Anyone here ever read a booklet/tract called "My Heart Christ's Home"?

[Taverner]

Horrible book - anyway, the gist is this:

Narrator invites Jesus aka Yeshua Bin Yusuf (my clarification, his real name is Joshua, but I digress...)

into their heart. Like anyone you invite into your home, Jesus goes out and points out all the shit he doesn't like and you throw it away.

Pushy fucking Jesus!

Anyway, I thought of writing a satire of it called "My Heart Christ's Eviction"

[Warpy]

1. Wow, it's not even a Chick tract

I think your parody idea is a great one.

[Taverner]

2. No pictures, all words

So I realize a lot of Fundies probably think its of the devil

[Promethean]

3. Yeshua

Is the precursor to the name Joshua. During the time period the events supposedly happened when people weren't calling him savior they would have called him Yeshua. Yusuf is the precursor to Josef as well. At least as I've been told by people much more savvy in old Hebrew dialects than myself.

[Taverner]

4. Yeshua bin Yusuf, Joshua son of Joseph

But then again, I like to think they called him "T-Man"

[Promethean]

5. The sad thing is

I have yet to meet a christian who actually knew this before I told them. I'd ask them straight up "What is the name of the christian savior" and infallibly they would answer me with the Hebrew word for savior. They were generally less than amused when, after correcting them, I would note: Why should I take anything you say on religion seriously when you haven't even put forth the basic intellectual effort to learn the name of the most important figure in your religion?

[Taverner]

6. Exactly! The Messianic Jews are about the only Christians that know it

Also - ask any Christian how the Bible was put together

95% chance they will have no idea. They might said God or Paul put it together. That would be wrong. The Roman Catholic church, working hand in hand with the government, decided which books went in, which didn't and even changed large parts. This was Constantine turning Rome into a kind of theocracy - one that ruled long past Rome and still exists today.

In Evangelical Junior High, as we learned it, they put all this emphasis on how they were copied letter by letter...etc

No mention that it was at least 300 years after most Jesuses (there were several Messianic claimants named Yeshua - it was a popular name) were dead. So I looked that up, and found out all about Constantine, who was sold as "allowing freedom of religion" and actually forcibly converted Rome to Christianity.

So when I posed all these questions to my teachers, I of course was swatted (corporal punishment vis a vis a bat that looks like a flat cricket bat) and told to have more faith.

At that moment, a light went off in my head that told me "What these people are telling you is bullshit. Go learn the truth."

And I did, and I'm here

Took me a while to step down from religion: several years before I kicked that monkey off my back. I tried the Methodist route, the Peace Church route, the Unitarian route and then I realized, through learning that it's ALL made up.

Knowledge IS power. It's not just a cliche.

[Promethean]

7. Of course knowledge is power.

Why do you think all the authoritarian types try to hard to disparage and undermine education.

[Taverner]

8. Yep. As much as I loathe him, Stalin was right.

Ideas are more powerful than guns. We would not let our enemies have guns, why should we let them have ideas.
Joseph Stalin

[Heather MC]

13. Yes Christianty was forced

I was radio surfing the other day and landed on two men discussing how the fact that Christianity spread across the land and lasted so long was proof of God's existence.

It's funny how they comfortably dismiss and forget about all hangings, beatings, slavery and beheading that happened in order to magically spread Christianity "across the land" for thousands of years.

[progressoid]

9. Yeah but if I hit my thumb with a hammer, I'm going to scream "JESUS CHRIST!"

Yeshua just doesn't cut it.

[FiveGoodMen]

10. "Oh Lord, I have made you a place in my heart...

among the rags and the bones and the dirt.
There's piles of lies, the love gone from her eyes,
and old moving boxes full of hurt.
Pull up a chair by the trouble and care.
I got whiskey, you're welcome to some.
Oh Lord, I have made you a place in my heart,
but I don't reckon you're gonna come.

I've tried to fix up the place, I know it's a disgrace,
you get used to it after a while -
with the flood and the drought and old pals hanging out
with their IOU's and their smiles.
bare naked women keep coming in
and they dance like you wouldn't believe.
Oh Lord, I have made you a place in my heart,
so take a good look - and then leave.

Oh Lord, why does the Fall get colder each year?
Lord, why can't I learn to love?
Lord, if you made me, it's easy to see
that you all make mistakes up above.
But if I open the door, you will know I'm poor
and my secrets are all that I own.
Oh Lord, I have made you a place in my heart
and I hope that you leave it alone."

-- Greg Brown

[Taverner]

11. +100000000000000000000000000000000

[Arugula Latte]

12. Jesus doesn't like the feng shui of my internal organs.