Guess I must just be in a righteous mood. You know how it is on YouTube: it's designed for addictive browsing, where way leads on to way, and often you can't go back. So you end up affixing, pasting your favorites onto your blog so you won't lose track of them.
This has to be the ugliest piece of video I have ever seen, so of course I had to post it. When I first watched it, I just could not take in what I was seeing. It was an ugly mob scene featuring hysterical men making weird noises and pushing people over. I would love to know more, i. e. who ARE these people, WHERE are they and WHAT are they doing?, but the video says nothing. The clips have been taken from other videos, perhaps illegally, so are not labelled.
This is obviously some sort of mass exorcism. Trouble is, it's the exorcist who's possessed. Possessed by the God of idiocy. The most baffling and grotesque example is the long clip in the middle. For some reason another guy sort of holds on to him, so he won't float away to Cuckooland. One wonders at the sadism of such people, who surely can't believe they're doing anything of value, or doing anything at all except create false hopes and suck away cash.
Though it's the poor and marginalized who are most taken in by these vampires, I notice the suits and ties and '80s-style dressed-up women with high hair and wonder who on earth would fall for this. It's desperation, for sure, the need to believe, but do we really have to check our intellect at the door, to give our will over entirely?
I'm reminded of Nazi Germany, of Triumph of the Will and its hideous uniformity, the fierce, vacant pride of people falling into lockstep and throwing their individuality gleefully away. People do NOT want to think for themselves. It's a burden to make decisions and live with the consequences. I've heard so many people, even "moderate" Christians and people in 12-step groups (which can be more fundamentalist than the whooping, hollering crowd you see here) go on and on about how "God is in charge, God makes all the decisions, I just put it all in God's hands." Even when I was part of the United Church, that Godless bunch of New Age heathens and mortgage brokers/Mary Kay salesladies, I was encouraged, nay, pressured to just trust in God, bring all my troubles to Him/Her and believe that I would be guided, reassured, even healed.
Didn't happen, folks. In fact, I wasn't the only one who found that her soul maladies and vulnerabilities of the body only got worse in "God's hands".
The truth is, "God" does not HAVE hands. God is a concept, just about the slipperiest, most unknowable and inexpressible concept that exists. God is, perhaps, the mysterious force that gave rise to all life, to the entire universe. And it didn't happen in a week or even a couple thousand years, but an expanse of time so vast we can't even comprehend it. But is there a personal God, a God who knows us, cares about us, tends to us and listens to all our sorrows?
I think not. Sorry, God. For that, we need each other.
Afterblog. After watching this compilation, I am incredulous: I MUST find out more about the maniac with the suit-and-tie audience. Watching it over and over again, I notice to my horror that most people in the audience are wearing badges. Are they all members of the Gospel Insane Asylum Club or what? Is this some sort of conference? What the hell is going on here? Why are people going along with it? Are they functionally sane? Is HE functionally sane? Are people that desperate to be taken over, to voluntarily give up their will and power of decision? In other alarming clips, I've seen examples of people claiming to be "healed", when in truth they had cancelled surgeries, chemotherapy or other medical treatment in the deluded belief they didn't need them. In one clip, an elderly woman said she was scheduled for open heart surgery because she had several blocked arteries, but glory be to God, she didn't need it any more! "So you went to the doctor and - " began the televangelist scumbag. "I don't need no doctors now! I'm healed! Glory be to God!" In this case, even the evangelist seemed a bit uneasy, but quickly went on to the next victim.
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What it shows me is that people are starving for spirit. Our addiction for material accumulation is suffocating us, and the chance to break out and breathe some free air drives us out of our minds.
ReplyDeleteIf only the whole thing weren't in the hands of such greasy charlatans. There's a new movement called prosperity ministry, in which they tell you that you have to pay God for salvation. Not only that, if you give, you will GET. Money. This seems to be the whole object of the thing. What's worse is that if these widows give up their pensions for the sake of salvation, the evangelist and his corporate machine will actually send a small, anonymous cheque to the donor, to give the impression that "God" sent the money. This keeps them on the hook and ups the amount until they are totally broke.
ReplyDeleteSweet Daddy Grace was doing that back when Styron was writing Lie Down in Darkness.
ReplyDeleteAt least Elmer Gantry was sexy. Or I thought so.
ReplyDelete