On ritual, superstition and subjugation

While most of us are preparing to participate in the pagan celebration of the winter solstice, I had a couple of questions for the superstitious among us.

If we are to believe, as the superstitious around us do, that there is a loving, all-powerful god behind the curtain pulling the strings in this universe of ours, how do you explain what happened in Newtown?

If you believe that this loving, all-powerful god of yours knew every one of us before we were ever born, how do you explain why this god would have snuffed out the lives of 20 children in a hail of gunfire?

And don't tell me that it's to test the faith of the parents. If that's your argument then we are all just pawns in someone else's game. What message does that send to our children - that this god they are told loves them has no compunction about ending their lives in an instant?

If your god does exist as some kind of a prime mover then your god is an arbitrary and capricious god. Your god is a cruel and sadistic deity.

And the massacre also points to another loose end. If your loving, all-powerful god really does sit in a throne in an alternative universe called heaven, most (if not all) of those 20 children will never enter the gates.

For those steeped in liturgical superstition, when that little baby is baptized it's only a ritual that means next to nothing until the bureaucrats in charge have determined that the child has been confirmed. And that only happens after the child is thoroughly indoctrinated in the particular flavor of superstition you practice.

For the rest of the superstitious among you, a person is only "saved" from their miserable existence in this universe if they buy into the sect's superstitions. But, until that time, you don't pass Go and you don't collect your $200.

But that's the dirty little secret that no one wants to talk about and that no one dare admit. Just how many folks do you think would buy into the great opiate of the masses if that was explained to them?

Religion has always been a tool to subjugate the masses and to quell dissent. It is used today as a tool of the ruling elite to justify the suffering that they have wrought on the rest of the world. It is used as a tool to justify the mass killings of innocent men, women and children around the world. It is used as a tool to inflame prejudice. It is used as a tool to convince the downtrodden that it was ordained by god that they be exploited and left to rot like garbage.

Just something to think about.