Radiohead is an awesome band.
SellsUsedCars: I dont think you're fat
kpie687: haha thanks you're really sweet
Road trip to Cali in late March is in the works. Scott Loescher's frat house for accomadations. we're thinking leave after Humanities on a thursday morning, come back sunday afternoon.
I have to write the last 5 papers we've had for Troche pretty much tonight so tomorrow she doesnt castrate me when I schedule a writing conference and she asks about my progress on said papers. That will be fun... if anyone wants to give me suggestions/their papers/good places to CopyPaste from, I'm willing to give out um... USED FLOPPY DISKS. or something of the sort.
During 6th period:
Liam: Hey, I'll door check the lady and her baby... you get double points because of the small child.
Alex: Kind of like Scott Peterson got double points for Laci Peterson?
Then we laughed and realized we're damned to hell.
Read the great and amazing The Christian Church:
on Hypocrisy, Humanities and Hope
When faced with the decision of what topic to choose for this mid term paper, I had not really put a lot of thought into how personal an essay I would write. Since we had been given the liberty of personal tense, I knew it could easily be something that I could sort of take an hour or so and write about something shallow or vague, or remotely amusing that I had experienced in Western Civilization, but I didn’t think until talking with other kids in class that I could put of myself into it. After asking around, I found out that several people had chosen to do their papers on religion and how Humanities had so far helped them define theirs, and this struck a resounding chord in me. I am one of those privileged youth who had parents that were “good Christians” while growing up, and so I was brought up in such a religious environment until the last couple years.
I saw this paper as not only as more homework but as an opportunity to delve into and explain some of the more painful parts of my life. This is something that I loathe doing, because I am the kind of person that never likes to really reveal weakness, or show any sign of trouble. I was raised to be the strong one that never cries or has problems, and I still am that person. However, Humanities thus far has not only educated me and provided me with ridiculous amounts of humor and fun, but also helped me through my own struggle to find out who I am and justify decisions I have made regarding a lot of things in my life, especially religion.
The main difference with my upbringing and most others was that my “religious” mother was physically and emotionally abusive towards my brother and myself, and my fairly religious father was working in a different state and was thus rarely able to spend time with me. The so-called religious upbringing I had was a healthy one as far as being active in our church, praying, and things like that. The parts where I was thrown down stairs and choked into unconsciousness were rather different, and seeing my dad every other weekend was the only good part of my life for my middle school years. We would sleep in a pop-up trailer out in my backyard as to avoid the presence of my good Christian mother. In April of my eighth grade year, after about a year of ugly court proceedings, my dad came to the house in Seattle one day after school and told Brendan and I that mom would not be home that night due to a court order and we had until the next morning to pack our things and drive to Portland, where he worked, to try to start things fresh.
Long story short, this year I ended up in Humanities, and with help from the material studied in this course, I have been able to finally begin to clear up doubt and ignorance regarding my past and present in religion. Most of my life, I have harbored and nurtured a deep resentment and hatred towards my mother and through her the idea of the Christian Church, yet I remained a semi-believer and a church attendee until last year. When we began looking more in depth at the beginnings of organized Christianity, I started to be able to tone down my problems with organized religion, or at least become more educated as to why I had such a dislike of it from beyond a personal perspective. For instance, I found that the church had always had problems with hypocrisy and arrogance, and has been used often as a tool for personal gains.
Martin Luther and his 95 Theses exposed to the general public many of the problems that the Catholic Church was undergoing at the time. Priests gorging themselves on swan and other delicacies and engaging in sexual relations and bearing children out of wedlock were simply everyday occurrences at the time. In 1517 when the theses were posted, they sparked what became the Protestant Reformation. Luther’s criticism of the church’s doctrinal failings was the final straw for a good amount of the population, and the Catholic Church’s power was diminished. The Catholic Church reacted to the growing Protestant movement, in a number of ways. These are collectively called the Counter-Reformation. The Church simultaneously enacted a few reforms, in order to satisfy the demands of some of the reformers and at the same time, struck back at the Protestants. Many heads of state in Europe were loyal Catholics & assisted the Church in repressing Protestants. Perhaps the most famous example is the Spanish Inquisition, directed and fueled by the Spanish royalty than the Church. One hundred and one years after Luther’s theses were posted, the 30 Years War began to rage through Europe. From 1618-1648, warring countries fought each other with the Catholic and Protestant churches behind them, once again using religion as a crucial piece of a power play.
Constantine used it to conquer, using the effective “Convert or Die” policy to take control of most of Europe. Later, during the late 700’s, Charlemagne conquered in order to spread religion, and of course to conveniently bring power to himself. Cardinal Richelieu used his position as a religious figure to take control of France during the reign of Louis XIII. In 1624, Richelieu took power and used his power to amass a fortune through the sale of indulgences, and ruled for eighteen years until his death in 1642. He was a ruthless leader that used religion as an excuse to eliminate anyone that posed a threat to him and as a way to further his own political and personal goals. He stated this in various letters written to other cardinals and friends, saying “If you give me six lines written by the most honest man, I will find something in them to hang him” and “the state is above everything, religion is a mere instrument to promote the policies of the state.”
Another of relevant example of hypocrisy and abuse of religion is the saga of Henry VIII of England. After the “Defender of the Faith” was denied a divorce from the Catholic Church in 1529, he formally broke from the Catholic Church in 1534 and joined with the Protestants in order to grant himself the divorce from Catherine of Aragon that he needed to produce his male heir. His split from Catholicism caused a shift in overall influence and power from Rome and the pope to the Protestant Reformation and its leaders. The fact that religion has been used so often and effectively as an end to a means is something that I wasn’t fully aware of until this year through our studies in Western Civilization. I knew primarily of my own experiences with religious people, particularly my mother, and this left me jaded and bitter towards religious people in general.
Religion in and of itself is not a bad thing. In fact, it inspires people and gives them hope. Organized religion however, seems to be a way for people to get what they want and manipulate things to their advantage using their beliefs as an excuse to do so. I have met and come to know only eight Christian people in my life that I deeply and truly respect, and while I bear no ill will towards the average Christian, I will automatically be biased against them if I find that they hold such beliefs. So many people in the Christian church, and I’m sure other religions have become so disgustingly and transparently fake, living a lie. There is the half of them that goes to church and prays and sings and cries when God speaks to them, and there is the half that goes home and changes into someone else entirely. Admittedly, I think this way because of my past with my mother, whom I seemingly cannot come to terms with or forgive for her behavior, but I have also seen these characteristics in women and men like her. These are the kind of people that feel they can live how they want, and then go to church four times a week and pray for forgiveness and automatically receive it with no strings attached from their objective and loving god.
I cannot stand what has happened to the practice and idea of organized religion, and taking Western Civilization has helped me to gain an understanding of the past and corruption, but also the good parts of religion. Since the beginning of our studies, I have grown to become less of a bitter person in general towards organized Christianity, because I have learned more about the problems that started hundreds of years ago in Europe. Instead of blaming everything about the way the church has become morally corrupt on the influences of society, the product of today becoming people like my mother, I now realize that the church has always maintained a level of imperfection, and that it is not a recent development that corruption and hypocrisy have come to play.
Through our explorations into the world of Western Civilization, I have found kindred spirits who have questioned the church just as much if not more than I have. From Aquinas to Descartes, people have always tried to understand and change the organized church, and I hope that I am no different. While I am no longer a member of the church, I would like to perhaps help change it, or bring some sort of “Liamist Reformation” to it, and because of the education I am receiving from this class, I very well might be able to change people within the church for the better, and through that, if enough people change, the church itself.
kpie687: haha thanks you're really sweet
Road trip to Cali in late March is in the works. Scott Loescher's frat house for accomadations. we're thinking leave after Humanities on a thursday morning, come back sunday afternoon.
I have to write the last 5 papers we've had for Troche pretty much tonight so tomorrow she doesnt castrate me when I schedule a writing conference and she asks about my progress on said papers. That will be fun... if anyone wants to give me suggestions/their papers/good places to CopyPaste from, I'm willing to give out um... USED FLOPPY DISKS. or something of the sort.
During 6th period:
Liam: Hey, I'll door check the lady and her baby... you get double points because of the small child.
Alex: Kind of like Scott Peterson got double points for Laci Peterson?
Then we laughed and realized we're damned to hell.
Read the great and amazing The Christian Church:
on Hypocrisy, Humanities and Hope
When faced with the decision of what topic to choose for this mid term paper, I had not really put a lot of thought into how personal an essay I would write. Since we had been given the liberty of personal tense, I knew it could easily be something that I could sort of take an hour or so and write about something shallow or vague, or remotely amusing that I had experienced in Western Civilization, but I didn’t think until talking with other kids in class that I could put of myself into it. After asking around, I found out that several people had chosen to do their papers on religion and how Humanities had so far helped them define theirs, and this struck a resounding chord in me. I am one of those privileged youth who had parents that were “good Christians” while growing up, and so I was brought up in such a religious environment until the last couple years.
I saw this paper as not only as more homework but as an opportunity to delve into and explain some of the more painful parts of my life. This is something that I loathe doing, because I am the kind of person that never likes to really reveal weakness, or show any sign of trouble. I was raised to be the strong one that never cries or has problems, and I still am that person. However, Humanities thus far has not only educated me and provided me with ridiculous amounts of humor and fun, but also helped me through my own struggle to find out who I am and justify decisions I have made regarding a lot of things in my life, especially religion.
The main difference with my upbringing and most others was that my “religious” mother was physically and emotionally abusive towards my brother and myself, and my fairly religious father was working in a different state and was thus rarely able to spend time with me. The so-called religious upbringing I had was a healthy one as far as being active in our church, praying, and things like that. The parts where I was thrown down stairs and choked into unconsciousness were rather different, and seeing my dad every other weekend was the only good part of my life for my middle school years. We would sleep in a pop-up trailer out in my backyard as to avoid the presence of my good Christian mother. In April of my eighth grade year, after about a year of ugly court proceedings, my dad came to the house in Seattle one day after school and told Brendan and I that mom would not be home that night due to a court order and we had until the next morning to pack our things and drive to Portland, where he worked, to try to start things fresh.
Long story short, this year I ended up in Humanities, and with help from the material studied in this course, I have been able to finally begin to clear up doubt and ignorance regarding my past and present in religion. Most of my life, I have harbored and nurtured a deep resentment and hatred towards my mother and through her the idea of the Christian Church, yet I remained a semi-believer and a church attendee until last year. When we began looking more in depth at the beginnings of organized Christianity, I started to be able to tone down my problems with organized religion, or at least become more educated as to why I had such a dislike of it from beyond a personal perspective. For instance, I found that the church had always had problems with hypocrisy and arrogance, and has been used often as a tool for personal gains.
Martin Luther and his 95 Theses exposed to the general public many of the problems that the Catholic Church was undergoing at the time. Priests gorging themselves on swan and other delicacies and engaging in sexual relations and bearing children out of wedlock were simply everyday occurrences at the time. In 1517 when the theses were posted, they sparked what became the Protestant Reformation. Luther’s criticism of the church’s doctrinal failings was the final straw for a good amount of the population, and the Catholic Church’s power was diminished. The Catholic Church reacted to the growing Protestant movement, in a number of ways. These are collectively called the Counter-Reformation. The Church simultaneously enacted a few reforms, in order to satisfy the demands of some of the reformers and at the same time, struck back at the Protestants. Many heads of state in Europe were loyal Catholics & assisted the Church in repressing Protestants. Perhaps the most famous example is the Spanish Inquisition, directed and fueled by the Spanish royalty than the Church. One hundred and one years after Luther’s theses were posted, the 30 Years War began to rage through Europe. From 1618-1648, warring countries fought each other with the Catholic and Protestant churches behind them, once again using religion as a crucial piece of a power play.
Constantine used it to conquer, using the effective “Convert or Die” policy to take control of most of Europe. Later, during the late 700’s, Charlemagne conquered in order to spread religion, and of course to conveniently bring power to himself. Cardinal Richelieu used his position as a religious figure to take control of France during the reign of Louis XIII. In 1624, Richelieu took power and used his power to amass a fortune through the sale of indulgences, and ruled for eighteen years until his death in 1642. He was a ruthless leader that used religion as an excuse to eliminate anyone that posed a threat to him and as a way to further his own political and personal goals. He stated this in various letters written to other cardinals and friends, saying “If you give me six lines written by the most honest man, I will find something in them to hang him” and “the state is above everything, religion is a mere instrument to promote the policies of the state.”
Another of relevant example of hypocrisy and abuse of religion is the saga of Henry VIII of England. After the “Defender of the Faith” was denied a divorce from the Catholic Church in 1529, he formally broke from the Catholic Church in 1534 and joined with the Protestants in order to grant himself the divorce from Catherine of Aragon that he needed to produce his male heir. His split from Catholicism caused a shift in overall influence and power from Rome and the pope to the Protestant Reformation and its leaders. The fact that religion has been used so often and effectively as an end to a means is something that I wasn’t fully aware of until this year through our studies in Western Civilization. I knew primarily of my own experiences with religious people, particularly my mother, and this left me jaded and bitter towards religious people in general.
Religion in and of itself is not a bad thing. In fact, it inspires people and gives them hope. Organized religion however, seems to be a way for people to get what they want and manipulate things to their advantage using their beliefs as an excuse to do so. I have met and come to know only eight Christian people in my life that I deeply and truly respect, and while I bear no ill will towards the average Christian, I will automatically be biased against them if I find that they hold such beliefs. So many people in the Christian church, and I’m sure other religions have become so disgustingly and transparently fake, living a lie. There is the half of them that goes to church and prays and sings and cries when God speaks to them, and there is the half that goes home and changes into someone else entirely. Admittedly, I think this way because of my past with my mother, whom I seemingly cannot come to terms with or forgive for her behavior, but I have also seen these characteristics in women and men like her. These are the kind of people that feel they can live how they want, and then go to church four times a week and pray for forgiveness and automatically receive it with no strings attached from their objective and loving god.
I cannot stand what has happened to the practice and idea of organized religion, and taking Western Civilization has helped me to gain an understanding of the past and corruption, but also the good parts of religion. Since the beginning of our studies, I have grown to become less of a bitter person in general towards organized Christianity, because I have learned more about the problems that started hundreds of years ago in Europe. Instead of blaming everything about the way the church has become morally corrupt on the influences of society, the product of today becoming people like my mother, I now realize that the church has always maintained a level of imperfection, and that it is not a recent development that corruption and hypocrisy have come to play.
Through our explorations into the world of Western Civilization, I have found kindred spirits who have questioned the church just as much if not more than I have. From Aquinas to Descartes, people have always tried to understand and change the organized church, and I hope that I am no different. While I am no longer a member of the church, I would like to perhaps help change it, or bring some sort of “Liamist Reformation” to it, and because of the education I am receiving from this class, I very well might be able to change people within the church for the better, and through that, if enough people change, the church itself.