We imagine that we can somehow control or at least influence the mysterious forces that determine how we suffer, or prosper, by religiously focusing our attention and our willful intentions upon things around us that symbolize those forces. In the past we worshiped sacred trees and rocks. Then as we evolved we began creating our own images in the form of idols and icons placed in holy places known today as temples. And then as we evolved more, and could see through the childishness of our obsessions, we shifted our attention and our reverence over to ideas and philosophies which became the systems of belief that so many billions still worship today in the vain hopes of somehow winning favor in this life or the imagined next.
And today, as science advances our understanding further, we are forced to realize that even our most vaunted ideations are no more holy than the rocks and trees our ancestors turned to for influence and solace. And so we turn to science itself, or at least what some call science. (True science, like true religion, does not pretend to provide solace or favors to anyone, it only offers understanding and perception which those who cannot grasp such gifts try to manipulate into a means of power and influence thus creating all the world's false religions and pseudosciences.) We create our "gods" today out of sophisticated geopolitical ideas that appear to be scientifically validated (but aren't). And one of those concepts is the naive belief that the way we pay attention to and direct our willful intent toward our children will somehow influence and control our present and future lives.
But, it doesn't. Worshiping our children and making them the holy "little angels" that we do these days isn't going to save us any more than some imagined god nailed to a cross or holy rocks erected toward the night sky. The only possible result of such false beliefs is further suffering and even more misery, as all our attention and affection is wasted on futile pursuits.
According to the legend, Jesus himself understood the harm caused by such futility. And in a rage he lashed out against the symbols in his day of such ignorant holiness. And for his "crimes" he was executed. But, what exactly did he do that people found so offensive that they collectively felt he should be killed? He attacked his people's symbol of Holy Innocence (according to Jewish belief, God is the only "innocent" being, and all others, including children, are "sinful" by nature, which Christians continued to believe with the addition of a means to become innocent via holy forgiveness, etc.). So it should be no wonder today when a man lashes out in rage against the modern symbols of such holy innocence, our children.
It should be no wonder because when you make something falsely holy, you are only inviting men like Jesus to tear it down; men who see the falseness, and the hypocrisy, and who have personally experienced the harm that such false worship engenders. Jesus experienced this harm as a child when he and his parents were forced to flee and hide for their lives because some terrified king (government official) felt threatened when the "pseudoscience" of his day predicted that his authority would be challenged. And so today our "kings" (our modern American government was in fact covertly based upon some sovereign model of government from which it came, calling the king, the "President" instead) persecute and condemn the marginalized classes of our modern culture (hippies, gays, pedophiles, etc.) for the exact same reason.
So, history really does repeat itself. And today when we judge and condemn men (or women, or other children) for violating the "innocence" of our children we are really just persecuting them because of an imagined threat against our imagined authority to determine what is "right" based on some pseudo-scientific ideas that hold no muster against the facts of our history. In Jesus' day, children were routinely used for sex, because it was "natural" to do so. And today we see it as "unnatural" only out of delusional need to somehow control and influence our lives as we always have. The fact is that children are not any more or less innocent than anyone else ("innocence" in this sense is just an invented concept). And sexual pleasure is just as natural for a child as it is for any adult. It makes no sense to restrict children from expressing one of their most basic and fundamental drives any more than it would be to expect them to eat only baby food until their digestive systems are fully developed, or to not educate them until their brains are fully developed, etc. etc..
We only worship our children in modern times because for the first time in human history our children are generally expected to survive their childhood. Even the "sickly" and weak children usually survive these days. But, that has never been true before recent times. Our incredible infant mortality rate allows us to become emotionally invested in our children to the extent that they become "holy" sources of emotional gratification. So today we use our children for emotional gratification in place of sexual gratification. And we pretend (or imagine) that somehow that makes us more "righteous". But, of course, it doesn't. It only confuses our children, and brings more rage and violence into the world as those who suffer the brunt end of our ignorance instinctively lash out against the deception, like Jesus, and like me.
[Joseph Duncan, October 2018]
