by VorJack
Here’s an old not-funny joke I heard while living in Wisconsin:
A man by the name of Ole lives to a ripe old age and dies. He awakes to find himself in Hell, which is a bit of a surprise. Still, he figures he might as well get a look around before the torture starts. He wanders over to another lost soul, who turns out to be the preacher whose church he attended as a kid.
“Father Dunn!” Ole exclaimed, “You’re a Godly man, what are you doing in Hell?”
But the preacher wouldn’t meet his eyes. The man just gives him a sickly smile and shuffles off.
Feeling unsettled now, Ole wanders over to another lost soul. Ole immediately recognizes the face from one of his textbooks: it’s Martin Luther.
“Martin Luther!” Ole shouts, “What are you, of all people, doing in Hell?”
But Luther just mutters something in German and points over to a third lost soul in the distance. Perplexed, Ole hikes up to this final man. As he draws closer, he recognizes (somehow) the figure of Saint Paul.
“Saint Paul,” cries Ole, now completely befuddled, “what’s going on?”
Paul looks at Ole for a long moment before breaking down in tears. “Works!” he weeps, “It was works all along!”
No longer being Christian means no longer having to ask, “Am I doing it right?”
It means being free of the nagging worry that my understanding is not correct and that my eternal salvation is in jeopardy. It means being able to read a new interpretation of Paul’s theology and not having to ask, “Is this it? Is this what I should have been believing all along?”
What don’t you miss about your previous religion?
I don’t understand the punchline. Is there even anything to understand there?
Didnt get the joke, please explain. I am free from having to pray while no one is listening, not feel anyone is out there watching me, free from going to church and all those silly Catholic rites., free from thinking that some superior being is responsible for what happens to me: I am.
The joke is that all of those 3 guys in hell were the main proponents of “saved by faith, not works”, also known as “be as much of an asshole as you like; as long as you accept Jesus you’re saved.”
Cop-out Christianity
Isn’t it all just a bit too easy? Saved through faith is a vacuous doctrine. I live in a society full of hypocrites and liars who really think that being dunked in a bathtub and regurgitating bad mythology will reserve them a seat in eternal utopia. It’s the perfect ideology for lazy, ignorant dolts.
The “joke” is that there are a fair number of Protestant denominations that claim that “good works” — deeds, actions, whatever — aren’t really necessary to get into Heaven. You’re either saved or you’re not (particularly according to the strains of Calvinism that focus on predestination), and doing good deeds isn’t going to save you if you’re evil in your soul. Hence we get these groups of Christians, particularly born-agains and the looniest of the evangelicals, who can justify to themselves being a bunch of jackasses who don’t have to have a shred of human empathy to be saved. See also: the entire target market for the Left Behind books (Fred Clark at the Slacktivist tears these guys a good one over this pseudo-theology regularly).
(That said, my understanding of predestination/salvation and good works in Calvinism is a little different, and more ambiguous. I learned it as that if you are saved, you will be drawn to do good works anyways; having no drive to do good works is a clear sign you aren’t saved. It’s like a cold. If you have a cold (salvation), you will present symptoms (good works). However, you can present the symptoms, like coughing or sneezing, without having a cold (evil can do good acts for its own ends). By the same token, if you present no symptoms, then I’m not going to believe you have a cold (do no good works, and you aren’t saved).)
And I largely share VorJack’s position on what I don’t miss about being Christian: the question of if I’m acting right. I generate enough angst and confusion about if I’m living an ethical life on my own. I don’t need to worry about God looking over my shoulder too.
It’s not a question of “evil in your soul”; according to protestant theology, we’re all evil sinners who deserve hell, and nobody is ever good enough. Indeed, the idea that one can be “good enough” is hubris to them; the only way to be saved is by faith in Jesus; in other words, by divine “charity”.
If I was a believer, I’d ask: “evil? By what standard?”.
On my way out, I just started comparing myself to God in the OT. I always came out looking like a saint.
This is a great question. I joyfully think about the fact that I’m not having to go to church every Sunday. I really didn’t like church even when I was a believer–and I “got saved” in a pretty well-known and popular church for many years.
I don’t miss feeling like I need to fake a conversation with someone just to share my faith. I don’t miss feeling manipulative like I did walking around my college campus with “surveys” and little copies of the 4 Spiritual Laws. I also don’t miss being in a ministry where my job was to manipulate my way onto a secular high-school campus in order to share the gospel.
I don’t miss feeling that nagging sense that something just wasn’t right with what I was doing and that, surely, any god would be big enough to do this kind of thing without expecting me to be so under-handed. I don’t miss making convoluted arguments to explain away the uncomfortable things about my faith–arguments I knew, deep down, were pretty weak.
I don’t miss having to pretend to be someone I’m not.
P.S. I liked the joke.
Edit above: got saved in “and then attended” p.1
I would think the constant cloak of guilt would be easily and most happily shed.
You would think it would be easy to get rid of that feeling but I don’t think it is. The few atheist I know that were big into the guilt and all, took a good while to get away from that. You have to remember that some who have finally left christianity, have been in their religion for many years.
I don’t miss thinking that my theology was right. I revel in my uncertainty now.
That joke illustrates a problem that I ran up against all the time as a Christian. First, they work their tail ends off to persuade you of what a miserable, rotten wretch you are, fully deserving of eternal fire. Then, just as soon as they’ve finally got you convinced, they turn around and insist, “Oh, no. It’s all right now. You’re not a miserable, rotten wretch anymore. Your salvation is assured.”
But the unease persists, despite the assurances. And this is especially true as you encounter the devotees of other religions and even of other Christian denominations that contend salvation requires that you hold your mouth slightly differently. Sure, at some level you have that deep, abiding assurance of ultimate salvation. But as you lie on your bed at night doubts creep in. Those other Christians seem awfully “Christian,” too. Could it be that they’re the ones holding their mouths right? No matter what the preacher preaches, no matter how you try to reassure yourself, there will always be that sliver of doubt. And because you subscribe to a religion that teaches there are horrible consequences for getting it wrong there will always be a splash of fear from time to time at the thought of death–no matter how you try to suppress it. As one who now sees no reason to believe in an afterlife, I’m much less afraid of dying than when I had “the assurance of life eternal.”
Re: “But the unease persists, despite the assurances.”
Indeed it does, and I submit that’s the whole point. This underlying “unease” fosters personal insecurity and uncertainty, which in turn makes congregants look for a continual stream of reinforcement. They need to be told continually that “they’ve been washed in the blood of the lamb” and that they’ve been redeemed from their rotten, stinking, putrid sinful natures. Hanging one’s ultimate cosmic fate on God’s grace alone, keeps people wondering, and therefore “hooked” by the church they belong to.
On the other hand … the notion of “salvation by works” gives people a genuine stake in their own redemption. There are things they can do, to bring it about. The underlying unease is not entirely gone under this scenario, but it can be actively fought back by the person in the form of “good deeds.” Unfortunately, denominations that allow for some level of “salvation by works,” such as the Catholic and Orthodox churches, also require regular taking of sacrament(s), which forces these folks to be dependent on periodic clerical rites.
Either way, it’s a great scam that produces loyal followers.
“…a continual stream of reinforcement…forces these folks to be dependent on periodic clerical rites.”
Yep to both. Either way, the hook is set and it’s awfully hard to wiggle free.
Man, having read up on scientology and other heavy-indoctrination cults, and how they’ll prey on the insecurities of prospective members only to assuage them with the love of the community, I have to say, the issues of dependance you guys have brought up here draw a rather uncomfortable parallel between those fringe groups and the mainstream. I suppose it shouldn’t surprise me to see the same techniques (whether consciously applied or not) employed by any given faith, but it’s still disturbing to see those cases not as separate phenomena, but points along a gradient.
It’s a nice touch that while Luther speaks German, St. Paul speaks English, just as recorded in the original Bible, the King James Version.
hahahaha
If english was good enough for Jesus :-p
I got the joke. I can’t tell you how many times I have been told on the internet that my “good works” were but filthy rags to god and that if I wasn’t saved through Jesus it didn’t matter how good I was. Christianity is a sick and twisted self-serving religion to basically tell people they can’t be good for “Goodness” sake.
I don’t miss hating myself for being who I am.
All too often being who and what I am led to me mentally castigating myself because of some supposed divine edict (usually more of an interpretation of a verse or three). How, I thought, could I not control the temptations; was I so weak as to let satan and his minions lead me astray?
Now, without religion, I am who I am and I love myself for it.
“I don’t miss hating myself for being who I am.”
I like it!
If you don’t get the joke, read this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sola_fide
There are many things I don’t miss, but one that stands out is the feeling of guilt when I ask questions. Many times I would read something in the Bible (and it was always the King James) & wonder–”what does this really mean?” or “why is this different than the previous gospel?” or “why are there so many different interpretations of this passage?”.
Now (as a skeptical agnostic), I feel no guilt or shame for asking & researching these questions. I am no longer burdened by the “just have faith” statement that I felt obligated to when I was a believer.
TBH, I rather like where I am now. Hail Satan.
I don’t miss being forced awake in my teen years on Sunday morning to be dragged off to church, or sitting through Christmas mass STARVING because we couldn’t eat until after church. And CONFESSION!! I always hated to have to store up all my “wrong doings” for a once a month tell-all session with the priest.
Now, I don’t miss Football ;)
I was raised a Baptist Christian Fundamentalist in the late 1970s, early 1980s.
What I Don’t Miss About Being Christian.
1. Anti-intellectualism. I always had a natural curiosity. I love to learn and had a desire to see the world. This of course caused problems between me and some of my follow fundies. My youth minister once mocked me when I told him I was watching PBS last Friday night. He implied I was gay for not having watched “The Dukes of Hazards” instead. I once run for student council president at my Baptist high school. A classmate told me I was too immature to be student council president. A year later when I told the same classmate I wish to visit Australia, she told me that I should only visit another country I was either going as a missionary or a solder. Anyway Jesus was coming soon, and during the millennial reign of Christ, Jesus might put me in charge of running Australia.
2. The fear of anything new or different. I can remember being told the UPC bar codes on all packaging would someday be used as a tool by the antichrist. I am sure today’s fundies are saying that about my GPS. And all new music and movies were evil.
3. Wasting my Sundays and sometimes Wednesday and Friday evenings. I missed seeing team USA Hockey beat the Russians in the 1980 Olympics. I also miss many Super Bowls, often sitting in a half empty church. (It was a plot by Satan to have pro-football on Sundays) Now that my Sundays are free, I am a better golfer.
4. Hearing tone-deaf people sing.
5. Having people assume every time something bad happen to me, I must have done something evil to piss god off, therefore I got what I deserved.
6. Being around a bunch of arrogant pricks that assume all because they said a sinner’s prayer when they were three-years old, they were better then everyone else (unsaved trash).
7. Hearing my pastor yell and slam him bible on the pulpit. Its Sunday morning and I am trying to sleep.
8. The hard church pews, and when either the heating or the air conditioner was not working.
9. My youth group (see 1, 3 5 & 6.)
10. Well I need 10, because both god and David Letterman like that number (and both are a**holes). Having to wear a suit and tie during the summer.
What don’t I miss? I haven’t got the time. It would be easier to list the things that I do miss.
One of the things I don’t miss: the shitty jokes.
……. and the uncomfortable and obligatory chuckles from the congregants.
Salvation by faith fits well into the concept of religion as a mind virus. If you know a few things about biology and evolution, you will understand that unnecessary features tend to get lost in the competition of natural selection; so that for example, a bacterium grown for many many generations in a flask with a steady supply of food and no predation may lose pretty much all abilities except to eat and reproduce. It doesn’t need to do anything else (avoid predation, etc.) and to keep those abilities entails a cost upon the keepers, so they lose out to those who do the least amount needed to get by. And so it is with salvation by faith. The ability of this mind virus to spread is enhanced by the loss of the need to actually do anything to earn the promised reward, the spread of belief is the only thing valued.
Ha! Cool. I’d always thought of grace-based salvation as particularly appealing to the lazier individual, but I’d never expanded that thought to think of that appeal as a competitive advantage for a memetic virus. Thanks for that, Reg!
I don’t miss the feeling of discomfort seeing everyone around me assimilate a “humble” attitude of superiority over those “sinners” out there.
Jesus kills Bedeviled Pigs
. . . I miss favorite bible stories about the Paul Bunyan of Palestine and his Babe. ‘Cause in those days no one understood schizophrenia (no DSM IV to guide you) — there was demonic possession.
And Jesus – on a date with his Babe, Mary Magdalene – sailed right into trouble among the Gerasenes (Luke 8:26-33, 37 NIV):
26They sailed to the region of the Gerasenes, which is across the
lake from Galilee.
27 When Jesus stepped ashore, he was met by a
demon-possessed man from the town. …
28 When he saw Jesus, he cried out and fell at his feet, shouting at
the top of his voice, “What do you want with me, Jesus, Son of the
Most High God? I beg you, don’t torture me!”
29 For Jesus had commanded the [unclean] spirit to come out of the man….
30 Jesus asked him, “What is your name?” “Legion,” he replied, because many demons had gone into him. 31 And they begged him repeatedly not to order them to go into the Abyss.
32 A large herd of pigs was feeding there on the hillside. The demons
begged Jesus to let them go into them, and he gave them permission.
33 When the demons came out of the man, they went into the pigs, and
the herd rushed down the steep bank into the lake and was drowned.
. . . .
37 . . . all the people of the region of the Gerasenes asked
Jesus to leave them, because they were overcome with fear. So he
got into the boat and left.
I enjoy how the demon-possessed man’s inner spokesman knows that Jesus is “Son of the Most High God.” That’s proof for sure. I mean if a demon in PR says so, who am I to doubt it? Who am I going to believe: 99 demons with a PR shill, or some jewish heretic like Paul, or a liar like Peter? Demons get my vote!
Jesus doesn’t even offer to pay their owner for drowning his pigs. He scoots back across the lake. What will Mary M think? “Geez, this guy’s just not kosher.”
anti_supernaturalist
Now I can masturbate without Jesus watching me! It was pretty weird.
It’s pretty easy to be mostly secular as a Reform Jew. I had problems reconciling my idea of “god” (something sort of nebulous and undefined) with that of Yahweh. Realizing I didn’t in fact believe in god took care of that conflict. But a basic precept behind Judaism — be a good person here on earth, including good works aka mitzvot, because that’s the only life we have — carries over nicely to a secular view. I just jettisoned the “and because God wants you to” part of it and haven’t changed the way I live.
ZenMonkey,
I recently went to my cousin’s Bat Mitzvah and was really impressed with the ceremony, even as an atheist, because of how much it was about service to the community and not at all about proselytizing.
What I don’t miss – ever having to ask again “Why would God allow this?” or “Why would God do this?” Something bad happens, I am angry at God, then I feel guilty for being angry – bah. A lot of unnatural and unnecessary feelings to deal with.
Now that I’m a godless heathen, bad things happen because bad things happen – or more accurately, because stuff happens and humans have an opinion about whether it’s good or bad. I will feel how I feel about it, which is brain chemistry and electricity. I still got very sad and mad and upset and grieved when my stepmom died, but without the added burden of pretending to be happy she was in a better place, or guilty for being angry at God for allowing it, etc.
My brother once said, “Some omnipotent being either allows or causes bad things to happen, and that’s supposed to be COMFORTING? I find it way more comforting that the universe is random and things happen for no reason.”
Mm, I never was a believer. However…
1. I don’t miss people praying over me. I’ve had arthritis since I was eight months old; to have people trying to cast the disease out of me – suggesting I had something demonic in me – it’s like they’re telling me that I’m doing something wrong because I learned to cope with it rather than beg and beg and beg for it to go away. That I can’t possibly be happy like this. That I need to change.
2. I don’t miss the pitying looks.
3. I don’t miss the tone-deaf people singing…
4. … neither the screeching banshees.
5. I don’t miss having to chit chat with people who feel the need to insert the word ‘Jesus’ at least once per sentence.
6. I don’t miss the melodrama every time something went the least bit wrong.
7. I don’t miss the obligatory chanting for Jesus during prayers.
8. I don’t miss the horrible suspicion that I was going to hell – since I never believed.
9. I don’t miss the fear of dying.
10. Lots and lots more…
I don’t miss the constant fear of messing up big time and being thrown into a fiery pit to burn…forever and ever…by a “loving” God. I live a “right life” now, along the lines of Buddhist teachings, though I’m not a Buddhist. I am just me, peace and compassion. That’s a comfortable way to live a life.
“It means being free of the nagging worry that my understanding is not correct and that my eternal salvation is in jeopardy.”
Incidentally, worrying about whether one will gain eternal life is a sin.
My parents did my brother and I a favor by accident. We were raised southern Baptists and when we went to high school, my parents sent us to a Catholic military school. I don’t know of any two groups supposedly worshipping the same God and using the same book that are further apart in their beliefs. We both came out as Atheists though I did for a time search other religions, looking for something that wasn’t phony. Never found it. Now I sleep in on Sunday mornings and when I get up I go to the local diner for a nice southern breakfast. Nobody tells me I’m going to hell or that I am an unworthy sinner.
I realized that since sin is a crime against god and there is no god, there is no sin. Living in the bible belt I hear a lot of religion but surprisingly I am finding more and more folks here who are open about their life without fairy tales and invisible sky daddies.
When I hear folks credit Jesus or Allah for winning a football game or some other achievement they made I think two things: Is their god so bored that he cares about who wins the local highschool football game on Friday night and has religion so destroyed their sense of self worth that they cannot give themselves credit for their efforts?
Also, what did God have against the losing team, who probably prayed the exact same amount?
Our biggest rival was another Catholic school so I really didn’t know how any god could have made a decision between us. Unless he liked the Fathers of the society of Mary better than the nuns of the order of st. Pius
I went to a Lutheran school, and we sucked at pretty much every sport. Clearly Martin Luther had it wrong.
god had money riding on the game, while god does not play dice with the universe, he likes gambling and skeet ball.
I got the joke too : )
Actually I remember a joke growing up Down South that was more or less the polar opposite of the one you posted. It goes like this:
A man dies and finds himself before the Pearly Gates. Now, he wasn’t an EVIL man in life … but what he WAS was a hard drinkin’, skirt chasin’, hell raisn’, SOB for most of his life and, finding himself in The Afterlife, he’s more than a little bit afraid that his long list of Sins is going to weigh against him and that his name is not going to be on the guest list, so to speak.
He takes a deep breath and walks up to St. Peter who smiles and waves away his worried look: “Don’t look so worried my friend: we don’t keep any records up here and you’re just as welcome as anyone else! Enjoy your stay!”
The man is, of course, flooded with relief and joy and is about to walk into Paradise when he notices several people standing just outside the entrance. All of them are conservatively dressed and there are Catholic Priests and Hasidic Jews and several other flavors of Holy Men mixed amongst them. These people are all weeping, and crying, and beating their breasts ect ect and it’s all rather confusing to our friend who’s only just been told that everyone is welcome. What on earth could then have DONE??
With some misgivings he walks back to St. Peter and asks somewhat shyly: “Excuse me Sir? But what did THOSE people do?? Didn’t you tell me that EVERYONE was welcome here?”
St Peter looks over at he miserable group and shakes his head sadly: “Oh, yes, everyone IS welcome just as I said … but …. ::sighs:: well, do you remember how you felt just now when I told you that we didn’t keep any records?”
Our friend breaks into a wide grin: “BOY do I EVER!! Best news I’ve ever heard!!”
“Right”, agrees St Peter nodding, “well, you see, THOSE people over? They ALSO THOUGHT THAT WE KEPT RECORDS!”
——————————————————————
I remember this joke being quite popular with other Apostates (as well as pretty much anyone else who wasn’t still a Southern Baptist True Believer) for the obvious reasons and it’s my answer to your question: what I DON’T miss is the HATE and the ANGER and the constant feeling that most of the people around me were watching for any hint that I might be about to have anything that might be mistaken for a GOOD TIME. And I’m not talking about an orgy wantonness: do you realize that there are people in Mainline Christianity right now that are making very public vows to NOT KISS until their wedding day???
I was, quite frankly, boggled.
It means being free of the nagging worry that my understanding is not correct and that my eternal salvation is in jeopardy. It means being able to read a new interpretation of Paul’s theology and not having to ask, “Is this it? Is this what I should have been believing all along?”
Interesting, because that’s almost exactly how I felt after leaving Fundamentalist ways of thinking behind.
And to add to the discussion about faith and works:
Luther would argue that doing good is essential and necessary; however, doing good is the effect, not the cause, of salvation.
That’s a far cry from this (from above):
“be as much of an asshole as you like; as long as you accept Jesus you’re saved.”
(http://unreasonablefaith.com/2009/10/26/what-i-dont-miss-about-being-christian/#comment-68119)
Luther did said, “Be a sinner and sin boldly!” (though to be fair, he did say after that to trust Christ more than your sin… ;)
Of course, Luther also said:
1. [Jews are a] base, whoring people, that is, no people of God, and their boast of lineage, circumcision, and law must be accounted as filth.
2. [Jews are] full of the devil’s feces … which they wallow in like swine
And gave this advice on how to deal with Jews:
# “First to set fire to their synagogues or schools and to bury and cover with dirt whatever will not burn, so that no man will ever again see a stone or cinder of them. …”
# “Second, I advise that their houses also be razed and destroyed. …”
# “Third, I advise that all their prayer books and Talmudic writings, in which such idolatry, lies, cursing and blasphemy are taught, be taken from them. …”
# “Fourth, I advise that their rabbis be forbidden to teach henceforth on pain of loss of life and limb. …”
# “Fifth, I advise that safe-conduct on the highways be abolished completely for the Jews. …”
And lots of other things. I love Martin Luther.
Re: “Luther would argue that doing good is essential and necessary; however, doing good is the effect, not the cause, of salvation.”
Yes, this is the “works follows salvation” or “works follows grace” line of thinking. Trouble is, it renders the whole idea of “works” meaningless and irrelevant. Here’s why:
If it’s possible for someone to do “good works” even without salvation/grace, then “good works” cannot by definition indicate that one has salvation/grace. If on the other hand those with salvation/grace always do “good works,” why then do they continue to sin anyway? If salvation/grace has power to compel “good works,” why is this not consistent?
Basically this line of thinking renders the entire issue of “good works” totally irrelevant to salvation, since their presence or absence tell us nothing at all. This is, however, contradicted by scripture, which asserts quite the opposite: “Even so faith, if it has no works, is dead, being by itself” (James 2:17) and “For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead.” (James 2:26)
A Christian cannot, therefore, have it both ways. Either works are a definite and intimately-linked sign of grace (as James said), or works are not directly linked (as Luther implied via his doctrine).
Having said all that, of course what Luther had objected to were the works-oriented Catholic doctrines, including things like indulgences. He started out objecting only to the sale of indulgences, not to indulgences per se, but in his and Melanchthon’s efforts to build a new church on new doctrines, he needed to go further. So he went after the underlying concept of indulgences as a whole. Now, it’s possible for a Catholic to gain an indulgence not by buying them, but by doing things (e.g. a certain amount of devotional prayer, etc. which is still the case). In order to make his point, Luther and Melanchthon needed to make the entire concept of a Christian doing something to earn salvation appear unacceptable.
Hence the condemnation of works. The only exception in Luther/Melanchthon’s teachings was the performance of penance by a Christian, which they viewed as having power to ensure salvation. However, they saw the performance of penance as being tied to grace rather than being a matter of human volition.
By condemning works, Luther/Melanchthon forgot (or maybe they didn’t exactly “forget,” they rather consciously chose to ignore) the definite link between works and salvation that are found in scripture. Because after all, when you’re carving out a new Church for yourself, you can’t let little considerations like “scripture” get in your way, now, can you?
To further complicate the issue, there’s the issue of what “good” means in Luther’s historical/religious context. Good doesn’t mean moral, kind, or nice.
I don’t miss having to maintain a loyalty to Dogma even in the face of contradictory evidence…i.e. I don’t miss having to choose Dogma over Truth…
I don’t miss defending a supposedly loving God who devises a system of salvation that is so dubious & questionable by anyone with the slightest bit of personal integrity & yet is supposedly be willing to condemn those same people he loves to an eternity of hell for getting it wrong…
I don’t miss defending a “holy book” that is a contradictory and ambiguous mess…
I don’t miss trying to decipher what Jesus meant by this saying or another…
I don’t miss wondering why Jesus didn’t speak more clearly & write a few his oh-so vital truisms down instead of leaving it to a bunch of anonymous creative fiction writers generations later…
I don’t miss having to be right…
I don’t miss feeling feeling guilty if I don’t share the “good news” faith with my dying patients …
I don’t miss this ever-present Big Brother watching my every move with disapproval and condemnation…
I don’t miss this evil sky-god & what he did to mess up my mind…
I don’t miss trying to be someone I am not, to try to please this invisible voyeur…
My only regret is that I wasn’t brave enough earlier in my life to search for truth no matter where it might lead; but as they say, better late than never.
For the first time in my life, I am free. In that respect, the anonymous writer we call John , ironically had it right: “The Truth does make you free”…even when all you may know is what it isn’t.
-evan :-)