Smelling hot dirt
it’s an expression my grandmother used to use when she talked about people who- at the end of their lives- begin to worry about their places in the herafter. My grandfather (other side of the family)was like that. He watched every damned televangelist there was, and sent them all cash, trying to ensure his place in the herafter. See, he’d been the sort of a bastard you might want to kick around if you had a chance, and he knew it. He’d done things in his life that were plainly bad, and while I’ll never know if he repented of his evil, I knew he was afraid of the fires of hell. He was close to the grave, and he knew it, and the dirt he was smelling had the aroma of brimstone.
I’m amazed at the people all around me that are “smelling hot dirt”. Bloggers I used to read, friends, co-workers. They are doing their level best to ingratiate themselves with the Creator because they fear the things they have done in the past will prevent them from attaining salvation.
I may come to that point, myself, someday. For now, I don’t feel a need to change a damned thing in my life, because I have spent pretty much my whole life trying to live right. I have had lapses, and I have done things a lot would consider wrong- but the Creator is the only judge I am concerned about.
In the meantime, I continue to find amusement in the people that feel they have to cast aspersions on other beliefs to prove to the Creator that their faith is the bestest ever. Even more amusing are the atheists/agnostics who are anxious to deny the existence of the Creator, because they apparently lack the reason to comprehent Pascal’s Gambit. If you want to spend a few weeks understanding what a logical fallacy is, you should read the reams of writing that proposedly “debunks” pascals gambit.
(Brought on by an exceptional sermon today in mass. Now back to the regularly scheduled crapblogging.)
Update: Mr Dennis points out- very appropriately- in comments, that there are other creeds aside from Christianity (which was the point of the original comment) and the same holds true for them- give me a thousand decent Muslims who live normal lives devoid of any of the Infidel bullshit of the Koran (and yes, there are decent muslims out there, I know many of them) over a single Perry Stone. Thanks, mr Dennis, for helping me make this more accurate.
21 comments Og | Uncategorized
Amen!
Or Shalom!
Or Praise Allah!
Or whatever in the hell some want you to say. ;)
LOL
Peace be with you. :)
Hmmm… sounds like a good time see on of them interviews with G_d.
http://www.dribbleglass.com/interview/
Don’t worry Og, he’s rather funny in this interview.
There are many people trying to score points for the afterlife. I’m guessing they are the ones that are most judgemental of others as if there even was a tally.
For me its life support: I’d rather be dead than be an asshole.
Thanks for trying to flush me out old buddy.
I’ve always understood how stupid are the anti-wagerists and have never addressed them because they are so stupid.
For instance, the complaint that the wager applies to any god, so which one is the right one? Bothering to explain to such people that the existence of natural law point to only One is a waste of time.
I can also see why you reject it when I say “I’m agnostic.” You always say “I don’t think you fully know what that word means.” But I do – it’s simply that I don’t KNOW. It’s hardly dishonest — as the misleader, Dawkins claims — to live one’s life as if one believes. It’s called decency. I can easily understand, as should any other decent individual, why someone like Dawson calls it dishonesty to chose to live as God would have you live.
When you say that it does not matter what creed one follows — THEN you are showing real understanding of my position.
Thanks buddy.
Dunno guys. Pretty sure if Christ is not the center of your lives, you are screwed blued and tatooed.
Argue all you want, but love and life is what was taught. Hard to do but most benefit in the end.
Thanks! And here I was just trying to be a smart ass! ;)
Paul, I can’t disagree, but I’m certainly not going to judge anyone. You know, like Christ said I shouldn’t.
I had a sociology professor at a local commuter public college make a comment toward the end of the semester that I’d never expect from a sociology professor, or at a public college, but it stayed with me. He said how having faith is like weight lifting: you have to do it life long, lift a tiny bit more every day, for if you wait until the end of your life to put it all together with God, you’ll end up like someone trying to lift a weight lifter’s amount of weight, though you didn’t do the necessary training: you’ll get crushed.
That sounds right mts.
Ok, here my agnostic arse goes….
I’ve thought long and hard on Pascal’s gambit. I truly have.
It doesn’t work for me. In fact, it rings false to me on a very deep level.
I cannot, in good conscience, “hedge my bets”, because if I am only going through the motions instead of having true faith, and there is an allmighty, The Lord will know.
Will know that I did not TRULY believe, that I only paid lip service to accepting Jesus/Jehova/Allah/Etc. as my Lord.
I’ve done some crappy stuff in my 38 years on this planet, but overall I try my best to live a good life: if not by the specifics of any one religion’s edicts, then by a code of honor and decency. I never say that God does not exist, just that I do not KNOW if he/she/it exists. Nor do I tend to deride the beliefs of others, unless they are beyond stupid (IE: Scientologists… if you’re going to worship something written by a Sci-Fi author, at least pick a good one, like Heinlein). I do not claim anyone’s beliefs are wrong, unless they use their religion as the basis to do Evil (Not a big fan of Islam).
I cannot claim faith, if I do not FEEL it. To do so would be against my nature.
So here’s Grau’s Gambit: That should I find myself in the afterlife facing judgement, I will be far less harshly judged for being honest and living a good life, than falsely proclaiming faith and going through the motions.
And that should I end up burning in a lake of fire, there will many MANY very surprised folks roasting with me who thought sitting at a pew every Sunday would excuse them being douchebags Monday-Saturday.
Look, everybody makes mistakes in life. The better people among us do the best they can. In my view, if Hell exists (and I do not necessarily subscribe to the theory that it does), it’s reserved for thoroughly evil bastards like the raghead fucks who flew airliners through buildings on 9/11, and for people like the Germans who who organized and ran the death camps.
If Hell exists to punish every little infraction, conscious or unconscious, accidental or purposeful, white, grey or black — then to Hell with that.
It is called faith. And the weight lifting analogy is correct, it must be practiced to have any effect. Music, the arts, faith, all follow the same vein. They allow for the positive expression of what is, perhaps, evil.
Even if we doubt our faith, we must have faith that it will come, that Yes, there is a God and that he loves us. God is love. He gave us the ability to either love him or not, to acknowledge him or not. It’s sort of a catch 22, you must have faith to get faith.
Maybe as a rancher and a person who is around animals and the out doors so much, helps me. When I see a birth and anything grow from the soil because of light and water, I can not NOT have faith! I am certain there is a God.
Hell is the absence of God, so if you don’t believe, you are already mostly there.
There is one God, called different names and probably misunderstood by us all. If we knew for sure, where would be the mystery. We are supposed to not be able to prove there is a God. He wants us to love him by faith. Trust. Trust in God.
That’s my take on it, for what it’s worth.
I feel so sad for those who have no faith.
If there is a Hell, it exists for one reason, and one reason alone. The Damned Fools who inhabit it can only imagine one fate worse than Hell. That is Heaven.
Grau, you missed the point utterly. You are the very definition of pascals gambit: you lead a moral life. Pascal doesn’t want you to pretend to love jesus, just to live like a decent person and not an asshole.
Bothering to explain to such people that the existence of natural law point to only One is a waste of time.
Yeah, maybe. Too bad that’s irrelevant.
Pascal’s wager remains a pile of crap, even if Og and Pseudo-Pascal disagree.
(While Og’s latest comment at 10:23 shows a useful possible effect of Pascal’s wager, I don’t know that it’s really the intent.
And if it was his intent, that’s a horribly ineffective and inefficient way to go about it. Remember that “belief in God” has always been compatible, sadly, with being a total douche.)
Even if we assume that there must be, if any deity-like-beings exist, Just One God… for the wager to still work, God would have to save you merely for believing in any God at all, not for specific beliefs.
(For example, the Christian declaration that “none come to the Father except through me”?
Suggests very, very strongly that the best Muslim in the world, who otherwise led an exemplary life, still doesn’t get saved – because he didn’t accept Christ as a necessary intermediary.)
No amount of handwaving will change that; it boils down to a sneaky attempt to redefine the wager into meaninglessness.
(“Okay, so maybe some specific deity-beliefs really are mutually incompatible, and Pascal failed by simply ignoring that little problem.
Let’s just assume that any deism will work and God will accept it. Because we have to assume that or the Wager is untenable, and we just can’t have it be untenable, because dude, Pascal.”)
(I will say that mts is right, though, as the Catholics say – you gain faith… in anything you have faith in, by doing it. Even if it feels like “going through the motions”, it can become real faith in the end.
Of course, I kinda see that as evidence that it’s not God’s grace in action, because if it was it really ought to work only towards true faith.)
Man, sigi, talk about deliberately missing the entire point on purpose.
Just as an FYI…
The Mormon belief is that we will be judged for how well we livee based on what we knew and what our circumstances were while we were alive. If there is a biological basis for homosexuality or violence or alcoholism or whatever, and we were born with that, we will be judged on how well we dealt with it and overcame it. Someone without such a DNA curse would be judged based on that fact.
The same thing applies for societal and cultural upbringing. If you were raised where extramarital sex was condoned or encouraged, you would not be held to the same standard as someone that lived in a more Puritanical setting.
God is both loving and merciful. He will take into consideration ALL the facts when judging us.
Such factors as nature and nurture give us even more reason to avoiding judging others. We have no idea what they are dealing with (to include brain chemistry) nor how well they are doing considering how they got to where they are.
“Remember that “belief in God†has always been compatible, sadly, with being a total douche.)”
Actually, no. If you’re a total douche, you may profess to believfe in God, but belief and douchebaggery are mutually exclusive. I’m sick to death of how faithful, decent people are tarred with the same b loodstained brush as the pseudo-believing douchebags, and that is the PURPOSE of this post.
With you on that, Og. To many times good people who believe need to give up ground because of those who profess to believe, but only in word not deed.
Keep up the good work.
Sigi, though you raise some good issues, I see how you drove Og to say redundantly how you miss the point. :)
God, being just, would not judge a single person having not walked the way of man (though Leviticus 26 says He would if only man would follow directions).
It appears you answered one question about Judgment Day: “none come to the Father except through me.†means you accept the concept (or are playing with us) that all souls will be judged.
Next question: In this world, does it matter whether or not you recognize a judge for him to have the power to pronounce your guilt or innocence?
Coming at it from another angle: should your kissing up to a judge have any bearing on his judgment?
The answers are, of course not, because that would not be justice, it would be “buying” favorable judgment. That is unjust and thus, by exclusion, not of God.
On the other hand, what was it that makes The Judge worthy to judge? Could it be His standards? What were they? Was there something about how one felt about God and one’s fellow man?
Perhaps by becoming aware of the standards for judging one may find a way to imprint those on one’s heart?
Why would one want to do so? Hint: read the wager again Sigi.
Remember that “belief in God†has always been compatible, sadly, with being a total douche.)
Recall “Thou shalt not take the name of thy God in vain.” Could there be a connection between this commandment and the way an observer might hold God to account for the sins of alleged “men of God?” At some point the obligation to discriminate true leaders from charlatans rests with each individual?
For instance, I was raised ever hearing the phrase: “Look at how many have been killed in the name of God.” Maybe before the 20th Century there might have been some rational to support that notion. But after the 20th Century, one need only look at how many have died in pursuit of the “ism”s of men, and it becomes clear to all (except those someone who choose not to see) that the problem lies not with God but with mankind.
And that, Sigi, includes your douches who ever claim to be speaking for God.