Welcome

This blog has chapters that must be read in order for the content to make sense.
Of course, the older posts are pushed back and the newer ones are up front; hence, the blog is basically represented to you backwards.

For that reason, look to the right hand side for the Table of Contents with links to the posts so that you can read them in order with minimum hassle.

A Serious Epilogue

Learning the true meaning of grace and resolving to erase self-justification from my life brings great peace to my soul.

...but...a few things still linger.
The lingering things are ultimately meaningless.
Just because we find the true nature of God doesn't mean that we stop being human.
Hence I found myself still questioning some aspects of my life, even though I felt like I was on the right road in the grand scheme of things.

Specifically, I wondered what I was to do about those John Wayne movies I loved.
I love classic westerns because of their stories of good vs. evil.
They are violent movies, but violence in fiction is not the destructive act that it is in real life. It is instead a dramatic movement for the action good takes over evil.

Of course, the argument of the impossibility of evil in alcohol applies to most movies: a movie itself can't be evil since it has no will power or ego of its own.
The evil is within me.
So the question is, can I watch these movies appropriately, or will they only serve to lead me back to the dark side again?

It's a real danger.
I kind of idolize the strong heroes that John Wayne plays.
I take this so far as to buying cowboy hats that I can wear when I go walking in the woods. I got one that resembles Robert Redford's hat in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, but I wanted a more summery hat, and John Wayne's hat from Hondo was perfect.
I can't find it anywhere though.

A detour for a minute:
The day after completing the journey I have written about on this blog, I went to see the Coen Brothers' A Serious Man.
It's eerie how certain elements of this movie reflected what I was going through.
Thank God I did not experience the Job-like experience that the main character Larry Gopnik has in that movie. But he responded to these incidents much like how I did: wondering what God is trying to tell me in the midst of all of this chaos.
Larry's journeys is baffling. He learns nothing about the meaning of life purpose of the bad luck he has experienced.
The only sense of meaning he learns during the story is that helping others "couldn't hurt".

This mirrors the realization that I experienced the day before: there is nothing we can really do to fix ourselves or the world. The only thing we can do that insures we are right with God is to help others as He has helped us...even when they don't deserve it.

What a coincidence!
Here's another one:
Halfway through the movie when Larry talks to his lawyer, way over in the upper right corner of the screen hangs the Hondo hat on a rack on the wall!

No kidding.
The hat I've been looking for was randomly put into a non-western about a character learning exactly what I learned the day before?

But what did it mean?
On the ride home I told my Dad (who saw the movie with me) about the Hondo hat coincidence.
Discussing this led to me discussing the message of A Serious Man; in particular the issue of helping others when they don't deserve it.
Larry does this at the very end of the movie, of which I said, "It's good in principle, but I wouldn't want everyone to help people that way as a rule," (I'm being vague to avoid spoilers), "...but it's just a story."

Bingo!
That was it.
I then asked my Dad, "Did I just answer my own question about the westerns?"
"They are only stories," he replied.
If I approach the John Wayne movies as just purely stories instead of Right-Winged rituals, it's OK.

I would have never discussed this if that hat wasn't in the movie.

It really makes you wonder if God really does tweak things here and there for us to stumble upon His answer to our prayers.

Blessed are the Poor in Spirit: Ch. XV - Wasted Efforts

I am by nature a very orderly and resolute person.
It's the way my mind works: I see the chaos of the world around me and I do my best to mentally arrange it.
This means I'm a creature of routine, organization, and methodology.
I thrive on To-Do-Lists, outlines, and schedules.
I tend to be distant and greatly troubled when I'm faced with a situation that I can't seem to square in my head.
I constantly seek to resolve any confusion or lack of order in my life.

So you can imagine how troubling it is to realize that my very philosophy of life is counter that of God's. I have to change it...or else!
Recall that this crisis began politically: the question of whether or not Conservatism bares good fruit or wicked fruit.
So, after learning the error of my ways, resolving to improve myself, and accepting God's forgiveness, the next step is to get back together with the life around me.

In other words, what politics or world view should I take on?

Yes, Right-Wing Conservatism did turn me into a Pharisee.
Yes, I'm much more cautious now about going Ra-Ra over War than I have been before.
Yes, going around acting like other people don't live up to my ideals is truly evil.

What then? Do I switch parties and become a Liberal Democrat?
How can a true Christian support Gay Marriage?
How can a true Christian support Abortion?
How can a true Christian support a political ideology which wishes to erase every trace of Judeo-Christianity from American Culture?
How can a true Christian support promiscuous sex among teenagers?
How can a true Christian support the moral relativism that defines Neo-Liberalism?

No! I can't be a Liberal and a Christian. At least not a Modern Day Liberal.

What then?
Do I become a Green?
A Libertarian?
A Reformist?
A Blue Dog?
A Populist?

This is important for such an orderly mind as my own. I can't approach the world without an ideology.

Here's the thing: all ideologies are traps!
I made the case before of the Pro-War person vs. the Anti-War Person: both become so convinced that they are right that they justify themselves and hate those who disagree with them.
They delude themselves into thinking that they are right with God because they support this or that.
It doesn't really matter what it is that they are supporting: the self-righteous attitudes makes them both the same in the end.

This points to a truth that must be understood to be a true Christian: evil is not within inanimate objects or (most) ideologies; evil is within the individual.
We are all fallen creatures. We fell when mankind attempted to be like God. Hence to be fallen is to be prideful.
Theologically speaking, Pride is not a smug feeling but the belief that you are God, or close enough. It is the conviction that you are the center of the universe.
We all inherently feel this way since we all experience the universe through the senses of our bodies.
Hence, we are all, by nature, fallen, sinful, and evil.

Evil is sneaky. It's a shape-shifter that changes forms or a catalyst that takes inert substances and transforms them into something dynamic.
Pro-War in and of itself is not evil if it for the use of defending the innocent.
Anti-War isn't evil either in that war is the antithesis to peace.
Both, however, can be hijacked by the evil that is within us and used to fuel our self-serving needs.

I'm not making this up.
Jesus said it:

...that which enters into the mouth doesn't defile a man; but that which proceeds out of the mouth, this defiles the man. (Matthew 15:11)

C.S. Lewis also spoke on this topic:

It is a mistake to think that Christians ought to be teetotallers...it may be the duty of a particular Christian...to abstain from strong drink, either because he is the sort of man who cannot drink at all without drinking too much...One of the marks of a certain type of bad man is that he cannot give up a thing himself without wanting every one else to give it up...the moment he starts saying the things are bad in themselves, or looking down his nose at other people who do use them, he has taken the wrong turning. (72)

Alcohol can't be evil because alcohol isn't alive; it has no conscious, no will power. It is a material, not a person, not a being, totally incapable of being pridefully anti-God.
The same goes for just about everything else: the evil is within you, not something that you put inside of you, physical, spiritual or intellectual.

In other words: you are damned if you do and you are damned if you don't.
This is why we believe we are born with Original Sin: human beings by nature are prideful and self-serving.
Stop and think about it: just about all of your interests in life consists of things that makes you feel better about yourself.

So what then?
Stoicism might be a good alternative. But a religion consisting of pure stoics would not be a joyful or fruitful tree.
However, stoicism can be a good attitude to take towards any thing that we can turn into prideful evil.
A better attitude is humility: the Pro-War person should stop calling the Anti-War person a wimp, and instead communicate with him to insure that his Anti-War stance is genuine, and not self-serving.
The world would be a better place if we can accept the fact that people have different opinions on how to improve the world.

By the way, none of this erases right or wrong.
Nor does it erase smart and stupid.
If it was somebody's opinion that the best way to improve his life was to do drugs, I think most reasonable people can agree that this person is mistaken.
Even though they can be used as idols that turns us away from God, morality and intelligence is still important.

But many of us do find some idol that takes hold of us and convinces us that we are close enough to God to start judging like He does and stop caring for others.
Beware! There is a good chance this is you, and you don't even realize it.
Remember, evil is sneaky: it'll take you over without ever advertising itself: "Beware of [those] who come to you in sheep clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves." (Matthew 7:15)

What are we to do then?
How do we avoid being evil and earn are way into Heaven?

Here is the most important thing about Christianity: we can't; we are powerless to earn our ways into Heaven.
We don't belong there. We don't deserve to be there. We don't deserve anything from God. He already gave us life and we immediately turn inwards with it.
It is impossible for us to be nearly as good as God.
No matter how close we follow His law, no human being can keep it 100%.

This is precisely why we need Grace to be saved.
Grace is the unearned, undeserved forgiveness of God.
All we have to do is believe that Jesus is our Savior to receive it. To believe this is to believe we need a savior. To believe that we need a savior is to believe that we are imperfect and sinful creatures. Hence we must never make the mistake of thinking that we are Godly.
Does He not forgive if you do make this mistake? He forgives all! For even the most Pharisee-ish of people are that way because they believe in some portion of God's ways.
Like a small seed growing into a mighty oak, this ounce of faith will eventually win them over and show them the error of their ways.
Do not worry that you have sinned, even the greatest of all sins; for this only means you will soon experience the awesome power of unearned forgiveness.

Think about it: the supremely perfect and eternal being that created the universe we live in and then us cares for us enough to do this!
Even when we turn from Him, he still cares enough to keep calling us back.
He cares about you! When you go down the wrong path, He is hurt because it is the betrayal of a loved one.
When He calls you out, it'll hurt at first, much like a chastising parent. But the love He will enact by forgiving you unflinchingly after realizing the error of your ways will be more positive than the most intense pleasures this world can offer you.

Of course, nobody can genuinely experience this and not wish to share it with others.
If not, then you haven't experienced it.
If you do, don't worry about how; just do it. Every occasion that comes down to you or them, help them. When you fail to do this, and you will, be aware of it and resolve to not do it again.
Don't do it to pat yourself on the back. Do it because you like experiencing the humility of God's grace. Do it because you like knocking yourself off of your high horse and getting back on the same level as everyone else, even the most annoying or evil of people.

Everything else are Wasted Efforts.
Every other action, ideology, philosophy, and recreation are done in vain.
We live in a world where it is normal, acceptable and even wise (in a worldly way) to partake in such efforts, but always keep in mind that in a spiritual sense they are all wasted.
There is nothing you can do to truly justify yourself. So do what you must, be weary of what you want, and never forget that you are endowed with the love of God despite this.
Spread the wealth.

Blessed are the Poor in Spirit: Ch. XIV - The Faith vs. Works Conundrum

Now, the journey has come full circle.
It began with the goal of discovering what the Bible says about being "Mugged by Reality" and in turn, the Bible "Mugged" me with Faith.
I didn't really discover what the Bible says about being "Mugged by Reality" but did find that I was following in the footsteps the Pharisees, of whom Jesus was no fan of.
As a result I fully realized how sinful I was and how abhorrent to the almighty God I am. But these moments of judgment were then washed away by the outreach of His hand telling me to get up and begin anew.

Begin what?
Am I to sell all my belongings, go to a Third World country and feed the poor?
Who knows, maybe that will be in the future, but I'm not going to jump to rash conclusions right now. It's only been three weeks since I completed the journey I am writing about here.
I believe in what St. Paul wrote about what Christians being parts of the body of Christ: each called upon to play a different part, whatever best fits the part (1 Corinthians 12: 12-31).
I'm only 24 years old. I studied film in college only to find I'm not really cut out for Hollywood.
I believe that I'm in period of transition. I believe my purpose in life will eventually be made clear to me, even if it's nothing more than being a loving husband and father.

But what about "Mugged by Reality"? What about certain necessary actions for the sake of a higher principle?

I do not judge anyone who hears my words and does not keep them, for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world. The one who rejects me and does not receive my word has a judge... (John 12: 47-48)

Cool. Along with this and the very fact that Jesus often broke the law by healing on the Sabbath shows that it's OK for a higher principle to be the judge of actions instead of a strict law. After all, is that not why Jesus died, so that we can be forgiven for the unavoidable sinfulness of our life?

But what about:

Do not be deceived! Fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, male prostitutes, sodomites, thieves, the greedy, drunkards, revilers, robbers - none of these will inherit the kingdom of God. (1 Corinthians 6: 9-10)

Can the Bible make up it's mind!
Is the Christian life one of grace or one of Legalistic rules.
A friend of mine is fond of reminding me that Jesus established few rules, which were more like ideals of behaviors rather than realistic expectations (did Jesus really want us to cut off our hands?).
St. Paul, on the other hand, sets up many rules, including telling slaves to obey their masters and not letting women speak in Church.

This is where the Holy Spirit comes in.
The Holy Spirit is the third person of God we experience in our own lives as a spiritual force via the grace of Jesus Christ.
Once we are truly saved, truly understand why we need grace to be justified in God's eyes, we then experience the very way of God for ourselves.

The Holy Spirit acts as a cipher for confusing situations: when we don't know what to do, we merely apply the situation to the very experience of salvation we had when we were on our knees before God lamenting our sins.

With that in mind, I realize the context of St. Paul's above quote: Corinth had a bad reputation as a sleazy go-to spot for retired people. It was the Vegas of its day.
Notice St. Paul's deliberate words: all negative connotations. He didn't condemn toasting a wine at a family get together, but drunkards. He also grouped drunkards along with a plethora of evil acts.
It's clear that St. Paul was not setting up legalistic rules but explaining how a depraved life-style is opposite to a Christian life style.

Still, why then does a Christian require a life style if nothing we can do can prove ourselves in the eyes of God, who sent His only Son to die for us so that we have a chance?

Once again, I turn to the Holy Spirit to educate me on this.

As I mentioned earlier in this blog, I heeded C.S. Lewis' advice to be charitable and of service to other people regardless of my feelings or of what they deserve.
This very action, the most purely Christian of actions, can not be done unless the charitable person quells his worldy ways, swallows his pride and puts himself on the same level of the person in need of charity.
Charity simply does not happen unless the charitable person is humbling himself (the one exception is if he's doing it to please an audience); just like how the sun can't shine unless it's day time.

What I found when I did this is that it is strangely enjoyable!
It sounds so corny, so "Sunday School", but it feels good to be nice to people even when they deserve it.
I'll tell you what, often times when I'm charitable to nasty or odd people, the often improve instantly and become very warm and friendly people when I serve them.
I find that this has an awesome trickle effect: I immediately think less of myself; I want to help others more. I also want to sin less. The urge is still there, but I find myself less of a slave to these urges before. They attract me less and less as things of Christian nature outshine their drawing power.
Sinful urges I've struggled with my entire life are suddenly quite manageable. Oh, I still sin. Don't think I make any pretense to be perfect! But it's less painful to resist.

What I have found is that neither Jesus nor St. Paul expects legalistic lifestyles from us.
What they are saying is that one must practice the Christian life style to be a Christian, just as a doctor practices medicine to be a doctor.
How does this work?
Practicing Christian acts of charity is like exercising a muscle: you want to have a good body, you got to keep doing it. It makes you look good; it makes you feel good; it makes it easier for you to lift heavy objects and do harder work. The same principle applies to a Christian life.

Accepting Jesus as your savior and then living the life of a depraved person is a lot like wanting to be thin and trim, but all you do all day long is sit on your but and shovel in the food.
But exercising is hard!
Of course it is! But I'll tell you something that all physical exercisers know: the more you do it, the more it becomes routine and less of a burden.

Now, I exercise daily.
I also enjoy ice ream, cookies and beer.
But it's balanced out by healthy meals and not breaking the "three meals a day" rule.
So far, this balance has me in good shape.
Can I be better? Of course. But that doesn't mean I'm bad either.

I think the same goes for the Christian life: it's not important to be a Mr. Universe of Charity, but if some habit is preventing you from doing one push-up without passing out, it has to go.
It's different for each person: one bad habit that can be crippling to one person is harmless to another.

The final step of this journey will be the appreciation of this principle: what defiles and what can be done about it.

Blessed are the Poor in Spirit: Ch. XIII - Lewis' "New Men"

It's not a pleasant feeling to realize that you would be one of the Pharisees that Jesus was attacking when He was on Earth.
Forget this "when he was on Earth" business: He was attacking me in the present day!
I always imagined that if I met Jesus, He would embrace me and it would be an ethereal or intimate moment.
But it seems that from what the Bible tells us about Him, He would have ridiculed me for my pride and self-righteousness.

For somebody who claims to be Christian this is a horrifying thought.
But the real horror was yet to come.

At this point of my journey, I was merely realizing how my utter conviction I was good in God's eyes was foolish and that God hates such Pride.
If I didn't change my ways, I'd be on a trip to Hell, despite all my claims to accepting Jesus Christ as my savior.

Then comes the thought: why?
Why was it wrong for me to hate sinners and the Godless? It seemed logical to be unhappy with the lousy job humanity has done to live up to His expectations.
In order to progress beyond this realization of being on the wrong side, I have to fully understand what did I do wrong, not merely know that I did wrong.

I looked at my behavior from God's Point of View.
What we know of God from the Bible is that He is unflinching in his goodwill to the spiritual well being of humanity.
When He incarnated Himself as Jesus Christ, He never harmed a fly, never made a wrong turn; was ridiculed, tortured and executed without ever raising a hand to defend Himself or stop it.
He took the world's sins that were heaped on him; He didn't hate back.

I then though of that Myth of Violence: the projection of my own un-Godliness on others and hating them to make myself good in the eyes of God.
This is where the true horror began.
To merely discover that you may go to Hell is one thing, but to actually see in nakedness the evil that I have committed is by far the most horrifying thing I've experienced.
To be honest, it totally blew away any fright Hell put into me; possibly because I understood I deserved Hell for being so evil.

I hated people. Hated them!
I mentally killed each person who never said "Excuse me" when they butted in front of me; I mentally executed those who disobeyed God; and I mentally tortured those fools who supported views without even understanding what they were talking about.

What despicable thing I was!
Taking it upon myself to punish people for not being Godly.
Even worse, that wasn't quite the case: I was hating people for not being like me.
Why was I the model of this excellence? Because I became convinced that I was God, or close enough to for the mistaken identity.
Talk about foolishness!

What is very important to understand is that I did not think quite this way when I was a Pharisee.
That is the nature of evil: it deceives you and dresses up evil acts and thoughts as good.
We humans fall for the deception all the time and truly believe we are good.
My folly was basically identical to those of the Liberal Humanists.

What then, now?
Am I doomed?
No.
Thank God (the phrase has never been more truly stated)!

There are always second chances. No strike outs in God's game of baseball. No Game Overs.
This much is very clear, even to those who aren't religious: one of Jesus' main teachings is that anyone can be forgiven, anyone can change their ways no matter what.

Whew.
But how?

I was still in a state of self-hatred.
The evils that I projected on others came back to me ten-fold and now I was more loathsome than ever.
I saw clearly that I was a horrible human being, as un-Godly as they come. The mere thought of God's goodness brought shudders to my body, for His goodness is brilliant power and my evil is like a rotting frame.

C.S. Lewis, strangely enough, talks about this in Mere Christianity when he addresses the question over why some Christians are nasty people.
His argument is that merely being "nice" is not the measure of Christianity, for there are nice atheists and if a Christian's goal is to be nice like the atheist, than Christianity is merely to be as good as a human can be good on his own (168-169).
This is illogical since the very core of Christianity is that we need a savior; we need a God to show us how bad we are and that we can't be truly good without him.
The niceness of an atheist is not that true goodness, but merely the result of a fortunate and comfortable life in which the atheist has no need to be angry with people.

Lewis than illustrates how it is the nasty Christian who is in better shape than the nice atheist: when they die and are judged, would not the atheist's reaction be "Look how good I was! I didn't even believe in you and yet I am good like you!"
The nasty Christian, being at least faithful and aware of his sinfulness would say "I'm not worthy. Please have mercy, for I failed you."

Which one would go to Heaven?
Jesus Himself gives us the answer in "The Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector":
"...all who exalt themselves will be humbled, but all who humble themselves will be exalted." (Luke 18: 9-14)
I suspect Lewis was intentionally remaking Jesus' parable for it tells the same story: a pharisee who met God and thought he was good enough to get in versus a tax collector who convinced by the culture around him understood himself to be sinful and unworthy.

Suddenly, that famous Beatitude makes sense: "Blessed are the Poor in Spirit"
Allow Lewis to explain:

If [nasty people] make any attempt at goodness at all, they learn, in double quick time, that they need help. It is Christ or nothing for them...They are the lost sheep; He came specially to find them. They are...'poor': He blessed them. (169)

Christianity states that the world and its people are inherently Fallen, which means we are easily deceived into being evil.
Hence nobody is good and worthy on their own; that is exactly why we need a savior. That is why believing in Christ is so important: it's not merely to believe He existed, but to believe His existence is the only way we can be justified in God's eyes, not by our own means.
It is the "Poor in Spirit" who have the best chance of understanding this. Nice and happy people don't realize they need anything else; they are sitting pretty. It's the lowly of us who are acutely aware of how messed up we are and how we can't do a thing about it.
People of this sort are blessed because they are privileged to experience the joy of being saved by God Himself!

At this point in my journey, my horror began to fade away.
No.
It was blown away.
The very brilliant power of God that shamed by evil soul, breathed new life into it.
The Hell of knowing how evil I am was eradicated by God's love.
I was on my knees desperate for help; desperate for salvation. God reached down, grabbed my hand and told me to get up.

Get up for what?
First, simply to experience the awesome beauty that is God himself.
I thought being pious to the un-Godly was a good feeling? That was nothing compared to the indescribable joy of feeling God's unforgiving love.
I didn't deserve salvation. I did the dirty deeds and should have gone to Hell for it. But God loves me, loves me enough to berate me as Jesus berated the Pharisees, not to punish but to educate me of my true evil.
Once I recognized that evil and did not resist what God was revealing to me, God's love for me manifested itself as mercy: get up, you are not condemned but saved by your own admittance to needing supernatural intercession.

What a feeling!
The feeling that God Himself forgave me despite being just about the most loathsome example of a human being.
Even in my sinister and diseased state, He cared enough for me to not overlook that I was deceived and capable of improving.

I used the word "supernatural" earlier quite specifically.
By natural law, I deserve to go to Hell and hence it makes no use to rectify myself by suddenly being good.
By definition, it is supernatural for me to be excused of this.
By the Law of Moses, I should have lived the rest of my days in shame and penance in order to exalt the goodness of God.
But God has better plans than for us to retreat from life and resort to apologizing over and over again.

He is by definition "supernatural"; His ways are "supernatural"; and when He touches you with His grace the way He touched me, you are then called upon to be "supernatural".
What does this mean? Are we to be superheroes?

Not quite.
We are to be what C.S. Lewis called the "New Man"; the next step in human evolution. "Not mere improvement but Transformation" like a horse into Pegasus (171)
We are called upon to transform into a new version of man that does things we previously couldn't do, much like a horse who can now fly.

It is not so much a condition of God's grace, but merely the result of the grace. Much like how growth is the result of hormones, rather than the condition.

Mugged by Faith: Ch. XII - Passion

Earlier I wrote about being "Mugged by Reality", the process through which Conservatives understand some harsh truths about the Fallen World we live in and how we deal with it.
Emotionally, I would say this is a neutral experience, except for ex-liberals who probably have great difficulty letting go of their prior beliefs.

Truthfully, we Conservatives take on this "Mugged by Reality" as if it's a trophy or a right of passage.
Indeed it is: getting "Mugged by Reality" is a transition between a child-like view of the world and into that of an adult.

Now it's time to talk about a totally different kind of "Mugging", a much much more troubling and painful kind.
"Mugged by Faith".
Just like "Mugged by Reality", being "Mugged by Faith" is finding yourself face to face with an undeniable and unyielding fact which demands a real reaction from you.
Only now, it's for Christians and they are being mugged by the fact that they believe in God, and there is no changing that.

Why is it a "mugging"?
Because it is at this time when a Christian learns some inconvenient facts about God. Namely: He wants you do to certain things and not do certain things.
Suddenly, you find yourself realizing that despite dying for ours sins, Jesus had no intention of handing out cheap grace.
Hence, being "Mugged by Faith" is to realize you have two choices: stop believing in God; or start giving up certain things and taking up others things.

It's not always the same thing: alcoholics have to give up drinking all together because they can't control themselves; this is not true of non-alcoholics who enjoy a good brew.
For me, what Jesus was telling me to give up was my Pharisee-ish attitude towards life: my self-righteousness by means of hatred toward the Godless.

This was not as easy to do as it may sound.
Remember, that I lived life as a willing loser before adopting this Pharisee mentality
Being a Pharisee made me feel good. It vindicated my past embarrassments. I enjoyed feeling some self-esteem rather than self-loathing. I liked feeling strong and knowing, not weak and ignorant.
It excused me from my childish angst.

And now, I'm being asked by God Himself to give it up; the very alternative to a self-destructive life is no longer good for me.
I based so much of myself on this mentality, that to give this up would be mental suicide: a deliberate killing of my very personality and identity.

To say I didn't want to do this is an understatement.
It was downright painful; as painful as being told I must walk into the fire and burn alive rather than do the natural thing and run away to preserve myself.

There was one alternative: call it quits; toss in the towel and decide that God was make believe after all and become an atheist.
See, suddenly I felt sympathy for all of those atheist claims that "God" is some sadomasochistic figment of our imaginations.

Eh, I have gone too far down the path of doubt to be stop believing now.
Besides, what a risk to take! I don't want to go to Hell simply because the game got too tough.

So, against every ounce of resistance from my body and mind, I bit the bullet and started killing my prideful Pharisee-ish self.

It was a Passion, in the original meaning of the word: Suffering.

Old School Catholicism started to have a certain ring of the truth to them:

We know that our old self was crucified with [Jesus] so that the body of sin might be destroyed, and we might no longer be enslaved to sin. (Romans 6: 6)

St. Paul was often fond of this concept of dying in Christ: metaphorically being crucified just as Jesus was.

Many people did not understand Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ; especially the graphic violence.
Those who did tended to be of the more Classical thought of Theology: the study of the very nature of God, mankind and sin.
The Passion was Jesus' bail-out of us: He paid the price of sin so that we don't have to.
Instead of our certain damnation, the only sinless man in history died a brutal death (for we Christians believe that it is sin that causes the body to die).
But He rose again, exemplifying the fact that through the power of God, we can move on after being killed by the sin that has enslaved us.

He was wounded for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities; by his wounds we are healed. (Isaiah 53)

Every lash of a whip, every punch, every kick, each nail into his limbs, each milliliter of spilled blood that is recreated in The Passion of the Christ is not just about the price that Jesus paid for our sins, but instead the mythological passion that we must go through!
We undergo our own Passions when we decide to accept the fact that sin has become an inherent part of our bodies and that we must die to it so that we can resurrect.
We believe this literally in an Apocalyptic way, but also metaphorically in our own personal struggles-kind-of-way.

I was asked to give up John Wayne as my hero and make Christ my hero.
And what did Christ do? Blow away the bad guys?
No!
He let the bad guys kill Him.

Keep in mind that my bad guys aren't really the Liberals or the Godless of the world; they were merely the screens I was projecting my own insecurities on.
My bad guys were my own feelings of shame and self-hatred: my very mental self.

So, instead of continuing the practice of projecting these imperfections on others and hating them as a result, I would instead give them free reign to kill me.
It was painful. I liked being the person who killed them!
But I allowed these feelings to have their way with me and kill me.

They killed me because they drove me to hate others; the refusal to do so is then to let them shrivel up and die.
Because they were apart of me, like a parasite, I died to.

I didn't like this because I didn't fancy who I would turn into once this was all over.
My only hope was to look to Jesus as the replacement of Western Tough Guys as my new Role Model.

Mugged by Faith: Ch. XI - The Wrath of God Against the Self-Justified

Is it wrong to believe in a Just War?
As I pointed out earlier in this blog, Jesus did say "do not resist and evil man", but He also didn't seem to care much about the Centurion's day job when he asked Him to cure his servant.

It doesn't seem to matter much since I'm not much of a violent person.
The closest I come to enjoying violence is in the movies. And even then, it was not the destructive act that I praised, but the punishment of evil and allowance for good to prosper.

But when I read about the Babylonian Myth of Violence as an act of Creation, I was shaken to my core.
I found myself realizing that I was just as guilty as the parricidal gods as well as the jealous Cain.
How can this be if I never killed somebody, let alone hurt anybody?

No, I'm not referring to what foreign policy I vote for.
I'm referring to my thoughts.

Jesus himself clarified that "You have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, 'You shall not murder'...But I say to you that if you are angry with a brother or sister, you will be liable to judgment.." (Matthew 5: 21-22).

Am I guilty of this?
Yes.

As my right-wing-ness increased, so did my anger.
I found myself hating Liberals. Not in a direct and personal way, but as a matter of principle: I hated what they stood for.
It started growing grotesquely out of control when this hatred extended not only to Liberals but to anybody who didn't adhere to any values.
This manifested itself largely at my work in retail, but also with some individuals in my personal life.
I would look around me and see selfish person after selfish person; not merely being selfish but foolish; and not merely being foolish but telling others to be equally foolish.
I saw rudeness all around me; gross arrogance and downright childish behavior in adults who were children when Truman was President.

I hated them all.

I rarely, if ever, said a word to these people.
But my thoughts were raging with mental violence.

It started to become habit for me to enter each day of work to start going on mental tirades against those who I felt fell beneath the dignity of a Christian person.
I never lifted a finger to help people who asked impolitely; never gave the benefit of the doubt to people who have yet to prove themselves to me.
Oh, I loved all who did prove themselves to me, even if just a little. But all else were subject of my wrath.

And guess what, I enjoyed it! It made me feel good!
Where did this come from? The myth of violence: projecting one's insecurity onto others and then punishing the other to justify oneself.

My enjoyment of Westerns became a sacramental activity of exercising this skill of projecting my evil onto others and then punishing them.
Did I consciously think this while watching such movies?
No.
But I did consciously enjoy these movies as alternative to the mopey-dopey dramas I enjoyed in my adolescent angst years such as Manhattan and Chasing Amy.
They were alternatives because the heroes of these Westerns were the opposite of of the heroes of this mopey-dopey dramas: strong, with principles, self-sacrificing, instead of self-serving.
But they were also quick to anger, and easily violent characters who took pride in punishing evil.
Every time John Wayne blew away a bad guy, I was blowing away the part of me that actually idolized Woody Allen!

I'm not so sure if this is actually a bad thing.
I have a theory that this is why fiction and fantasy exists: so that we spiritual-carnal hybrids can enjoy our carnal side as long as it's isolated in the realm of the Mythological.

But hating specific people in my life for failing to be as good as me is a big No-No.
That's bad enough, but the worse sin I committed was to then feel good about myself in doing so!
I convinced myself I was a Godly person by hating people.

I was a pharisee.

We all know what Jesus thought of the Pharisees.
He projected the same kind of tough love I wrote about earlier in this blog towards them.
Tough Love isn't as good as it sounds:

...woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you lock people out of the Kingdom of Heaven...for you tithe mint, dill and cummin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith. It is these that you ought to have practiced without neglecting the others...For you clean the outside of the cup and of the plate, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence..." (selections from Matthew 23).

Jesus showed zero signs forgiving murderers and prostitutes; but had to use rather unkind language towards the Pharisees.

As I read Matthew 23, I realized that Jesus was chastising me; the sins of the Pharisees were my sins: justifying myself by setting myself apart from others.

I was in big trouble.