Apples are Free for Renee Good
First, loosely connected thesis point: Religion is not the opiate of the masses because it never provides euphoria. Give me even some weak ass, generic Vics over a 30 minute sermon, any day. Religion never easies pain.
Religion categorizes sin as innate, as primal, as if there were never mothers (human and animal) who loved their babies unconditionally, forgave them for times the babies hurt them, and raised them to love themselves, and be happy, and not hold grudges, and be flexible and tenacious with problem solving, and able to securely attach to others and their environment. People who were respectful and fair, who listened, who planted, who reaped, who wept, who hoped, who forgave, who rejoiced, who praised the rising of the sun and moon, who cared for elders, who healed the sick, and tended to the cries and loneliness of those who were on the path of dying, the path to beyond, and who prayed for them here and there. There was love before there was religion. Jesus wasn’t the first human to love and forgive.
The church constructed the idea of native sin, and they forced upon people the idea that self-forgiveness and love is a prize you win by overtly agreeing with obviously myth-based narratives and culturally irrelevant dogma, using the message of female shame, the detailing of physical, sexual aberrations, the priest hungering for confession, witches burning (all she said was, No New Taxes), heretics tortured, and the thorough brainwashing of people into believing Christianity offered something they didn’t originally have already. The apple is the fruit of life, not the fruit of the knowledge of shame. Disobedience is the yang to the yin of obedience. In fact, say the love and abolition that Jesus preached about was an apple. The apples were already in our world. He didn’t invent apples! He focused on them. Look what you have that’s solid and sweet. We don’t need the church or God to forgive us. We need to forgive ourselves and each other. We could always do that. We could always repent, realize how our actions have caused harm, and attempt reparations. That behavior, the reparations, leads to the kingdom of heaven. The way they twisted up into down, female into male, night into day, day into night, and in to out, works perfectly for them. Since they agree to the doctrine and dogma, they consider themselves in good shape for heaven, and think no further of their own behavior.
Blood sacrifice is NOT NECESSARY AND NEVER WAS. You fucking sickos. Loving (or flattered by? or in denial about?) how the colonial state killed him (like a common beggar).
So twisted. No. Nobody wiped your slate clean, your list of fuck-ups is still there and always will be until you decide to admit it and make amends.
Not to mention, the execution of Jesus has nothing in common with kosher blood sacrifice. Blood sacrifice, as practiced by pagan and ancient Hebrew people, was supposed to be done a certain way, if you believe in it. If you believe in it, then you know that there are requirements to the ritual and components thereof. The lamb should be calm. The person making the sacrifice should in a meditative or spiritual frame of mind and fairly sure that the sacrifice will please the god(s) they intend it for pleasing or reaching. The person or people making the sacrifice sing songs or chant, there are prayers and dedications. The sacrifice (lamb) should not be afraid much less terrorized or brutalized (as was Jesus). The lamb should be sedated, calm, and comfortable. You can’t just brutalize, humiliate, and suffocate somebody and then call it a sacrifice. Christians don’t care.
The way Christians accept(ed) the idea of a blood sacrifice made to atone for their sins is actually cringe. Didn’t they ever think a deal like that (guilty as charged with no time or labor as a consequence) that might be too good to be true? But they’re all going to heaven, right, the prime real estate for church goers!
To BELIEVE in heaven and hell, as a place that creates a truly just narrative and final solution to HARM, is irresponsible, finally. Heaven and hell doesn’t stand up to any scrutiny. Yin/yang alone destroys its foundation. You can’t separate two elements that complete and require interaction with each other or comparison to exist at all.
Christianity was never good news for us. We had everything it offered already.
The blood of an ancient Hebrew hippie could never compensate for the necessary REPARATIONS that sin creates.
Causing harm is sin. It’s here and now. Be here and now. Fuck your scriptures. Quoting weird poems at this day and age. Take it to a poetry class. It doesn’t pass a logic test by any logician’s standards. Don’t say “faith” to me. “Faith” is your excuse for not thinking things through because the potential results are discomfiting. What you’d have to do if you realized it’s on you to made reparations. Tiny sins, huge sins. Sin suggests shame. Shame isn’t necessary. The church CREATED shame while overtly offering relief from shame. Shame didn’t exist before the church started shaming everyone outside the CIS/HET box. Facts they invented sexual sin. Before the church, people respectful each other more, accepted each other, made fewer attempts to control others’ gender or sexual expression and behavior. The church and state used violence and terror to silence the community leaders advocating for material equality, (or even just) relief/survival, and abolition, who were OFTEN women and nonbinary figures. Protesting taxes? Witch— drown her while everyone records it with their cell phone. Renee Good joined millions of sisters who’ve been silenced when the ICE cop executed her in her car. Every day I hope it aint the day they come for me.