The Absurdity of Religion
Why is it that if I claim that the keyboard, I'm typing this on, regularly
turns into green cheese from the planet Krypton, then everyone will call me
insane, but if someone claims that the bread they are eating and the wine
they are drinking are turning into the flesh and blood of a guy born of a
virgin, who is his own father, and who rose from the dead 2000 years ago,
then he's called a Catholic and should be respected for his faith?
When an absurd belief is labelled religious, then it suddenly isn't
considered absurd any more. This seems pretty weird to me, and let's face
it, most religions are based on beliefs that really are silly. A typical
example of this is the story of the Ten Commandments.
In this story God calls Moses to Mount Sinai to give him the divine will
about human conduct. God then lets Moses walk up the mountain, down again
and up once more, before giving him the Ten Commandments. Afterwards the
tablets with the commandments are broken, and Moses must ascend the mountain
yet again, to get a new copy. Now imagine yourself in Moses' place. You have
climbed three times to the top a tall mountain enshrouded in clouds and
lightning to receive the divine guidance of the almighty God, and then it
turns out that he can't remember his own commandments and therefore makes up
some completely new ones, while claiming that they are exactly the same. And
to make matters worse the tenth commandment is "Thou shalt not seethe a kid
in his mother's milk" (Exo 23:19). That is the guidance that God in his
infinite wisdom wants to give us? We can't cook a goat in the milk of its
mother?
Can anyone really look me in the eyes and with a straight face say that this
story wouldn't be considered plain silly, if it wasn't a religious story? In
my opinion it could have been taken straight out of a Monty Python sketch.
Of course being silly or absurd doesn't rule out existence, but it doesn't
seem to be likely attributes of a being with infinite wisdom.
Why Haven't We Seen Any Gods?
If any gods really exist why haven't we seen any of them? If they really
want us to worship them, why should they want to hide from us? I know that
this is no definite proof against the existence of gods, but it should give
anyone pause that religions have existed for thousands of years and a huge
number of people have done their best to discover gods or prove their
existence, and as far as I have been able to find out, we still have no real
evidence.
If it were anything other than religion we were talking about, wouldn't you
have given up if such a search had failed to find any evidence? I know I
would, and I don't see any reason to make religion a special case.
