Here is the only sensible way to answer this imbecile.
Pope: Worship God not technology
VATICAN CITY (Reuters) — Pope Benedict said in his Christmas message on Monday that mankind, which has reached other planets and worships technology, cannot live without God or turn its back on the hungry.
Living without God is exactly what this species needs to advance far beyond where we are today.
It was shameful that in “this age of plenty and unbridled consumerism” many remained deaf to the “heart-rending cry” of those dying of hunger, thirst, disease, poverty, war and terrorism.
Agreed, but how does turning to God solve the problem of “unbridled consumerism”? Give us a break, Benedict. Perhaps improving the social fabric, scrapping the plutocratic systems of government and so on would be a better solution than worshipping some deity that counts the fall of every sparrow in the sky.
In his “Urbi et Orbi” (to the city and the world) message, he made a heartfelt appeal for peace and justice in the Middle East, an end to the “brutal violence” in Iraq and a solution to fratricidal conflicts in Darfur and other parts of Africa.
The “brutal violence” in Iraq caused by religious rivalry between Sunnis and Shias. Fratricidal conflicts in Africa aided by arms sales from the First World that in turn contribute to the coffers of the wealthy by making human lives worth less than Kalashnikov shells. Good one, Benedict.
“Does a ‘Saviour’ still have any value and meaning for the men and women of the third millennium?” he asked in his address to tens of thousands of people in a sunny St. Peter’s Square.
No. And don’t ask the people who’re already there. They’ve already bought your story hook, line and sinker. This is like your friendly professor in University castigating those present in class for poor attendance.
“Is a ‘Saviour’ still needed by a humanity which has reached the moon and Mars and is prepared to conquer the universe; for a humanity which knows no limits in its pursuit of nature’s secrets and which has succeeded even in deciphering the marvelous codes of the human genome?”
No. The day we send an evangelist out into the Universe to spread this insidious claptrap is the day we should nuke ourselves out of motherloving existence.
“Is a Saviour needed by a humanity which has invented interactive communication, which navigates in the virtual ocean of the Internet and, thanks to the most advanced modern communications technologies, has now made the Earth, our great common home, a global village?”
No. Mankind’s advancing, and stop trying to hold us back with your two thousand year old fairytales which in turn are ripped off from older, pagan religions and nicely packaged into one pretty mythos which culminates into an orgasmic frenzy of consumerist spending on the birthday of your saviour. “Unbridled consumerism”, anyone?
The Pope, marking the second Christmas season of his pontificate, said that while 21st century man appeared to be a master of his own destiny, “perhaps he needs a saviour all the more” because much of humanity still suffered.
“People continue to die of hunger and thirst, disease and poverty, in this age of plenty and of unbridled consumerism,” he said from the central balcony of Christendom’s largest church.
“Some people remain enslaved, exploited and stripped of their dignity; others are victims of racial and religious hatred, hampered by intolerance and discrimination, and by political interference and physical or moral coercion with regard to the free profession of their faith,” he said.
The only “saviour” mankind needs is education. Freedom from ignorance, superstition, disease, all these command a heavy price. But it’s not impossible. The key is education without any strings attached. Setting up schools in Central Africa for impoverished kids is great, but not if they have swallow liturgical hogwash on a daily basis.
“Others see their own bodies and those of their dear ones, particularly their children, maimed by weaponry, by terrorism and by all sorts of violence, at a time when everyone invokes and acclaims progress, solidarity and peace for all,” he said.
Yeah, see capitalism and gun running and all those good topics.
In his address, the Pope also made a reference to the controversial case of Piergiorgio Welby, a paralyzed Italian man who was denied a Catholic service because he had asked to die.
“What are we to think of those who choose death in the belief that they are celebrating life?” he said.
Welby, an advocate of euthanasia, died on Wednesday after a doctor gave him sedatives and detached a respirator that had kept the victim of advanced muscular dystrophy alive for years.
Your life is your own. If you feel that you can’t enjoy it, you have every right to snuff it out. Staying alive because of some guilt ridden feelings of epehemeral guilt is no way to enjoy life. It’s a bit like buying a ticket to a movie and realizing halfway through the movie that this movie is utter junk. You can stay and watch the rest, hoping for a few seconds of brilliance, or you can get up and leave and reject the abysmal bilge being forced down your throat. Welby chose to leave the theatre, but the Church is like the bogeyman usher, preventing him from leaving by insisting he sit and watch, after all, he’s paid for the full movie, hasn’t he? Nevermind that he’s blind and in the worst seat in the entire house, this movie is great, Welby, stick it out, you’ll see the magic in it soon. Welby, do us all a favour and burn the entire theatre down.
In his midnight mass for some 10,000 people in St. Peter’s Basilica earlier on Monday, he said the image of the baby Jesus in a manger should remind everyone of the plight of poor, abused and neglected children the world over.
At that mass a member of the congregation read a prayer in Arabic asking God to encourage “a spirit of dialogue, mutual understanding and collaboration” among followers of the three great monotheistic religions — Christianity, Judaism and Islam.
In the beginning, there were carnivores, great hulking beasts that tore man from limb to limb. Then there was disease, that great leveller of life on the Savannah. Then Man advanced to relative safety with his collective living and invented religion. Men bled and died in vast multitudes for gods they had never seen. The real killers are the religions Benedict named above. While it is naive and foolish to blame all mankind’s problems on religion, one can’t deny that it forms a huge part of the pie. With that in mind, Benedict is ultimately guilty of abusing his position of tremendous power. Can you imagine if he advocated sensible rememdies instead of Biblical nonsense? One can only dream. But Benedict is trapped by his profession. After all, a priest says a thing at twelve, and the same thing at ninety.
Taken from here