Catlick Chorch.

Thrown together with more than a nod to the Donagh McDonagh poem: 'Dublin made me' (like as what I did for me leavin'.) Todays poem is a nasty bit of sneering anger. The eccentric spelling of the title is there to suggest the reader puts on their hardest north-dublin working-class accent.

The Catlick Chorch made me,
and no little cult,
With it's proselytising surveys on the street.
or baldy congo-bangers dancing on its pavements,
Or bragging born-agains with megaphone-borne bleats,


Devouring the fractured between them,
snapping the worried sheep back to the pen.
The anorexic, the neurotic, and the weak,
Most wholly: profit shall be born again.



The Catlick Chorch made me,
not something fashionable,
That's all the rage with actor-millionaires,
that advocates the gathering of wealth,
So rich folks can be holy in Bel-air,


Patronising post-colonial 'God-lite',
Might be your drug of choice, it isn't mine.
Or those cute self deceiving hippy-chicks who bend,
And break to the east for a sign.


The soft and dreary Anglicans, with their tame beliefs,
Built on the balls of a horny english king,
The lunatic puritans beating on One book,
One Rule: 'Thou shalt do no such fucking thing'.



I disclaim all the 'come-lately's;— all the splits,
The evil that comes from them and the good.
And Cat-lick doctrine also,


yeah, it's shit.


I'd rid the world of that crap, if I could.

Good Friday part II

It's late... I maybe lost the run of meself a bit...


An interventionist God should intervene,
And if he can't or won't then he should not,
The lucky lepers met the Nazarene,
( The other Lepers never got a shot),

An omnipotent God should use his might
to cure us all,-or if that's not the plan
To cure no-one, it seems a wee bit shite,
To only help out people when you can-

- make it into P.R. for your own son.
( so those who get to witness, will believe )
And stop it when the P.R. job is done.
And leave the rest to die with no reprieve,

And nothing as miraculous or great
for us to witness, no - we must have "faith"

The truth is I am on the Jesus side,
I like his take on things, I like his view,
"Forgive your enemies,"- "reduce your pride,"
"Treat others as you'd like them to treat you",

"Whoever's without sin, cast the first stone".
It's different from the torah or koran,
The spirit of the gospels stands alone,
( The other books don't really give a damn

and differ only by some slight degrees )
They both advocate murder: that's just fine!
Oppress your women: kill your enemies,

So long as you don't never dig on swine.

The gospels ('Musselmen' and Jews despise),
Impart a message way more civilised.

Without the magic tricks, it still holds true,
as a philosophy,-it still has clout.
What difference would it make to me or you,
If it was proved beyond the slightest doubt-

- that Jesus died and never healed the lame?
or walked on water, did no parlour tricks?
he just was right. Would that be such a shame?
To know the sick he visited stayed sick?

The point was that he visited, I think.
He dwelt among the outcasts, the despised,
And giving comfort to the destitute,
Is not as cool as giving folk new eyes,

But it's a good example for a creed.
That champions empathy above base greed.

It's a good pointer on the way to live,
A great example of what we can be,
To receive in this world then you must give,
These words are not, for me, hard to believe.

The world today's miraculous beyond,
what bronze-age desert tribes could ever dream,
Though people in the Third world are bein' conned,
exploited and enslaved and all between,

That's the temple I think we should wreck,
If did we follow Jesus, this would stop.
We wouldn't tolerate it one more day.
We'd fix it so each child would get enough.

and if we did: d'you reckon christ would say,

"No that's not it! - you're just supposed to pray"

Good Friday

Space Jesus with the magic healing trick,
what cured the lame, the lepers and the blind,
Was able to help out the poor and sick,
( who got sick at the proper place and time ),

to demonstrate his truly awesome power,
( and silence non-believers at a stroke ),
This aspect of the story turns me sour.
No seriously folk, is this a Joke?

For speaking for myself, I'd be ashamed,
if I had the ability to cure,
and used it to advance my cause and name,
and stopped.
Why do it? What was that all for?

"So all would know the truth;- 'his light shone out'"

Oh Yeah?

-Well I'm a part of 'All'
..............this gives me doubt.

300 miles

The following is a selection from a longer piece; 'Gaps in the Mind' by Richard Dawkins. I remember when I first read it I didn't really know the geography of Africa and that's an important part of the illustration. Still, I thought this was great so I've repeated his words here and added pictures for thickos like as what I am.

Molecular evidence suggests that our common ancestor with chimpanzees lived, in Africa, between five and seven million years ago, say half a million generations ago. This is not long by evolutionary standards.



Happenings are sometimes organised at which thousands of people hold hands and form a human chain, say from coast to coast of the United States, in aid of some cause or charity. Let us imagine setting one up along the equator, across the width of our home continent of Africa. It is a special kind of chain, involving parents and children, and we will have to play tricks with time in order to imagine it. You stand on the shore of the Indian Ocean in southern Somalia, facing north, and in your left hand you hold the right hand of your mother. In turn she holds the hand of her mother, your grandmother. Your grandmother holds her mother's hand, and so on. The chain wends its way up the beach, into the arid scrubland and westwards on towards the Kenya border.



How far do we have to go until we reach our common ancestor with the chimpanzees? It is a surprisingly short way. Allowing one yard per person, we arrive at the ancestor we share with chimpanzees in under 300 miles. We have hardly started to cross the continent; we are still not half way to the Great Rift Valley. The ancestor is standing well to the east of Mount Kenya, and holding in her hand an entire chain of her lineal descendants, culminating in you standing on the Somali beach.



The daughter that she is holding in her right hand is the one from whom we are descended. Now the arch-ancestress turns eastward to face the coast, and with her left hand grasps her other daughter, the one from whom the chimpanzees are descended (or son, of course, but let's stick to females for convenience). The two sisters are facing one another, and each holding their mother by the hand. Now the second daughter, the chimpanzee ancestress, holds her daughter's hand, and a new chain is formed, proceeding back towards the coast. First cousin faces first cousin, second cousin faces second cousin, and so on.



By the time the folded-back chain has reached the coast again, it consists of modern chimpanzees. You are face to face with your chimpanzee cousin, and you are joined to her by an unbroken chain of mothers holding hands with daughters. If you walked up the line like an inspecting general -past Homo erectus, Homo habilis, perhaps Australopithecus afarensis -and down again the other side (the intermediates on the chimpanzee side are unnamed because, as it happens, no fossils have been found), you would nowhere find any sharp discontinuity. Daughters would resemble mothers just as much (or as little) as they always do. Mothers would love daughters, and feel affinity with them, just as they always And this hand-in-hand continuum, joining us seamlessly to chimpanzees, is so short that it barely makes it past the hinterland of Africa, the mother continent.

Dawkin's original full thing here.

Religulous

I saw this fillum t'other night; the whole thing, free and gratis on Google video.

There's probably nothing more satisfying than coming across an entertaining and intelligent comedian who shares your point of view;
pretty cool for the comedian too, when he finds his audience, he can tell'em what they want to hear and they love him.



Not easy to be confrontational, dismissive, honest and loveable at the same time though: when you attempt, as this film attempts, go out in the world and "sell 'doubt'" to people who believe, it's difficult not to come across as a condescending asshole.

Bill Maher's fillum does a pretty good job I reckon of making it's point without being too much of a shit about it.

He's strongest in his confrontations with Church leaders because he has the balls to laugh in their faces when they say anything ridiculous (and religious leaders say ridiculous things all the time).

When the grassroots religious people get laughed at, I have to admit that I found it less comfortable to watch, but Bill is genuinely warm with folk and re-iterates his point again and again: not that there is 'no' god, but that there is no earthly reason to believe anybody who tells you that they 'know' that there is, because they cannot know, and they only ever operate from the flimsiest of evidence.

I watched with a friend who pointed out that an unfortunate element of the essay is that he never encounters anyone who is his argumentative equal. It is impossible to argue rationally on behalf of any set of religious beliefs, so his adversaries are a little hamstrung in that regard, but I do think the essay would have been even stronger if I had seen him ever asked about his own premise, i.e. that Religion is bad and pretty much behind every conflict you might care to mention, with a few more pointed inquiries.

Somebody at some point should have mentioned the horrors commited under atheistic communism, and in conflicts, religions may exacerbate the way groups of people view themselves as 'different' and 'separate'- but it is in no way correct to suggest (as was suggested in the concluding montage) that Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland are actually in conflict about the minor differences in their respective Religions.

I still completely agree with this film and found the style a lot warmer than Richard Dawkins' God delusion. Where Dawkins' might say 'How do you know that?' or 'Surely you can't believe that?', Mr Maher will just laugh in your face and say: " Get the f*ck outa here, that's the lamest sh*t I ever heardin my life! Puleeeze!" which in a strange way seems more polite.

Go figure.

Watch d'fillum.

Trailer

The X-mas factor

Christmas! Hurrah! Huzzah! And we SHALL have one... but of course it's not all about conspicuous consumption and boozing... what we are constantly reminded at the traditional annual church attendance is that we should take time and examine the true message of Christmas.

And what message is that? Well it's the nicer end of the whole story isn't it? The donkey and what have you... the 'star'... the bit of the bible that's for kids.

We have Angels and Shepherds and Stables and Stars in the Sky and expensive presents from people we never normally hear from.
Sounds like Christmas to me...these are all elements of the story we recognise and understand as proper yuletide, and what's a nativity play without them? And what's Christmas without a nativity play? Why it's nothing more than an updated pagan festival of gluttony designed to give us something to look forward to in the depths of winter, isn't it? ; we cant be having that.

So let's take our cue from Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five and be all about 'the message'.

Jesus's biography comes to us via the four books of the good news/gospel(good shpeil?) of Matthew, Mark Luke and John. (Yes I'm getting a bit theological on your ass but BEAR WITH ME PEOPLE) It's estimated that these books were written a while after Christ's "death" about the time that early Christians figured out that the Judgement day wouldn't be happening any time soon:

Mark says that Jesus said to his disciples:
"Truly, I say to you, there are some standing here who shall not taste death before they see the kingdom of God come with power,"
- so you can see where they might've got the impression that the kingdom of heaven was only 'round the corner.

Of course, after a while, the early Christians copped it that maybe they weren't lucky witnesses on the fast-track to salvation after all, but instead they might be guardians of a message that had to be written down and passed on and spread.

'He won't be along for a while Lads, so out with the foolscap'.

Because it's Christmas, we'll only bother with Luke and Matthew because the other two have nothing to say on the subject (Mark only starts when Jesus is baptised by John the Bap and John has him flame into being with the beginning of the universe). We don't know for certain, but most Biblical scholars agree that the books of Matthew and Luke were written sometime between AD60 and AD90. We're not talking about eye-witness accounts anyway.

Neither Matthew nor Luke suggest sources either, so we don't know if these stories of the nativity are attributed to Joseph or Mary or Jesus himself. If you consider the stories as 'gospel', then essentially it doesn't matter, but if you consider them as stories or even historical accounts then it does become relevant where all this information about the circumstances of Jesus's birth came from, why? Well because they contradict each other:

Matthew says Joseph and Mary were residents of Bethlehem who had to flee to Egypt because Evil Herod had ordered the destruction of every boy child living there (in a chilling echo of 'Passover'). Joseph and Mary were able to avoid the infanticide because an angel appeared unto them and gave them a 'heads up' (it's all about 'who you know' isn't it?) to quit town pronto .

Luke, on the other hand, says Joseph and Mary were residents of Nazareth, but the Emperor of Rome decreed a Census. This Census demanded the return of Jews to their ancestral homes so they could be counted there instead of where they happened to be living. Which is why the tourist industry in Bethlehem enjoyed a brief bonanza and there wasn't a bed and breakfast to be had for love nor money by the time they made it.

To me,these seem like pretty big events. They seem like big events in terms of Jewish/Roman history, and they seem like big events in the life of a special baby destined to be the saviour of mankind. Is it just me, or is it not a bit mad that they both differ so much? And is it not a bit mad that neither account refers any of the amazing and unprecedented elements of the other? What can be the possible reason for it?

I think there are four options:

possible reason 1. Matthew is lying and Luke is telling the truth.
possible reason 2. Luke is lying and Matthew is telling the truth.
possible reason 3. they're both telling the truth.
possible reason 4. they're both lying.

Now for a believer who takes the Gospel, well.. 'as Gospel' reason number 3 is the only option and a person who honestly believes 3 might as well stop reading now, But; if you're a faithless fecker, such as meself,who's had their doubts ever since they found about Santy, then number 3 simply wont wash.

The traditional response has been to marry the two into one story. They are both 'Gospels' and, in christian orthodoxy, both represent unassailable truths so therefore all the things that both guys said happened, happened.

This, to me, is crazy talk.
To really believe it you'd have to believe that Matthew's bits: the flight to Egypt, the star, the magi and the massacre of the innocents, were all elements that Luke was aware of, when he wrote his version, and decided to leave out.

You'd also have to believe that the strange Roman census and the subsequent 'no-room at the inn' birth and the visitation to the shepherds by angels-with-trumpets were all elements that Matthew was also aware of but decided to leave out of his version.

INTERIOR : EARLY CHRISTIAN H.Q:

MATT:
Whaddya up to Luke?

LUKE:
Oh y'know... Stuff.

MATT:
Gospel Stuff?

LUKE:
Yeah Gospel Stuff,

MATT:
What kinda Gospel stuff?

LUKE:
Oh same old, same old, Gospel stuff, -Y'know yourself...

MATT:
Yeah?

LUKE:
Yeah, I thought I'd do the early days, y'know with the angels and the flight to egypt and all that... some great material...

MATT:
You bastard!

LUKE:
What?

MATT:
I was going to do the early days!

LUKE:
So?

MATT:
So? So it's already ridiculous, there's you, me, Mark and John and we're all basically writing the same story! I was planning on my Gospel covering the whole early days thing!I mean, look if we just have the same thing four time's in a row who's gonna bother finishing the second one?

LUKE:
I 'spose you have a point... They are all a bit 'samey'...

MATT:
My point exactly. And the early days is the best stuff! Nazareth and Bethlehem and the flight to Egypt...

LUKE:
Fairly action-packed alright.

(PAUSE)

LUKE:
Tell you what; there's plenty of stuff there, why don't we split it?

MATT:
Split it?

LUKE:
Yeah, I'll take the Shepherds and the Inn and the Census of Rome bit, and you can do the magi and the flight into Egypt and the massacre of the infants...

MATT:
The massacre, you mean it? Because I always thought the Census was a bit boring...

LUKE:
I don't mind, I kinda like it.

MATT:
So it's a deal?

LUKE:
Deal.

MATT:
And you wont even mention..

LUKE:
What did I just say?

MATT:
You're a saint.

LUKE:
Go way out of that and just get writing, it's almost AD90 y'know...

MATT:
I better get started.

LUKE:
Yeah :And Matt..

MATT:
What?

LUKE:
You cant use any of my bits either now, Not a mention, is that understood?

MATT:
Janey, who'd you think I am?

LUKE:
Just so long as we're clear
PAUSE (They're writing).

MATT:
Luke?

LUKE:
Oh what is it now?

MATT:
I was thinkin; If I just write my bits and leave out your bits and you just write your bits and leave out my bits,-wont that seem weird?
I mean people might not believe it.

LUKE:
You don't have to worry about anyone who doesn't believe it.

MATT:
I don't?

LUKE:
Nah, anyone who doesn't believe it is going to hell.

MATT:
Oh.

PAUSE

MATT:
Cool.

If you believe both then you'd have to believe that something like this happened:
Either you believe that they made a pact together to tell different parts of the story or else you believe that somehow Matthew knew all of these significant details while at the same time being completely unaware of the details Luke was privy to, and vice-versa.

A faithless fecker has got to go for number 4.

How dare you! you faithless fecker!- Explain to me now, what possible reason two faithful holy men would have for lying about something as important as the circumstances of our Lord and Saviour's birth!

Well okay, seeing as you ask.

Both of these stories solve a prophetical stumbling block that must have been real thorn in the side of the early church and that's geography.
It wasn't enough that the message of Jesus was ethically superior to anything we'd heard before in the Old testament, the man was simply not palatable as the messiah mentioned in the prophecies of Isiah if he wasn't born in Bethlehem. The 'of Nazareth' element of 'Jesus of Nazareth' was a deal-breaker.
And, to my mind, Matthew and Luke represent two equally convoluted and equally fictitious solutions.

Luke can't be telling the truth (solution 1) because the Emperor of Rome simply didn't decree a Census. There was a lot of paperwork involved in such an action and there's no record of it. Also it's simply bizarre to imagine that the Roman state gave a flying continental what house of David its' citizens were from for the purpose of Census taking. It puts the baby where he needs to be for the purposes of Isiah's prophecy and provides a nice counterbalance between the powerful earthly ruler and the defenceless child at the beginning of our story, but well-told fiction is still fiction.

Matthew can't be telling the truth( solution 2) because, well because Herod, even though he was a vicious and cruel ruler, wasn't alive at the purported birth of Christ. And all over the world, not least of all Rome itself, people were staring at the heavens and trying to make sense of it. All over the world people kept records and nobody noticed a new star (if it's supposed to be Halley's Comet then he's out by at least twelve years). The massacre of the innocents is a nice literal echo from the passover and the flight from Egypt, but because something works so well in terms of a story is no reason to believe it; In fact, it's a good reason to believe the opposite.

All a bit glib I know, but I feel glib about it. I mean : I don't believe it. A word of it. I'm not sure that the people who take it seriously pay that much attention, most of 'em. If you think I'm smug then just imagine how smug a person with an invisible best friend who can make them live forever seems to me.
Anyway, I imagine this is one of those posts that those who agree with me won't bother finishing and those that don't agree with me wont bother finishing either. But still, surrounded, as I am annually, by all this usual Christmas crap, it was a real pleasure to get this off my chest.

######DISCLAIMER#####

In ancient Greek, the word 'heresy' means 'choice' and so I will say, in defence of this heretical text, that I respect the 'heresy' of others; to think otherwise , and to approach these questions from a different angle, even if that is the obedient 'bet-into-you' unthinking uncritical slavish angle.  In other words, please don't burn down my house or stone me in the street just because we see things differently.  
If you wanna be Christian about things: forgive me. Merry Christmas.