Oh, and Arie, thank you for your article. I don’t agree with every little aspect of it, but I do agree with the main points, and don’t believe in arguing small theological points in these last days. Been there, done that enough, and I feel like I should be spending my time on a much more important task, reading the Word of God itself, meditating day and night, so that the Holy Spirit will speak directly to me.

You’re downright foolish if you believe that the anti-christ will literally me marked by 666, like a tattoo on the hand or forehead. And also, speaking of taking things too literally, alot of you people against what Arie said seem to believe God is a person, albeit a mighty, all powerful person, but an actual person none the less.

Science has determined that people will see things they best understand and are familiar with, like a face in the clouds as Arie put it. So, when the ancient peoples were getting all their revelations and prophecies, those truths were rendered into human-like form, and then people (who again, took things too literally) began to fear God and Satan as they would fear an earthbound king, as a somebody.

God cannot be seen more than metaphorically, however. God is simply all the power and mystery that is the universe, and was perceived as something familiar, something that equates God to man-kind in terms of appearance and attitude. God, in terms of what God might actually be, would never punish anybody for sins that aren’t really sins, but simply part of human nature. Punishment itself is something we lowly humans resort to in order to feel satisfied and just, and it is not a course of action God would take. You aren’t going to hell, a world based on punishment, because the universe and God does not punish as man does. No sex before marriage? Marriage is a man-made institution, and sex is natural. Most sins follow that format, something conceived by man as a means of suppressing his human nature, in a futile attempt to get closer to God. The only way one can get closer to God is to partake in ALL that life has to offer, as God can be seen in everything.

As far as demonic possession is concerned, I must state again that humans see the familiar when confronted with something unknown. An unknown to everyone is ”What exactly are emotions?” Ancient man was confronted with the thought, and thus conceived demons and angels to explain away the two sided nature of man. To be under demonic possession would seem to me that that person is possessed by their negative emotions and attitudes, not by a corporeal sentient being (a little horned demon, rawr!)

Basically, what I’m trying to say is that at the end of the day, the Bible was written by man. Unknown forces influenced the content of the Bible, and man, flawed imperfect man, had to be able to familiarize with its Word. Man needed something understandable and comforting, and so the ancient Biblical authors used metaphor and ambiguity all over the place. Then, people just like you who took it way too literally, started Catholicism and the church of its name. Since these people thought they knew the truth, the one and only truth, about the universe, they were wrong right from the start. God, mankind, the universe, none of it can be accurately explained by any creation of man, whether a religious institution or a book. Part of the essence of the universe is mystery, ambiguity, ”uncertainty”. Trying to explain it is like trying to build a tower to reach heaven, it is impossible.