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Nov. 9, 2005 Here on U-K as elsewhere, the battle lines remain drawn between the True Believers and the True Skeptics. Meanwhile, I sit in the wings and wait for the Final Trumpet to sound. Ron Lewis has been dispatched by the editors. He was a heckuva good writer and I wonder if I will be the next to be axed. Talk about the Sword of Damocles! Even so, I dance in the forest with ten thousand or more bright little eyes that sparkle and twinkle like the fireflies they are. Playing kid stuff, as in dodge ball, I dodge the fast-flying blades. Tee hee. More to the point, Skip Toomaloo the well-known and articulate U-K High Priest delivers yet another sermon to his loyal U-K readers, one of millions such sermons about the mythical Second Coming of Jesus Christ. But just think for a moment. How many millions of similar Bible-based prophetic talks do you think have been uttered since 1000AD? Every generation has had its Skips and it's less articulate doomsayers. Think of the millions of pulpits around the world that have been drummed on without mercy by the fists of such hard men? Just thinking about all this negativity hurts my balding head! All the while, in every nation of the world, the determined skeptics keep on thinking, doubting, and questioning. For example, U-K writer Thomas Keyes continually points out inconsistencies in the Bible text. With so much of the Bible called into question, on what basis are we justified in taking John's Revelation seriously. Honestly, John's Revelation reads like bad science fiction. It reads like the visions of a mad person. Today madness is actually being studied. People driven crazy by various kinds of stress are better understood than they were at the time when Pariah John lived in total isolation on the Island of Patmos. If John had this vision of the Second Coming of Christ, the description of it given in the Bible reads like the visions of a madman. So why do so many modern True Christian Believers still await the Return of Jesus Christ and expect this Event to be like the Revelation to Saint John the Divine? Many skeptics doubt the reality of Christ altogether. Other skeptics doubt certain aspects of the Bible. There are as many different kinds of skeptics as there are kinds of True Believer. Yet the battle lines remain drawn. Frothing at the mouth on both sides, grown men go at one another like fighting cocks with long sharp pens affixed to their nimble feet. Bad metaphor? Maybe. Anyway, sparks fly in anger and U-K articles follow. Furthermore, according to Skip Toomaloo I'm bound for hell anyway, so what difference does it matter to you U-K guys and gals? Rather like the mythical Jesus, I'm an idealist with a different idea. The main difference is, with the help of government documents I can prove that I'm a real person. You can't prove that Jesus ever existed. Just think of it! Imagine being an idealist with a different idea, so that you get attacked as a heretic!!! Take a moment and think of other damnable heretics! Think of Akhnaton the heretic pharoah who taught that the Sun was the Source of life and who taught his court artists to study nature and depict nature realistically. To the Egyptians that was a shocking idea! Think of Giordiano Bruno, who (I think) was burned at the stake because he followed the teachings of the arch-heretic Copernicus! Think of Wilhelm Reich whose controversial books got burned by USA militants! Sane or insane, Right or wrong, these heretic men had a fierce determination and an admirable devotion to Truth! On that issue, both Skip and I are standing on the same plate along with Thomas Keyes and a lot of other U-K columnists. The issue at hand isn't whether Skip is right or wrong or whether Jesus existed or not, or whether Saint John was insane. The issue at hand is whether all this battling of idealists makes any difference or not. Ultimately don't all of us have to face reality? Isn't that the truth? Like a month ago something came up and I had to deal with it. I'd been sending in articles to U-K almost every day. Then this bolt came out of the blue and knocked me flat like I was Saul on the Damascus Road. I was put out of U-K commission by practical necessity. I've had lots to do since then. For two weeks I scarcely visited the U-K website at all. Brian wrote me asking me, "Where the hell are you?" I wrote him back saying I'd not gone to hell yet. I don't know whether he got the joke or not. I'm not THAT telepathic. Everyone seems so SERIOUS now! Bills. Money problems. Leaking roofs and mud-clogged water systems. Pet cats that disappear in the night and are never seen again. Cougars on the loose, gobbling up puppies, kitty cats, and little kids. Mad women who suffer from brain damage and drop family heirlooms on your kitchen floor so that they shatter into ten thousand pieces. Toilets that mutter and whisper keeping one awake at night and wasting water. Wars and rumors of war in France and elsewhere. Cities coming apart at the seams and whole landscapes inundated. The news media hype rages on and on. But soon it will be Christmas season and the bells will ring and the angels will sing. At least little boys and girls will dress up in pretty robes and sing like angels. But still the battle lines remain drawn. I like to sing a song. I like to make up songs. A song has a poem or lyric and I like to write poems and lyrics. At least I did before I got converted like Saul got converted on the Damascus Road. The truth about conversion is the main subject here. How does a skeptic get converted to become a True Believer and how does a True Believer get converted into being a skeptic? What makes a person non-convertible? The non-convertible person gets no new idea. I say, that is a profound observation! In cars, a convertible has a hood that can be swung back leaving the interior of the car exposed to heavenly influences such as wind, sun, and rain. The non-convertible car can't be opened up. The car's owner has to be satisfied with a closed compartment. But in the convertible car there is more choice. Maybe a similar thing is true for the convertible person. The convertible person can vacillate more than the non-convertible person. You know, vacillate means to vibrate between two polar extremes. as is in "To be or not to be...that is the question." Hamlet's soliloquy. It's not good to dither too much. When the battle lines are drawn, the good man searches his soul and decides which army to join. The weaker man can't make up his mind. Fear may also cause a weaker man to avoid becoming involved in the struggle. And then as we bystanders witness what goes on in the U-K stuggle between strong witnesses for the Truth, we observe the barnyard cocks going at it like bulls in the bull ring going after the matador. Spectacular bestial adrenalin rushes feed the flames of war. No peacemaker "Messiah" is in sight! Surely the most devout Muslims and the most devout Jews and the most devout Christians and the most devout atheists all stand together on the same plate in their valiant defense of Truth! It's funny, then, that each one of them is fighting against the other! It has me rolling on the floor in spells of whoop-te-do so that I look and sound like a Holly Roller. Halleluja! If only these fanatical guys could get the picture and laugh at themselves, or just join the nearest choir and sing on key. Then U-K would be a less brutal website. One last word. My time is more limited now, and either I will stop sending articles in to U-K or I will send in articles with more errors, hoping that you understand the pressures of real life. Things happen. Roofs leak. Cars rust away. Both dreams and heirloom platters shatter. Conversions take place. We never step into the same river twice. Minds change. Yogic force endures, making all yogis feel and project the abiding peace as they radiate the unity felt by those who stand together on the plate of Truth. We are one. Only words divide us. Come on you guys, mellow out! Coyote aka Court Jester ------------ About the author: John L. Waters is an amateur psychologist and independent researcher on self-healing, integration, and problem-solving. John has created art, music and songs, prose and poetry, and helped people solve a difficult problem. For more information, read: John's letters of recommendation: http://members.tripod.com/johnlwaters/recommendations about John's self-healing and integration: http://members.tripod.com/johnlwaters/index.html about John's independent research: http://www.humboldt.edu/~jlw47/index.html about John's seeking an agent or a publisher: http://www.writers.net/writers/39295 Email: blueguntwo@yahoo.com Tell a friend about this site! ------------ All articles are EXCLUSIVE to Useless-Knowledge.com. Please link to this article rather than copying and pasting it onto your site (which would be unauthorized and illegal). |
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