« microcast | Main | silver »
January 16, 2004
Flesh and the Devil
Some quick thoughts after seeing last night's Channel 4s ‘Flesh and the Devil‘.
One does not become more Christ-like and spiritually aware simply by having oneself flogged raw or by being nailed to a cross. We now know that all that actually does is tap into the body’s own natural endorphin system - which is just to achieve a drug-like state that could be far better and more easily achieved by …er, oh yes, just taking drugs. D’oh.
In case you didn’t realise it -at around Mr. Jesus' time hundreds upon hundreds of people where crucified -it was a very common form of execution by the Romans in those days - but there was only one Christ. (Supposedly.) So experiencing crucifixion isn’t the answer. Nor indeed, is being in a blissed-out state or else we’d have millions of Christ-like clubbers roaming about the place after every weekend now wouldn’t we?
It’s supposed to be that Christ has already died once for your (and all our) ‘sins’ - so surely you shouldn’t have to go through it all again personally. It kinds of negates the whole point of his sacrifice doesn‘t it? So all that nailing yourself up stuff seems to be more than a little self-indulgent and self-centred by comparison. Tsk. The sheer presumption of it. Disrespectful or what? The 'son of god' going through it just wasn't good enough for you was it? Didn't do quite right for you? Do a better job of it can you? Um.
Surely a far better way to achieve a Christ-like state and to get yourself in God’s good books would be to be exceptionally nice to people, and encourage other people to be nice to each other, help the disadvantaged, do good works, sin no more, etc. But that’s usually long-term hard work and frankly most people couldn’t be bothered to put in that kind of effort over the long haul now could they. Always the quick fix. Hum again.
As for celibacy. Er… sorry to put the cat among the pigeons here but the chances are very high that the real proper historical Mr. Jesus (as opposed to the mythically-charged one that St. Paul invented for everyone to worship) was in fact a married man -so all that celibacy thing is a bit of mistake. Sorry.
It's (not) funny how every single last person I've met who's been into S&M has come from either a Catholic or otherwise very strict religious background. It proves it's not healthy.
Posted by groc on January 16, 2004 02:41 PM