Ruminations of a Mad Wizard

Yeah, that’s right, I said it.

But, one might say, the ends-means doctrine was never an approved dogma of the Catholic church or any other! This is an unfair and unfounded attack on the Pope, and organized religion in general! In fact, this same doctrine has been shown through many teachings of said churches to be the work of Satan, attempting to corrupt.

Well, perhaps all that is true. However, we must take into account that there can be a disjunction between the words people speak and the actions they actually take. (My preferred term is two-face-i-cism) To illustrate this point, let’s take an (admittedly brief) look at the behavior of the Catholic Church throughout time and touch on a few examples.

I shall take the chronology from a very neutral (in my mind) source: A Catholic website that has posted it so that others might educate themselves on the history of the church. I can release this source upon request if anyone takes issue with my assertions here, but I hate leaving paper (web) trails if I can help it, so I will not post it initially.

Between 48-49 A.D., there was held the 1st Christian Council, in which the doctrines of circumcision and dietary law (encapsulated in Leviticus) is agreed to by apostles and written in a letter. This is about 12 years after the Crucifixion of Jesus. Now, Leviticus is the third book in the Hebrew Bible (Christians can read this as Old Testament for most intents and purposes). Orthodox Jews, therefore, see this book as being the absolute word of God, dictated to Moses on Mount Sinai. Christians, however, interpreted this information more as a prophecy of Jesus rather than as strict rites or regulations, and most importantly, his sacrifice as an offering to God, as purification for sins. Obviously, however, they still perceived worth in some of its restrictions, and acted to make this doctrine. Why? What ends were they seeking? Well, let’s see…Many of the restrictions in Leviticus are very intelligent and useful to those living in harsh conditions in near-desert and desert climates. Pork? Why does God hate pigs? Maybe he really hates Trichinellosis, a vicious and nasty disease we can get from eating undercooked pig. Circumcision? Well, even today people bandy about the theory that it is easier to keep the male genitals clean when a child is young, since the foreskin is not retractible until an variable time after birth. This may be a very basic hygiene concern. My problem with is that it was translated, not into a health warning, but doctrine. Official Church Doctrine. In that, the Lord Your God said it, so do it. Aw, come on, are people really that intractable that everything must be couched as doctrine? Back to my point, the ends (keeping people healthy) justified the means (spiritual blackmail). Whether the apostles believed that God still talked to them, they felt the need to couch these commands in direct language from God to create fear and obedience.

Also, let’s look at Genesis, and the Concept of Original Sin. Adam and Eve, Garden of Eden, Pretty Tree with fruits, and a hidden snake. Why does this concept exist in the Bible? Any Bible? The Books of the Bible, Old and New, were collected and inserted over time, so if Leviticus is the Christian interpretation of an earlier work, then Genesis may be as well. After all, every single book that is in the Bible was approved, and many gospels were thrown out by those in charge of the Church for various reasons. Why keep Genesis? Well, lots of reasons! Everything has a beginning, and this is explained in Genesis. Of course, there are a few beginnings in Genesis, different but parallel. Why keep the Garden story, and thereby force all believers to accept the sins of their progenitors, which they can never truly atone for in life? My answer: Guilt and Dependancy upon Grace. Guilt because it is one of the most powerful emotions of Humanity, and Dependancy upon Grace because it makes God, and therefore The Church and Jesus, necessary. (Later Martin Luther would try and cut the Catholic Church out of their piece of this pie by his 95 Theses, setting into motion the Protestant Reformation, creating a new War of Ideology that continues to claim lives even today.) By no means was the success of the Catholic Church amongst the viciousness of Romans and Barbarians an accident. It was carefully planned to appeal to a large base of believers, bring the pagans into the fold by adding in many of their Solstice and Equinox celebrations as Christian Holidays and transferring their beliefs in a Mother Goddess to the Virgin Mary, gave them answers (however incoherent those might be considered in a rational light), and the motivation (Guilt and Fear) to fight with complete fanaticism against those who persecuted them. Also, shared belief and dependancy is a powerful force for unification and social control of behavior, which is why virtually every civilization that has ever existed has used religion and/or superstition to control, I mean enlighten, its citizens. Again, the ends of creating a cohesive religion with almost complete dependancy on the Church justified the means of picking and choosing exactly which part of God’s word in the Gospels would be included in the Bible. If you doubt that the Church underwent this process of selection, read the King James Version against ANY OTHER VERSION. In fact, read any version against any other version with an eye for what is not there, not for what is there. Did God stutter to some of the people whom these versions were dictated to? They are all the Word of God, are they not?

Ah, now we come to one of my favorite periods of history…The Crusades! Now, what was the stated purpose of the Crusades? Let’s start with the first one, under Pope Urban II. The purpose was to restore Asia Minor to Byzantium and conquer the Holy Land from the Turks. Why? Well, should the cradle of the Christian Religion be occupied by infidels? Never! Even though many books of the Old and New Testament are virtually identical to those of the Quran and many more are similar, the Turks must die! Understanding between similar moral viewpoints? pshaw. Hmm…Well, Jerusalem was sacked, and many were killed on both sides. For some years, the Christians occupied the Holy City. Then they didn’t again. Then they did again. Then they didn’t again. Still they do not, though most are free to visit the area. Now, what were the real purposes of the Crusades, since permanent occupation did not occur, and indeed, only seemed a periodic interest of the Church. There were several side effects of the Crusades, and perhaps we should look at these rather than the stated purpose. First off, the Pope himself declared that these Crusades should happen, and world leaders fell over each other trying to accomplish them. This certainly solidified belief in the SECULAR Authority of the Church rather than the Spiritual Authority. Also, sending young men in a cause where they might die for their religious or patriotic beliefs often reinforces those beliefs, and this was especially true before the Ages of Reason and Humanism. Young men who stayed in their own country are more likely to be disaffected of the Church or Religion, and more likely to serve secular ends throughout their lives. The Ends: increasing loyalty to the Church, picking a vicious enemy to rally the troops around you rather than criticizing your policies, and solidifying their Secular authority by controlling the movement of the troops of nations. The Means: Approximately Nine million dead, at least half of these Christian.

All right, well, this post is getting somewhat huge, and we can always revisit it later. Let’s end on one of my favorite subjects, and one of the Catholic church’s least favorite: Condoms! The Catholic Church is rather notorious at the moment for their stance on this, and also because the successor to John Paul II, Benedict XVI, is currently reviewing this stance. Let’s just look at one country at the moment: South Africa. In this area, 5.3 million people are infected with HIV and fully a quarter of all pregnant women test positive for it. Abstinence, not only being impractical for this mode of society for these women (choosing with whom you sleep or are married to is mostly a Western phenomenon),is obviously not cutting it. What has been the Church’s position on this? Well, condom use prohibits the transmission of Life, and this is certainly against the instructions we were given in our Holy Book. The fact that abstinence is not working appears to be the fault of these poor souls. To be fair, Catholic organizations contribute between 25 and 30 percent, depending on which set of figures you look at, of the care AIDS victims receive in the entire world. Well, I say an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, and guess what? There is no cure! At least, until our Pharmaceutical industry manages to find cures for Cancer and AIDS rather than pills that restore old rich men’s hair and sexual potency. But I digress, that is a discussion for another day. The Ends of the condom controversy: Protecting the infallibility of Church Doctrine, not having to admit the Church is utterly and completely wrong, and not letting science and reason interfere in what has been declared to be a spiritual matter-Procreation. The Means: Tens of millions dead, millions currently dying, Pope shuffling papers to give a good PR impression without actually giving ground.

Have you noticed it? In 2000 years, the means have become more and more costly to Humanity, while the ends have become less helpful and beneficial to Humanity, but better for the Church. This is ultimate corruption, that offered by Satan or Lucifer in the Christian Framework. Make a small concession, and you are more likely to compromise yourself the next time a concession is asked for. This is how Evil can corrupt, and evidently it can infest an organization of individuals, not just one. Also known as the Slippery Slope theory, this is one of the same arguments used by Christians and Governments against things like Gay Marriage today…If we let Homosexuals get married, what’s next? Animals marrying people? Three person unions? Ironic, I think, that a Church that has constantly invoked this doctrine to preserve its own power now has adherents that try to take the rights of others away by refusing to give an inch on its beliefs and trying to enforce their own world view on the world. Of course, the subject of Marriage is not that simple, and has never been. But again, a subject for another time.

Anyone who reads this, please comment if you wish! Questions, concerns, answers, and/or verbal abuse are welcome as long as you present evidence and logical argument to back it up. Expect your argument to be attacked and deconstructed if you seek to attack and deconstruct mine…I do not take this personally, and if you post, neither should you! I enjoy debate and the give and take of ideas, and free exchange of opinion, but these things ARE NOT the same!!! Post an opinion and say it as such, or give me a spirited argument about the cases I have presented here, but understand these are not the same thing, and I will treat them very differently.

Also, the next post will be about the current world situation and how this doctrine has been expanded by Christian and Muslim nations to influence their foreign policy. Scary, ain’t it!