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An article by Sha'Tara - local writer and friend.
Give me a Break
[thoughts from ~burning woman~ by Sha'Tara]
There are two major philosophies bandied about this neck of the woods of the planet these days, one receding almost as fast as it is splintering into meaningless sub-beliefs, the other expounding and exploiting an eclectic variety of theories about life, the universe and the cosmos, each slightly more off the wall than the next, but doing quite well in selling its paraphernalia, from aromatic candles to books, from sacred waters to seminars and movies.
Know what they are? The first, which I was born in, and later 'born again' in, is of course, Christianity. My first contact with that belief system was Catholicism. It wasn't too bad. It had meaning through rituals such as confession to a priest (not as easy as it sounds) then public communion at every mass, something you were banned from if you hadn't done your confession beforehand. Also, it was serious about it's teachings and as children we were fully expected to 'live' that life. Of course the chain of command broke down at the adult level. It wasn't difficult to see and sense the hypocrisy and futility of the religion 'in action' among parents, priests, bishops. Parents fought and abused each other and their kids. Practically everybody drank. There were fist fights in the general store. In keeping with all of that, pillars of the church regularly failed to pay wages to their employees. As for the religious leadership well, there was a lot of joking about the 'do as I say, not as I do.' Our priest disappeared one day and we found out much later it was because he was giving his personal touch to sex education for the girls at the church. So much for God's call to celibacy and holiness. At fourteen I said enough is enough and quit—church and God, lock, stock and barrel as we used to say.
(Yes, I was born old and I'm now one hundred and twenty six years old actually, no lie.) And where was I? Oh…
Much later I had an awakening following a near-death experience. I chalked it up to God—that was my training, you see, who else would care so much and give me back my life? So I became a born again Christian this time. At least that was something I could experiment with, an unknown quantity. Maybe I'd been wrong about judging these kinds of (non-Catholic) Christians as greedy, self-centered, and for the most part racist and fascist in their politics. I gave it a really good try… for about three years. The disillusionment far surpassed my Catholic debacle. And this time I had enough experience in the real world to know I wasn't being overly judgmental. No, these people weren't what I'd judged them to be from the outside, they were far, far worse on close up inspection and personal interaction.
I thought, OK, well, God must want me to show them what they are like, sort of a mirror from the world of the unbelievers, those 'believe what you will by don't believe it here' ungodly types who were destined for hell. So I told them how they were perceived by that 'outer world' and proceeded to prove to them that world wasn't wrong at all. In fact, it didn't know the half of it. The results were predictable. I found myself on the street. Also predictably, God didn't intervene on my behalf. So, I reasoned, God was on the side of Organized Christianity because it paid well. Lots of rich churches and organizations like Campus Crusade for Christ and Focus on the Family, lots of billionaire TV evangelists, lots of sacrosanct NUMBERS. And isn't it all about numbers in the capitalist and communist worlds? And any other worlds for that matter? Impeccable logic on my part.
So what do you do, once out on the street and nothing's left of your old life? Not being as yet the self-empowered and self-motivated (and driven, OK, I admit it) person I'm now, I looked for something NEW. There is always something claiming to be new out there after all. And there was. It called itself New Age. It was, admittedly, quite a mess of pottage to take on. It didn't seem to begin anywhere, and certainly wasn't going anywhere either. But it was chock full of self-important information, everything from Einstein to Elohim, from Madame Blavatsky to Jesus Himself. Who could resist? There was something good and wonderful for any taste in quasi-spirituality and pseudo science. Here you could find home-grown (oops, channeled) theories on quantum physics and the string theory, Satan worship for the soul, Shamanism riding in stretch limos, Indian gurus and Indian chiefs, animal talkers, plant talkers, Dolphin talkers, sacred stones, symbols and cymbals, music, chanting, Oming, Yoga and yogurt.
Meditation groups sprang up all over the neighborhood, sometimes even invading your own house: you'd watch while finishing dinner as weirdly dressed people carrying incense and guitars walked into your backyard, sat in a circle and began playing the couple of notes they'd memorized, and started chanting. (You wondered what your other neighbors were thinking while introducing yourself and realizing that you had actually invited a couple of them to your house in a moment of weakness the week before and the rest of these strangers were just the support group that came automatically with the territory.) Well, OK, I'd gone through parts of the Hippie commune days and home church gatherings so what the hell. At least these didn't go around saving the neighbors, or bring illegal substances. Mildly inoffensive.
You could attend endless seminars on the same topic served at different smorgasbords all over the planet. Yes, the dinner smorgs were different from the lunch smorgs. People channeled aliens and divinities in the same breath. Jesus and ET flew the same bicycle, or was it broom, across the skies. Entire legions of galactic federations, Melchizedek priesthoods, Pleiadian and Sirian fleets were gearing up to save the Earthians (but only after they engaged in interminable Galactic squabbles regarding who would be in charge), to take them gently (and not so gently if they raised a fuss) off their planet while it was being fumigated and redecorated, to be relocated later who knows where. Doesn't matter, the thing to remember was that for a few dollars, and a few dollars more… and a few more, it was all good. And if you did not believe that, you were in trouble with the Universe—it likes only positive thinking people. The rest are penniless and sick which explains why you're in debt, your second-born has the sniffles and your health-care costs are skyrocketing.
So here I am. In the very middle of the All Good. I have access (for a price) to undeniable information without any proof that the Universe is literally begging to give me millions of dollars, if only I would buy the instruction manuals, take the Course In Miracles, follow the seminars. The Universe, you see, has one Law that supercedes all other Laws. That's the Law of Attraction, what else? Know this Law of Laws and you're in. Easy street. Pick the house you always wanted and before you know it the people are giving it to you because… they won the lottery and they're moving back to Baghdad. Or they had a tragedy (they didn't know about the downside of the Law of Attraction, stupid people) and the house was put on the market for quick sale. As it turned out you had the corresponding amount of dollars in hand because YOU won the lottery that morning, and just happened to be walking your Rottweiler when the realty saleswoman was hammering the sign in the yard so you bought YOUR house. And you lived happily ever after. With Peter Pan and Wendy in the attic.
But that's not all. There's more. You see, even after all was sold and said about the Law of Attraction, it was still a deep, dark SECRET. But some wonderful channelerette from Down Under was kind enough to put that into a book and reveal THE SECRET for all of benighted Earthianity to buy so they can learn how to use the Law of Attraction properly. It worked for her and she's rich now. See? What did I tell you.
So that's where we are right now. Of course we could ignore the great dying Religion of Latter Corporation Days; ignore the fact that New Age is for the most part just a bunch of disgruntled Christians, hence the endless references to the Holy Trinity (but now with a goddess as the third member), archangels, angels and all of that, hence just an aspect of the disintegration. We could ignore all spiritism. But then what?
Surely not TV. There's another dinosaur. All I hear from TV watchers is grumbles that there's nothing new there, and too many channels… Too many channels? That's the complaint? I remember when it was black and white, had 1.3 to 1.7 channels (if you didn't mind snow on your summer beaches while spending half your watching time on the roof aligning, or tying down, that ghastly aluminum aerial) and it actually shut down with a pattern screen at 11:00 PM. I remember when large TV's were 14 inches across and they were a tool of the Devil which, if need be, you could fix yourself by changing tubes in the back. And they could set your house on fire. That was because of the tubes, not because they belonged to the Devil, nor because of the content although, come to think of it, you could smoke on TV, but since it was a tool of the Devil, you couldn’t swear there and you couldn't go butt-naked, unless you were doing a sun block commercial and were under 5 years old. Child porn, anyone?
I gave up watching TV the day they asked me to pay for it. Who would pay to watch or listen to something so utterly wasteful, stupid, brain dead? Where there's something for everybody, there's really nothing for any one. That truism applies to every aspect of marketing, not just TV.
Now what? Of course: the Internet. Who needs religion or spiritism when you can live in never-never land just by clicking a mouse? The Internet brings you the world… ads by Google, praise Jesus, Allah be praised, add to shopping cart. So now we have a truly new, global religion. The overriding religion, the one that can bring you all the others, according to your every desire or whim. Depending on the mood it gives you, choose a topic, click on a link, fill up with enough disinformation to clog the arteries of a healthy, medium sized solar system, then pass on the links to "friends" all over the planet. Now this is living!
There is always another option, of course. I call it self-empowerment. Personal choice in living a life not dependent on the offerings of fools and opportunists. But that's too much like making your own toys, creating your own entertainment. Where's the fun in that when you can spend $100,000 to do what a kid with a branch, a piece of string, a tin can, a safety pin and a worm did for fun once upon a time and managed to bring home dinner?
But hey, I don't want to piss off the Universe again! Read my lips: things ARE getting better and it's ALL good.
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I gave up on all religion a long time ago. My well being is fine without the help of whatever the latest fad is. I do believe in good science--and I'm the judge of that.
Ron
We've been down the same paths--surprised we didn't run into each other along the way lol. My final step was just being spiritul--"you and me, God" and ignore the nonsense. So far its working quite well. It may be the sad state of the country and world but I find more people like myself around lately and that's a good thing to my mind. Good post!!
Micki
Georg
PS. Tell Regis that he was featured on Guess from Hell (part three)
Kathy
TRASK...
Could you be saying that the SECRET IS - there is NO SECRET?
OR - could it simply be that POWER begets POWER?
The rich get richer - the poor get poorer -
in the meantime, in between time -
AIN'T WE GOT FUN?
IF - Daddy just happens to be rich - and you don't like your silver spoon -
buy a GOLD one, or a PLATINUM one!
IF - Daddy happens to be poor - then SUCK HIND TIT!
IF - Daddy is MIDDLE INCOME - ENJOY YOUR MEDIOCRITY - AND -
KEEP ROWING THE FREAKING BOAT!
Peace, my Friend ... Tom.
Nicole