For Those of You on Your Way to Church This Morning... [Archive]

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FORD

10-04-2009, 03:44 PM

For Those of You on Your Way to Church This Morning...

Friends,

I'd like to have a word with those of you who call yourselves Christians (Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, Bill Maherists, etc. can read along, too, as much of what I have to say, I'm sure, can be applied to your own spiritual/ethical values).

In my new film I speak for the first time in one of my movies about my own spiritual beliefs. I have always believed that one's religious leanings are deeply personal and should be kept private. After all, we've heard enough yammerin' in the past three decades about how one should "behave," and I have to say I'm pretty burned out on pieties and platitudes considering we are a violent nation that invades other countries and punishes our own for having the audacity to fall on hard times.

I'm also against any proselytizing; I certainly don't want you to join anything I belong to. Also, as a Catholic, I have much to say about the Church as an institution, but I'll leave that for another day (or movie).

Amidst all the Wall Street bad guys and corrupt members of Congress exposed in Capitalism: A Love Story, I pose a simple question in the movie: "Is capitalism a sin?" I go on to ask, "Would Jesus be a capitalist?" Would he belong to a hedge fund? Would he sell short? Would he approve of a system that has allowed the richest 1 percent to have more financial wealth than the 95 percent under them combined?

I have come to believe that there is no getting around the fact that capitalism is opposite everything that Jesus (and Moses and Mohammed and Buddha) taught. All the great religions are clear about one thing: It is evil to take the majority of the pie and leave what's left for everyone to fight over. Jesus said that the rich man would have a very hard time getting into heaven. He told us that we had to be our brother's and sister's keepers and that the riches that did exist were to be divided fairly. He said that if you failed to house the homeless and feed the hungry, you'd have a hard time finding the pin code to the pearly gates.

I guess that's bad news for us Americans. Here's how we define "Blessed Are the Poor": We now have the highest unemployment rate since 1983. There's a foreclosure filing once every 7.5 seconds. 14,000 people every day lose their health insurance.

At the same time, Wall Street bankers ("Blessed Are the Wealthy"?) are amassing more and more loot -- and they do their best to pay little or no income tax (last year Goldman Sachs' tax rate was a mere 1 percent!). Would Jesus approve of this? If not, why do we let such an evil system continue? It doesn't seem you can call yourself a Capitalist and a Christian -- because you cannot love your money and love your neighbor when you are denying your neighbor the ability to see a doctor just so you can have a better bottom line. That's called "immoral" -- and you are committing a sin when you benefit at the expense of others.

When you are in church this morning, please think about this. I am asking you to allow your "better angels" to come forward. And if you are among the millions of Americans who are struggling to make it from week to week, please know that I promise to do what I can to stop this evil -- and I hope you'll join me in not giving up until everyone has a seat at the table.

Thanks for listening. I'm off to Mass in a few hours. I'll be sure to ask the priest if he thinks J.C. deals in derivatives or credit default swaps. I mean, after all, he must've been good at math. How else did he divide up two loaves of bread and five pieces of fish equally amongst 5,000 people? Either he was the first socialist or his disciples were really bad at packing lunch. Or both.

Yours,
Michael Moore
MMFlint@aol.com
MichaelMoore.com

Michael Moore: For Those of You on Your Way to Church This Morning... (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-moore/for-those-of-you-on-your_b_308948.html)

standin

10-04-2009, 06:03 PM

Thanks, I haven't checked my J~ in folder in quite some time. I would have missed that.

Baby's On Fire

10-04-2009, 06:16 PM

The man has a point. Well spoken. (Michael Moore I mean).

What about us Heathens? Well this Heathen agrees with Michael Moore.

He's simply fuckin' right.

ELVIS

10-04-2009, 06:22 PM

No he's not, and Jesus has nothing to do with catholicism...

Jesus Christ

10-04-2009, 07:19 PM

No he's not, and Jesus has nothing to do with catholicism...

Gregory, why did ye need to go there? :rolleyes:

Verily I say unto you, as I said unto Joseph Smith when he asked Me in the 19th century, that all churches hath become corrupt and none are truly doing what I instructed My disciples to do. Including the one Joseph formed after that conversation.

But ye should not judge My Catholic children as being worse than thine own church. For it will not be churches that stand before Me on the Last Day and giveth an accounting of their lives, it will be individuals.

thome

10-04-2009, 08:01 PM

I wonder how he feels about Chinch Bugs and Crab Grass..?

Not enough controversy in those sentences.

What if I inserted additional words like... God, Jesus, The Pope,and Every other religons name, across the world, and,.TA'DAH!.. "My New Movie..??"

Do you think .................................................. ............?

People would find it more interesting through, HYPE..?

Bored lonely confused people?

Seshmeister

10-04-2009, 08:14 PM

No he's not, and Jesus has nothing to do with catholicism...

So all the Christians in the world were wrong for 1500 years but some of them are right now?

You base this on translations of the bible passed down by the people that were wrong and the bible is the only evidence of any of your religion being true.

Interesting...

ELVIS

10-04-2009, 08:55 PM

No, it's based on the pages that Martin Luther nailed on the door...

Ally_Kat

10-04-2009, 09:30 PM

No, it's based on the pages that Martin Luther nailed on the door...

Um...those weren't about Jesus, either. They were about church politics and an abuse of power.

Anonymous

10-04-2009, 09:36 PM

Um...those weren't about Jesus, either. They were about church politics and an abuse of power.

Shh, don't contradict him... he may be dangerous.

Just back away slowly, and don't make eye contact.

Cheers! :bottle:

Little Texan

10-05-2009, 12:07 AM

GAR

10-05-2009, 01:09 AM

We saw the movie last nite, it was entertaining.. I'm sure FORD will post a review before I do so hop to it, Hop Singh!

GAR

10-05-2009, 01:10 AM

Shh, don't contradict him...

She doesn't!

ELVIS

10-05-2009, 09:27 AM

They were about church politics and an abuse of power.

Hmmm...

Things that Jesus would have nothing to do with ??

ELVIS

10-05-2009, 09:40 AM

And BTW, in his writings, Luther accused the Catholic church of heresy, as well as directly challenging the position of the clergy in regard to individual salvation...

Salvation has everything to do with Jesus Christ...

Seshmeister

10-05-2009, 09:41 AM

What do you know about the Jesus myth?

You seem to interpret the story to mean that he was a right wing pro war money grabber.

ELVIS

10-05-2009, 09:42 AM

How do you figure that ??

Seshmeister

10-05-2009, 09:52 AM

It makes no sense to have your political views and then try and join them up to your religious superstitions.

The Jesus doctrine is way too left wing for me, he was basically a communist.

ELVIS

10-05-2009, 10:33 AM

Well, I find scripture to be conservative and logical...like me...;)

Seshmeister

10-05-2009, 10:41 AM

You should go and read some of the writings of Marx, they are almost the same as the Jesus teachings.

Jesus hated accumulation of wealth/entrepreneurial activity and advocated welfarism, the Bible denounces the acquisitiveness necessary to spur competition and heartily advocates collectivist statism as opposed to individualism, and the early Christian church was totally a socialist community. And the Bible is especially strident in its criticism of "interest," which is really synonymous with "profit."

The great irony is America is a country where the majority of the people worship a Marxist. :)

Coyote

10-05-2009, 10:51 AM

I'm still amused by this "religion vs rational thinking" match...

Hardrock69

10-05-2009, 10:53 AM

Well as far as wealth vs. religion, just last week a discovery was announced of a bunch of old gold coins from ancient Egypt which had Joseph on them.

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1253820674074&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

Archeologists find 'Joseph-era' coins in Egypt

Archeologists have discovered ancient Egyptian coins bearing the name and image of the biblical Joseph, Cairo's Al Ahram newspaper recently reported. Excerpts provided by MEMRI show that the coins were discovered among a multitude of unsorted artifacts stored at the Museum of Egypt.

According to the report, the significance of the find is that archeologists have found scientific evidence countering the claim held by some historians that coins were not used for trade in ancient Egypt, and that this was done through barter instead.

The period in which Joseph was regarded to have lived in Egypt matches the minting of the coins in the cache, researchers said.

"A thorough examination revealed that the coins bore the year in which they were minted and their value, or effigies of the pharaohs [who ruled] at the time of their minting. Some of the coins are from the time when Joseph lived in Egypt, and bear his name and portrait," said the report.

The discovery of the cache prompted research team head Dr. Sa'id Muhammad Thabet to seek Koranic verses that speak of coins used in ancient Egypt.

"Studies by Dr. Thabet's team have revealed that what most archeologists took for a kind of charm, and others took for an ornament or adornment, is actually a coin. Several [facts led them to this conclusion]: first, [the fact that] many such coins have been found at various [archeological sites], and also [the fact that] they are round or oval in shape, and have two faces: one with an inscription, called the inscribed face, and one with an image, called the engraved face - just like the coins we use today," the report added.

ELVIS

10-05-2009, 11:12 AM

Jesus warns of the accumulation of wealth becoming your god. He never said wealth was bad. He said it was impossible to worship two gods. It's the same with idolatry...

ELVIS

10-05-2009, 11:16 AM

Well as far as wealth vs. religion, just last week a discovery was announced of a bunch of old gold coins from ancient Egypt which had Joseph on them.

I don't find that extrordinary...

Seshmeister

10-05-2009, 11:43 AM

Well as far as wealth vs. religion, just last week a discovery was announced of a bunch of old gold coins from ancient Egypt which had Joseph on them.

Coins with Joseph's name found in Egypt | Middle East | Jerusalem Post (http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1253820674074&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull)

This is the coat of many colors Joe rather than the believe anything your adulterous wife tells you Joe. :)

As far as the pictures go if someone in the future found this note from 1896 would that mean this was a typical US family scene from the time and that there were angels around?

http://flyingmoose.org/truthfic/10obv.jpg

ELVIS

10-05-2009, 11:47 AM

Duh! Which Way Did He Go, George ??

Big Train

10-05-2009, 03:19 PM

If capitalism is so bad, why wouldn't the good catholic stop participating in it so successfully? Hedge Funds-Bad. Moviemaking-fantastic.

Notice he has not intention of stopping what he is doing, returning the checks, or living like a monk. But the rest of us should really start reconsidering what we are doing....love it.

ZahZoo

10-05-2009, 08:36 PM

Well, I find scripture to be conservative and logical...like me...;)

Hmmm I find a good part of it to be contradictive, misleading, nebulous and in many cases just plain jibberish. Nothing against the authors... it's the interpretors and bizzare sense of symbolism used as a communication form from those primitive cultures.

Odds are pretty good if there were a way to go back and correctly decipher the language, correctly interpret the context and then apply the mythical belief system at play... little of it would make much sense or find any application in today's world.

A large part of it was just a cultural value systems in it's infancy... I can only guess the mysticism and magic made it more appealing than other forms predating and following it... like buddism, greek and roman god things or many of the earth based belief systems outside of the middle east region.

Seshmeister

10-05-2009, 08:37 PM

Big Train

10-05-2009, 08:39 PM

No kidding...keep those sin taxes rolling in. The money and treasure that is buried, mgawd..

Makes total sense Moore is a Catholic.

jhale667

10-05-2009, 10:00 PM

Scripture may be a lot of things, but "logical" isn't one of them. :umm:

No he's not, and Jesus has nothing to do with catholicism...

Even as a recovering Catholic I'm going on record as saying you're an ignorant asshat for saying that. Did your church tell you that before or after the snake-handling, btw? :rolleyes:

And you call yourself a "Christian". :fufu:

Seshmeister

10-05-2009, 10:01 PM

Making films is expensive. If he doesn't make money he can't make any more films.

Everything I have seen and read is that his latest movie is great.

Big Train

10-05-2009, 10:16 PM

Well Sesh, word on the street is that the "dedicated servant" has a few euros left over after his filming expenses.

Seshmeister

10-05-2009, 10:51 PM

Moore has his faults, in the past he has over egged stuff in my opinion unnecessarily which gives ammo to his critics. I think he's doing that less now though and the bottom line is that he creates something entertaining and usually informative with his films whereas the hundreds of millionaire hedge fund gamblers earn ten times more creating nothing.

binnie

10-06-2009, 02:51 AM

Moore's biggest problem is that he oversells his line. The best documentary makers let things speak for themselves. Of course, were Moore to do that he wouldn't sell half as many DVDs/cinema tickets because the films would be as entertaining without his little quips.....

binnie

10-06-2009, 02:52 AM

The great irony is America is a country where the majority of the people worship a Marxist. :)

I have to say, that is the quote of the month!

bueno bob

10-06-2009, 04:58 AM

Seshmeister

10-06-2009, 08:54 AM

I'll happily go after Michael Bay. :)

Give me a corrupt derivatives dealer over that guy any day. He produces more ass gravy than Calcutta in a dysentery epidemic.

ELVIS

10-06-2009, 11:09 AM

Hmmm I find a good part of it to be contradictive, misleading, nebulous and in many cases just plain jibberish. Nothing against the authors... it's the interpretors and bizzare sense of symbolism used as a communication form from those primitive cultures.

Odds are pretty good if there were a way to go back and correctly decipher the language, correctly interpret the context and then apply the mythical belief system at play... little of it would make much sense or find any application in today's world.

A large part of it was just a cultural value systems in it's infancy... I can only guess the mysticism and magic made it more appealing than other forms predating and following it... like buddism, greek and roman god things or many of the earth based belief systems outside of the middle east region.

Odds are pretty good that this post is BS!

Dude, you're making it up as you go along...

Mushroom

10-06-2009, 11:38 AM

Fuck The Church!! I go with my Catholic wife only when she goes once in a blue moon. fortunately she's a PhD in Biology so we never argue Creationism vs. Evolution.

ELVIS

10-06-2009, 12:08 PM

What church are you speaking of ??

FORD

10-06-2009, 12:11 PM

What church are you speaking of ??

Maybe it's YOUR (http://www.24hourchurchofelvis.com/) church? :biggrin:

ELVIS

10-06-2009, 12:23 PM

He doesn't know the church I belong to and he has no idea who Jesus Christ is...

ELVIS

10-06-2009, 12:24 PM

The Church of Elvis, eh ??

That's scary!

:elvis:

Big Train

10-06-2009, 12:34 PM

If we're going to go after Michael Moore for being a rich filmmaker, then we have to go after every other director for making millions of dollars. Lucas, Spielberg, Tarentino, Bay, Smith, whoever. Otherwise it's unfair to the other filmmakers who make money from making entertaining films.

But once we do that...uh oh! Here comes socialism!

:D

None of those others have said that capitalism, which they participate in so richly, is inherently bad and in some ways morally wrong, while not ceasing that activity. Nor have they criticized others professions as morally wrong. Which makes the rest of them ok and not huge hypocrites like Moore.

Mushroom

10-06-2009, 12:35 PM

He doesn't know the church I belong to and he has no idea who Jesus Christ is...

what's that saying? "to know him is to love him"... no wait... "real men love Jesus" ...or... "My Boss is a Jewish Carpenter"

ZahZoo

10-06-2009, 01:22 PM

Odds are pretty good that this post is BS!

Dude, you're making it up as you go along...

Try reading some of the more current theological studies on various portions of the scriptures...

If people who study this stuff for living can't agree on symbolism and inuendo in many of the writings... what makes you think some guy in the pulpit's interpretation filtered through his chuch's politics and agenda are all that logical and inspiring..?

ELVIS

10-06-2009, 02:01 PM

Why are you so biased based on nothing that you have presented so far ??

Give me one solid example of what you're talking about...

Jesus Christ

10-06-2009, 03:39 PM

what's that saying? "to know him is to love him"... no wait... "real men love Jesus" ...or... "My Boss is a Jewish Carpenter"

I was really only in the carpentry business for a short time, in reality.

My stepfather Joseph died when I was a teenager and none of My brothers were old enough yet to take on the responsibility of the business. So I took over for a while, just to support My family. And verily, when My brother James was old enough to handle the business, I turned it over to him.

And now that I know, from personal experience, what it feels like to have a nail pounded into Me, it's not a line of work I could ever do again.

ELVIS

10-06-2009, 04:00 PM

Asshole!

Satan

10-06-2009, 04:15 PM

Oh, you're so going to Hell for that. http://www.cosgan.de/images/smilie/teufel/d025.gif

Guitar Shark

10-06-2009, 04:39 PM

Jesus warns of the accumulation of wealth becoming your god. He never said wealth was bad. He said it was impossible to worship two gods. It's the same with idolatry...

I've read this post several times and I still don't understand it.

So, wealth is ok, but it's not ok to accumulate it? How is one to become wealthy without accumulating wealth?

In any event, I think you are forgetting the camel/needle thing. Look it up.

Jesus Christ

10-06-2009, 05:18 PM

Very well said, Matthew. Ye might make it into Heaven yet.

Nickdfresh

10-06-2009, 06:05 PM

Guitar Shark

10-06-2009, 06:07 PM

Very well said, Matthew. Ye might make it into Heaven yet.

Not a chance, bud.

Big Train

10-06-2009, 06:57 PM

And he would accuse many protestant churches of the same thing today...

And he would still be right...

Jesus Christ

10-06-2009, 07:03 PM

Verily.... :(

Ally_Kat

10-06-2009, 10:26 PM

I've read this post several times and I still don't understand it.

So, wealth is ok, but it's not ok to accumulate it? How is one to become wealthy without accumulating wealth?

In any event, I think you are forgetting the camel/needle thing. Look it up.

I think, in a way, Elvis is trying to say that money is not the root of all evil, but avarice.

ELVIS

10-06-2009, 11:37 PM

Correct. The LOVE of money is the root of all evil...

It leads to greed, or avarice...;)

binnie

10-07-2009, 02:50 AM

But wouldn't you agree that since the 1980s the West has essentially been a society that loves, and indeed worships, wealth?

Aren't a lot of people motivated almost solely by the accumulation of it? Big house, big car, big pension, lots of 'stuff'. Isn't that 'dream' essentially what capitalism thrives on?

Big Train

10-07-2009, 04:30 PM

Hot Air » Blog Archive » Socialist millionaire: People who default on their mortgages are like rape victims or something (http://hotair.com/archives/2009/10/07/socialist-millionaire-people-who-default-on-their-mortgages-are-like-rape-victims-or-something/)

Socialist millionaire: People who default on their mortgages are like rape victims or
Something

Only now, after watching this, do I grasp the full horror of what Polanski did to that little girl. Why, he treated her like some common loan applicant, didn’t he?

Seriously, what is it with media liberals minimizing rape lately? First the Polanski spirit squad rallies to defend a child molester, replete with Obama cheerleader Tom Shales hinting that 13-year-olds should be fair game in Hollywood. Now here comes this guy treating subprime borrowers who took out mortgages they couldn’t afford like they’re Jodie Foster being slammed down on the pinball machine in “The Accused.” My memory of commercial law is hazy but signing your name to a contract does usually imply consent, no? Or does he mean to suggest that the poor, as eternal victims of the great bourgeois conspiracy, can never meaningfully consent? That would fit better with the socialist view of the lower class as essentially children, who can’t fairly be held to the same standard of personal responsibility as middle-class “adults.”

And yet, I can’t stay mad at him. For one thing, his willingness to resort to nutty rhetoric like this ensures that he’ll remain a fringe figure. And for another, check out the exchange he had with Hannity about Jesus and Al Qaeda. Sean dodges the question with a joke but that doesn’t mean it’s not a good question.

Click here for the clip.
Michael Moore: Foreclosed Homeowners Like Rape Victims (http://www.businessandmedia.org/articles/2009/20091007091530.aspx)

Nickdfresh

10-07-2009, 11:36 PM

But wouldn't you agree that since the 1980s the West has essentially been a society that loves, and indeed worships, wealth?

...

Since the 1980s? I think you mean 1680s, bro. What do you think Imperialism was all about? Christianizing spear chuckers?

binnie

10-08-2009, 02:31 AM

Since the 1980s? I think you mean 1680s, bro. What do you think Imperialism was all about? Christianizing spear chuckers?

Haha!

What a depressing thought.......

It certainly was about wealth, no question. However, for the majoirty of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries the bulk of the population of Europe and America was still dirt poor - earning a crust was their goal, not the endless consumerism that we know and love(?). Something began to change in the 1950s but really kicked in the 80s I think.....

Seshmeister

10-08-2009, 05:33 AM

Since the 1980s? I think you mean 1680s, bro. What do you think Imperialism was all about? Christianizing spear chuckers?

More like the 1080s

The Christian monastries were richer than the countries they were in.

They had a cool scam going that for each person you were responsible for killing you had to pray for penance for say 40 days or go to hell. This left Christian kings after battles having to pray for 10s of thousands of days!

The only answer for them to avoid eternal damnation was to sub contract all this praying to 1000s of monks for a price. In turn the monasteries made bags of gold.

Ludicrous and silly but isn't that always the way with the invisible friend stuff...

Coyote

10-08-2009, 05:44 AM

Correct. The LOVE of money is the root of all evil...

It leads to greed, or avarice...;)

Hey, I've heard that song before...
<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/Zk2zoEZuEPg&hl=en&fs=1&"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/Zk2zoEZuEPg&hl=en&fs=1&" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>

Coyote

10-08-2009, 05:46 AM

ZahZoo

10-08-2009, 09:59 AM

Haha!

What a depressing thought.......

It certainly was about wealth, no question. However, for the majoirty of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries the bulk of the population of Europe and America was still dirt poor - earning a crust was their goal, not the endless consumerism that we know and love(?). Something began to change in the 1950s but really kicked in the 80s I think.....

That "something" that changed in the 1950's was a combination of coming out of the Great Depression and the end of World War II. One of the more peaceful times on Earth...

What followed was the largest increase in population/birth rates ever recorded in North America, Europe and Austrailia.

Think about it... all that fuckin and baby making drove the global economies. More people and you get more economy... food, goods, services, housing, transportation, technology, etc...

In the 60's the introduction of birth control and the end of the mass of fertility from that demographic of breeders ran out. You can almost chart economic downturns in relation to decreased birth rates and vice-versa.

Look at the two largest growing economies today... China & India what's going there that ain't happening elsewhere... Increased birth rate and population growth.

You want to help our economy today... get busy and make some babies!!

ELVIS

10-08-2009, 11:09 AM

The government doesn't want us making babies...

Nickdfresh

10-08-2009, 04:31 PM

The government doesn't want us making babies...

No. They don't want YOU making babies!!

http://www.demotivateus.com/posters/birth-control-demotivational-posters.jpg

Seshmeister

10-09-2009, 10:16 PM

Separated at birth... :)

http://www.topnews.in/files/images/Michael-Moore2_0.jpg http://img361.imageshack.us/img361/457/petergriffinga3.jpg