Hitler and Being A Christian

Was Hitler a Christian?

This is both the reason I started this blog and the idea I wanted to avoid. There's just no way to really win it, either way. So let's deal with it either way.

The argument for is that Hitler's parents were Roman Catholic, and so he was a good little Catholic boy. Throughout his career, Hitler maintained his belief, maintaining a belief that he held in common with those underneath him. It was his deep respect for Catholicism that would lead him to making a deal with the Catholic Church so that he would leave Catholics alone as long as it didn't interfere with Germany's rise to power. Although he was eventually disillusioned with Christians, an issue that would magnify itself as World War II turned against Germany, he was nonetheless looking at helping Christianity expand after the Germany won, with an eye towards linking Christianity and historical German beliefs.

However, there is the argument against. Sometime during the First World War, Hitler lost his faith, but realized that religion could be used to manipulate the masses; religion in service to the state could create a much more loyal population. He wrote as such in "Main Kampf", devoting a full chapter to it. He would emphasize his Christian background in the biographical sections, bu most of writings seem to indicate that he was only interested in looking like a religious person in order to solidify his following. Based of the journals of those around him, he also wanted make the pact with The Vatican in order to take it off the list of people who would oppose Germany's rise to power. During World War II, those around him noted that he talked derisively of the religious. His plan for Christianity after the war was to mix Christianity with his beliefs on Aryan perfection, re-fashioning Jesus Christ into a warrior.

Although there is a part of me that would love to see Jesus Christ wielding a huge ax into battle smiting sinners, it's just wrong. Obviously I'm going to go with the idea that Hitler was not a Christian, but that he using that religion in order to make it seem as if he were one of the people. I appreciate that people expect that of politicians anyway, but there just feels as if there were an extra level of cynicism attached to it in this case. He had, after all, written that he a leader only need to pretend to share the religion of the people, and that he should then use that religion to mollify the people so that he could lead them without question.

I am obviously offended that atheists use him as an example of what Christian leaders become. As I believe that Hitler was never a Christian beyond convenience, Hitler was never an example of what a Christian leader can be. His actions never had anything to do with any form of Christianity as practiced at the time; antisemitism was even being decried by the Church at the time, and killing on such a scale went well beyond any killing in the past. Sure, it can be argued that individual Christians wanted the Holocaust to happen, but it would be hard to argue that more than a small minority of churches wanted to see something like that to happen.

I'm definitely not saying that Christian kings are without sin. Just look at the examples of David and Louis XIV. There were a lot of Christian kings that could have acted more kingly, and definitely more Christian. I'm just arguing that Adolf Hitler was only Christian in the most general sense, and not someone that could be used as an example for any belief system; I'm just not sure he was completely sane based on some of the profiling I have seen done on him. I'm just not really convinced that he was a Christian by any but the most cynical stretch.

My God Loves Me...I hope....

Here's the article in question: The Fires of Mercy

And here's the obvious problem: God doesn't think that way. People are not perfect, nor will they ever be perfect. We all have our individual flaws, and ultimately it is up to us to deal with them. We all have problems with the Big Seven, as well as any number of smaller sins. Some of us are into rebellion not because of the good it brings society, but just to be rebellious. Some people lie because they know no other path. Some people are into eating not just because we all need to eat or even because they like to cook, but just because they feel a need to eat.

We are all sinners.

But that does not mean that God rejects us. He sent down His one and only son to act as a Judas goat to absolve us all of our sins. A careful reading of the Four Gospels reveals that there was no question of Jesus being sacrificed; it is not hard to read a Passover tale in them, where the steps were being followed for a lamb to be slaughtered and prepared for the celebration of when the Angel of Death visited Egypt and slew the first born sons of Egypt. A sacrifice was made then in order to rescue the sons of Israel from death, and a sacrifice was needed again to save everyone from a different sort of death. Jesus was that sacrifice, the ultimate Passover lamb.

God recognized that we all have our problems, and that if He put restrictions of any sort on those who went to Heaven few of us would ever reach those shores. In order for people to reach Heaven, to pass through the Pearly Gates, He would need to forgive us all of our sins. More importantly, He would need to make this declaration open and obvious. There was no more open and obvious declaration than to sacrifice Jesus, so that everyone would know that He had died for our sins, and that we merely need to ask for forgiveness for our sins.

Thus, when people complain of being too filled with sin for God to welcome them in, those complaints are groundless. God recognizes that we all have our sins, hidden in our hearts or worn on our sleeves, and He recognizes that it is just part of being human. Just like any father, He acknowledges that we all have some issues that need to be dealt with so that we can learn from our mistakes and become better people. I hate making the obvious jokes, but part of being an omniscient and omnipresent being is that He has not only been to Vegas, but He probably knows a lot about what goes on there. He had to either make allowances, or get rid of us all. He decided to make allowances.

So if you are ever worried that you will not make into Heaven, that's on you, not God. He knows what you've been up to, and to a degree He exalts in it. He expects you to make mistakes, just as we expect kids to make mistakes, and then to learn from those mistakes. (I would hate to see if he records some of the more spectacular ones for private showings, for his version of Youtube, but you have got to seriously wonder what He records once you realize that ALL fathers record the proudest moments and biggest laughs.) Sure, some people are more likely than others to take a long time learning, but He has all the time in the world. And just like any father, He is always curious and filled with that weird mix of dread and humor about what his children will come up with next.

So if you are worried about if God loves you or not, don't. He really does hate the sin and love the sinner, and is just waiting for you to figure that out.

If you're going to charitable, be charitable....

When an organization claims to be a charitable one, it needs to be charitable and proselytize not by force but by example. A lot of churches do some major charitable works: They get food to those that need it, make sure the cold are warmed through coat and blanket programs, and find ways of helping people cover rent and bills, among many other things. There is no doubt that society needs churches, at least on some level.

However, there is are several problems when the same church that puts out a helping hand asks that the person being helped join the church. The biggest is that this is the same as conversion at swordpoint; the person has no choice but to join, and thus the conversion is probably not going to take. It is at best a false conversion; the person is not looking to be a Christian because he believes the Jesus Christ is the way, but because he simply needs something that the church happens to provide. That is not the way to gain converts, at least those that will support your church in the long run.

It also comes off as being a bully. You are holding back something that someone else needs to survive, and that's just not cool. Getting someone to come to Christ is not about putting them over a barrel and telling them to "Convert or die!"; conversion should be about showing them a way to deal with their spiritual problems, not those of survival. It's sort of okay for Alcoholics Anonymous, but that's because you have acknowledged that the problem is bigger than you and that you need some serious help; giving it to God is just a way of letting it go. However, telling someone that the fate of their house, children, or whatever depends on them converting is just not going to work if you claim to be a charitable organization, and actually causes you to lose a lot of credibility as one.

It is definitely not okay if you are doing it as an investment in the local area. Some churches get charity horribly wrong; they interpret the phrase, "and they shall know ye by your works" in a way that it should not be interpreted. Charity is not about seeking to help the community so that the community shall like you; it's also not about doing good works so that you look good. It's about doing good works for the sake of good works. It's not about karma; if you are doing something in order to get credit for it, then it's just as selfish as greed or lust. Charity is not an investment, and should not be looked at that way.

Charity should be seen as doing good simply for the sake of doing good. We need to do good things for others not because we hope they will do good things for us, but because we wish to support our community or simply out of the need to do good things. If there is any other reason, then just donate money and get the deductible. Tis the season to do good for your fellow man, not yourselves.

Breaking Rules: What Would Jesus Do?

Sometimes a miracle needs to be analyzed in more detail. We'll be looking at the wedding of Cana just a little bit more closely, but before we do we need to look at cheeseburgers.

A cheeseburger is probably not a kosher food, as it combines meat and dairy. Unlike a lot of other Jewish traditions, this is one that has more to symbolism rather than practicality. In order to enjoy meat, you need to kill something. There is simply no way around it; in order to enjoy kebabs and sausage, something has to die. This would mean that meat can, in a very real way, represent death. Milk, on the other hand, represents life; given that babies and children tend to prosper when they are fed milk, and that it comes out of mothers, this symbolism was perhaps inevitable.

The separation of meat and dairy is a necessary symbolism, as death and life need to be kept separate. It just works out better that way.

What does this have to do with Cana? Wine and water are also kept separate for basically the same reason: Water was seen as being important to clean things. The Jews, especially in Jesus' era, were constantly washing themselves. Even in the four gospels, there are a number of times were washing someone carries extreme importance, such as Mary Magdalene washing the feet of Jesus, Jesus reprimanding someone for not washing His feet, and Jesus washing the feet of his apostles. So washing was extremely important, and thus keeping water clean was just as important. More to the point, the jars for keeping water were only to be used for water.

So, Jesus has the servants take six of the huge jars for water and has the servants fill them. Not the jars usually used for wine, but he ones used for water. He then turns them into wine, effectively defiling the jars. This wine is then served to the guests, who are surprised by how good it is.

Now, we know this was no mistake. Jesus had argued Mosaic law with rabbis back when He was ten, so we know that Jesus knew the rules. Why did he do this? Because He also had a point to make, and He may as well do then as any other time. It was the same as when Jesus cured the blind man on the Sabbath: The Jews were too dependent on rules just to follow the rules, and we were not worried about why the rules had been established in the first place. Now, He obviously didn't want to say that all the rules needed to be cast down, as He also supported the tax laws in place at the time, and even ate regularly with tax collectors. He just wanted to make the point that if you have no idea why you are following a rule, it may be time to do away with that rule.

Just look at the value of that: This means that if a rule no longer serves its purpose and no one even remembers why it was made in the first place, then we can cast it aside. This is not something to be done without reason, but something that is worth noting. And it is something that we need to note in our personal lives, as we are all bound by rules that we established but now have grown past. Soooo...enjoy that cheeseburger and start looking at what rules you need to cast aside.

Free Will and Russian Atheists

Free will seems to be something that more atheists have a problem with the religious. There seems to be a number of systems that preclude the idea, ranging from everyone simply does what their chemistry does to everything is dependent on a small number of variables; in short, if we know what the original set up was and what the rules were then we would be able to predict everything. That's fine and logical; the quote about butterflies and hurricanes follows from that logic. It would just require a huge computer.

The problem, however, is when atheists see some form of deity impedes the concept of free will. A Russian anarchist and contemporary of Marx, Mikhail Alexandrovich Bakunin , goes one better than Voltaire in saying that if there were a god, we would need to abolish him. By having a deity of some sort, we are more likely to do what we think the deity wants, or what his representatives want. To a degree History bears this out, especially when we consider things like the Spanish Inquisition and the number of Islamic fatwas that have been created by Muslim clerics.

At the same time, it is interesting how much rebellion against religious leaders there has been. Consider the 65 Theses of Martin Luther, or the creation of the Church of England; if there was no free will, especially when it came to the will of God's representatives on Earth, then how did these things happen? Even in The Bible there are multiple examples, not just one or two, but a number of them, where someone rebels against what God says. Sure, they eventually come around and there are major ramifications when it happens, but the original decision is there. For someone creating a being who is to be totally compliant with His wishes, God seems to have really screwed things up. That there are even atheists says a lot about the lack of control over those He has created.

Now, if He was creating a race that free will, however, he seems to be doing just fine. We have religious schisms, there are atheists, and people follow their own desires when it comes to the question of spirituality versus religion. It just amuses when people say there is no such thing as free will when the main book of the religion they are discussing says otherwise. So, until they build that giant supercomputer, I'm going to enjoy what free will I have....

Mary: Scariest Woman in The Bible?

A lot has been said about what The Bible about the lack of feminist rights. These people have apparently never heard of Mary, mother of Jesus.

Mary was a force to be reckoned with. Look back at the marriage at Cana for a moment; the wine had ran out and Mary asked Jesus to make some more. Jesus, like all kids, didn't want to do any work during a party, and so looked at her and basically asked if she was serious. Mary was not going to take any backtalk from a son of hers, even if He was the Son of God. She looked at Him, told him he was going to do it, and told the servants to just do what he said. When Jesus said to get six jars and fill them with water, you can bet they ran to comply, especially when they saw Mary get the last word in and walk away before Jesus could say anything else.

Putting this a little into historical context: The word of the firstborn, which Jesus was, was the Word of God, doubly so in this case. Mary had told him what He was going to do, and that He was going to do it even if He didn't want to, and He had better do it now. This was just something that wasn't done. This makes Mary officially the scariest stage mom in history: She knew what her son was capable of, and He had best start living up to her expectations or else. Jesus probably complied because it was easier to turn water into wine than say no to Mom.

This is why Jesus had to go out in the desert for his forty days of testing; that testing would have gone entirely differently if Mary had something to say about it. Sure, Satan may have been the Prince of the World, but Mary got Jesus to back down with a glance. There is no question that she would have gone to the mat for her son, and that would have been a slapdown for the ages.

Mary did a few other things, but her telling the Son of God to do something and expecting it to happen says a lot about the expectations of women in Jewish life. When Jesus questioned her order right off the bat, that should have been it. She, as the supposedly obedient wife and mother, should have had no power over her son. And yet there was no question in her mind that Jesus would do exactly as she said. There is no question that women may have been told to obey, but obviously that was not the expectation.

Another consideration is that Mary is seen as having the power to intercede on one's behalf when it comes prayers to God. That says a lot about the power of mothers, that we expect them to be able to intercede on our behalf in a world where women are supposedly powerless. Obviously there is a lot more to feminism in The Bible when what that is just not actually expected behavior.

The Coolness of a Common Holiday

I keep hearing about the Catholic Church and how it likes to kill pagans at every turn. If that's the case, then could someone please explain Halloween to me?

Halloween began as a decidedly pagan celebration. The timing made some pretty good sense; the fields had just been harvested and animals were culled for winter meats. Even among the human population a lot of deaths were going to happen in the next few months from cold and disease. As even the sun seemed to be getting sicker it was really hard to not think about death. The shamans of the tribe, who were supposed to make sure that the tribe's morale was kept up. Somehow the idea of celebrating the dead seemed a natural, if somber, way to deal with the tribe's issues. Eventually children acting as the proxy for monsters somehow got into it, and Halloween started its path down to our celebration of it today.

Along came the Catholic Church. The Church has always been looking for ways to increase its numbers. Admittedly there can get rather obnoxious about it, but some of their best campaigns are the peaceful ones, such as Ireland and snakes, or when they can get others to make the threats, such as a certain Viking king. Halloween is probably one of their greatest PR campaigns ever; you can see the missionaries saying, "Sure, we celebrate our dead as well around there; we have all these saints, see, and so we can get behind the idea of celebrating their deaths." Odds are there was some celebration, even if it was a quick toast, the clergy being human and the season being rather fit for thinking about death.

Although it's a given that the celebration was kept when the pagans became Christians, I'm not sure if it can be truly said that The Church kept the holiday but were able to find a sacred purpose for it so much as they liked the idea, Catholics having a morbid fascination with death, but the holiday and its traditions stood. At least, until recently.

As a number of Christian groups have decided to get away from all things satanic, Halloween has come under fire. This makes a certain degree of sense given its pagan origins. I personally like the idea of Halloween as compared to a generic harvest festival. Harvest festivals are just reasons to celebrate the fading sunlight; Halloween is a reason to celebrate the dead and their departure from our lives; there is just something fitting about it being when everything else is being harvested. I also like the idea of embracing our own demons, and allowing them to be seen on the outside; people being flawed, it is sort of nice to have one night a year when we allow masks to show our true selves.

Ultimately, all I am saying is that one needs to remember where Halloween comes from, but embrace it rather than run from it. Happy Halloween!

Great Quote, Wrong Direction

Let's make fun of Penn Jillette, or specifically his quote, "If every trace of any single religion were wiped out and nothing were passed on, it would never be created exactly that way again. There might be some other nonsense in its place, but not that exact nonsense. If all of science were wiped out, it would still be true and someone would find a way to figure it all out again.”

Yeah, re-read it once or twice. Now, I used to respect him up until I caught a few episodes of his. It's not so much the opinion presented, but how it was presented; he was just a little over the top for me. Admittedly, I do have a preference for just enough kill when it comes to debates, but I think once you attack something a little too much, you create sympathy for what you are attacking. This quote doesn't help much.

Now, I'll give him the first part; just look at how many different religions humans have created since the beginning of time. In a lot of ways, I'm pretty sure that although some of the basics would be there, such as the Golden Rule and karma, but I think that no matter how rationality is judged, you will always have people that will believe in some form of higher being. It's interesting how many scientists started their careers as atheists, and now believe that there is a higher being based on their research. So I have no problem believing that if all religion were somehow eliminated, something would eventually take its place.

The second part is the problem. The issue is that nasty science background I have; I'm way too well aware that a number of scientific discoveries required a little bit luck. I'm not talking Jonas Salk and smallpox vaccine type of accidental, where a discoverer just had to pay attention to who wasn't catching a disease and follow up on it. I'm looking at a number of inventions required for technology that were pure accidents, such as the vulcanization of rubber; if it weren't for someone falling asleep, and it either would not have happened, or happened at a much later date. But just look at how much our technology is based on vulcanized rubber; the vehicles we ride on require it not just for the tires, but valves, seals, and a range of little things. Even though some of these have been made out of different materials, it's hard to think of what our society would be like today without vulcanization, and that's just one of a dozen or so inventions that are society as a whole is dependent on that are based more in luck than actual intelligence, and none of those are guaranteed to be discovered again if we had to restart.

That also assumes that our technology went the same route. There is the possibility that are technology could have gone down more eco-friendly paths, making the society we know now to be something entirely different. Or it could have gotten nastier as people had to fight for resources; Europe, for example, is notorious for its lack of arability. Or it could be just different, but equivalent, with animals taking the place of machines, sort of like a higher tech Flintsones. If society's knowledge base got a reboot, there are just no ways of knowing what could happen to our knowledge, and what we would eventually recover or find.

So...I'm choosing to disagree with Jillete's quote. It just doesn't square with our actual science...