Blog 3495 – 05.29.2025

Only Make-Believe

The two things, or people behaviors that pissed Jesus off the most according to the Gospels were those who were the opposite of Robin Hood, those who robbed from the poor and gave to the rich, themselves; and the fakers, the hypocrites, the pretenders. He called them out and even once toward the end of his ministry he even made a whip of cords and drove the money changers out of the Temple.

The Jewish religion was all about making sacrifices to God for the forgiveness of sins, blood sacrifices, animal sacrifices. Poor people saved the little money that came to them all year long and took it with them on their annual pilgrimage to the Temple in Jerusalem where depending upon how much they had, they bought animals to be killed and offered to God as a sacrifice for their sins. They were not allowed to purchase these animals with the Roman coins of the realm but had to exchange them for Shekels, the acceptable money recognized by the priests. And so the religious leaders and the money changers were in cahoots to cheat the poor in the exchange. This really got Jesus’s goat, pun intended.

Of all the subjects Jesus spoke about most, reviling religious hypocrites and pretenders was one of his favorites. He called the religious hypocrites of his day whited sepulchers, white washed graves, pretty on the outside, yet on the inside full of putrid and rotten remains. I recall hearing a Mississippi politician once say that whenever he heard someone talking about what a good Christian they were that he put his hand on his wallet.

People have not changed much since Jesus’s time. Church people, politicians, professionals, and business people still pretend to care for poor people yet they find ways to enrich themselves at the expense of the poor. I watched an HBO Special yesterday about a famous and still revered NFL quarterback who conspired with some Mississippi (the poorest state of the fifty) politicians to steal public funds meant to help the poorest of the poor in that state to build an elaborate volleyball stadium at his daughter’s university and to further enrich himself, millions of dollars robbed from the poor to feather the nests of the rich.

I personally do not believe in hell, thinking it was invented by the guilt religions to keep people in check and to bilk them out of their money in tithes and offerings to buy God’s forgiveness, favor, or prayers to get them out of purgatory or hell. What a crock of you know what, a whitewashed crock at that.

Jesus told a story about a rich man who ended up in hell and a poor man that the rich man had had many opportunities to help in life but did not. In the rich man’s hell he could see the poor man in paradise and begged that the former poor man might be allowed to dip his finger in water and come to him to touch his tongue and quench his thirst for but a moment. The former rich man’s request was denied.

As a boy I was taught to count things with a little poem that imagined what I might become. The little poem went:

Rich man, poor man, beggar man, thief,

Doctor, lawyer, Indian Chief.

Some years ago I rejected all guilt religions, opting for a simpler faith. I believe in a loving and infinite source that allows us these adventures in time a space, as many as we choose, till we get it right, or just get tired of playing make-believe.

Such a scheme just seems to make more sense to me.

Your friend and fellow traveler,

David James White

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YA0WtFXxH6OJLwfJ9lovDSRn19dFnS6p/view?usp=drivesdk

The Highwayman