I was sitting outside one of my favourite cafes in the freezing cold yesterday enjoying the growing anticipation I have that the warmth of spring will finally arrive any month now. But the reason for the choice of coldness over warmth and chatter was that there was some sort of flowery festival going on and a band was setting up on a lorry in the high street and I thought a front row seat might be worthwhile if they turned out to be good.
The positioning of crosses all over the stage didn't register at first, and if they had I would have thought they must be a Black Sabbath tribute act due to my generally godless nature. But no! It was that curious thing, a Christian rock/gospel/sing-a-long sort of band. The likes of which I never usually listen to - the Devil having all the best tunes doncha know. But they were fun, if rather earnest, and all were competent musicians and singers, perhaps a bit too much hands-in-the-air hallelujahing for my taste but it was their gig and their (hijacked) holiday and I'm always happy for other peoples happiness. So I thoroughly enjoyed this completely new experience. Some members of the crowd though, were really digging it and were clearly close to ecstasy if not actually speaking in tongues, I couldn't hear due to the volume PA that I'm not really used to these days. But listening to the lyrics I couldn't help but think what an odd idea it all is, I reasoned that a visitor from a world that never heard of Christianity would find the whole idea utterly perplexing. I imagined myself as just such an otherwordly type and had an imaginary conversation with one of the devotees: "What's going on here? You guys look happy." "Yes, we've all heard the Good News" "What, have the Tories decided not to contest the election?" "Ha ha, no. Better news than that, Jesus has risen from the grave to save us all from sin" "I missed that on the news this morning" "Ha ha, no. It happened two thousand years ago but because he was God's son it works for all eternity" "Erm, what works exactly?" "Well, God put his son, Jesus, on Earth to save mankind but he was betrayed by a disciple and crucified by the Romans and he came back to life to symbolically represent our own rebirth through us accepting him as our saviour" "So the guy who betrayed him is a bit of a hero then, because without him there would be no act of resurrection and there would be no point to any of it, did I get that right?" "Ha ha, no. Not quite. Actually he's been damned to hell for all eternity, but maybe the resurrection would have happened anyway" "There must be good and reliable sources that documented all of this to make it such a planet-wide movement for all these centuries" "You'd think so, but actually no it's the other way round and the first people to write about it lived many years afterwards and contradicted each other massively" "Ah well, I don't suppose it matters if we all get saved, whatever that means" "It means our souls go to heaven when we die and we spend eternity by God's side" "God?" "He created the universe and us in his image" "Far out. I was taught something else at school" "We're working to change that" "There must be some good corroborative evidence or some more recent proclamations from God and not just this dubious iron age stuff?" "No, but we're happy with it" This is kind of the problem. Without the self-perpetuating context of us being taught what our parents were taught, and thus just accepting these ideas simply because they form part of the cultural background we grow up with. things like this get passed on without question. We do better at challenging these days but religion still gets a free pass as a point of view that's not to be messed with, to the extent the state even pays for schooling in this stuff. Is it a problem? Anyone who actually watched the "Going Clear" Scientology documentary will know how much of a problem it really is. The IRS was left to declare - or not - whether CoS was a religion. Because if it is it doesn't have to pay tax. It came down to the wire with the CoS destined to be bankrupt if the decision went against it, but due to some dubious legal shenanigens, they got away with it. The trouble really was the lack of any definite way to assess whether something is a religion or not. After all these centuries people still can't seem to put their finger on it. This amazes me. My Christian friends ought to be a shining example of what constitutes a religion. Their beliefs are based on metaphysical stories and not on physical observations. Too simple? You tell me. What else would we need to stop, say, Scientology from making an absolute fortune out of running it's prison for the mind? Or kids in UK schools being taught things that are not just open to debate but actual demonstrable nonsense? And if that stops people dancing in the street, is it even a good idea? I don't know but I like the fact that Easter has evolved into another tacky consumer-fest of conspicuous consumption. and the way they honestly expect us to believe the bunny rabbits and eggs are symbolic of Christ rising from the grave! It's too cute for words.
