The Divine Dictatorship

I was sitting around the house today thinking of ways to compare religion to a dictatorship. So before I get started I would like to first begin by defining exactly what a dictatorship is according to the Oxford English Dictionary. Dictatorship: 1. A country run by a dictator. 2. absolute authority in any sphere. For the purposes of this blog entry we will refer to the dictator as the biblical god. And instead of having absolute rule over a country he claims and demands absolute rule of the universe.

If you were to subscribe to a belief in the bible and its teachings regarding god and his relationship with mankind you would have to agree that he is demanding. According to the bible from the moment that you are born you have already incurred your first debt. That's right, you have a debt to god for redeeming you through the vicarious death and sacrifice of his son Jesus. It does not matter that you did nothing to god before or that you had nothing to do with the so called fall of mankind.

What people fail to realize is that religion, especially Christianity was used as a political tool to maintain order by the Roman Catholic church. Once they had gained political power as well they were able to utilize the full force of the Roman government to destroy any and all opposing belief systems. The goal was to subjugate the populace as a whole to the Roman church. The very doctrines themselves taught in the scriptures espouse complete and absolute submission to its god and the elders of the church. 1 Timothy 5:17 "Elders who do their work well while they are in charge earn double reward, especially those who work hard at preaching and teaching." (NJB)

The catholic church prides itself and claims that it is a direct descendant of the apostles of Christ. Because of this they, like all Christian churches claim to be the true church of Christ. The church wants to control the lives of its members through the use of doctrine. As a Christian you are taught to believe without question, to only thing a certain way, to walk with humility because having pride is a sin. Most of our natural impulses as human beings are condemned in the bible and by the fictional god.

Christianity is nothing more than a modern day superstition that unfortunately has not died out. Religion seems to be a need for a lot of people because somehow it is comforting to know that when things are not going well at least "it's in Gods hands." The bible teaches you to abase yourself and abhor your own flesh because you are only alive today because of the great and wonderful mercies of the dictator in the sky.

Here is a question that is worth asking. What of those people who have had a horrible life, are they supposed to be thankful to the lord as well for giving them that life? I once was discussing this issue with a theist friend of mine from work and he was telling me how we are all supposed to be grateful to his god for sacrificing his son and redeeming us from sin. My reply was that I personally did not offend god in the garden it was Adam and Eve. Moreover I did not ask god for redemption, if it were not for the teachings of the bible I would not have known that I had a need to be redeemed.

Through the scriptures we have all as a species inherited vicariously a sinful nature. It does not even make sense to put that on yourself when I am pretty sure if you has no knowledge of god at all your life would go on just fine. The church through the teachings of the scriptures wants to even carry on their sentence on you even after death. The threat of hell fire is ever present and the only way to avoid it according to them is to buy their product.

There is a saying that states that power corrupts and the church has demonstrated this throughout their bloody and dark history. Popes and clergy in the name of God ordering mass murder, rape, torture all for the crime of not accepting their brand of religion. Ignorant Christians of today long for a theocracy but since they have not taken the time to do their homework they are unaware that we have been there and done that. If you really want to know what a theocracy would be like just read up on the various crusades and witch hunts conducted by the church in 1095.

These so called holy men of God committed the most heinous crimes ever on their fellow man. They made the holocaust look like a picnic. The tales regarding the horrors committed during the crusades pale in comparison. They were gutting people with swords, burning people alive, and they even implemented the use of several home made torture devices and methodologies of inflicting excruciating pain. The most famous of these devices was the rack which was used to stretch out your limbs and disjoint your bones and tendons.

A divine dictatorship is what the bible describes in the Old Testament and the church carried one out here on Earth. Nothing new but as history has taught us it is indeed nothing to be desired.