The more that I educate myself about the mysteries of the universe, I also learn about the psychopathy of those who would rather we STFU and forget our dreams of a better life.  Some of these people are more extreme than others–the Becks, Limbaughs, Palins, Coulters, etc.  But I’m not exempt. 

I’ve come across an idea that the conflicts that are emerging right now are not liberal-conservative or business/secular-religious/spiritual, but between expanders and restrainers.  To be sure, these terms are not the best–I am a rather expansive person, who doesn’t like to be restrained all that much.  Still, I appreciate that circumstances are pretty much telling us all that we need to accept limits.  That’s basically what “restrainer” means here–living life on LIFE’s terms, not on phantasmic terms I might come up with in some vaporous fog.

The expanders are all out there wishing/hoping/enforcing a viewpoint that to my eyes is quite self-destructive, as well as generally destructive to this planet at large.  At least for the purposes of mammalian survival, the choices we are having to face would seem to demand some rigorous and vigorous scouring of grimy and delusional beliefs about the techno-matrix we inhabit.  But no!  Instead we’re exhorted to go out and max out our credit cards, and hope and pray we can get even more credit to further indebt ourselves. 

There are the sturdy, steady folks out there who have been dutifully scrimping and saving, and it must be quite weird for them to suddenly be vilified as hoarders, when all they’re doing is preparing contingencies and keeping a prudent reserve.  Our crazy go-go-go age demands that we ignore prudence and thrift, say goodbye to virtue and honor, and deny the reality that is slapping us into oblivion.  (To disclose something about myself:  I look at some people such as Andrew Harvey and others, who are talking about some of this stuff, but for whom there is also some denial about the current situation, at least insofar as there’s a pernicious hope that Business As Usual (BAU) will some day return, when BAU is the very thing that we need to cease.) 

My 12 Step work says “Acceptance is the answer to all of my problems.”  And my spiritual training  says “A healthy priest makes all things sound.”  Sometimes I see that this sounding I send out periodically makes others a bit nutty.  It’s to be expected, but as people refuse to accept reality as it lays, as people put their own notions on it (and no, I’m not exempt from this occurrence either, though I tend toward the more pessimistic admittedly), the harder it’s going to be not only for them, but many of the rest of us to get on board the reality train.

Anyway, my conundrum is this:  I perceive that there are loved ones in my life who are expanders in the sense that they wish to work within BAU, and thereby maintain it or work to bring it back.  To revive the dead as it were.  I see them like the people who refuse to acknowledge Daddy has a terminal illness and is dying.  Granted, the patient (BAU culture) refuses to know what is in store for itself.  Still, I can’t live by the patent delusions out there percolating passim through the vEmpire working its necronomic evils.  And it becomes hard when I perceive that loved ones want me to support them in their quixote notions while I wish to learn to live below my means and retire debt.

My two big intentions this year may be in conflict.  My intentions are to reduce my debt load — grandly I envision lowering it completely, maybe even with an answered prayer of jubilee forgiveness of all debts? — and to work to make my relationship with my partner as healthy as possible.  I don’t think they are mutually exclusive, but … sigh.

I have a feeling that our notions of abundance are not in synch, and I hope they will resolve themselves.

Right on Matt!

You hate for your brain to turn you on this horrific way without warning. Even though you’re physically healthy, you never know that this mental illness or mental disorder can mess your life up in a terrifying way and can later drive you mad. Read more here.

~Warning~

Some of the content might be offensive to some audiences.

-Viewer’s discretion is advised-

Image by Hizuki24

Ah, magic. Isn’t it wonderful for its existence to be proven? Why? Well, you could anything with magic, notably, bending a spoon or moving objects with only your mind (Psychokinesis). We can find “magic” in a more approach to sci-fi films like “Harry Potter” or any other films that’s in the Victorian era. The question remains, Does magic really exist in any form?

When we talk about magic, we would simply think of somebody or a so called magician wearing a robe and a pointy hat casting a spell on something with a age-old book filled with ancient script but nowadays, it doesn’t seem so. We can’t really define magic with just plain word or in any scientific approach because this “magic” is just a power that is produced by the consciousness; it is said to be that when you both focus on a certain object with all your might and command it where it should go, that object will start moving as it has been ordered to do so.

There are quite a lot of known types of magic like “Black Magic” which is a form of sorcery that draws on assumed malevolent powers. This type of magic would be invoked to kill, to steal, to injure, to cause misfortune or destruction, or for personal gain without regard to harmful consequences to others. As a term, “black magic” is normally used to describe a form of ritual that some group or person does not approve of. In some occasion, black magic isn’t all bad, it can be killing off diseases or others.

In a skeptical view point of magic, we would call it a illusion or trickery that is made by a conjurer. But why conjurer and not magician? Well, today’s magician does not perform with any magic or spells but instead they use illusions or any other delusion/trickery up their sleeve, for a magician to perform their “magic” on a stage doesn’t really seems hard at all, he’ll just need to delude a bunch of audience by either misdirection or a dab hand at manipulating items with ease.

Here’s a perfect example:

Perhaps you may ask that how do I relate magic and psychic powers? Well, to be frank, psychic power is just like mere magic but with a twist of words, since their usage of the concept which is the brain is the same.

As you can observe the video above, James Randi (a known skeptics) exposes James Hydrick’s technique on moving objects with his psychic powers. Hydrick achieve his effect by blowing a gust of wind from the mouth to the object and with the help of a ideal environment where air currents are everywhere since the room is air-conditioned, this, in turn, when a small amount of force is exert onto a object, the object is most likely to move and that is what most people said to be “magical powers”.

When James Randi apply stryofoam around the telephone directory, Hydrick can’t seems to get his psychic power to work, why? Because if he use the same technique as before, he’d have been exposed by James Randi red-handed but then he’s using an excuse to avoid exposure, in particular in the video, he said that the light of some light bulbs together with the stryofoam created magnetism, therefore an excuse is created.

I am not sure I agree with this.  Click here to read.

…in contrast to my usual necessary misogyny.

It was just gross; he could do so much better. I see this so often. I think I was originally going somewhere better with this post. Oh well.

Among my rich, myriad delusions, a recent favorite is that all I need to straighten my life out, make me a perfect person, and fill in my bald spot is a girlfriend.  I’ll no longer be an asshole–I’ll talk to Julie again as to someone I never had the least inclination to fall in love with.  I will like myself and be popular.  But let’s say that that original catalytic miracle happens, that some woman actually falls in love with me as I am now.  Here’s what would happen:  I’d have her come to the library for lunch with me on every Monday, Thursday and weekend–that is, every full workday with Julie–and flaunt her shamelessly.  I would brag on her loudly in the workroom to anyone but Julie (but with her always in earshot).  In other words, I’d be a loud-mouthed jerk (as opposed to the tight-lipped jerk I am now), and my girlfriend, flattered though she might be at my apparent pride in her, would get very little attention otherwise. I wouldn’t change a bit.

Perhaps I’m being hard on myself.  (Perhaps that’s another delusion.)  Does awareness of a self-delusion make it less of a delusion?  Awareness of my depression doesn’t seem to lessen the depression, but are my delusion as organic?  (Hm.  Maybe I don’t want to know the answer to that.)  It’s one thing to be aware of the delusion; it’s another to take action against it.  I’m not likely to do that.  My pride generated the girlfriend delusion as a rationale against its own dissolution.  But even knowing that doesn’t hasten pride’s demise.  No, pride has the upper hand here, engineering my demise.  I could stop being a jerk to Julie–at least say “hi”–but not without making a point of it in order to satisfy my ego.  But I’d vowed not to write her any more”notes”–or “Notes!,” as Julie practically spit in my face the last time we had it out–or, rather, she had it out on me.  The best I can do right now is nothing, since anything else would be provocation.  If awareness of my delusion is not enough to dispel them, then it is my punishment for doing nothing about them.

A girlfriend doesn’t need to be in the middle of this.  How could I lover her?  And though nothing I feel for Julie is but a projection of my pride, it’s a slick enough barrier to love trying to get a foothold.  I’m not deluded there.

True friends are willing to intrude into your delusions. You must only be willing to let them.

In a world of adversity there are so many opportunities so accept the mediocre; to do what’s easy. But at what point in life do those who can make a difference stand up and make that difference? What would happen to the world if they didn’t, and do they have an obligation to just because they have the talent and ability? I think so, but the harder question… The one that everyone dreads to ask themselves is: Am I one of those people? Of course after that question follows the inevitable question: How conceited am I by just thinking that?

I’ve always thought that if you work hard and are diligent you can accomplish anything. But is that really true? I’ve always thought so, and I’ve always been able to do well at whatever I put my mind to. In all of that though, I haven’t accomplished anything. I’d like to think that that’s because I’ve never stuck with any one thing long enough. Perhaps one day, when I finally stick with something, that I’ll finally accomplish that something.

Yeah, I’m an optimist, and some people say that that just makes me delusional. Be that as it may, I would rather live in a world where anything is possible. A world where I really can accomplish anything and make a difference. Call me delusional if you want, but there isn’t a single person who has made a difference in this world that did so thinking that they couldn’t.

- Rich

By Phil Enlow – Midnight Cry Ministries

We live in a unique hour in the world’s history.

Though in one sense there is nothing new under the sun, yet in another sense the manifestation of forces which have always been present is such that this is an hour like no other the world has seen.

History is moving inexorably toward the day when “time shall be no more.” There is little time before the Almighty will bring down the curtain upon this age and man will stand before God in judgment. Satan, though he knows not the precise time, is very aware that his time is short. Rev. 12:12 speaks of a time when the devil will “come down unto you, having great wrath, because he knoweth that he hath but a short time.” Obviously from this scripture we see that the devil is able to know that the end is near and that this knowledge causes him to redouble his efforts to destroy men and oppose the work of God in the earth.

No doubt this knowledge comes through the church. Paul says in Ephesians 3:10 that the manifold wisdom of God is made known to the principalities and powers by the Church. When the present tense expression of the mind and purpose of God comes forth in the earth by the anointing, Satan is a very attentive listener. He probably listens to the word of God more closely than most Christians. He has to. It’s the only way he knows what God is up to.

It is no accident that there is a great increase in satanic activity in our day. God has spoken many times to his people to warn them of the lateness of the hour. By this means Satan has learned that his time is short. Therefore he is mounting a last all-out offensive in his work of evil.

An all powerful God is permitting him to deceive those who will not receive the love of the truth that they might be saved. II Thess. 2:10.

SATAN AND THE CHURCH

But I am mainly concerned here with Satan’s opposition to the Church of Jesus Christ. Though he is powerless to destroy Christians in the ultimate sense, yet he ever seeks to destroy the effectiveness of Christians as lights in the world.

In opposing Christians, Satan seeks one of two things: to put them to sleep; or make them drunk. I Thess. 5:6 exhorts believers concerning both conditions: “Therefore let us not sleep, as do others: but let us watch and be sober.”

Of course, sleep and drunkenness are spiritual conditions of which natural sleep and drunkenness are types and symbols.

The Bible is full of explicit indications that true blood-bought believers, possessing eternal life, bound for heaven, can be spiritually asleep in this world. In Matthew 25:5, Jesus indicated that when the time of the bridegroom’s coming approached, the wise and the foolish virgins would all be sleeping: wise virgins, having oil in their vessels, but asleep. These are true believers. In Matthew 13:25 in the parable of the wheat and tares we see that the enemy was able to sow his seed in with the wheat because “men slept.”

To be asleep is to be at ease, careless, unaware of anything of a spiritual nature. All kinds of things can take place around a sleeping person yet he knows nothing that is going on in the real world. The only thing on his mind is the shadowy unreal world of dreams.

The sleeping Christain is unaware of things happening around him in the spiritual realm, which is the only real eternal realm. His mind is occupied by this material temporal world and its affairs.

Paul wrote to the Romans (13:11): “And that knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep;….” and today we must “know the time.” We have already touched some on this but I Thess. 5:7 says, “For they that sleep sleep in the night; and they that be drunken are drunken in the night.” The phrase “in the night” stands out here.

We are nearing the end of a long gospel day. Though it has not always been a bright day yet there has been light and the powers of darkness have been restricted to the degree necessary for the worldwide propagation of the gospel. John 12:31-32; II Thess. 2:7; Col. 2:15; Matt. 12:29.

SATAN’S INFLUENCE GROWING

But the day of grace is drawing to a close. The restrictions upon Satan are steadily dwindling as men reject God and are turned over to darkness. A deep spiritual night has fallen. Our world is “in the night.”

Isaiah spoke of the time when “darkness shall cover the earth and gross darkness the people” (Isaiah 60:2). This darkness is more than an absence of light. It is the result of an intelligent conspiracy to destroy man. It is demon power which blinds and deludes lost men. Though there is light in the world for believers, this darkness exists in the minds of the children of destruction. It is the darkness of a man unable to see a blazing light because he is blind. II Cor. 4:4.

This demonic darkness is the prevailing condition of our world today. And it exerts a terrific force upon believers. All of us have experienced the difficulty of staying awake at a time of the night when we are normally asleep. Through habit our bodies and minds cry out for sleep. We yawn; our eyes grow heavy. Only a most determined effort will keep us awake. It is like that in this hour.

Though we are redeemed and possess eternal life, so long as we are yet in these bodies we will also possess the fallen adamic nature with which we were born. Though we are not compelled to obey it, the influence is there. Our old nature responds to the influence of our sin-darkened world like our bodies respond to the habitual time for sleep. Only a sober effort to combat this influence will prevent sleep from overtaking us.

Satan is using his new-found freedom in the world to bear upon the spirits of believers to cause them to quit fighting and to go to sleep. He will do anything to cause them to become preoccupied with natural things to the neglect of eternal matters.

Great spiritual battles can rage around some Christians yet they are unaware. The effects may stir them slightly but they just turn over and go back to sleep. They are useless to God in matters of the Kingdom and may even become unwitting tools of the enemy.

They dreamily serve a Christ of history or a Christ who will one day come, but do not hear Christ speaking today as they are all involved in the affairs of this life both secular and religious. And Satan knows how to appeal to people to keep them involved and busy.

In many parts of the world today, believers are systematically persecuted. They suffer the loss of possessions; of opportunities to prosper in this world; they are imprisoned and tortured; many are even losing their lives for Christ. But Satan’s opposition to the Church in the western world is much more subtle — and much more effective. Here he poses as a friend, a benefactor. He offers religious liberty, opportunity, comfort and ease.

Without a doubt the Church is purer and stronger spiritually where it is openly opposed. Christians have far less difficulty staying awake when there is a lion roaring at the door. But let the gentle breezes blow and the bank account grow and the snores of sleeping Christians will almost surely follow.

With opportunities for indulging the appetites of “Adam” within us abounding it is easy for spiritual realities to seem a bit foggy and unreal. We give mental assent to the doctrines of heaven, the Kingdom of God, angels and devils, spiritual warfare and the soon return of the Lord, but they seem dream-like beside our day-to-day interests in this world.

The Spirit of God cries, “Awake, repent, be sober, fight!” We start a bit in our slumber. Then Adam soothes us back to sleep: “Fight?! Fight what? You never had it so good. You’re respected and liked by your friends. Just last week you got a raise. You’re active in the church. Don’t rock the boat. Look at brother so-and-so: he’s not all upset and fanatical and he’s a fine Christian, respected by all. Relax. Things are fine.” And our minds are flooded with thoughts of the various activities that fill our lives and we slumber once more.

THE SPIRIT OF SLEEP

The whole atmosphere is pervaded with a spirit that is causing men to fall into a deep sleep. It is like a deadly gas and Adam is right at home in such an atmosphere. This spirit of sleep is a cover, however, for the greatest satanic onslaught against men the world has ever seen. Great battles are taking place. Eternal issues are at stake. Lives are being enslaved and destroyed.

Is it any wonder that God’s word is: “Woe to them that are at ease in Zion.” Amos 6:1. What will God have to do to arouse us? Must persecution come before we awake?

“Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain: let all the inhabitants of the land tremble: for the day of the Lord cometh, for it is nigh at hand.”

This passage in Joel 2 goes on to describe the destructive forces loose in this time. God’s people are warned to turn wholeheartedly to the Lord. Blessings and restoration are promised. The passage ends with the promise that Zion would be a place of deliverance and salvation. God will have such a people. Will we be among them?

SPIRITUAL DRUNKENNESS

According to I Thess. 5:6-8, the possibility of sleep in the endtime was not Paul’s only concern: he also issued a clear warning against drunkenness. As in the case of sleep, this drunkenness was not literal but spiritual in nature.

Of course natural drunkenness is intended to be a picture of the spiritual condition that concerned Paul. A man who is drunk is robbed of all self-control. His judgment is perverted. His behavior is embarrassing and inappropriate to those around who are sober. Though awake, he cannot properly assess or relate to the realities of life around him. He becomes useless in any meaningful undertaking. He may even become a source of danger to others. His influence for good is gone.

Not only may his condition be thus described, but the instrument of his stupor is powerfully addicting. He cannot live without it. Psychologically as well he comes to need the fantasy world that alcohol helps him create.

Drunkenness of the spirit is like all of this and far worse.

Isaiah 28 gives us a clear picture. Verses 1-4 graphically portray the delusion of religion without God: proud spiritual leaders in religious trappings impressive to the natural man, presiding over the ease and prosperity of drunken multitudes blissfully unaware of impending doom. This is a perfect picture of most religion including most of professing Christianity.

Some professed followers of Christ even have a form of godliness but there is no power. II Tim. 3-5. Not only is there a lack of power, but if God’s power were suddenly to be manifested, no effort would be spared to suppress it. Consider the reaction of the good orthodox, bible-believing religious folk of Jesus’ day. That is what is meant by “denying the power thereof.”

Religious man does not merely lack light; he hates and despises light and seeks at all costs to suppress and destroy it. John 3:19-20, 8:40.

THE WINE

The wine that keeps man in such a stupified condition is the spirit of Satan expressed in religious doctrines and ideas. This wine fixes him up with a delusion that all is well when it is not. The delusion exists in the minds of men who embrace religious falsehoods.

And not only do they drink in the falsehood itself – that would be bad enough – but the authors of that falsehood come in to live as well – demon spirits long schooled in the art of deception. Demons have learned their craft over thousands of years of leading men astray.

Thus does Babylon become “the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit and the cage of every hateful bird. For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication.” Rev. 18:2.

How does this delusion gain such a stranglehold on the world as a whole?

The answer is simple — it is man’s rejection of truth.

II Thess. 2:11-12 says, “and for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.”

THE WRATH OF GOD

Rom. 1:18-32 shows the connection between the wrath of God and the state of delusion. “Wrath” involves turning man over to the darkness he loves to reap its fearful consequences.

Jeremiah 51 is a remarkable parallel to Rev. 17 and 18.

In verse 7 we read, “Babylon hath been a golden cup in the Lord’s hand that made all the earth drunken.” We clearly see that although the devil brings the delusive wine, the Lord sends it as the first step in judgment and destruction.

Note that in both Jeremiah and Revelation the cup is golden. One must never judge a cup’s contents by its outward appearance. That is true both of the devil’s cup and the Lord’s.

Jesus’ description of the religious leaders of his day included these words: “Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, Hypocrites! for ye make clean the outside of the cup and of the platter, but they are full of extortion and excess.” Matt. 23:25.

Isaiah 29:9-13 presents a clear picture of spiritual drunkenness:

“Stay yourselves, and wonder; cry ye out, and cry: they are drunken, but not with wine; they stagger, but not with strong drink. For the Lord hath poured out upon you the spirit of deep sleep, and hath closed your eyes: the prophets and your rulers, the seers hath he covered. And the vision of all is become unto you as the words of a book that is sealed, which men deliver to one that is learned, saying, Read this, I pray thee: and he saith, I cannot; for it is sealed: And the book is delivered to him that is not learned, saying, Read this, I pray thee: and he saith, I am not learned. Wherefore the Lord said, Forasmuch as this people draw near me with their mouth, and with their lips do honour me, but have removed their heart far from me, their fear toward me is taught by the precept of men:”

CHRISTIANS AND THE WINE

This condition of drunkenness that prevails so completely as the end approaches affects real Christians in varying degrees as well as the lost. Why else would Paul exhort believers to “be sober”?

Isaiah 28:5-8 portrays vividly the effect that this wine has wherever it prevails. Verses 7-8 read, “But they also have erred through wine, and through strong drink are out of the way; the priest and the prophet have erred through strong drink,they are swallowed up of wine, they are out of the way through strong drink they err in vision, they stumble in judgment. For all tables are full of vomit and filthiness, so that there is no place clean.”

God has always had his remnant in the earth. Even so it is today that a remnant of God’s saints are scattered through the systems of men where these conditions prevail. They cannot help but be affected by the wine. That is at least one reason Paul warns us against being spoiled by philosophy and vain deceit as a result of exposure to the traditions of men (Colossians 2:8). I’m afraid that there have been many real believers who have been confused, abused, scattered and who could certainly be characterized as having been out of the way. Like Lot who pitched his tent toward Sodom and barely escaped with his life they are in no position to be profitable to God in his Kingdom.

“Out of the way.” That’s a serious condition, specially in the light of the time. Only through a steady diet of God’s anointed truth can we escape the stupor and vomit brought on by the wine. And God’s anointed truth itself will have no effect on one who doesn’t see his need and desire it from the heart. One might as well lecture a drunk on the virtues of sobriety.

A CRITICAL POINT

Now a critical point: escaping the wine always involves leaving the place where it prevails. The word is clear: “Come out of her my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues.” Rev. 18:4.

I am more persuaded than ever that God has abandoned most of professing Christianity and that escape is imperative for His little remnant. It matters not that religious people gather in the name of Christ, sing “Amazing Grace” and preach many biblical doctrines. If God’s power and life are not there, God is not there. Those places exist to bind up bundles of tares for the fire (Matthew 13:40). It is no place for a true born-again believer — especially now in the end of the age.

It is the hour when God’s remnant must seek Him with all their hearts to be led to where they can be delivered. The Lord’s cup may not appear to be golden, but it contains the pure water of life.

It is night. The world is asleep, or drunk, or both. Passive indifferent Christians in this hour are in trouble and don’t even know it.

Consider the warning in Matt. 24:48-51 against carelessness and the time of Christ’s coming. Indifferent Christians may prove not to be Christians at all. Half of the sleeping virgins had no oil. They were unaware of their lack until it was too late. We will see an accelerated process in the days ahead of separation involving apparent believers being overcome by wine or sleep.

As Paul said in I Thess. 5:5-11,

“Ye are all the children of light, and the children of the day: we are not of the night, nor of darkness. Therefore let us not sleep, as do others; but let us watch and be sober. For they that sleep sleep in the night; and they that be drunken are drunken in the night. But let us who are of the day, be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love; and for an helmet, the hope of salvation. For God hath not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us, that whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with him. Wherefore comfort yourselves together, and edify one another, even as also ye do.”

தேட வேண்டும் அவனை
தேய்ந்து போன நாளையிலும்
பல் துலக்கி எந்திரித்து
அவசரத்தில் குளித்து
அரைகுறையாய் ஆடை உடுத்தி
வாயிடுக்கில் சிறு உணவை திணித்து
செரிக்காத நாட்களில்
நடைபழகி ஓடி
தொப்பை இடுக்குகளில்
வியாதிகளை பிரசவித்து
சிவப்பு விளக்குகளில் கொஞ்சம் ஓய்வெடுத்து
வெயிலையும் இரவையும் கொஞ்சம்
மென்று துப்பி
பத்து விரல்களை விசைபலகைக்கு
கொடுத்தவன்
மாதம் ஒரு முறையாவது
வந்து பார்த்து விட்டு போவான் என்னை
தொலைந்து போய்விட்டான் என்னைவிட்டு
தேடவேண்டும் அவனை
எங்காவது பார்த்தல் எனக்கொரு
மெயில் அனுப்புங்களேன்

After learning Game, familiarising myself with how it all works and whatever, I still desire pretty much the same girls I used to desire.

I had assumed that guys who learn The Art would be smarter guys, and thus deeper. I thought this 1) because they are smart enough to understand it, and 2) because higher intelligence when unguided is a bane to seduction. These points are true, but I’ve learned as I’ve gone on that intelligence does not necessarily entail depth. Thus I was surprised to see that these guys who learned game seem to enjoy clubs, desire shallow socialite women; basically the chick version of douchebags. Just look at this picture of Mehow:

The only thing more repulsive about this picture than Mehow’s bowling-ball forehead and ghastly complexion (testament to the power of game) is the whore he’s standing with. YUCK.

No thanks.

Given that it’s Christmas break (the equivalent to “summer break” for most of my readers) I’m working a shitty Christmas break kind of job: I am waiting tables at a hip Asian-fusion restaurant.

Am I going to do anything about it; participate in labour movements and whatever else? Unlikely. But I do try to help myself escape this.

When I broke up with a particular girlfriend, I began reading about love.  I was not heartbroken–I was relieved–but I still had that hole to fill.  Don’t ask for titles–I don’t remember them, but they all probably had the word “heart” in them somewhere.  Besides, I wouldn’t recommend them.  All they did was infuse me with the warm and fuzzy delusion that I deserved and was ready for love.  Right and wrong, but I swallowed it all, opened my starry eyes wide and got myself married.  Twenty years later–seven years post-divorce–I’m putting it down to a weakness akin to religious conversion.  Hallelujah! I’m married!

It was not a match made in heaven, a blessed union, or anything else remotely beatific.  There was no love.  A component of the delusion that got me married was the belief that with marriage came love.  She gave, I didn’t.  She didn’t give as much as I wanted, and I gave nothing.  She gave up.  (Don’t mistake the concision for glibness.  It’s still painful, and that is as much as I want to consider it right now.)

I have not since sought out those books, or any of the hundreds more written since then.  Divorce was an even bigger relief than the breakup that laid the groundwork for the divorce, and so a more lasting lesson was learned, or I was finally old enough to grasp it wisdom.  Bottom line:  I’m in no hurry to marry again.  A girlfriend would be nice, with love and all that.  Well, maybe not the “all that.”  We all have our “all that.”  I have mine and you have yours, and, frankly, most of mine I’d like to keep.  I live like a batchelor, with the poorly kept apartment and things where I like them.  I could use a cook and a housekeeper, and sex would be nice, but if I could afford the first two I’d go that way.  (I don’t pay for sex, thank you.)  Living with someone is out of the question.  I’m not moving, and no one’s moving in.  Let’s get together for love, dinner out, yard sales, movies from the sofa–but let’s leave “all that” at home.

Of course, that’s too conditional.  Love won’t stand for that.  If that means I’m not ready for it, then, well. …  No, I won’t read those books!  What I have is not enough, or too much of what I don’t need.  When I can no longer pretend that it’s an adequate substitute for what I need I’ll discard it and make room.  I’m the only book I need to open.

She offers me the deck of Tarot cards.  “Think of a question,” she instructs, “and shuffle them until you feel that you’re ready.  Then pick whatever card feels right.”  I need no time to consider which question to ask:  a seeking mind’s fantasy, an ancient archetype, or the immortal of legends — which is he?

One moment, so obviously a grown man’s equivalent of an imaginary friend; the next, a riddler revealing things I couldn’t possibly know.  And to my incessant need for a yes or a no, he replies with a grin: I am and I am not.  My mission with you, Chris, is to make you embrace uncertainty.

My fingers skim the cards.  Suddenly a nerve seems to whisper in my flesh, Here.  I flip it over: the four of coins, pentacles, worlds.  Normally a card signifying the hording of great wealth; this particular deck’s interpretation, however, is of the opposite — the lush verdancy of Spring.  His symbols and a fitting description on both counts.

Two men laugh within me: the skeptic, ridiculing the entire enterprise, and the fool, saying, Yes, of course.  It’s precisely the kind of answer he would give.

I said a while ago that I’d share my findings on The God Delusion vs. The Dawkins Delusion. Well, here we are! No point in beating around the bush – I’m cutting straight to it.

I think that firstly, Dawkins has stepped out too far. He has delved into fields that he has very little experience in. I commend him for his efforts, but I think he failed in The God Delusion. His earlier books are all very well written and the line of argument he follows in them are far more effective. McGrath rightly points out that Dawkins’ quotes in The God Delusion are taken somewhat out of context, and he should have tried harder to ensure that they were representative of the view of the people who said them. Furthermore, Dawkins presents atheism as virtually a religion in itself. He doesn’t do them any favours by comparing them to gays, telling then to ‘come out of the closet’.

I think that Dawkins could have made his argument far more effectively. For starters, faith does not require proof, therefore, how, Mr. Dawkins, will scientific proof disprove faith? It is the wrong approach to take!

I feel that there were many good points in The God Delusion, but they have lost all credibility because of the flaws in the rest of Dawkins’ argument. I think that his book should have focused on evidence, and let people draw their own conclusions, rather than saying that religion is bad and atheism is good. It should STATE that the eye is a flawed organ. It should SHOW how it is flawed by showing how blind spots work, and why the brain has to rotate the image. Perhaps he could linger on the point slightly by saying that how could God have created something so flawed, but that’s ENOUGH. He does not have to spell everything out. He was right to point out that children have no choice in which religion they are brought up in, and so they should get to choose. He was right to point out that often atheism shows a healthy state of mind. He was right in so many places, but his whole argument was undermined by his selective choice of quotes. It’s a pity really. He should have focused on Science “the bringer of knowledge”, not Religion “the root of all evil”. It would have been a better, and more substantial argument. It would have made people stop and think. Instead, he gave people like McGrath a reason to dismiss his book, but it shouldn’t be!

As for McGrath’s book, it is virtually without flaw in terms of the holes he picks in Dawkins’ quotes. And it should be – he’s an Oxford theology Professor, just like we’d expect Dawkins’ biology to be sound.

To sum up, then, Dawkins has made a bit of a mess of The God Delusion, and I think he knows it. McGrath certainly knows it, and he shows where Dawkins has gone wrong. It’s a shame that Dawkins could have won the argument so easily, had he taken a different approach. Hopefully Dawkins has realised his error, and I hope his next book takes us in a new direction.

I said a while ago that I’d share my findings on The God Delusion vs. The Dawkins Delusion. Well, here we are! No point in beating around the bush – I’m cutting straight to it.

I think that firstly, Dawkins has stepped out too far. He has delved into fields that he has very little experience in. I commend him for his efforts, but I think he failed in The God Delusion. His earlier books are all very well written and the line of argument he follows in them are far more effective. McGrath rightly points out that Dawkins’ quotes in The God Delusion are taken somewhat out of context, and he should have tried harder to ensure that they were representative of the view of the people who said them. Furthermore, Dawkins presents atheism as virtually a religion in itself. He doesn’t do them any favours by comparing them to gays, telling then to ‘come out of the closet’.

I think that Dawkins could have made his argument far more effectively. For starters, faith does not require proof, therefore, how, Mr. Dawkins, will scientific proof disprove faith? It is the wrong approach to take!

I feel that there were many good points in The God Delusion, but they have lost all credibility because of the flaws in the rest of Dawkins’ argument. I think that his book should have focused on evidence, and let people draw their own conclusions, rather than saying that religion is bad and atheism is good. It should STATE that the eye is a flawed organ. It should SHOW how it is flawed by showing how blind spots work, and why the brain has to rotate the image. Perhaps he could linger on the point slightly by saying that how could God have created something so flawed, but that’s ENOUGH. He does not have to spell everything out. He was right to point out that children have no choice in which religion they are brought up in, and so they should get to choose. He was right to point out that often atheism shows a healthy state of mind. He was right in so many places, but his whole argument was undermined by his selective choice of quotes. It’s a pity really. He should have focused on Science “the bringer of knowledge”, not Religion “the root of all evil”. It would have been a better, and more substantial argument. It would have made people stop and think. Instead, he gave people like McGrath a reason to dismiss his book, but it shouldn’t be!

As for McGrath’s book, it is virtually without flaw in terms of the holes he picks in Dawkins’ quotes. And it should be – he’s an Oxford theology Professor, just like we’d expect Dawkins’ biology to be sound.

To sum up, then, Dawkins has made a bit of a mess of The God Delusion, and I think he knows it. McGrath certainly knows it, and he shows where Dawkins has gone wrong. It’s a shame that Dawkins could have won the argument so easily, had he taken a different approach. Hopefully Dawkins has realised his error, and I hope his next book takes us in a new direction.

Two options
1 God is a jerk
2 God does not exist

Only a greedy selfish fool will believe in god, eternal life bs, stop being a fools tool; Gods are made up, it’s all fake… the end.


Religions are made to make you willing to go to war, send your kids to certain death.. religion makes your only life worthless…they tell you that more awaits when you die, eternal life in luxury if you follow & protect the dogma.. all LIES

Don’t be angry with me, be angry with those who sell you gods and bs

Caller: Through history billions of people have believed in gawd and hence gawd exists + people have personal experience & the bible is really really old and the word of the master of the universe because it says so.. hahahaha idiot.
Sheesh

Christianity tsk tsk.. BTW does this man know how many have been killed for imaginary Jeebu$ & the imaginary mass murderer in the sky.
Don’t think is the key in religion, don’t use yer brain.