That's right, sports fans - see you in Hell!
Where do bad folks go when they die
They don’t go to Heaven where the angels fly
Go to a lake of fire and fry
Won’t see em’ again ’til the 4th of July– From Lake of Fire by the Meat Puppets
While it is well-known that Christianity has used real weapons for murder and genocide in the past during the Crusades, against indigenous people, on “witches”, etc., this post is about the use of their most potent weapon of persuasion – the concept of Hell as a weapon of fear. Fear has been religion’s life-long partner. They go together like priests and pedophilia. If religion were a tree, then the original seed would be the fear of death and fear of the unknown.
“They use fear a lot, that’s their main weapon. It starts young. You start hearing about Hell and Lake of Fire real early.” - “Jacob” – member of Christ Church in Idaho (requested to remain anonymous)
Is it fair to call Christians “terrorists” if they use Hell as a threat? One of the most basic definitions of a terrorist is a person who terrorizes or frightens others. Coercion is a form of psychological terrorism and evangelicals use it to instill the fear of Hell in everyone, including their own kids as early as possible. Coercion “may involve psychological harm….The threat of further harm may lead to the cooperation or obedience of the person being coerced.” When a five-year old tells you that if you don’t accept Jesus Christ as your lord and savior, you’re going to Hell – that’s seriously fucked up.
“[God] has a special place full of fire and smoke and burning and torture and anguish where he will send you to live and suffer and burn and choke and scream and cry for ever and ever ´til the end of time…but he loves you.” — George Carlin
Christian proselytizers are happy to tell you the “good news” first, about Jesus dying for your sins so you can be “saved” and go to Heaven if you accept him into your heart. If you choose not to? Now comes the bad news: eternal torture in a place called Hell. The very idea of a “hell” that exists solely for the purpose of eternal punishment for the “sins” of non-belief/disobedience/wearing a miniskirt implies that God is in fact not a loving god, but instead is one sadistic, vengeful - dare I say evil – bastard. There is no lesson to be learned with this punishment. This is not a temporary “time-out” and there is no rehabilitation plan or chance at redemption with this eternal sentence.
While the idea of Hell is fantastic for use as method of persuasion, Christianity can’t take credit for the invention of it. They stole the idea from Norse mythology and the Greeks. It’s a re-invented, re-hashed fable – as are many of the stories of Christianity. The weird thing is that many Christians can’t even agree on exactly what Hell is (or even if it exists as a physical place) or what happens to the soul upon death. Part of the reason for this is that the bible is full of inconsistencies and contradictions. If souls and physical bodies are supposed to go to their final destinations on judgment day (Christ’s return, second coming, Armageddon, etc.) then what is happening to the soul from the time of death until then? 1 Peter 4:5 states clearly that judgment will be upon both “the living AND the dead” on judgement day. The Seventh Day Adventists believe that there’s some kind of “soul sleep”, where there is no consciousness. The Catholics believe in some odd half-way point known as purgatory. Some believe that souls go directly to heaven or hell at the moment of death (which is actually backed up by multiple passages in the bible, including Jesus’ own words) which makes the whole “judgment day” that’s referred to in Revelations pretty much a moot point, but it does make for great Sunday morning theater for fire and brimstone preachers.
So, who goes to hell? “Unsaved” sinners….which unfortunately happens to include unbaptized babies – since we are supposedly born with “original sin”, passed on to us from that asshole Adam who screwed humanity over for all eternity because he tasted the forbidden fruit (Eve’s labia). Psalm 51:5: “Behold, I was shapen in iniquity [wickedness/sin]; and in sin did my mother conceive me.”
The offer of Heaven alone just isn’t persuasive enough for recruitment. Perhaps evangelicals could get rid of the notion of Hell and just sweeten the afterlife pot a bit and take a note from Islam – maybe throw in a virgin or two. Doubt it. Almighty Fear has been far too successful in growing the flock, keeping them in line and emptying their pockets.
There are weapons available to defend against religion’s weapons of fear that are so powerful they can completely extinguish the fires of Hell.
Included in this arsenal are skepticism, education, science, rationality and reason.
Lock and load.
