I Can’t Argue With That

HOW TO WIN FRIENDS AND INFLUENCE PEOPLE

Not by arguing with them, and telling them that they are wrong!

This is what one of the amateur Christian Apologists recently discovered.  (I’d like to say that they are all amateurs, but several of these men – they’re all testosterone-driven men – make outrageous amounts of money with their own televangelism programs and paid lecture/debate tours.)

He found that, like Red State/Blue State, modern American society has become quite polarized, two solitudes, shouting past each other.  Despite all the heat and light and words in the air, Atheists weren’t listening to/believing what Christian Apologists had to say, and vice versa.

He had taken a Theater Arts course in University (How remunerative), and he wanted to make it useful in Christian/Atheist debates.  His idea was to present the Christian position like a one-act stage play, to lead the Atheists through a mental image of what he considered truth to be.

Why not??!  That’s probably how he arrived at his faith.  Each denomination – each individual church – puts on a musical-comedy play for the faithful, with strange, outdated, but impressive costumes, upbeat, inspirational music, painted scenes, set decoration, props, special lighting, mystical chants, even some audience participation.  It hooked him.  Why wouldn’t it hook a non-believer?

He gave detailed instruction to others, how to win debates with the dreaded Atheists.  They were to put in great amounts of research – not in the tenets of Christianity or the Bible – but in the arguments and objections of the evil, heathen Atheists, the better to rebut their opinions and claims.

In my Whichness Of The Why post, I had uncharitable things to say about philosophers, debates, and structured arguments.  It is possible to twist words and presentations, and win the debate….yet still be wrong.  😳

Like many other Apologists – and sadly, many Atheist arguers as well – he is too caught up in massaging his ego by looking intelligent and winning the BIG ARGUMENT, to see the small solution.  They both often can’t see the forest for the hedge maze in front of them.

Mr. Apologist, want to validate your position??  It’s easy!  It boils down to two words – PROVE GOD!  Don’t prove that God is possible.  Don’t prove that He is the most likely answer.  Don’t prove that the Universe needed a cause, and God is it – because you can’t.  Don’t prove that you believe He exists, or that you want/need for Him to exist, or that a couple of billion others (kinda) agree with you.  Don’t wave your hands and point at rainbows and trees and claim that those prove that He exists.  They don’t!

I just rewatched (third time) a 7 minute call to The Atheist Experience.  It didn’t make sense the first two times, and it didn’t make any sense the third.  The young lout began by demanding that the two ladies state if they believed a couple of rather vague definitions.

He didn’t show God.  His aim didn’t even seem to be to disprove the Atheists’ position.  Assigning the women specific viewpoints became important, as he used esoteric words, complex verbiage, and confusing philosophy, simply to refute these views, and show how much smarter he was than two amateur Atheists, and win the argument .

Don’t win the argument!  Prevent the argument.  Presenting it like some high-school play just doesn’t convince the unconvinced.  Unless and until you can actually show proof of God, you and 47 other angels are just dancing on the point of that theosophical pin.  All you are getting are sore feet, and proving that an Atheist’s opinion is as valid as yours.

Rest your feet, and use your cursor to dance back over here in a couple of days, to see what I have to say after I’ve cooled off a bit.  CU  😀

Flash Fiction #217

PHOTO PROMPT © Ulrika Undén

IDENTITY THEFT

Where are we going??

It is not wise to ask. We are going to have our identities removed.

What? Why??!

After the Holy Trump – Blessed be His Name – escaped the seditious impeachment trap set by his enemies, He appointed himself Emperor for Life and decreed that there would be no more division and dissent among his People.

His thoughts would be our thoughts. There would be no more Red States or Blues States, only Orange States, to worship his Divine Hair. Fake news was outlawed, climate change conspiracy was crushed, and He holds our Peace in His tiny manly hands.

***

Go to Rochelle’s Addicted to Purple site and use her Wednesday photo as a prompt to write a complete 100 word story.

The U.S. Is NOT A Christian Nation

I have heard it said many times that America should support a certain principle (usually conservative) because America was founded as a Christian Nation. When I hear this, I immediately wonder where this notion came from. We know that America is clearly not a “Christian” nation, considering the fact that the Constitution never mentions Christianity or Jesus, and the only mention of religion in the text is in the First Amendment where it seeks to respect the free exercise of any particular religion, I find it interesting where this thought came from.

The answer actually resides in the way America was set up. Contrary to what many Christians today believe, the goal of the Constitution was not to proclaim Christianity as the official religion of America, but actually to disorient any notion of that particular thought. The goal of the founding fathers was to establish a country in which a particular religious system was not collectively in cahoots with the established state.

This was one of the main problems in Europe at the time. The Church and the State were linked, causing a whole array of problems to exist. While there were several founding fathers who were in fact Christian, the reality is that their goal was to keep Christianity, or any other religion, from becoming a functioning part of the state.

Ever since the reign of Roman emperor Constantine the Great in the early 4th Century, Christianity has become an institutionalized religion. Let me rephrase that. Christianity has become (in the western world) the institutionalized religion.

Before Constantine, Christianity was far different than we see it now. In fact, it would be difficult to associate it with the modern title of Christianity, considering the differences between it and today’s established, institutionalized religion. Think of the church of Acts. It was a message of beauty. It was a desire to proclaim the beauty of the gospel to all. Many were persecuted, and it consisted of a small following.

The terror of the Roman Empire created little willingness to follow an outlawed religion. But when Constantine converted to Christianity, and it became a part of the state, it was reformulated. It became the dominant religion, and with this, it became the ordering sheriff of its world.

Christianity was no longer about the beautiful gospel message. It became about getting people to behave. It became about attacking those who didn’t agree. It became about war. It became about nationalism and patriotism. It became law and order. It became about God’s chosen people. It became about how to do all the right things to get to heaven and what everyone else should be doing so they won’t go to hell. It was no longer about bringing heaven to earth. No longer was it about the beauty of the gospel.

To see the attempts of Christians to force their religion into the religion of America, is really not a shock. This is what Christianity has been doing for 17 centuries. And sadly, it is largely what Christianity has become.

Flash Fiction #135

PHOTO PROMPT © J Hardy Carroll

I GOT CONNECTIONS

Giancarlo had come to America, the land of promise and opportunity. After several years of hard work, he had saved enough to bring Mama over.

He installed her in a nice apartment, in a safe building which also housed several European widows of similar age. He made sure she had every comfort, and visited her each day.

After almost a month, he asked if there was anything she lacked. She said, “Yes, I wanna Halo Statue.”

They were good Catholics, but he’d never heard of a Halo Statue.

Impatiently, she mimed picking up a telephone, and said, “Halo, ‘stat you?”

***

Go to Rochelle’s Addicted to Purple site and use her Wednesday photo as a prompt to write a complete 100 word story.

 

Donkey Hotey

I read a post by Don Quixote recently. Well….not the real Don Quixote, because the real Don Quixote isn’t really real.  This one was a linguistic and social-engineering donkey.

He had a real hate on for the word, ‘retard.’ He posted the following definitions,
verb (used with object)
to make slow; delay the development or progress of (an action, process, etc.); hinder or impede.
verb (used without object)
to be delayed.
and still managed to call it an adverb.  This one is pronounced ri-tahrd.

The version he actually had a problem with, was
Noun
Slang: Disparaging and Offensive.
 a contemptuous term used to refer to a person who is cognitively impaired.
a person who is stupid, obtuse, or ineffective in some way: a hopeless social retard.  pronounced ree–tahrd.

He was obviously concerned that someone might get their little feelings hurt by being called a ree–tahrd. He didn’t advocate school programs, or public awareness drives.  Ignoring the valid noun and verb uses, he went straight to, he wanted to have the word ‘retard’ removed from the English language.

Shades of ‘1984.’ If there is no word, there can be no corresponding sin.  I’ve known people who were egotistical enough to want to get a word in the Dictionary.  This horse’s ass gets one arrogance point for thinking that he can take a word, any word, away from the 50% of the World’s population who speak English.  He also gets the, ‘Dumb As A Sack Of Hammers Award,’ for thinking that, somehow, the American Government has the authority to grant his wish.

He was quite upset that he couldn’t get 5000 people to sign up, so that he could officially petition Washington to outlaw the use of the word.  He’s not attacking windmills, but there’s definitely something tilted about this guy.  Maybe 5000 people know that it wouldn’t happen, even if he petitioned the Queen of England.  I can just hear her reply.  “We are not amused – you retard!”  😆

 

Flash Fiction #57

PHOTO PROMPT- © Sandra Crook

HISTORY LESSON

Milos came to America as a teen, intending to become rich and famous.  He worked hard, always thinking about returning to his home for a visit.

Hard work alone guaranteed neither riches nor fame.  Sometimes you needed a little bit of luck.  His first chance to return to beautiful Zagreb came with a small lottery win.

Many Americans were so immediate.  They had no sense of history.  They thought ‘old’, was yogurt past its best before date.

There were buildings on this quiet street which had been erected over three different centuries, two of those before the United States existed.

***

Go to Rochelle’s Addicted to Purple site and use her Wednesday photo as a prompt to write a complete 100 word story.

#481

Flash Fiction #7

 

Stepping Down, Stepping Up

 

 

 

 

He still couldn’t believe the amount of work and planning that had come together to allow him to study at this prestigious little English college.

His marks were quite good and he would graduate next spring and return to America to begin his career. He particularly liked the panoramic vista from the entry arch.

He had begun to think of it as his exit arch.  College staff had taken down a sign some wag had put up, reading, “Watch the first step.  It’s a doozy.”  How prophetic, his first step out of here, after his graduation, would indeed be life-altering.

 

Go to Rochelle’s Addicted to Purple blog, and use her Wednesday photo as a prompt to write a complete 100 word story.

 

Why I’m Proud To Be From Ontario (Or Not)

After a micro-surgeons’ conference in New York City, some of the leading surgeons were in the bar and, being drunk out of their faces, began to reminisce and brag about their accomplishments.

The first, a British surgeon explained:

“We had a chap caught in a printing press at a factory last year, and all that was left of him was his little finger.  Our team of surgeons constructed a new hand and built a new arm, engineered a new body, and ultimately, when he returned to the workforce, he was so efficient that he put five men out of work.”

That’s nothing, boasted the American surgeon:

“We had a worker trapped inside a nuclear reactor, and all that was left of him was hair.  We constructed a new skull, a new torso, and new limbs, and put him back in the workforce.  He is now so efficient, that he put thirty men out of work.”

Not to be outdone, the Ontario surgeon claimed:

“I was walking down the street one day, when a fart went by.  I took it to the hospital in a garbage bag, let it loose on the table, and we got to work.  First of all, we wrapped an asshole around it, built a butt onto it and attached a body to one end, and legs to the other.  Gradually it turned into Premier Dalton McGuinty, and he has now put the whole fucking Province out of work.”

Having thoroughly screwed things up, Daddy Dalton has now resigned, and taken his Golden Handshake with him.  It would be nice if I could have the entire Handshake, but one finger would suffice.  Goodbye, Asshole, you old fart!