Dr. John's Blog

 thoughts on politics, religion and everyday life

 by Arizona's primary New Age spokesman

July 28, 2008

         Maybe you have already come to this conclusion, but religion has nothing to do with God or spirituality.

         It is a social organization.

         As a social organization, Western religion does a very good job.

         As a spiritual organization it does a terrible job.

         Western religion helps the needy, provides a social consciousness and, as Karl Marx said, “is the opiate of the masses.”

         By opiate, Marx did not mean something low and illegal, but rather he was referring to opium’s pain-killing properties.  Thus, he was saying that religion, rather than correcting the social situation, made it possible for the masses to endure it.

         And that’s what Western religion does today. It supports the establishment and helps the masses to endure the pain of our current social madness.

         Don’t we need a religion that will point out the insanity of our social order and work to correct it?

         I don’t know of any such churches, do you?

         Oh, sure, many churches address poverty and illness, but the only solution they offer is welfare.  We’ve had welfare for 75 years and it doesn’t work. But religion does not offer a solution.  The job of Western religion is to SUPPORT the current establishment, not suggest an alternative.

          The early Christian religion got their members to band together and form communes in which they shared the labor and the wealth. Communes can work.

         But sharing the labor and wealth, when run by government, NEVER WORKS.

         It has to be voluntary and cooperative.

         Even religion is often compulsory—do what I say or God will punish you.

With religion supporting the establishment, there are no restraints on government. Everyone wants to be on a winning team and government is winning, so everyone wants a piece of the action. Thus government grows and grows and the costs of running the country skyrocket.

All this is made possible by Western religion– a social organization that is not doing everything it can for society.

         Give a man a fish and eats for a day. Teach a man how to fish, and he eats the rest of his life. (old saying)

         Western religion only teaches us how to get a fish from the government.  It does not teach us how it works or how to fix it or create a new one. (Well, they do teach us the high-flying principles of how it is supposed to work, but they do not teach us how and why it is failing, or how to fix it)

When it comes to spirituality, religion lets us down again.

         Jesus, Buddha and other masters set a standard for us to follow.  But it was too inconvenient to follow their exact steps. The religions established in the names of these masters did not understand the spiritual principles their masters taught.

         “We cannot do what our masters have told us to,” they say. “So we can only worship them and hope that they will accept our adoration instead of our actions.”

          The Western religions are run by people who understand politics but not paradise, hate but not heaven, catholic but not karma, and relics but not reincarnation.

They speak of the love of God and, in the same breath they speak of God’s vengeance and the punishment of God.

          They tell us that God created sex and that it is a wonderful thing. At the same time when they say “sin” we all know they mean “sex.”

         They say that we should be as innocent as little children, but they define innocence as being sexless, not non-judgmental.

         And so they continue, revealing their total ignorance of what spirituality it, being totally wrapped up in material things– the things of the physical world.

        A social organization should be involved in the things of this world, but shouldn’t a spiritual organization be concerned with the things of spirit?

        I invite you to come on down to our services Sunday at 1030 am and ask us about spirituality.

 

 

 

 

 

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