What It Is To Be a Human -- Part I

A living organism is a complex and fragile mechanism that requires continual maintenance and repair.  Maintenance and repair of an organism depend on supplies of both material and energy. Some microorganisms obtain energy and structural materials from inorganic compounds in their environment. But the great majority of living organisms, both plant and animal, depend directly or indirectly on solar radiation for the energy to build and maintain their physical structure. 

Humans obtain the material and energy for growth, cellular maintenance and physical action by consuming other organisms: either plants that derive energy directly from the sun, or animals that derive energy by consuming either plants or other animals. 

Because all living creatures are mortal, perpetuation depends on reproduction. Hence, the basic human preoccupations: food and sex. Attention to all else, it might seem, is maladaptive.

But was the childless Sir Isaac Newton maladapted, was Saint Francis, or Jesus? Not necessarily. they each had a huge impact on the civilization in which they lived, and hence upon the survival and expansion of the gene pool to which their own genes belonged.

An Exclusive Interview with Satan

In view of the interest evoked by my interview with Jesus of Nazareth, I decided to further enhance understanding of the supernatural forces at play in this world by seeking an interview with the Devil in Hell. I anticipated some difficulty reaching out to the Lord of Darkness, but my emailed request for an interview received a prompt and positive response.

Thus it was that I found myself seated the other day at a table outside a neighborhood StarBucks in conversation with a pleasant-mannered individual dressed in a well-cut two-piece suit in a good quality, charcoal gray worsted, and with a plain white shirt and a black and white polka-dot tie. His manner was charming, his features pleasant, and his complexion not, as I'd expected--dark as the event horizon of a black hole--but somewhere between olive and white.

The weather was cool, and I was glad to have worn a full-length overcoat together with a hat and scarf and to have a mega-sized mug of Starbucks' regular grind around which to warm my hands. Satan, however, seemed oblivious to the cold and indeed radiated a perceptible warmth of which I was only too glad.

So the Roof of Notre Dame Cathedral Burned: Who Cares?

I like cathedrals, and any other stone-built churches. To enter such a building off a busy city street is to experience a hush that can induce a truly blissful sense of calm. So, yes, if I lived in central Paris, I would be deeply saddened by the burning of this great church.

But otherwise, who cares?

The Maverick Philosopher asks pretty much the same question:

A Fox News commentator this morning opined that the world watched in horror [the burning of Notre Dame]. Really? The Islamic world? The leftist world?

So why should the world mourn the destruction of a church while remaining indifferent as the ruling elites systematically dismantles both the faith that that church was built to celebrate and the civilization constructed on the foundation of that faith?

Today, apparently, we are to view with horror the burning of an empty religious shell, while applauding the very rich familes that have come forward to repair the damage.

CNN: France's 3 richest families lead $700 million fundraising effort for Notre Dame..

Better it would have been had those rich people offered their money to alleviate the hardships of the poor, or to repatriate the millions of aliens who the elites have invited in to replace the common people of France. Better both for the people of France and for the souls of those rich people*.

And to those who think that the burning of a Christian cathedral really matters, remember these words of the founder of it all:

For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them. Matthew 18: 20.

* That the chief donors, Bettencourt-Meyers and Arnault, are Jewish only confirms an absence of Christian faith and hence the unimportance of the church to the people of France.

Related: 
Voice of Europe: Macron says Notre Dame should be rebuilt consistent with the modern, diverse France – and architects suggest a glass roof, steel spire and minaret
Gateway Pundit: 875 Catholic Churches in France Were Vandalized in 2018 by Radical Secularists and Muslims

Fundamentalist Atheism

Fundamentalist Christians hold the Holy Bible to be the word of God, and hence every word of it to be the literal truth.

Fundamentalist atheists hold the Holy Bible to be based on nothing more than a collection of myths. In particular, they hold that the story about Jesus — including the new star in the East that heralded his birth, his delivery in a stable, the hay-filled manger in which as a new-born infant he was laid, his ministry in the company of twelve disciples, his death, his resurrection and his ascent unto Heaven — is taken virtually in its entirety from accounts of the lives of earlier religious figures including the Egyptian gods, Osiris and Horus, the Zoroastrian divinity, Mithras, and the Hindu deity, Krishna. In addition, they point to the inconsistencies in the gospel accounts of Jesus's life and teachings. On such grounds they reject Christianity as a false religion.

An Exclusive Interview With Jesus Christ

We all know what Jesus thought about major social issues of his own days on Earth, matters such as the stoning of adulteresses, the payment of taxes to Rome, how to respond when smitten on the cheek, and so forth. But there are many moral questions that we have to decide today on which Jesus's position is not immediately obvious.

Fortunately, Jesus, as everyone who has read the gospel accounts of his life knows, taught his followers to regard God as a personal god to whom they could speak as they would speak to a loving father. It was in this spirit, therefore, that we invited Jesus to join us on this blog for an exclusive interview via Skype*, a request that Jesus, now a member of the Holy Trinity, and thus the voice of God, very graciously agreed to.

Without further ado, then, here is our conversation.

Christian Theology Is Bunk: But Jesus Lives

For where two or three are gathered together
in my name, there am I in the midst of them.

Over at the Irish Savant, Anonymous remarks: "I respect anyone who lives a Christian life" but goes on to say that, in his experience, churchgoers don't live such a life. This, he seems to fear, is the rot that underlies the ongoing death of the West.

But, in fact, the sinfulness of professed Christians is not the problem he supposes. Jesus, after all, supped with whores and tax collectors and found their company much preferable to that of holier-than-thou orthodox Jews.

The real problem for Christians today is that only the most simple-minded and uneducated can possibly believe the Bible. It's all a fairy tale, with some moral guidance thrown in. What's more, the big churches — Catholic, Orthodox, Lutheran, Anglican — are based on that Pauline mumbo-jumbo encapsulated in the Apostolic Creed, unrelated to anything Jesus is reported to have said during his lifetime.

Caravaggio: the Nativity. Image source

The fact is, we know almost nothing of what Jesus said or did. He left no autobiography and his disciples were illiterates who left no verbatim record of His sayings. We are not even sure if Jesus really existed, although a remark by the historian Josephus (37 – c. 100) suggests that there was some obscure Jewish leader, or Messiah, of that name who was crucified by the Roman occupation authority at about the time the Gospel tells us Jesus died.

What we do know is that the Gospel accounts sure as Hell aren't gospel truth. They were written a generation or several after the death of Jesus by we know not whom with we know not what axes to grind. Further, to anyone with a modern mind and a clear head, all the stuff about angels, virgin birth, walking on water, the Resurrection and Ascension is obvious bunk, apparently derived from ancient Egyptian and Greek myths.

So Christianity is all crap, right?

Of course not.

Loaves and fishes: Mosaic floor, early Christian
basilica of Olous, Elounda, Crete, Greece,
Byzantine civilization, 6th century AD.
Image source.

There is no more reason to throw out Christianity and the Western civilization that is based upon it because we don't believe in miracles, than to cancel Christmas because we don't believe in Santa Claus, or to abandon the Easter holiday because we don't believe in the Easter Bunny.

And the Nativity scene, made central to our perception of Christianity through the artistic genius of Saint Francis, is infinitely more charming than stories about a reindeer-hauled sled and a jolly old fella in red climbing down chimneys.

The essence of Christianity has to be seen in the works of the saints, Jesus who, we are told, sacrificed himself in obedience to what he believed to be the will of God, being the first.

More generally, Christianity amounts simply to the golden rule, the still small voice of conscience, the Kingdom of Heaven within. This is what underlies what is most admirable in the Western tradition of art, law, scholarship, and public service. It is what has allowed the best in the West to thrive and spread the benefit of their gifts to society as a whole. But it is this openness that constitutes the West's greatest vulnerability, now that it exists under the government of a treasonous elite. We are wide open to infiltration by organized, collectivist, groups propagating alien ideologies, from Political Correctness and the worship of billionaires to Communism and Islam.

Christians needs to forget arcane theological disputes of no moral significance and attend to the defense of their civilization. Concerning churches, music, art, myth or dogma, take it or leave it as suits your temperament.

Related:

CanSpeccy: Atheists for Christ

Frans de Waal: Moral behavior in animals

Social Media To Tackle Hate Speech — Not

Good news: liberals and Treason Party  globalists will no longer be free to smear opponents of national genocide through mass immigration as "racists," "bigots," "far-right wingers, "extremists," or "Nazis," on Facebook, Twitter or U-Tube.

Um, well actually, not. 

In future mentioning the ongoing genocide of your own people through compulsory "sex education" (aka, suppression of the fertility of the indigenous people) and replacement immigration is to be branded not only as "far-right wingism," "extremism," "racism," and "Nazism," but also "hate speech," which I suppose it is. I mean, don't you hate it when your race and nation are deliberately targeted for extinction? Well in future just keep it to yourself or be branded an exponent of hate speech, against which the EU will soon have a law, if they don't already: Jews exempt, on the condemnation of genocide, of course.

Meantime, Oxford Professor warns Today, Jesus Christ would be BANNED from speaking at universities as a 'non-violent extremists'.

But in response, a UK Home Office spokesman told MailOnline today:

There is no contradiction between promoting freedom of speech and taking account of the well-being of students, staff and the wider community,...
Protecting those who are vulnerable and at risk of radicalisation is a job for all of us and this Government is continuing to work in partnership with communities of all backgrounds to challenge those who spread hatred and intolerance.

And that's a sentiment Tony Bliar must share. After all, Jesus did truly speak hatefully of liars and humbugs:

You are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies (John 8:44).

And as for hypocrites, he condemned them to Hell, which is extreme as, well, Hell:

You snakes! You brood of vipers! How will you escape being condemned to hell? (Matthew 23:33).

Is that hate speech, or what?

 So forget anything about Christianity on the social media. Only positive stuff, about the Pope washing the feet of Muslims, etc. and promoting the Islamic occupation of Europe from now on.

Related: 



CanSpeccy: Are you a far-right-wing extremist, racist, anti-Semite against genocide?

Christianity and the Death of the West

There are five things you need to know about a religion to understand its present and future role in shaping a civilization.

First, what is the moral code that it teaches?

Second, what is the way of life that it teaches?

Third, what are the beliefs that compel acceptance of its teachings?

Fourth, what support do the justifying beliefs of the faith receive from non-religious institutions?

Fifth, what are the consequences of the faith for society as a whole?

Atheist detractors of religion would like to add a sixth item to the list; namely, what is the truth of the justifying beliefs of the faith. But that is to misunderstand the role of religion in the foundation and survival of a civilization. Religion is founded on myths not historical truth, and its value is to be judged by its fruits; namely, the civilization to which it gives rise.

Here I consider the five key questions about Christianity as the foundation and defender of Western civilization.

1. The Moral Code of a Christian

The moral code of a Christian is nowhere fully and explicitly stated. Jesus was a Jew preaching to Jews and his teachings stemmed from a deep knowledge of the Jewish religious tradition. But Jesus was not a literate man and left no written account of his ideas. Jesus's disciples were, likewise, not literate, and left no record of their life in the company of Jesus. Thus, the only record we have of Jesus`s teachings are by persons unknown, the gospel authors who wrote a generation or more after the death of Jesus and who thus had no direct knowledge of what he said or did, and who in all probability had axes of their own to grind.

What we can say, however, given his Jewish roots and hist adherence to the Jewish faith, is that Jesus accepted the Mosaic law, known to Christians as the Ten Commandments. Moreover, it is uncontroversial to say that the Commandments constitute the bedrock of the Christian moral code.

Beyond the Commandments, Jesus taught the virtues of charity, modesty, forgiveness, and love, particularly love for the poor, the sick, the lame and those who have transgressed the moral law.

Last, but not least, Jesus taught the virtue of martyrdom, seeking for himself  a cruel death by crucifixion thereby enabling the miracle of the resurrection, which proved the divine inspiration of his teaching.

2, The Life of a Christian

Jesus was no recluse and he had no time for empty religious formality. He mixed with the common working people, sinners and tax gatherers. To Jesus, then, religion was not about ritual and religious ceremony, but about how life is to be lived by ordinary people.

In his preaching, which was to the common people and in his conversation with the disciples, Jesus redefined the concept of God. God, Jesus taught, was not a being in the mold of an oriental despot of whom one should be greatly afraid, but a loving and forgiving spirit, who knows one's most intimate thoughts and, like a father, is ever attentive to the needs of those who turn to him for help.

Psychologically, this redefinition of God is a profoundly important development in religious practice. It compels the believer to consider his problems with complete honesty for, in praying about them to God, he speaks with a being that sees his every thought and knows the truth of every word he utters. Prayer, as Jesus prescribed it, thus becomes an exercise requiring complete honesty in confronting dilemmas and difficulties, an approach that opens the mind to new possibilities. Thus, as the atheistic Winston Churchill remarked, "in times of fear or perplexity, I pray to God and it helps. It helps a lot."

In the Sermon on the Mount, surely the most unorthodox statement in Jesus's ministry, Jesus urged the forgiveness of enemies, the loving of enemies, and the doing good to enemies. Such a teaching seems to fly in the face of all practical reality.

If a mugger demands your Rolex, give him your wallet too? Yeah, suuuuuure.

But Jesus well knew the limits and frailty of human goodness. By demanding extreme tolerance of those who take advantage of us, Jesus taught that we should not be quick to anger, and that we should not show forbearance for kith and kin alone? As such, the message of the Sermon on the Mount conveyed a lesson of profound importance for the future of Western civilization, expanding the range of human sympathy, and thus creating scope for productive collaboration among strangers in an ever expanding social world.

In laying down his own life for the instruction of humanity, Jesus inspired the deaths of a multitude of Christian matyrs, soldiers, and an even greater number of those who, while not making the ultimate sacrifice, nevertheless devoted much of their life's work to the benefit of others.

3. The Beliefs that Justify Adherence to the Christian Code and Way of Life

The beliefs that Justify adherence to the Christian moral code and way of life are various, but most include a belief in (i) the existence of God, the creator of the World who takes a loving interest in human affairs; and (ii) a life after death, the nature of which, happy or hideous, depends on the way we have led our lives here on earth. [Technically, according to the great Christian churches, Catholic, Orthodox, Anglican and Lutheran, hope of a heavenly afterlife does not require virtue here on Earth, only belief in the risen Christ, but that idea is surely only for the very simple minded.]

4. The Support Christian Faith Receives From Non-Religious Institutions in the West

Today, Christian faith in the West receives essentially no support from any public institutions, but rather is under continual attack from academia, broadcasters both public and private, the media in general, Hollywood and the the book publishing industry, the latter having a profitable line in atheistic propaganda from the Hitchens's to the Dawkins's, and all the other pseudo-intellectuals who offer a pathetically adolescent critique of religion.

5. What Has Been the Chief Influence of Christianity on Western Society

The influence of Christian faith on Western civilization has been fundamental. Christian ideas underpin the Western tradition of an open society in which people interact cooperatively and productively based on a mutually understood moral code requiring adherence to basic decency in dealing not only with family and friends but with everyone. It was thus Christianity that enabled the emergence of an open meritocratic society that proved to be the most scientifically and artistically creative and industrially productive civilization the World has yet witnessed.

To answer the questions posed in the title of this piece, it is evident that organized Christianity has been a vital institution of Western civilization and that its deliberate destruction by the forces of Political Correctness and globalist interests in the service of the international Money Power means the destruction of the West, a process already evident in widespread decline, decadence, depravity and despair.