Joe Fatso Ministries

01/25/2023

How many times have we been wrong about an issue, when we swore we had it right? Each time we should be thankful, so we can humble ourselves for the next time

01/19/2023

There is nothing wrong with utilizing Christianity as a political force; this is the reality of the world we live in, that things which should ideally be pure and free of politics, must become so to ensure their survival.

Many will say wearing your faith on your sleeve, embracing Christian nationalism, and behaving more like a crusader than like Jesus, wasn't what was originally intended for Christ's followers. And to some degree this is true.

But we also don't need to live in an all or nothing, black/white construct, where perfect becomes the enemy of good. Turning the other cheek has its place, but it's strange that absolute literalism and purity sentiments always rear their head only when it can be a thorn in the side of our cause, and almost always used by those who oppose us. If we're to go this route, we should also go all the way and sell all of our possessions, which was also once instructed by Jesus.

But we live in the real world, and we face real matters of practicalities. Divine intervention won't miraculously save the church at the last minute, if we've chosen to do nothing ourselves.

In this way, we have to view Christianity in two different ways: one as a true lifestyle faith and practice, and another, as a political tool. Many times we will face an issue that doesn't square when viewed in the first way, but absolutely does in the latter.

01/19/2023

It's worth considering the idea of a Christian pride parade. Christian values are under assault everywhere in America, and you're immediately on the defensive if you try to uphold them. Those with actual pride parades seem to be the least in need of them. They gather explicit endorsements and accolades from every corner and institution of society.

Those who oppose this idea will say that being anti gay or anti LGBT is a poor representation of Christian values, and if it is representative, it shouldn't be elevated because it's in conflict with the goodwill of another group, which, they'll argue, isn't the case for LGBT pride parades.

So being that their response will have more sway with most "moderate minded" people, we need to be clear about the indisputable need of this, which can be summed up as sexual immorality and openness in general. This needn't be a LGBT thing. On the contrary, most of society could come to agree that everything has been over sexualized. Where it has reached the tipping point is with its expansion to children. People are fed up, it's no longer just conservatives that think so, and it's no longer limited to "anti LGBT".

Christians should go on the offensive and make a statement of faith, whether it be a mass march or what. It has the added elements of indirectly evangelizing. It should be a no brainer.

01/18/2023

I was surprised to see we came to similar conclusions separately

The first segment comes from a discussion between Jordan Peterson and Ben Shapiro on the Rubin Report. Streamed live 30 November 2018https://www.youtube.com/...

01/18/2023

On the luxury of atheism and irreligiousity; and the permanence of religion

One of the blind spots a lot of atheists don't consider, is the context of how they've arrived at their position. Throughout most of human history, religion was an integral part of life - so much so that there are arguments made that it's encoded in our genes. At the very least, it's safe to say it evolved along with us and is not only natural, but a necessary part of us.

For all of history, you will be hard-pressed to find a civilization or tribe that doesn't have religion imbedded in their culture. If you can find one, before the modern age, I'd be interested to know. Atheism is therefore a very new (lack of) belief system, with pretty large implications on how we go about daily life. But how did this new worldview sprout in only modern times? The answer, I think, lies in modern science and scholarship that was able to explain the formerly unexplainable, while also laying a secular alternative style of life that people could turn to outside of religion. If people took issue with their religion, they found it overbearing, unrealistic, etc. they can simply exist outside of it now in the new world of capitalism and community that can exist outside of religion. It's much easier and, taking the path of least resistance, many will favor this agnostic/atheist worldview and lifestyle. But there are two points here to consider:

1) It is only through our modern advanced, first world luxuries that the context is set to allow us to entertain a secular worldview

2) This context of modern luxury incentivizes an irreligious worldview, through the heightened immediate pleasures it now offers

If you maintain a religious worldview in the modern day, you are simply missing out on worldly pleasures. This sacrifice just wasn't as large in times past, and so the appeal to secularism wasn't as large. In sum, when things are going well in life and the world, why wouldn't you want to enjoy it fully here and now in THIS life, rather than be focused on the next. On the contrary, when someone is faced with serious hardship in life, they're brought to some faith pretty quickly. Notice how people in these circumstances are rarely secular atheists.

The point of all this is that circumstance predicts your worldview, and that we are living in extraordinary, anomalous times, which can only mean our prevailing beliefs are extraordinary, anomalous, and may need reviewed in the larger context of history and what it means to live. While you may be living for the here and now in the first world today, these conditions aren't really natural, and especially may not last. So you should adjust before our conditions do.

On the permanence of religion - religion will always be a part of us, no matter what you choose to believe in. By that I mean, our brains are formed to behave religiously, and we'll perform so regardless of belief. We will behave ritualistically, and prone to worship, and persecution. For those whose only god is themselves, they will just adjust what their ritual and worship is. For many, this means addiction. Their god will unknowingly be many things, and their worship will seem just as irrational. In the cult of woke, it's clear the religion it's become, the varied authorities or constructs they worship, and their tendency to persecute heretics.

All this is, is religion in a new name. Religion will always be with us, and we'll always worship something. The rare exception, like Buddhist monks, endeavor to reject their own personhood, only illustrating its intrinsic characteristic in us.

Not a business

01/18/2023

Journey Through Faith by Reason

My journey to and from agnostic/atheism, to theism, and back to a certain kind of Christianity.

Growing up in a protestant home, but not very strict or regular with church, I had some space to form my own opinions, while still having a flavor of the spirit of Protestantism/Christianity. My mom did a good job emphasizing the spirit of the message, not the letter, as she had her own conflicts with the church itself. The spirit of Jesus was sort've the law of the land, and because there were no draconian rules about it, it left a very positive impression looking back, in a now godless and hopeless world.

However, times were tough, and as a teen, life and suffering didn't make sense. I started reading more to understand the world and by 17, upon reading about the enlightenment era, started to doubt my faith, and soon after considered myself agnostic.

This continued for several years, and I deepened my identity as an agnostic, debating Christians when I could. I was still interested in paranormal phenomena though, and because of that I never strayed to atheism or believing in physicalism. In fact, it was this re****ed belief that pushed me away from the godless camp. Their reasoning was twisted, and it seemed to be moreso based in bitterness than genuine curiosity for the truth. Additionally, it was clear to see the differences between the lives of atheists and everyone else. There was usually something wrong with atheists, baggage or whatever, that pushed them to come to such a conclusion. So, I was already primed to be more receptive to come out of that camp, when I watched an apologetics debate. It was William Lane Craig vs Bart Ehrman, and I only saw the first part, arguing for theism. I thought WLC made great arguments, and knowing theists actually used reason to come to their conclusions, and not just the Bible, was appealing to me. I didn't know much of Bart at the time, but I did know he was an atheist, and he looked dead inside. I later found him to be a great resource, but it still confirmed what I thought, that atheists are fundamentally broken and bitter, and their beliefs stem from this.

At that point I was fine with calling myself a theist or spiritual, but I wasn't ready to jump back to Christianity. That debate I saw was in two parts, first for theism, then the second part to show Christianity is the right God. The second part I knew was more tenuous, but those two parts had to be distinguished - much easier to support the first part.

For a few years then I chewed on these ideas and felt pulled back to Christianity in some way, but not in its conventional way. In order to come back, there were problems with the Bible that had to be reconciled. Foremost was the issue of hell - basically, it made no sense. Something would have had to have been mistranslated or misunderstood, as from the beginning for me, this idea pushed me away and seemed nonsensical. While punishment alone didn't seem unbelievable, conscious torment for eternity seemed like just about the most petty being imaginable, while we're supposed to understand God as love, as stated in the Bible. For years then, i felt a pull to Christianity, as something that's true on some level, but must be false on another.

My journey back then centered around the issue of hell, since itself is sort've the basis of the faith. Predictably I found refuge in universalism, the idea that hell is misunderstood, but this all seemed like a little loophole to make the larger faith work. If the faith is completely wrong in its foundational concept, what's to be said of the rest of its doctrines? And what's to be said of this God, that would have allowed such large and impactful deviations from the original message?

Universalism just opens up more problems than it solves. For the truly curious, universalism just puts you down a rabbit hole. At the same time, should we dismiss the whole Bible? That's throwing the baby out with the bathwater, and not a mature way to understand things. Especially when we consider, there are parallels between Christ's teachings and other enlightened beings or phenomena, like the Buddha, or NDEs, or drug trips.

Theologically speaking, the most mature take I've currently come to, is viewing the Bible in realistic terms that allows for its criticism. That is, that Jesus existed, and there was something remarkable about him, but that the Bible isn't infallible, as it was written by men and compiled hundreds of years later. It's a huge leap to think of it as the infallible word of God. It's also important to remind adherents, Protestants really, that they basically believe in Bible-anity, not Christianity. We don't even know exactly what Christ said, since we weren't there. We can only hope we have a fairly accurate summary of it.

Theologically then, I'm more in line with Unitarian universalists, like our founders. The problem is, the UU churches don't even know what to preach. If you've ever seen a service, it's kinda pathetic, and devolves into liberal humanism usually. There then becomes a case to make, if you feel pulled by the figure of Jesus yet, to attend traditional churches. While they're theologically off, they have retained the spirit of it, or at least allowed potential for its members to retain it, by literally believing it all.

Without believing the Bible to be all true, it would fall away in one generation. It's necessary out of pragmatism for churches to maintain a stance of biblical infallibility. It's only through this fundamentalist worldview prevailing until now that an option for the lesser stance of, fallible but containing some truth, is available to us. Through this understanding, it could make sense that the theologically wrong yet prevailing view of the Bible actually was guided by God/Holy Spirit, adapting to the faults of man, knowing that without it, the whole thing will fall away. The fundamentalism then is like a tough outer shell "vehicle" to transmit the inner fruit to those who wish to break the shell and find it. At the same time, not everyone has to, as the prevailing understanding does just fine for most people's limited ability to understand.

I was told in science class that the way they teach the orbit of electrons to freshmen isn't even the truth. You later find it's an oversimplification to convey a broader point. I think that's basically the case here.

What then does someone like us do then, who are disillusioned with the conventional narrative, but feel compelled to the core truth in the Bible? A post on that soon...

Not a business

01/18/2023

Welcome to Joe Fatso Ministries. These are the ramblings of a fat man arguing for God in obscure ways