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No one knows better than the African American as a whole that
the brochure of America is better than the reality. Yet the
consequence of the black church to the welfare of the African american
human condition are not apparent to African americans as a whole.
However, for enlightenment, it only needs to be asked “is the African
American condition well today?” And then ask “What has been the
institution or device African Americans have utilized to bring forth
recovery, healing, and wellness in their community as a whole since
being brought to the Americas and later implementation of the 13th
amendment to the US constitution?” History will show it is the
teachings of the church and more recent the mosque too. Since most
African americans will admit their condition is not well(i.e.
economically, legally, educationally, medically, spiritually), it only
follows that the all the religious institutions used to bring wellness
to this community of peoples has failed. And when a solution for
repair is a time tested failure, it is time to try something else.
Why African American Christians Believe in their Oppressors Religion
When engaging young African American Christian indoctrinated minds, that are friends of my sons and willing participants, I often will enlighten them with the facts around dinosaurs' existence. When I make the inference that dinosaurs' existence disproves the supposed time line it took the mythical god of Christianity to create the universe in Genesis(not to mention all the other irreconcilable verses in the first 1-24 of the book) I generally get the same response when I follow up with "How did the dinosaurs come into being?". And it goes usually like this "god did, he created everything". The tragedy in this reply to me is not that it would be anachronistic to the old testament or put man before dinosaurs in the history of species on our planet, but that these young children cannot conceive or fathom anything (language, thought, imagination, perception or reality) outside of the unproven myths of the old testament as it has been passed down to them in the-god created everything-delusion of religious child rearing.
Like the greater American society this same type of sheep mentality rules the present for the majority of African Americans who are socialized with the early messages of Christianity as the only existential scope in which to view the universe. Unfortunately, today the masses caught up in this Great Distraction as the only way to view existence and creation, includes most of the well or higher educated and politically powerful African American intellectuals (Cornell West, Tavis Smiley, Al Sharpton) as well as the uneducated and uninformed. Most of the educated and intelligent elite are respected to the point that they are able, through access to media, speak for the majority of
African Americans. It is a well known testable experiential fact in the African American community that putting the word reverend in front of a person's name means immediate and mostly unquestioned respect and legitimacy in knowledge to the nature of existence. It is my estimation that many African American social activist call themselves Christians for the mere purpose of being able to be considered legitimate in speaking to and for the African American community. Most African americans, in my experience, won’t take any wholly secular humanist African American serious as having any influence in or representing anything in or for the African American community(and this goes for the Africentric community as well).
The consequence of this religious socialization and its supposed validity for African Americans comes in many false equivalencies and poor reasoning. One of these fallacies is expressed in the Latin axiom argumentum ad numerum (it must be true if so many people believe it). Aside from being a spiritually lazy argument, it concludes that one does not need to investigate validity in 'holy writs' because the proof of truth lies not in any evidence, but in the number of those who believe to those who do not believe. And again the ugly head of innate separatism arises, as there are many followers of the three different Abrahamic faiths and their hybrid late corners (Mormonism and the like), all with different end of times stories and all with different mores to live by. Therefore, they will be eternally at odds with one another and forever overlooking the fact that all mammals are connected through nature and that the number of people who believe in one thing or the other does not separate that forever connectedness.
These fallacies are also manifested in the cult of personality and various symbolisms. An example is seen when African American athletes and entertainers, politicians etc., who point to the sky or verbalize that god is the reason for their success or the mover of all things. In doing so the African American (and whoever else for that matter) sub-consciously derides and therefore obliviously overrides the fact that the fortune of being born and other social, cultural, economic, and internal fortitude variables are the reasons for any individual's idea of success. If challenged on those assertions in private or public(which rarely happens) these public figures have the same cop out or bailout rationale as every other believer when challenged with current knowledge that disproves the assertions of the ancient and limited knowledge of the 'holy writs' they believe explain everything. The question doesn't lie in what inspires what and/or why events take place. It lies in if there is or ever has been any evidence to validate the source that one chooses as the source that spawns what and why events take place. No events can be acknowledged if there is no existence. It is only the religious, again through socialization, who refuse to acknowledge there is no evidence to date that allows humans to know the source or purpose of creation. And this refusal of acknowledgment by theists, allow them to credulously, callously, and arrogantly give thanks to their beliefs specified creation source as the reason for how or why human events occur.
A source, of course, whose very myopic and limited context of evidence, if stacked up to present day knowledge, would fall infinitely short of any hint of credibility. A source backed by a folklore that would very closely resemble what present day adults and children, if read without being socialized as truth and 'divine', would think of as just another epic fairy tale or fable, a la the Iliad or Gulliver's Travels. A source that, as evidenced by history, will take the same inevitable path of all the past "true" religions of the Egyptian, Greek, Norse, and Roman beliefs that have since faded into humanities chronicles as truths proven untrue(mostly due to scientific and technological discovery with some political power grabbing mixed in). These civilizations and hundreds of others like them and their then "truthful" explanations (see H. L. Mencken Memorial Service for a historical list of many of them) of creation are now categorized as proven historical mythological fable and parable folklore.
Why African American Christians Believe in their Oppressors Religion
When engaging young African American Christian indoctrinated minds, that are friends of my sons and willing participants, I often will enlighten them with the facts around dinosaurs' existence. When I make the inference that dinosaurs' existence disproves the supposed time line it took the mythical god of Christianity to create the universe in Genesis(not to mention all the other irreconcilable verses in the first 1-24 of the book) I generally get the same response when I follow up with "How did the dinosaurs come into being?". And it goes usually like this "god did, he created everything". The tragedy in this reply to me is not that it would be anachronistic to the old testament or put man before dinosaurs in the history of species on our planet, but that these young children cannot conceive or fathom anything (language, thought, imagination, perception or reality) outside of the unproven myths of the old testament as it has been passed down to them in the-god created everything-delusion of religious child rearing.
Like the greater American society this same type of sheep mentality rules the present for the majority of African Americans who are socialized with the early messages of Christianity as the only existential scope in which to view the universe. Unfortunately, today the masses caught up in this Great Distraction as the only way to view existence and creation, includes most of the well or higher educated and politically powerful African American intellectuals (Cornell West, Tavis Smiley, Al Sharpton) as well as the uneducated and uninformed. Most of the educated and intelligent elite are respected to the point that they are able, through access to media, speak for the majority of
African Americans. It is a well known testable experiential fact in the African American community that putting the word reverend in front of a person's name means immediate and mostly unquestioned respect and legitimacy in knowledge to the nature of existence. It is my estimation that many African American social activist call themselves Christians for the mere purpose of being able to be considered legitimate in speaking to and for the African American community. Most African americans, in my experience, won’t take any wholly secular humanist African American serious as having any influence in or representing anything in or for the African American community(and this goes for the Africentric community as well).
The consequence of this religious socialization and its supposed validity for African Americans comes in many false equivalencies and poor reasoning. One of these fallacies is expressed in the Latin axiom argumentum ad numerum (it must be true if so many people believe it). Aside from being a spiritually lazy argument, it concludes that one does not need to investigate validity in 'holy writs' because the proof of truth lies not in any evidence, but in the number of those who believe to those who do not believe. And again the ugly head of innate separatism arises, as there are many followers of the three different Abrahamic faiths and their hybrid late corners (Mormonism and the like), all with different end of times stories and all with different mores to live by. Therefore, they will be eternally at odds with one another and forever overlooking the fact that all mammals are connected through nature and that the number of people who believe in one thing or the other does not separate that forever connectedness.
These fallacies are also manifested in the cult of personality and various symbolisms. An example is seen when African American athletes and entertainers, politicians etc., who point to the sky or verbalize that god is the reason for their success or the mover of all things. In doing so the African American (and whoever else for that matter) sub-consciously derides and therefore obliviously overrides the fact that the fortune of being born and other social, cultural, economic, and internal fortitude variables are the reasons for any individual's idea of success. If challenged on those assertions in private or public(which rarely happens) these public figures have the same cop out or bailout rationale as every other believer when challenged with current knowledge that disproves the assertions of the ancient and limited knowledge of the 'holy writs' they believe explain everything. The question doesn't lie in what inspires what and/or why events take place. It lies in if there is or ever has been any evidence to validate the source that one chooses as the source that spawns what and why events take place. No events can be acknowledged if there is no existence. It is only the religious, again through socialization, who refuse to acknowledge there is no evidence to date that allows humans to know the source or purpose of creation. And this refusal of acknowledgment by theists, allow them to credulously, callously, and arrogantly give thanks to their beliefs specified creation source as the reason for how or why human events occur.
A source, of course, whose very myopic and limited context of evidence, if stacked up to present day knowledge, would fall infinitely short of any hint of credibility. A source backed by a folklore that would very closely resemble what present day adults and children, if read without being socialized as truth and 'divine', would think of as just another epic fairy tale or fable, a la the Iliad or Gulliver's Travels. A source that, as evidenced by history, will take the same inevitable path of all the past "true" religions of the Egyptian, Greek, Norse, and Roman beliefs that have since faded into humanities chronicles as truths proven untrue(mostly due to scientific and technological discovery with some political power grabbing mixed in). These civilizations and hundreds of others like them and their then "truthful" explanations (see H. L. Mencken Memorial Service for a historical list of many of them) of creation are now categorized as proven historical mythological fable and parable folklore.