How Dare You, God? E-Book

Matti Helelä

• Herausgeber: Books on Demand
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 85

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Beschreibung

I use SARCASM and humor to discuss Christianity and the Bible. First, imaginary experts describe the divine brand, each from their own perspective. Second, imaginary people introduce themselves and reveal their thoughts without any sugar-coating: The HEROES OF FAITH are struggling with their problems and trying to do their best to follow their god's will according to their own interpretations. The CHALLENGERS OF FAITH are wondering about god's intentions, and they eventually break free from the yoke of faith. Third, the prayers are also divided into two groups. In each group, people talk to god with hilarious boldness and radical conclusions: The FAITHFUL FANATICS are trying to pray humbly, even though they do not always understand the purposes of their god. The CRITICAL DOUBTERS present harsh criticism against god. FROM READERS: "This is excellent, absolutely hilarious text. I read it nonstop and was howling with laughter alone here at night. Probably I woke up the neighbors. You have certainly surpassed yourself with this work." "The book proceeds logically in content and structure. The work is like the growth story of a cautious questioner into a categorically arguing religious critic."

Leseprobe

Dedicated to my youth-time friends in faith and to Jesus, our imaginary friend

Contents

Introduction

1.

Branding through Times of Change

Divine Brand

Godly Communication

Brand Story

Power of the Bible

2.

Heroes of Faith

Sherry Shamer: Religious Freedom to Desecrate Others

Minnie Mission: Jesus Saves from Hellfire

Holly Horney: Sin Is Lurking at the Door

Andy Avenge: The Lord Is a God of Vengeance

Lily Little: I Moved to My Own Room

Ferry Fire: I Save from Fire and God Saves from Hell

Yuri Nator: The Lord Chooses the Winner

3.

Challengers of Faith

Eileen Ulick: Only the Lord May Kill Babies

Boris Bossy: Obey Both Your Boss and God

Anita Naylor: Love Is Fantastic

Eaton Beaver: I Enjoy Life

Wayne Kerr: Struggling Like Hell against Satan

4.

Prayers by Faithful Fanatics

Mike Hunt: Teach Her to Obey

Samantha Smelly: The Lord Likes to Sniff

Harry Bald: Cursed Children

Charlie Churchman: I Love Them All

Mo Leicester: Thank You, Jesus!

Simon Small: Forgive Me for Getting Saved

Samuel Save: I Am Afraid of Hell

Betty Blest: My Son Was Saved from a Fatal Car Crash

Tammy Tweet: I Expect a Direct Message

Neil Down: Don’t You Ever Get Bored?

5.

Prayers by Critical Doubters

Gabe Itch: Why Did You Stay in the Closet?

Lola Laughter: You Are So Full of Nonsense

Cathy Cathell: Are You Really a Maiden?

Chris Peacock: Does the Holy Spirit Make You a Man?

Anita Kock: Have You Looked in the Mirror?

Ben Bio: You Are the Unnatural One

Foster Fury: You Are Not Good for Anything

Heidi Hate: Your Hate Speech Is Shameful

Afterword

My Books

Introduction

I decided to use sarcasm and humor to discuss Christianity and its holy scriptures. This approach makes it easier to give them the value that the products of imagination deserve.

Many teachings of the Bible contradict one another, and its numerous quite creepy passages are at odds with the values of the modern world. This book contains examples of hate speech, spiced with sarcasm, that flourishes in the sacred texts of Christians.

First, imaginary experts describe the divine brand quite bluntly, each from their own perspective.

Second, imaginary people introduce themselves and reveal their thoughts without any sugar-coating. The Heroes of Faith are struggling with their problems and trying to do their best to follow their god’s will according to their own interpretations. The Challengers of Faith are wondering about god’s intentions, and they eventually break free from the yoke of faith.

Third, the prayers are also divided into two groups. In both groups, people talk to god with hilarious boldness and radical conclusions. The Faithful Fanatics are trying, at least to some extent, to pray humbly, even though they do not always understand the purposes of their god. In contrast, the Critical Doubters present harsh criticism against god.

Because people have invented thousands of gods, I chose to use the word god as a common noun without a leading capital letter, except for headings or when starting a sentence. The same applies to the other words referring to deity, except for very specific names such as Jesus Christ. My direct Bible quotations, taken from the New King James Version and highlighted in Italics, naturally retain their original spelling.

1. Branding through Times of Change

Divine Brand

Brenda Brander

Readers often ask me for examples of how a brand can be adapted to the spirit and environment of the time. Naturally, the brand identity needs to be updated so that the brand can live and succeed in the same time context with its target group. I will give you an interesting example that I have examined recently.

The brand strategy of the biblical god began in a manner very typical of that time, and the strategy was adapted to the prevailing social order. The core value was the praise and worship of a very narcissistic and jealous god. Conscientious adherence to his petty commands and prohibitions was of utmost importance.

Anger and intimidation were characteristic of god’s communication. Central to god’s policies were defeat and subjugation, as well as revenge and brutal genocide. Good things were promised to the obedient, who were also severely tested. Obviously, god needed drastic measures to find out how genuinely he was loved. How else would he have known?

God also called for ethnic cleansing because foreign nations were worshiping false gods. They should have known better. Everyone from baby to grandparent had to be killed – except for the virgins, whom god promised as a reward to the executioners of the genocide. This is how the Bible calls for action (Numbers 31:17–18):

Now therefore, kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman who has known a man intimately. But keep alive for yourselves all the young girls who have not known a man intimately.

Promising virgins as war booty was quite an arousing way to lure horny men to wage war. Sex slavery was one of the forms of slavery accepted by the Old Testament. Slavery in general is also accepted in the New Testament.

From all this, we can conclude that the god of the Bible branded himself carefully to fit into his own time and environment. There are no ethics at all – ethnicity thrives instead.

The brand should live long and adapt to the changing times. Sometimes the brand strategy needs to be fine-tuned, and sometimes a fundamental change is necessary. As for god, a truly radical change took place when Christ, the son of god, was born the son of man, Jesus. This trick was quite a U-turn made by god.

The new brand strategy was, of course, based on real change. Now god had made a virgin pregnant, so that he could take a human body in all its glory. This way, the almighty ruler of the universe was able to sacrifice himself to himself and thus save the fallen people from the hell that he himself in his own superior wisdom had created. From the perspective of the modern man, god had access to a very limited variety of tricks and methods. But people thought differently in ancient times.

In the Old Testament era, god coveted blood sacrifices to be offered in ceremonies organized according to god’s extremely detailed instructions and orders. In god’s brand, blood sacrifice remained a driving force throughout the millennia until modern times. Time will tell how far into the future it will last.

Along with god’s brand rejuvenation in the New Testament, blood sacrifice was emphasized in a whole new way. The essential features included suffering and torture. Animals were no longer concerned, even though Jesus was called the lamb of god (see John 1:29, John 1:36 and Revelation chapters 5, 6, 7, 14, 15, 19, 21 & 22). Now the incarnate god sacrificed his own earthly body to himself. The culprit for all this was man.

The New Testament also emphasizes love, which is by no means unconditional but, according to the modern conception of love, very hypocritical: Believe in Jesus and love him – otherwise you will have to spend your eternity in the fire of hell. The brand promise could be summarized as follows: Jesus saves (from hell). The section in parenthesis is often left out because it looks so ugly. That is nonetheless precisely the case.

The brand was connected with its time and place about two thousand years ago. How well it would fit into the 2020s is quite a different story. Such an ancient brand makes the target audience of the 2020s doubt either the good intentions or the unlimited power of such a god – or, in the best case, both – as well as the entire existence of god.

“Love thy neighbor” is often claimed as a Christian value. To the god described in the Bible, however, genuine love seems to be a completely foreign concept. That is why many religious communities are always desperately trying to cherry-pick their favorite parts from the Bible.

Godly Communication

Godfrey Comm

Communication fails if it is characterized by a lack of updates and silence on current issues. Timeliness is very important to the people today, as information becomes increasingly obsolete. Equal attention must be paid to the clarity and consistency of the message, so that the target group can understand the intended message correctly.

In the 2020s, there are still many organizations and communities whose basic message is old and outdated. However, if we rise above these organizations and communities to approach the very source of their original message, the case seems even more bizarre. The source seems to hide behind the clouds instead of using modern cloud service.

Any real god could very well set up an account on some social media. For example, he could tweet or post messages whenever he pleases. That way, all of humanity would not have to fight over who he is and what he really wants, and whether gays may love and marry each other or not, or if women need to hide their beautiful hair from men’s eyes.

But no. The character concerned chooses to stay hidden. Many believers, on the other hand, rudely show off as if they themselves were gods on earth, not to mention airplanes, and very often these believers are not mature enough to take responsibility for their actions.

It is absurd to talk about god in singular because people have invented numerous gods. Many people nonetheless seem to assume that theirs is the one and only god.

Even many uncertain agnostics often discuss the possible existence of god in singular – as if there were either one god or none at all. These people might as well ask each other, "Do you believe in gods?"