Twilight – the church has much to answer for. It’s been transformed into an elite club. If you spurn membership then you’re the Devil’s spawn – especially in the Heartlands, or “Bible Belt”.

Jonathan -let me comment on your first question, then I’ll move on to your later comment:

One has, I believe, to take account of the insularity of Americans. Europe has been a melting pot for many thousands of years, but America never looked back across the ocean. From its inception, America has done things its own way and consequently failed to learn from the mistakes Europe made throughout its long history.

Certainly, the traits I describe in my post are common to all mankind. Americans are an integral part of the species, despite some who consider themselves vastly superior. It’s not their fault. They’re fed the indoctrination along with the baby milk. That at least some manage to mature and think for themselves is surely tribute to the tenacity of the human mind.

Which brings me to your second comment, and an invitation to participate in the religious debate presently raging on your own blog.

I regret I must decline the invitation. There was a time I would have jumped in with both feet, but I have learned over the years that, while the human mind is indeed tenacious in its search for truth, the power of promised immortality, coupled with the wisdom-proof dogma of ‘faith’, is so totally appealing to the Ego that logic and reason are imprisoned behind an egotistical shield with the ability to counter any argument put forward by reasonable thought.

It was Francis Xavier who coined the phrase, “Give me a child till seven and I will give you the man,” – later to become the motto of the Jesuits. He wasn’t wrong. American church schools (of which there are far, far, more than in Europe) take children from the age of three. At that age, it’s still years before they stop believing in Santa Claus. Adding numerous other fictitious, magical, characters to the mix is easy, given such malleable little minds.

Francis Xavier is a good example of the twisting of minds. He, of course, became known as St Francis Xavier, but he was somewhat less than a saint on earth. He was responsible for the Goa Inquisition, which procured its converts by torturing them on the rack. In Japan, he ran amok, destroying non-Christian temples and shrines. Here’s what Ratzinger (Benedict XVI) said of Francis Xavier, and his fellow saint, Ignatius Loyola:

“not only their history which was interwoven for many years from Paris and Rome, but a unique desire — a unique passion, it could be said — moved and sustained them through different human events: the passion to give to God-Trinity a glory always greater and to work for the proclamation of the Gospel of Christ to the peoples who had been ignored.”

No mention of the tortured and broken, left in Xavier’s saintly wake.

Pure religion, or at least the Christian form, is virtually dead in this country. In its place has risen a religio/political stew deftly utilized by the rich and politically powerful to meld certain sections of the populace to their will, and help achieve goals otherwise unobtainable through normal political channels.

Never has this been more obvious than the combining of certain aspects of the church, media, and Republican movement, to thwart the birth of a healthcare system for all in this country. If there was ever a more unholy alliance calling itself Christian, when their founder championed the poor and healed the sick (without ever sending them a bill), it’s hard to find one outside of the Spanish Inquisition.

Nevertheless, most on the “Christian right” support it wholeheartedly.

Given that fact, it becomes obvious these people are not open to persuasion. Their minds are as robotic as their actions. They do as they’re told, without thought or question.

It is for that reason I will respectfully decline your invitation.

We haven’t encountered neighbourliness in any form at all since we moved to this house. I put it down to the fact that we don’t go to church, so we are looked on as some sort of savages. LOL! Takes one to know one!

What you describe is one of many myths imprinted into young minds, I guess. Norman Rockwell, wonderful illustrator that he was, did a lot to fuel the myths in the ’50s. But back then, perhaps the myths were actually closer to fact – I don’t know. Things have changed in the UK too, I guess. I don’t think neighbours there are as helpful to one another as they used to be.

But the idea that neighbourliness should compensate for lack of proper health care provision is obscene!