Musings on Christians

A few things I have learned thus far from my (admittedly faithless) reading of the New Testament: a) wealth and Christianity are pretty incommensurable, which menas that a rich "Christian" is a hypocrite (here's to you, Joel Osteen); b) condemnation of anything other than lack of faith is dubious, considering that Christ spent most of his time among the diseased and the "sinners"; c) Christ seems to have abrogated the statutes of Leviticus, which includes the line about "a man lying with another man is an abomination"; d) even if he did not, he certainly was more concerned about divorce, so "Focus on the Family" shou...ld really campaign against divorce rather than worrying about gay marriage (let's see the push for a constitutional amendment, you self-righteous assholes); e) Jesus - especially in Luke's account, but elsewhere as well - was kind of a dick; f) but not nearly as much of a dick as Paul, who seems to be single-handedly responsible for much of Western sexism; g) if you really believe that all of this is actually the Word of God, you'll probably believe just about anything, because h) God needs a better editor. i) Were there five loaves of bread or seven? four thousand people or five? j) If I were writing about someone who ascended into the heavens, I feel like I'd spend more time describing it than Mark: "So then after the Lord had spoken unto them, he was received up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God." (16:20) I think my first words - and here I'm channeling Ricky Gervais's comments about Humpty Dumpty - would be: "Once there was this guy who flew up to Heaven."

Finally, Christianity combined with capitalism is a powerful force, and Nietzsche is spot on in his critique of it: what better way to ensure that the oppressed do not confront injustice and inequality than by promising them that their reward for good behavior and piety will come in the next life?