ARE YOU TALKIN TO ME? to blame for 2000 years of monotheism

[Cargést]

Celsus (c180 CE) is said to have argued that Jesus was the bastard son of Mary and a Roman soldier named Panthera, used magic to deceive people into believing he was the son of a god, and there was no real difference between Christianity and many of the mystery religions existing at that time and some of the elements (such as the resurrection and virgin birth) could be found in older myths.

Motherfuckers.

[scourge]

Hordes of prophets arose from among the common folk around then, each promising to be The Vector to the Divine. Two made the big time for the long haul. One of them ultimately ended up as a method for rebellious commoners through the ages to subvert the authority of kingship or imperium; the only certain vectors to sustained reverence for divinity. The result was the erasure of Being and reverence from among the common folk. That detour from Neoplatonism in the urbanized regions and polytheism in heathendom was the turning point to slow ruin for the western hemisphere. Future Chinese historians take note here.

[Cargést]

I'd very much like to see something like this become popular amongst the far right of Europe, rather than Aryan Jesus.

[indjaseemun]

This kind of joke is interesting. I often wonder what is the meaning behind it and I have come to some conclusions (I'm ignoring the part of the joke that implies christianity is undesirable):

1. Magical Thinking - ARE YOU TALKIN TO ME? probably never read this information, so there is no apparent reason link the information with the name ARE YOU TALKIN TO ME? and christianity. Therefore the person unconsciously believes in some kind of esp or conectedness of all things, that would make, in the future, a band that they consider is related to christianity to adopt a name that is related to it. In this joke in particular this possibility is not good, but in others of the same kind it is, take the example of a character in a movie who is a homosexual and happens to have the same name of a viewer who is watching with his friends. His friends start to make fun of him because they both have the same name. There is no reason to believe names carry homosexual characteristics.

2. Natural Selection/Psychology - People often behave in curious ways. An example is when a teacher gives an example, let's say a law teacher. He picks two students and say "You are the killer, he is the victim". Then the person who is the victim says "But why me teacher? Ha ha" in a playful manner. He is being playful like this thread, but there is a meaning here. Why would he say that stupid thing if he knows it is just an example? Natural selection/Psychology. If there is a tense situation, if there is a class like the one I specified but in a war zone or some other hostile environment, you have to watch your words.

There is a mechanism in human life that deals with this: Do not let me be killed, even in examples. That's why some people would not like homosexual ficticious examples being used against them: "Fred, you and allan are a married gay couple and want to adopt a child..." Then the class starts to laugh, or fred or allan might get upset with this, or will try to take it as a joke and laugh along. Another example is name calling: If you are around normal people you are polite but you can afford to say some stuff... Like imply some person is a homosexual in a joker manner. But around a dangerous drug dealer you would not imply that in ANY way, be joking, be giving a ficticious example to teach him about the laws in gay marriage. Let's say the dealer asks you to teach him about gay marriage and you say: "OK, so you and that guy are a married gay couple..." "WHAT DID YOU SAY MUTHAFUCKA, BANG BANG". So when the poster saw this information and his primate self realized that the name was the same of a band he considered inferior, and this same name is associated with the undesirable christianity, he had to alert the tribe. It is not very reasonable to the more rational self, but it can be an ancient instinct.

[Mindtraveller]

Scourge:
How can Christianity, in which complete submissiveness towards divine authority is seen as the ultimate good, be misconstrued  as anti-authoritarian?  Compared to the deification of man seen in Eastern "that art thou" religions, I'd say true Christianity is the most authoritarian religion around.

[scourge]

How is the typical nosepicking asshat, who can't even consistently vote someone competent into office, expected to have the least concept of the majesty of Divinity? Where is this authoritarian church anyway? Does not exist. Probably illegal.

[Mindtraveller]

How is the typical nosepicking asshat, who can't even consistently vote someone competent into office, expected to have the least concept of the majesty of Divinity? Where is this authoritarian church anyway? Does not exist. Probably illegal.

The typical nosepicking asshat can gain an understanding of divinity by being humble and realizing he is just an infinitesimally small part of something very grand. The church I'm speaking of is the Vatican, and while it might not be the empire it was in medieval days, Catholicism itself has barely changed at all in its 1,000+ years of existence, and will never bend over for the crowd. True tradition.

[Dinaric Leather]

Catholicism itself has barely changed at all in its 1,000+ years of existence, and will never bend over for the crowd.

Haha if I didn't know better I'd think this is a bad joke. Are you really telling me the Catholic church for at least the past 100 years and probably longer hasn't been making more and more concessions to the crowd?

[Mindtraveller]

Haha if I didn't know better I'd think this is a bad joke. Are you really telling me the Catholic church for at least the past 100 years and probably longer hasn't been making more and more concessions to the crowd?

Enlighten me: How has it changed?

[vigor]

Haha if I didn't know better I'd think this is a bad joke. Are you really telling me the Catholic church for at least the past 100 years and probably longer hasn't been making more and more concessions to the crowd?

Enlighten me: How has it changed?

Start with Vatican II and the Novus Ordo mass. You'd have to be completely fucking delusional to think Catholicism isn't pandering to the modernist masses at every opportunity.

[Annihilation]

Haha if I didn't know better I'd think this is a bad joke. Are you really telling me the Catholic church for at least the past 100 years and probably longer hasn't been making more and more concessions to the crowd?

Enlighten me: How has it changed?

Start with Vatican II and the Novus Ordo mass. You'd have to be completely fucking delusional to think Catholicism isn't pandering to the modernist masses at every opportunity.

The Destruction of the Christian Tradition by Rama Coomaraswamy

[Mindtraveller]

Start with Vatican II and the Novus Ordo mass. You'd have to be completely fucking delusional to think Catholicism isn't pandering to the modernist masses at every opportunity.

Pandering? I don't think so. External appearance may have changed but the essence remains the same.

Vatican II - The Church realized that they're not an island and recognized a degree of parallelism between other Christian denominations.

Novus Ordo - They made mass understandable, thus more meaningful.

You could compare the changes to that of ANUS and the Amerika blog. Amerika is more palatable, but at the same time more substantial, because it avoids clubhouse mentality.

[vigor]

Start with Vatican II and the Novus Ordo mass. You'd have to be completely fucking delusional to think Catholicism isn't pandering to the modernist masses at every opportunity.

Pandering? I don't think so. External appearance may have changed but the essence remains the same.

Vatican II - The Church realized that they're not an island and recognized a degree of parallelism between other Christian denominations.

Novus Ordo - They made mass understandable, thus more meaningful.

You could compare the changes to that of ANUS and the Amerika blog. Amerika is more palatable, but at the same time more substantial, because it avoids clubhouse mentality.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQPkYwIOCRM

Making something more available to the common rabble does not make it more meaningful. The traditional Latin mass is a powerful ritual BECAUSE it's said in a liturgical language. It's powerful BECAUSE it's aesthetically impressive, complex, and regal. It employs chant to incite feelings of reverence for the divine. It's meaning is derived from the very impressive ritual of literal, flesh and blood union with the divine, without needing to have it explained in the vulgar tongue of the people. The Novus Ordo mass is a sham, because tradition and transcendent beauty have been eschewed in favor of catchy sing-along protestant hymns and ham-fisted sermons regurgitating lazy, lowbrow moral teachings that can be easily applied and assimilated into the already worthless false altruism of the congregants.

With regard to recognizing parallels with other Christian denominations, they flat out shouldn't unless it's Orthodoxy, because protestantism is worthless.

[Mindtraveller]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZQPkYwIOCRM

Making something more available to the common rabble does not make it more meaningful. The traditional Latin mass is a powerful ritual BECAUSE it's said in a liturgical language. It's powerful BECAUSE it's aesthetically impressive, complex, and regal. It employs chant to incite feelings of reverence for the divine. It's meaning is derived from the very impressive ritual of literal, flesh and blood union with the divine, without needing to have it explained in the vulgar tongue of the people. The Novus Ordo mass is a sham, because tradition and transcendent beauty have been eschewed in favor of catchy sing-along protestant hymns and ham-fisted sermons regurgitating lazy, lowbrow moral teachings that can be easily applied and assimilated into the already worthless false altruism of the congregants.

With regard to recognizing parallels with other Christian denominations, they flat out shouldn't unless it's Orthodoxy, because protestantism is worthless.

OK first of all, there's no way in hell the images in those video came from real liturgies, just about all of them are heretical and in no way should be representative of modern Catholicism.  Some bishops are more liberal than others, sure, but women priests? Not in a million years.

I too wish that parishes would play Palestrina instead of ham-fisted hippie hymns, I'll give you that,  but insofar as the Church speaking in the tongue of laymen, it really doesn't matter; what goes on behind the words is the same as it has always been. The "flesh and blood union with the divine" is stilll there.

[vigor]

I too wish that parishes would play Palestrina instead of ham-fisted hippie hymns, I'll give you that,  but insofar as the Church speaking in the tongue of laymen, it really doesn't matter; what goes on behind the words is the same as it has always been. The "flesh and blood union with the divine" is stilll there.

I guess so, if you actually believe that the priest is channeling Jesus into a fucking wafer. I'm a member of the 'belief is a means to an end, not an end in and of itself' camp, and care more about the pragmatic effect of the ritual on the congregants than I do about the actual eucharistic theology(because it's bullshit).