Thinking of Egotism

"THINK OF THE EGOTISM", said an astute Robert Ingersoll,"of a man who believes that an infinite being wants his praise". Good point, eh? Think of it indeed. To which one might add: Think of the arrogance and insecurity of an all powerful anthropomorphic being who wants, needs, or even cares about being worshipped and praised by lesser beings. Ingersoll was a prominent nineteenth century (1833-1899) thinker, writer, lawyer and speaker from a religious background who provided fascinating, eloquent persuavive arguments in defense of agnosticism. Both above remarks provoke thought, and make good, logical sense, but both can easily be refuted by any run of the mill Christian apologist. So can any intelligent argument agsinst the Christian faith. Its very simple, and it goes like this: "That's your point of view, not God's". Good luck trying to win an intellectual debate with a devout Christian, a debate in which said devout Christian accepts reason and admits that you have a compelling point of view. As we say, it aint happenin'...I am still perfectly free to harbor and expess my opinion that the Biblical anthropomorphic love starved attention craving deity is pure fiction, an invention of human fear, ignorance, longing for understanding, and conceit. An all powerful being, all too human, super human. Really? There is an abundance of unflattering and unpleasant human thought, imagination, and analysis underpinning not only Christianity but all organized religion. The always poplular expression among Christians "God fearing" is sufficient unto itself to push me away from the faith. I prefer loving to fearing God, and I would think most folks would. Again, the standard Christian admonition, "your preferences are not God's" rears its shallow head. The idea that an infinitely superior spirit that created the entire universe, requiring praise and worship from creatures of its own creation, and sitting in judgment of them, seems, seems supremely arrogant, naive, even laughable. How many intelligent species of life in the universe await or have received salvation through the shed blood of Christ the Lamb of God, washing away their sins in blood? Or are we the only ones? Both possibilies are equally frightening. One or the other must be true. With the advance of science and human understanding religion becomes less relevant and seems primitive and barbaric. Maybe it will fade out of human culture. The human species, abandoning its childish reliance on imaginary gods, and taking full responsibility for its own existence, problems, and destiny. Religion is mostly bad, but not entirely. All religion is imaginary, mental,emotional, psychological. It helps inspire and comforts us, andmeetsmany of our emotional and psychological needs. It helps binda society together,and gives millions of people a greater sense of community. Religion, however misguided, is an expression of the human quest for truth and understanding. What we must do, what we are impelled to do, is to find ever better ways of expressing our virtuous curiosity, our love of our creator and each other, and our reverence and yearning for connectedness to the vast and infinitely amazing universe in which we are so fortunate to live. Human religions of the future, or human philosophies, are bound to be an improvement on what we have always had, and have today. Perhaps creatures superior to ourselves will eventually give us guidance in this. For now, we are engaged in a life and death struggle, with ourselves only, a strugle we can only win if we somehow learn to stop destroying ourselves and the planet we inhabit. Perhaps this struggle will be the seed for future, more advanced religion. If nothing else, it should be enough to keep us busy, off the streets, and out of trouble.