Moon and Earth from a Chinese lunar orbiter, 2014.
From Phil Plait’s “Bad Astronomy.” He really could name it “Badass Astronomy” it is that fucking great a website, Thanks Phil!
Check it out.
This is what we should be spending our time on… not having to fight ISIS, not still fighting for women’s reproductive rights, not hoping against hope whether the Pope’s conciliatory utterances toward gays will have any effect (in decades?, in centuries?) on the gaggle of bishops and cardinals and nearly two millennia of their dogmatic bullshit that vehemently and unequivocally opposes anything less than the condemnation of homosexual behavior.
Romans 1, “Saint” Paul says they deserve death, remember?
Despite Elton John’s gushing praise of the Pope’s “makenice” talk…
…it remains to be seen how long it will take to overcome 2,000 yr old repressions ingrained in the dogma of the lumbering behemoth that is the Catholic Church.
“He is a compassionate, loving man who wants everybody to be included in the love of God,” EJ said of the pope.
Except there is no god and absolutely no reason to discriminate against homosexual behavior anyway. It’s a fools errand as we have already thrown out all manner of cruel and primitive Bible verses. At the snap of our fingers we could drop every homophobic passage as well. We already know they are no more the commands of some god than those upholding slavery, promoting genocide, or not eating shrimp.
Imagine (as John Lennon did) no religion. Think of it. If we were past all this foot-dragging completely retarded bullshit.
No religion?
No ISIS, no homophobia, no restrictions on women’s use of birth control ANYWHERE!!!
No denial of science. No burqas, no pedophiles hiding out as clergy, no TV preachers scamming millions.
Imagine if we spent ALL of the energy we spend as a species of over 7 billion members now arguing about, combating against, discussing the “nuances” of (read “bullshit” whenever you see that word or hear it uttered with respect to religion), enduring the repressions of, rebutting the delusions of, escaping the persecutions of… religion… on science and charity and education.
Imagine.
Imagine redirecting all that utterly wasted effort wrestling with ALL religions’ wholly unnecessary absurdities and cruelties towards the pursuit of new knowledge and the dissemination of information and the improvement of living conditions for all.
Imagine.
The Pope and his minions look back to that nasty, shitty little book that has caused untold suffering to gays and lesbians and women in general throughout all of modern history… and waste all of our time and tears over primitive, cruel musings: deciphering the nuances of Pauline pronouncements, fanciful Gospel claims, or Old Testament ugly commands while the secular world looks forward, moves forward.
We can do better than this.
Let’s put that ugly little book on the myth shelf where it belongs and put the Pope and his posse out of a job.
Don’t look back.
Let’s look forward.
Earthrise. Apollo 8, 1968.
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