I have always looked at religions from the side like, “Hi. Why you’re here?”.
My dad was doing catechism and it never worked with me, I was laughing at the silliness of it. I wasn’t a rebel but for that thing, totally. No offense but it seemed too dumb. First I was reading a ton of stuff about rockets and space (future Ariane 5 was in the work) and science and nothing seemed limited for humans so why would I ask “God”? And if God is the answer to everything, stop asking questions and bugging me about it then.
Second my mother didn’t participate in any religious activity nor she was talking about it. She was the only person not to go to church when it was happening (rarely) and for my Mini Me, that was something. She was pretty much never wrong so if she wasn’t going, that was probably the right thing to do, wasn’t it?
Some people truly believe that. Think about that.
I went to a private catholic school later, but religion was only a cross on a wall and that was pretty much it. The 90s were starting and religion in France seemed to be a thing of the past. Meaning, nobody in the streets would wear anything religious or nobody would care, US based TV shows with references to God –yeah, quite often- always were a source of lol, medias were always ready to kick religion in the balls at the first occasion etc. All we had was the pope message for the New Year which would always triggered “isn’t he dead already?” jokes about him, this old dude from the past, having no influence, except maybe the Latin world. The pope always has been a Mummy Star there.
Seriously, I thought at some point that religion and mostly the Christian thing, was about to slowly die around 2000 and that sounded about right for the New Millennium filled with obvious jetpacks and holo-computers.
Turned out to be the exact opposite way.
I think that even worse than the wars triggered by 9/11 is the resurgence of religions and especially the ones based on the same stories. Soon after the tragedy every single president in Europe was having a trip to the Vatican and when Jean Paul II died it was almost like we forgot about all the stupid shit he and his posse supported. JP II dies and medias with live TV events ask, seriously, if the white smoke announcing to the world the election of a new pope is white enough??? That really was the 2005 WTF moment. Yesterday I watched a video of a young French woman saying about an aggression in the metro “Thank God protected me”. That someone younger than me born in France is turning herself to religion and pray (for Islam “infidels” to be punished I suppose) kind of hurts.
It simply shows a high level of desperation. We fail to build a post-religion social structure evolving with us while providing security. That’s the challenge. Technology is accelerating so much, changing paradigms, transforming our lives, even businesses have a hard time keeping up with it. States are so far away it’s not even funny, not capable of providing this balanced social structure we want, making us angry. In this constant changing world I can see how an unchanged and stable system like religion is appealing, even more in the US where the state is so not providing enough. But to me it just seems insane to go this way…
I don’t know religion much, but I know they aren’t that right
Religions tend to be so totally outdated for our times, especially for women, how do they rise in popularity in a Facebook and Internet world, I don’t know. It makes me think about someone like Ron Paul, a Republican who can be wise voting against the Iraq War, opposing the War on Drugs , not supporting death penalty, being gay friendly or be tech friendly and at the same time being so WASP that he doesn’t believe in evolution (so yes, he’s pro-life). The dude is a libertarian until it hits his religious nerve. Religion is just fucking people up, that’s all I see.
These days, here in the US people laugh at an over religious woman but you have to be in a very religious country to found something like Scientology and make it work so good. In France people think that Islam is bad for women when everybody knows how bad Catholicism has been for women since forever. Like any religion I’d say.
The point is religions today should not be part of culture or being seen as part of it, period. It was, History is here to prove it thanks. But it’s not now, at all, it just makes things worse from France to Germany to NYC. Immigration and melting pot are unstoppable so let’s make it fluid by not fighting over really old virtual stuff that don’t matter in the world of today.
People prefer to rumble between groups instead of just being themselves, individuals who can enjoy any culture of the world and have their own preferences without attacking or degrading others because they don’t share them? Fine.
I’ll be somewhere, playing with robots.