Does exactly what it says on the tin. Some of the nonsense contained herein may be very loosely related to The Sisters of Mercy, but I wouldn't bet your PayPal account on it. In keeping with the internet's general theme nothing written here should be taken as Gospel: over three quarters of it is utter gibberish, and most of the forum's denizens haven't spoken to another human being face-to-face for decades. Don't worry your pretty little heads about it. Above all else, remember this: You don't have to stay forever. I will understand.
Getting a little off topic here, I was reading the Jefferson Bible today, thinking "This will be neat, all of the crap removed and only his moral teachings left", but while reading it I was shocked at how, well, rubbish they were. Maybe Nietzsche was right.
Friedrich Nietzsche's vehement attacks upon Christianity, encapsulated in his famous dictum that "God is dead," pose a problem for the reader who agrees with Nietzsche and yet does not wish to give up a certain basic Christian belief. However, careful analysis of both Nietzsche and the synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark and Luke) reveal an interesting pattern: the elements that Nietzsche opposes do not appear in the teachings of Jesus at this point, but rather in John and the writings of the Church fathers. In the synoptic Gospels, the earliest extant writings we posses, Jesus and Nietzsche often parallel each other, teaching similar doctrines.
Jesus did not teach the will to death and the ascetic ideal, but rather a strong individualism compatible with Nietzsche's philosophy. If this is the case, God need not die, even if the Church preaches dogma that appears to make that necessary for the free spirit to liberate itself from the yoke of the herd and its guilt. An extensively modified, but still religious, Christianity can complement and reinforce the Nietzschian worldview. Using the Gospels to find the true message is difficult, for they are evolving documents which have been modified by the Church over two millennia. However, enough support can be found, even with the warping of the originals, to support the view that Jesus originally taught something very different from the Christian religion as we know it.
"And when you start to think about death, you start to think about what's after it. And then you start hoping there is a God. For me, it's a frightening thought to go nowhere".
~ Peter Steele
eastmidswhizzkid wrote:or maybe he went on a "fantastic voyage" style adventure holiday: experiencing travelling through the inside of people's stomach's, veins, livers and arseholes as a peculiar side effect of transsubstantiating himself from their hovis and cabernet sauvignon?
So that explains my bout of indigestion last night!!!
December, 7th 2006: A wallet popps open, a penny looses the support and goes with the gravity.
April 23rd, 2008: *Ping* The penny arrives on the floor.
Now I finally see the benefit of being catholic and drinking wine: That's a way of getting a booze and assuring yourself of what you feel of as a good company while being up your arse.