Losing My Religion, Part 1

I recently stumbled across a website called, Jesus Religion. It's about a book written by Louis Charles, a husband and father, who examines the validity and insanity of organized religion. It is a look at the person of Jesus, who he prefers to call "Yeshua" which is the Hebrew/Aramaic name of Jesus. It means "one who saves."

I went through a period earlier this year where I began to question my religion (Catholic) and started to feel estranged and disheartened by it. I have been doing a lot of reading lately on the internet, and once again I am plagued by doubts about organized religion of every kind, including my own. There are many people who write that organized religion is bad for you; that it is the source of many of the world's problems. Organized religion takes away our ability to think and reason on our own; instead we are taught what doctrines/dogma/beliefs we are supposed to follow; we are taught how to act; we are taught what is right and wrong based on a set of beliefs and religious dogmas; we are taught how to pray and what to say; we are told that if we want to get to heaven that we should act this way and avoid certain behaviors/sins, or else we know where we might end up! We are told that sexuality is bad and so are condoms/birth control. We must confess our "sins" to another human being who is also a sinner in order to receive "absolution." We are not to question what the bible teaches and many of the doctrines are not even in the bible in the first place. Much of the doctrines of a particular religion are man-made and enforced by men. The bottom line is, we are controlled and pretty much enslaved by organized religion. We are also brainwashed! Sounds good, doesn't it?

My six year old (God Bless her) doesn't like to go to church, probably because she does not get anything out of it (how many 6 year olds do?). I don't blame her, because at 42, there are times that I don't get much out of it either, and I have been working at this much longer than my daughter has!

I want to buy and read the book by Louis Charles. He has peaked my interest and stimulated my curiosity. He challenges what organized religions teach and what Jesus/Yeshua really stood for. When you think about it, Jesus was against organized religion; yet men have created religion in the name of Jesus that is as oppressive and degrading as the Pharisees were in the time of Jesus. The Pharisees and Sanhedrin in the gospels place unnecessary burdens on people in the name of religion. They took away their inherit dignity and freedom as sons and daughters of God, while they in their arrogance did whatever they wanted. Sound familiar? Jesus challenged the Pharisees many times and even got angry with them. He came to transcend the laws, not to impose or enforce them. And since when is it okay to molest young children in the name of God and there is nothing wrong with it? I grew up Catholic and went to parochial schools and even the seminary, because I thought God was calling me to be a priest, until I found out that priests were molesting children. I was never abused, but I knew priests who have abused children and that disheartens me.