But there was a reason that my last post zipped about, the bugs on crack bit... but it's less about the speed and more about the coherency of my brain currently. And I have moved on to about seven other topics since I wrote that post BUT, one point that she brought out I really want to explore further.
"I am trying to phrase this delicately but I can't so here's the thing: to extrapolate from your allegory, do you really think it puts people on the side of Lucifer to say, you MUST respect these rules or face the consequences? I know that's overstating the case, and I am not even necessarily disagreeing with you, just playing (heh) devil's advocate. The whole not-regulating-honor-killings thing, that's not really working out for women in the third world very well. "
Au contrair mine souer! I don't mean to give anyone the impression that the followers of God are in any way exempt from consequences, rules, laws and the like. On the flip side, those who understand the workings of Eternity, understand that we are all circumscribed by law. Even our Father and Mother who want nothing more that to have their children return to them are bound by the immutable Laws of Heaven.
This entire section of EM's comment tells me that I need to explain in greater detail. First: really, when I gave you permission to take my brief and edited version of what happened in the pre-mortal experience as an allegory, I may have done y'all a disservice. It was no allegory. It was a snippet of what happened. I am not even going to soften what I now say by any language like "what I believe" or "I think." Dude. This happened, I know it to my very core.
First you ought to understand the importance of what Lucifer offered to us. He offered us salvation guaran-freakin'-teed. He offered us the chance to go down to this beautiful planet, get the mortal experience we needed, and return to our Parents as exalted beings, and all we had to do was agree that Lucifer was the bomb-diggity and give him the glory.
Cuz here's the thing.... if and when, and under the Fathers plan it is not a matter of "if" at all, so when we sinned, we would become unclean. Unclean things cannot dwell with the Father. We would be unable to return, and we would be damned for all eternity. How horrifying is that? Also, Fathers plan hinged on there being One, a perfect being who would go down, live a perfect life and then lay that sinless life and soul down, He would have to conquer death and sin and be a propitiation for the sin of all. Through means mystical and physical, this sacrifice would be enough for those that would repent and follow Him, that we could return to the Father. And that One? He didn't need to do it. If He was awesome enough to accomplish the task, he was awesome enough to not need to bother. Oh, and this Being? He had to do it voluntarily... more of that "not compulsory" bit that Truth is so in love with.
I don't know how or what Satan would do to force us to behave, maybe he knew a code of DNA that would take away our ability to sin. Perhaps he knew of some way to program our minds a La Clockwork Orange so that we were unable to choose evil and wrong, like we would be too sick to do the deed, or even trying might just kill us. But the guy was an amazing spirit, a chosen one, shockingly advanced from the spirits that you and I were. He was the "Morning Star" he was "The Light Bringer," and I for one believe that he could do what he said he could do. I also believe that what he offered was wrong on a cosmic scale, it was blindness and pride and he was fooling himself if he thought for a second that we could return to Father and be of any use whatsoever. We would have been duds. Automatons. Wretched neuters without light, without will, or at least without any idea of what to do with that will.
And as you are here on Earth? You didn't buy his "plan" either. Because after Lucifer pitched his idea, another One arose and addressed the gathered spirits. He said that He would go and He would be that sacrifice that the Father's plan hinged upon. He said it, and we believed it. For He was as far advanced from the "Light Bringer" as the "light Bringer" was from us. He was Jesus, He was the Firstborn and the greatest of all and oh....
...how we loved him, for oh...
...HE LOVED US.
And then He said "I will do it, and the Glory goes to the Father."
And then the War in Heaven began. Some say it was a War of words and ideas, but in the end Lucifer was banished from Heaven along with a third of the Hosts of Heaven. A full third of us opted to follow the adversary into darkness, never to receive a body.
Does that sound like any kind of "no consequences"? Ooof. There are consequences to everything, for every choice that we make. Existence turns upon human will. Our will, in the end, is the only thing that we can give to our Maker. It is when we align our will with His Will, that we unlock Truth, and Joy, and yes... Power.
And yeah... when we try to coerce and force another to be good or to do what we want them to do? You got it... we have aligned ourselves with evil. This brings all kinds of interesting things to the table when it comes to parenting, and I think that here, when we become parents ourselves we come to understand more about will. Because no matter what? You can discipline, you can mete out consequences, you can teach and love a child and encourage them to do what is right, but in the end in order to truly subvert the will of even a young child... you have to break it. Can you think of anything more evil that breaking a child in that way? Breaking a human in this way?
We are meant to choose. We are meant to learn and grow by making good and bad choices. We become exalted when we choose to follow our Advocate, and become more like Him. But we also pay the consequences when we knowingly choose wrong.
Now you may think that there is nothing but good to come from a government garnishing your paycheck and making you set aside some dough for your own retirement... I mean, it's for your own good! But here my problem with that... what if I can do a heck of a lot better by using that money to set up my OWN retirement through the means and avenues of my own choosing? We will never know, because the choice of what to do with my $$ has already been made for me, and I am forced into it, there is no opt-out clause. And it more than gripes my soul that today? I am paying into (albeit via Dadguy's paycheck) a system called Social Security that will never pay me back. The funds for this program are not self-sustaining, and will not make it till my retirement, we have pretty much been guaranteed that it cannot.
What about Welfare? Great idea huh? What if I came up with a way that was a more effective way to care for, feed, clothe and shelter those who cannot help themselves, and get those who can back up on their feet? What if I can do that more humanely and effectively and for 1/2 the exorbitant cost of what the Federal government is currently doing? We will never know... again, taken from the private sector, bureaucratized and rammed down our throats in the way that others, and many of them NOT ELECTED OFFICIALS deem fit for public consumption, whether the public likes or wants or needs it.
It really must be said, if you want to see how to handle Welfare... go talk to the Mormons, who do it faster, more efficiently and virtually for nothing. If I could take the amount of $$ that the Feds garnish from Dadguy's paycheck and send it to Welfare Square in SLC, that $$ would go five times further than the Feds can make it go, feeding and benefitting the needy not just in America, but all over the world. Perhaps it would go even more than a measly five time farther, I would love to see a study done on that particular question.
But I don't get that choice now do I? Instead I MUST pay into the beast that is US Govt. Welfare. Ew. Because the Feds know better, and it's for our own good.
But, even with Welfare in the US, do the citizens of this country call their job done? Heck to the NO! Most people want to do good, they want to share and they want to see others cared for. Seriously, I do not believe for half a second that helping those that need help is a thing that most humans need to be compelled to do.
Socialized medicine? Hoo brother, do I want to get into a society that has standardised everything when it comes to health? How long do you think that alternative medicine will last under Socialized medicine? Am I looking forward to the hell that is an HMO to the power of six? Run by the same losers who botched Katrina? As a healthy fat woman, do I want to be told that I must lose weight or be penalized because according to the BMI I am obese. Healthy, but obese. The same BMI chart that is admitted to be deeply flawed by many major health organizations? Seriously, my girlfriend is pregnant and is trying to avail herself of WIC... the WIC nutritionalist is trying to talk her into gaining NOTHING during the last trimester of her pregnancy even though her doctor insists that for the health of the baby, she must. Dude. This girl carries a few pounds extra, sure, but because she was an athlete as a highschooler and is in top shape (she worked out for at least an hour a day up until a few weeks ago) those couple of pounds (10... perhaps 12) plus her muscles push her BMI number to read high, high enough to be just barely over the line for "obese." This chick is "obese" like an Olympic grade shotputter. And even if she WAS obese to the tune of say... like me or bigger, the last trimester is not the time to go on a diet.... what kind of irresponsible tripe is the government trying to push here?
But as it stands, my girlfriend can opt out of WIC and lean on her family, or even LDS Welfare. But if this same agenda is being pushed by the Feds and medicine were Socialized, what if she had no choice but to diet or face penalties? What if all doctors HAD to go by the BMI whether they believed it was best for their patients or not? What if they had to kow tow to the Allmighty Fed or lose their license? Socialized Medicine is not the answer y'all.
Options. Cooperation. Free Market solutions. Healthy Competition.
Government absolutely has a place in a free society. There are laws that need to be enforced, such as "my freedom to swing my fists about, ends just short of your face." Like Currency, like dispute settlement and monopoly breaking, like roads. But most things and industries can be self regulating in a free market. The market doesn't tolerate much BS, but then, the market is all about competition and a government in a free society is about cooperation. Coercion has no more place in a free society or it's markets than it does in the Eternities, but we have become so bloody used to our choices being made for us in some of these areas, we hardly realize we are being coerced or that we are having our choices taken from us, for our own good. Which is just fine so long as we happen to agree with what is "for our own good." But what if we disagree? We are hardly aware that so much of what is being done today, not only has no foundation in the Constitution of the U.S. of A., but in some cases goes directly against it.
And fittingly enough with the motif of this past week of crap health for the Chaos Household, LaLa is up there barfing. Gotta go!
