John Calvin had somethin' goin' there...
For all of you who do not know of John Calvin, he played a role- albeit a small role- in the Protestant Reformation. Instigated by a falling out of trust in the church and a selling of indulgences to reduce one's time in purgatory were only two of many reasons that the Protestant Church lost so many of its followers to the ideals of Martin Luther and John Calvin. The interesting thing is, however, that I've been thinking about how radical John Calvin's idea of "Calvinism" was. His philosophy was that no matter what you did, you couldn't change your fate. This "Calvinism" is more commonly referred to as "Predestination". This philosophy, strangely enough, actually makes a lot of sense despite its hopeless-sounding disposition. Around this time in history (I think it was around the 1400-1500 time period) was when the church had a firm grip on society. The church could decide right from wrong, true from false, and pure from tainted. The people relied so heavily upon the church for guidance that they appeared to have no free thought of their own. When the Protestant Reformation came about, Calvin's belief was that no matter what we did we would not be able to change our fates. Unfortunately, if one's destiny was to reside in the burning bowels of Satan's Workshop, then that's how it would be. For those who were destined to ascend into heaven, I suppose it wouldn't be so bad. The point is, though, that I think Calvin realized something. You hear in the Bible all the time that 'he who gives is righteous' and 'faith is all one needs' and blah blah blah, but what of those who give all they have to give, and pray every second of every day, and are baptised, christened, ordained, etc. who don't get into heaven? What then? There's no real way to prove the existence of either realm; heaven or hell. And there's no true way to determine if a 'soul' actually enters one of these realms based on their deeds in the material world. But wouldn't it seem like a waste to spend all that time trying to impress God just to get into heaven if no one knew for sure if you'd really get in no matter how devout you were? I think Calvin was trying to spare the people the misery of trying to kiss-ass for the rest of their lives and to, instead, carry on with their lives and live them as if they would had they not known of heaven and hell. Predestination may sound like a scary concept, but for some reason it makes a lot of sense. That's my interpretation, anyway.
Peace.
Peace.