anthropomorphic God-in-the sky is as untenable as the notion that by sacrificing a virgin in a bloody ritual, we appease an angry God, and save ourselves from eternal suffering. Again, Goethe: "Pure was Jesus in his passion, in his heart but one God serving. Who of him a God would fashion, from his sacred will is swerving". You can keep the cross, just give us Jesus. I look forward each week to singing "How Great Thou Art".