Today’s Jesus and Mo strip, called “hybrid”, once again raises the extreme craziness of the sacrifice-and-resurrect-Jesus story—a story I’ve never understood. Yes, I know theologians can twist it into something that sort of makes sense—they get paid to do that—but I don’t really get why God has to turn part of himself into a specimen of H. sapiens who then has to undergo torture and killing, and then resurrection, as the only way to save humanity.
But wait! There’s more! This gory scenario doesn’t guarantee that YOU get saved: you have to accept Jesus as your Personal Lord and Savior to get past St. Peter. So there’s a combination of an act, and then a requirement not for your acceptance of the act itself, but of Jesus as your savior. If someone can put all this into words that would make sense to, say, a ten year old, I’d appreciate it.
At any rate, the cartoon’s motto is “They’ll be sorry when they close down the Cock & Bull,” and, given Britain’s draconian behavior toward “hate speech,” they might!
Ha!
What about the immaculate conception? Can’t have Christianity without that – I mean yeah, god makes every “baby”, really, but they’re all dirty and nonimmaculate – except one.
If only they had potatoes (did they?) and spray bottles back then.
For full marks, whose conception is claimed doctrinally to be immaculate. without sin?
I do like the definition of hate speech as anything that makes us hate you for uttering it. That’s really good.
Thanks to Sir Kukec, I stand corrected.
So I guess Jesus was a dirty baby like every other living thing except Mary.
It’s all so fascinating.
[ suddenly asleep ]
[ loud snore … ]
The only reason for my splitting this hair among the present audience is to point out that for Catholics, (and I guess for other Christians, too, but I don’t remember being taught this explicitly), sex is not doctrinally conflated with sin, although granted that does take all the fun out of it. If Jesus’s conception was held to be sinless merely because there was no sex involved, the calumny that Catholics think sex is somehow sinful would have some validity. But since Mary’s own sinless conception occurred in the usual manner, clearly sex = sin is a straw man. Not to mention absurd on its face. How could the procreative act be against God’s will? And if enjoying it excessively was wrong, then the Church would now be mandating IVF done with the sort ot technology that gives neither partner an orgasm.
Judging from the number of young people who say they aren’t having any sex at all—too angry and depressed, too trans, or too intimidated by the risk of firing, expulsion, or prison if consent is later contested, it seems—the one group that does think sex really is a sin is the Progressive Left.
Well technically, it’s nobody’s. The immaculate conception refers to the Catholic belief that Mary was free of original sin from conception.
I think you may be conflating the Immaculate Conception with the Virgin Birth (a common mistake), TP. The Immaculate Conception concerns the Virgin Mary’s herself being born free from original sin.
Not that any of it makes any sense.
Ha!
Thank you for helping me make no sense of the Mysterious Ways!
Mary had to be born without sin so she could bear Jesus.
What of Mary’s mother?
Routine terminated with error #FFFF FFFF - Too Many Turtles on Stack.
Press "Any" key to re-start Creation.
Insert boot string in Drive -1
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(I suspect a lot of the god-squad want this, secretly. I know that a substantial number publicly want this. Xtianity has always been thoroughly apocalyptic, from it’s very first days.)
Your remark about an explanation for a ten year old reminds of something Moe once said to Curly: “Listen, grapehead. Let me explain this in a way so that even you can understand.” As for a clearer explanation, I don’t have one!
That’s a good one from the Stooges, thanks! Here’s one of my favorites from the movie “Philadelphia:”
https://youtu.be/AR6eXWNJzoY
The only way the crucifixion makes any sense to me is that
it is a vestigial manifestation of animal sacrifice that was later
obfuscated by theological mumbo-jumbo into something
different. Animal sacrifice was common across many religions in
the ancient world and certainly every Christian knew about it.
Considering that the hard-on that Christianity has for martyrology is largely based on people refusing to sacrifice to [the Emperor / Imperial Family / State gods], with no obligation at all to stop believing in (whatever it is Christians believe) … you bet every Christian knew about sacrifice, until at least a generation after Constantine’s adoption of Xtianity in … 427 CE (? – I haven’t checked).
Actually, stick another couple of generations onto that number – I forget when Justin the Apostate took the empire back to the many arms of the Graeco-Roman pantheon for a decade or several, but it was a good while after Constantine.
What I can’t get my head around is how early Xtians thought refusing to perform a sacrifice to Cæsar was a “right thing”. No act of belief was required, only the performance of physical acts. And some dude often called Jeebus had explicitly told his followers to “give unto Cæsar Cæsar’s due” – which in this case would have been typically a pinch of incense into the candle on the altar. But I’m sure “Sophisticated Theology” can explain it to me. Please send explicatory Sophisticated Theologians to the komatiite eruption on the flanks of the Beer Volcano. I’ll be on the far side.
Warning:some really bad stuff.
The mighty one was not indifferent to asking the odd infatuated to knock off their offspring as a loyalty gesture and one nasty geezer, a Mr Lot, offering up his daughter to a mob for righteous raping, to protect something in his house that had wings.
“Hello police”…
Yeah, well, Lot, and his god, did have a rather “salty” opinion of women then.
ha,ha