When In Rome, Do As the Romans Do...
Sadly for us, we aren't in Rome. So, why are we still treating Popes, common men, as if they were gods on Earth, as the Romans treated the Caesars almost two thousand years ago?
I really wish I had some enlightening answer for that, but I don't. I'm just simply stupefied by it all.
Of the numerous things I find wrong with the Catholic faith, this has to be the front- runner, the big Chalupa of all the religious heresies that has afflicted our world. Yet still, somehow, people transcend the bogusness and treat Popes as if they were kings (who themselves don't even really deserve the grandeur they get and have gotten either).
Not only does the Bible, the collection of scripture that all of the Christian faiths are founded on, not in any way mention a position of Pope, but it also highlights no event or circumstance in which man ever deserves to be treated with such praise. Actually, with the way Jesus felt about man and sin, He probably wouldn't want a man in any such powerful position anyway (yes, I don't do the whole saints thing either, we aren't pagans, people. Doesn't it just feel a bit too much like Greece and Rome?)
What we should do, instead of wasting our time waiting for an old man to whisper words of wisdom to us (which usually aren't so wise anyway), is put our faith in something we can believe, our hope in something true and uplifting.
That doesn't necessarily mean that I want you all to find Christ (even though I really do), because I realize that it's hard to believe sometimes, because I've been there before, and was there for almost 18 years. I simply want us to have a little more hope in each other, to focus on what we need to do to live, and to live happily.
What makes a Pope so much better than a blue-collar worker, than a housewife, than a bus-driver? Absolutely nothing.
My grandfather always gets so angry when he sees the Pope come on t.v. and he always tells me the same thing, and it fits into this little discourse, so I'll end wit hit right now. He says that we worship an old man who sits on his throne, who gives his speeches, who gives out blessing as if it were a food sampler in the A&P (okay, so I added that last part in). But what about men like him, who have labored their entire lives, who have only a few hours of rest every night before they have to go out in the morning to fight in the only way they know how, just to put food on the table and provide for their families? What about the millions of workers who earn a living by working 10 or more hours a day at a job they hate, only because they know they have to?
We give them nothing. So, why do we give so much to a man who probably couldn't muster the strength to bring in a bag of groceries if you asked him to? I don't think we're stupid, I just think we're ignorant. And for the ignorant there are books, but for the stupid there isn't anything.
Let me finish (once and for all) with a list of things that I think you should question, which maybe you never have before; or which you basically just shouldn't give so much to and expect so much from:
News Reporters (Bums. Everything is skewed. We don't need rich men/women in desks to tell us that)
Popes
Saints
Governments (unless they are good ones)
Professors (ibid)
Multinational corporations (MTV, McDonald's, Exxon Mobil, etc... give the little guys a shot)
Rich people
Models and Musicians
Athletes (with A-Rods salary at the Yankees, 252 million in ten years, we could probably end hunger in at least one continent)
Doctors (just those private-practice schmucks that charge you an arm and a leg for a "Your okay, boss" and a bottle of Tylenol)
Businessmen
History (did you know that Teddy Roosevelt was racist? That Washington had slaves? That we murdered hundreds of thousands of patriots just to take over the Philippines, Puerto Rico, and Cuba. I bet your U.S. Hist. professor never told you that!)
Me (if you don't want to)
Now, go do something valuable!
freepoverty.com
thehungersite.com
freerice.com
freeflour.com
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