Fear, Ignorance, and Hate

Fear and hate and ignorance prevailed in the land where Jesus was born. Two thousand years hence, the same fear and hate and ignorance still prevail in the land where Jesus was born and raised. As a matter of fact, Israel today is a Jewish State surrounded by hostile Muslim countries. Indeed, the Muslims do not believe in the Christian God as they have their own God called “Allah.” Thus, in the Middle East, the region where Jesus had supposedly lived and performed miracles before He died, there is only the never-ending religious internecine warfare; but hardly any development in social welfare. Poch Suzara

MIRACLES FROM JESUS

Jesus and His disciples possessed the miracle to convert the Philippines into being the only Christian country in Asia. Yet neither Jesus nor His disciples had neither same miracle to convert the land of his birth into a Christian country? Indeed, Israel is a Jewish State. It has never been a Christian country. Meantime, search for Jesus in any of the Jewish literature of ancient times, no word is mentioned about the existence of Jesus as the Son of God. Poch Suzara

CHILDREN OF GOD

If we were all the children of God, then Jesus was not the son, but grandson of God as Mary, His mother, was the daughter of God. Jesus had the power to perform miracles. He made the blind see, the deft hear, the lame walk, multiplied loaves of bread to feed the multitude. He could walk on water, change water into wine; cure leprosy; raise the dead back to life. Curiously enough, not a single one of those grateful individuals appeared in court to testify that Jesus was a miracle-worker, and not a trouble-maker. Even his own apostles abandoned Jesus. They all disappeared out of sight. Nevertheless, crucified on the cross, Jesus cried out: “My God! My God! why has thou forsaken me?” Jesus could have been more honest with himself had he instead cried out: “My God, My God, as your only grandson on this earth, this crucifixion business is a little bit absurd? How can I die to save the world today if I will be able to resurrect myself back to life tomorrow?” Indeed, Jesus was a failure. His mission to destroy the devil did not materialize. The devil is still alive and quite a success living in the Philippines daily inspiring its government to solve problems of the nation with the power of prayer. Indeed, the devil must be so proud of his own devilish accomplishments; especially since God makes himself not omni-present but only always omni-absent! Poch Suzara

Parental Love and Affection

Jesus admonished: “If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sister, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.” Luke 14:26. Now the bible also says that Jesus was the Son of Joseph ( see John 1:45 & 6:42 ) but the same bible is silent as to how exactly his own brothers and sisters and his own mom and dad felt about such incredible conditions before they could qualify to be His disciples. Poch Suzara

The Mistake of Jesus

On the cross, Jesus even cried out: “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do?” If Jesus had instead asked Man to forgive God for he knows not what he is doing, Jesus would have won the hearts and minds of the whole of mankind as his follower, and he need not have been a failure and a loser in the business of saving souls as was His divine mission. Poch Suzara

University Library

In the library of Philippine Catholic universities, one can read books written by Hitler who was raised and educated as a Catholic. The books, however, written by Bertrand Russell are not available. Russell was not a Catholic; in fact, he was an atheist-philosopher-logician-mathematician. Filipino Catholic students are not allowed to read books written by non-catholic thinkers or philosophers; only books written by thoughtless saints, if not by mindless sinners, or by brainless criminals.

In the meantime, my dear reader, would you believe that even the books written by, and other writings of Jose Rizal are banned in Catholic schools, colleges, and universities in the Philippines!Poch Suzara

Not the Same God

It is not true that God Almighty is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow. During ancient times, as recorded in the bible, God had the power to save his chosen people – the Jews – from the Egyptian sword. However, during World War II, God showed neither power nor interests to save the Jews from Hitler’s gas chamber. And to think that this is the same Hitler who wrote in his MEIN KAMPF: “I believe I am acting in accordance with the will of God, because in defending myself against the Jews, I am fighting to defend the work of the Lord. “ Poch Suzara

JESUS AS GOD AND GOD AS JESUS

In John, Jesus speaks frequently of his extraordinary Status
in life and speaks of himself in the most exalted language:
“I am the light of the world.” 8:12
“I am the bread of life.” 6:35
“I am the resurrection and the life.” 11:25
“I am the way, the truth, and the life.” 14:6
“I and my father are one.” 10:30
“Whoever has seen me has seen the father.”14:6
“No one comes to God except through me.” 14:6
And yet, crucified on the cross, in more exalted language, Jesus cried out: “My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?” Imagine a God willing and able to forsake Himself? And all for the sake of accomplishing nothing! Poch Suzara

Credulous Theologians

The Theologians are a credulous lot, and must believe in something; in the absence of good grounds for belief, they are happy and proud to believe in anything especially if such beliefs were sacred and therefore based on nothing. Poch Suzara

George W Bush

As a candidate for the US presidency in 2000, Bush was once asked: “Who has been the most important influence in your life?” Without a second thought, he replied: “Jesus Christ.” This is the same Jesus Christ who, in the bible, admonished: “If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.” Luke 14:26. Under the leadership of such religious morons, is it any wonder that America has grown to be a nation of hate? Indeed, Americans hate other Americans for Christ’s sake. As an American citizen myself, I ask: When will we Americans grow up and show to the rest of the world that we have, just like most of the Europeans have duly ceased to embrace the evil called: Christianity? Poch Suzara

George W Bush

As a candidate for the US presidency in 2000, Bush was once asked: “Who has been the most important influence in your life?” Without a second thought, he replied: “Jesus Christ.” This is the same Jesus Christ who, in the bible, admonished: “If any man come to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.” Luke 14:26. Under the leadership of such religious morons, is it any wonder that America has grown to be a nation of hate? Indeed, Americans hate other Americans for Christ’s sake. As an American citizen myself, I ask: When will we Americans grow up and show to the rest of the world that we have, just like most of the Europeans have duly ceased to embrace the evil called: Christianity? Poch Suzara

Born-again Politicians

With Reagan’s victory in the 1980 presidential race, organized Christianity inherited more power and glory in America. Reagan, in violation of the separation between State and Church openly and constantly sought the advice of such famous Born-again evangelists as Jerry Farwell and Jimmy Swaggart – both generous supporters of the Republican party. Born-again Christians were elated; Born-again atheists were degraded.
Unfortunately, however, there is no such creature as a Born-again Christian. When we were born, fresh out of the uterus, we are atheist. No child has any religion. All babies are born atheists: free from theism, free from religion. No baby is born a catholic, a muslim, a jew, or a baptist or a hindu. We are all born free and then indoctrinated. For my part, I was raised and educated as a Catholic; but I know that in the truest sense of the word: Today and proudly, I am a Born-again atheist. Poch Suzara

Power of the Church

Church power has been damaged irreparably with questions from all sides and is in fact already crumbling miserably. Attendance is declining, except in those churches, like in the Philippines, who traffic in closed minds and broken hearts.
n the meantime, science has gifted us with diversity of beliefs, values, and standards so that we have been forced to wonder what is true or lasting or real. Tragedy, however, comes when people cannot embrace the changing reality and therefore unable to live creatively or intellectually. They would rather be inspired by religious timidity, if not by ecclesiastical mediocrity, not to mention biblical stupidity perpetually. Poch Suzara

Let’s Reason Together

“Come now, let us reason together, saith the Lord: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red as like crimson, they shall be as wool.” Isaiah 1:18. Verses down, the Lord also admits: “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither your ways are my ways, saith the Lord.” Isaiah 55:8. Gee, I am glad I have my own thoughts and my own ways. It's another word for self-respect and dignity. Poch Suzara

Wars in Heaven

How can heaven be a happy and a peaceful place when wars have been declared in the kingdom of God too? In Rev. 12:7 - 9: “And there was war in heaven: Michael and his angels fought against the dragons; and the dragons fought against his angels. . . And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast with him.” For my part, I ask: what was the devil and his dragons doing in heaven to begin with? Who created those celestial monsters, and for Christ’s sake, for what divine purpose? Poch Suzara

Biblical Unicorns

The Holy Bible as written by inspired authors of God actually declares that unicorns, yes unicorns, exist? Here are the biblical passages:

"Will the unicorn be willing to serve thee, or abide by thy crib? Canst thou bind the unicorn with his band in the furrow? or will he harrow the valleys after thee?" Job 39:9-10.

"Save me from the lion's mouth: for thou hast heard me from the horns of the unicorns." Psalm 22:21.

Unicorns are likewise presented as truly existent in Numbers 23:22; Numbers 24:8; Psalm 29:6; Psalm 92:10; Deuteronomy 33:17; and Isaiah 34:7. Poch Suzara

The Bible

The bible is the greatest source of inspiration especially for those who do not read it. They depend on bible scholars, if not on atheists to interpret bible messages for them. This, in order to maintain faith in the sacred mysteries and in church doctrines. It is indeed sad. The atheists have to point out the silly words, verses, and chapters written in plain English in the bible to wake up the bible believers to read for themselves the holy book. It is, after all, the basis of incredible beliefs in sacred lies and other ecclesiastical deceptions. In the meantime, the clichés of antiquity such as “but the bible says so,” or “but the church teaches,” can no longer be applied to settle questions and disputes. Only arguments based upon logic can we put ourselves on the path towards arriving at the truth of which has yet to be revealed in the bible. Poch Suzara

The Planet Earth

There is nothing tragic or even comic about the human conditions. We are like a speck of dust in the infinity of worlds. We are all but organisms inter-relating with one another in the environment on this grain of sand called “earth.” Against the backdrop of the galaxy, the earth looks like an atom. One million
( 1,000,000 ) planets the size of earth can fit inside the sun. In fact, our earth is one insignificant planet circling around one star in a galaxy that contains about 400,000,000 stars and planets, and is itself one of the hundreds of billion of galaxies called the Cosmos. One day our sun will eventually grow cold, and life on this planet will come to an end, but the cosmos will continue, utterly indifferent to our fate. “Mankind,” wrote Bertrand Russell, “is like a group of shipwrecked sailors on a raft in a vast sea at night. There is darkness all around. One by one they fall off the raft into the waters and disappear. When the last man has fallen off, the sea will roll on and holes made in the water by their bodies will be covered over. Thus, after a brief life, man drops out of the scheme of things, and the universe moves on uncaring and unknowing. In the eternity of the universe, one individual with his values and principles amount to nothing. Nature cares not for man.” It follows therefore that we must love one another as there is no else to care for us. It is up to us to assume responsibility for our own lives and for our own destiny by establishing local and global sanity as the redeeming feature in what should constitute humanity. Poch Suzara

Superstition

Superstition is the product of fear and ignorance. By nature the majority we are all still superstitious. Look how we believe that God will provide, and if that were not yet forthcoming, the Son of God Jesus will nevertheless make His Second Coming soon to straighten out the religious mess that is keeping, for example, the Filipino poor as a people and the Philippines backward as a nation. And to think that Jesus was not born in a Christian country like the Philippines. He was born in a Jewish town in Israel – a Jewish State. Poch Suzara

The Great Religions

If the human race lives in a welter of organized hatreds and threats of mutual extermination, do not blame human nature; blame instead the great religions of the world: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. For centuries, the faithful believers of each of these great religions have not ceased making a mockery of human nature as they all hate and kill each other down here for love of God up there. If, however, there is anything I find great joy in contemplating – it is that in this century organized religion is finally meeting its own mortality, a victim of its own immaturity, stagnancy, and traditional stupidity. Poch Suzara

Cemetery Mentality

Most theologians have the cemetery mentality – no thought, no question, no change, no challenge, no improvement, no progress, no knowledge, and no hope for a better future. The only new thing remarkable about the theologians of today is that they are beginning to look cadaverous - a living proof, I must say, that there is life after death. Poch Suzara

Bankruptcy Behind Religiosity

When science is unable to give the answer, religion steps in and fills the gap of our ignorance with sacred nonsense, holy fantasies, and pretentious lies. In the meantime, science as a self-correcting enterprise is the best antidote we have against the poison of organized superstition otherwise more popularly known as organized religion. Poch Suzara

Evil Show

When slavery died, another evil, called segregation emerged and took its place. When communism died, another evil, called terrorism emerged and took its place. The hidden evil, however, has been and still is the terrible fact that for centuries the corrupt businessmen in cahoots with the corrupt politicians have made not only huge profits but also enjoyed power and glory maintaining and supporting, if not replacing the death of old evils with the birth of new evils. Poch Suzara

Confucius

"Man,” said Confucius, “differs from an animal only by a little. Most men throw that little away.” If I may add, one day, hopefully, our emotion will catch up with our reason, our wisdom with our knowledge, and our purpose with our destiny. Then at last we shall all have behaved like decent human beings capable of creative thought that should transform into creative action. Poch Suzara

Love of Money

A great many people believe they are poor because they have no money. On the contrary, the worse kind of poverty is the poverty of the mind. Among those who are truly rich are those who are rich in thought. Here's what Bertrand Russell wrote: “Love of money has been denounced by moralists since the world began. I do not wish to add another to the moral denunciations, of which the efficacy in the past has not been encouraging. I wish show how the worship of money is both an effect and a cause of diminishing vitality, and how our institutions might be changed so as to make the worship of money grow less and general vitality grow more. It is not the desire for money as a means to definite ends that is in question. A struggling artist may desire money in order to have leisure for his art, but this desire is finite, and can be satisfied by a very modest sum. It is the worship of money that I wish to consider: the belief that values may be measured in terms of money, and that money is the ultimate test of success in life. This belief is held in fact, if not in words, by multitudes of men and women, and yet it is not in harmony with human nature, since it ignores vital needs and the instinctive tendency towards some specific kind of growth. It makes men treat as unimportant those of their desires which run counter to the acquisition of money, and yet such desires are, as a rule, more important to well-being than any increase of income. It leads men to mutilate their own natures from a mistaken theory of what constitutes success, and to give admiration to enterprise which add nothing to human welfare. It promotes a dead uniformity of character and purpose, a diminution in the joy of life, and a stress and strain which leaves whole communities weary, discouraged, and disillusioned.” Principles of Social reconstruction by Bertrand Russell

A SCHOOL OF THOUGHT

June 16,2005 MANILA STANDARD TODAY Dear Editor: If the truth were at the foundation of our social values, we would admire the truth-seekers and truth-tellers of our society. Unfortunately, however, our society is structured on lies, deceit, and falsehood. Indeed, we just carry on with the same traditional delusions that keep even our officials in government busy with virtually nothing but to be in the business of power struggle in order to maintain the circus that makes us all famous as the Sick Man of Asia. Ten million Filipinos now live and work today in some 180 foreign countries. They are enjoying decent standard of living and the higher standard of thinking. Such developing countries enjoy two very simple but most powerful sentiments benefiting them tremendously: Love of country and love of fellow-citizens. In such countries, our Asian neighbors, such sentiments are quite basic within their system of education. We Filipinos, on the other hand, have yet to learn how to love of our country, to love fellow citizens, to love law and order, indeed, we have yet to love growth as a people and maturity as a nation via the love of science and technology. To think that the corrupt men and corrupt women in our corrupt government are the products of the most prestigious colleges and universities in the Philippines: La Salle, Ateneo, UP, Assumption, San Beda, UST, Mariam, Letran, Santa Scholastica, and not to mention (AIM) the Asian Institute of Management. But then again, what can we expect of schools, colleges, and universities where education of values and indoctrination of religious beliefs tantamount to exactly the same thing? Indeed, what is biblical is practical and what is practical is biblical in this God-forsaken country. Look at China. She has been irreligious since the 11th century. Look at her today growing to become a world power not because of faith and trust in divine providence but simply because of hard daily work and discipline while taking full advantage of human intelligence behind science and technology. Look at the Philippines in this already 21st century. Since the 16th century, we have been the only Christian country in Asia. But due to our illusions and delusions, we continue to wallow in our social and political and religious confusion. For the Philippines, it means poverty, not national prosperity. It means stagnancy, not national maturity. All for the sake of our faith in divinity and trust in the holy mystery. Sincerely, Poch Suzara

Letter to TIME MAGAZINE

TIME Dear Editor, President Gloria Arroyo repeated the same words past presidents of the Philippines have faithfully declared again and again. Have “faith and trust in divine providence” during hard times. Indeed, democracy without education means hypocrisy without limitation; it means the degradation of high office into cheap prayers in order to serve the rulers and deceive the ruled. Meanwhile, growth as a people and development as a nation have yet to take roots. Unfortunately, our government officials are just waiting for divine providence to provide. Indeed, we Filipinos have been taught to believe that God will solve our problems for as long as we never lose faith. History, however, fails to prove that the creation of human decency throughout the land has ever been a priority with divinity. Corruption is the privilege of our elected officials and prayer rallies are organized if there were any proposal to alter the patriotic tradition. Our democratic failure is due to the popularity of ignorance. A Filipino has a better chance at winning high government position if he or she has achieved a reputation in mediocrity. Is there hope for the Philippines? Yes, there is. As soon as we begin to become the intelligent masters rather than the stupid victims of religion. Golly, even the daily prayers addressed to God in this country are as similar in form and content to letters children write to Santa Claus. But if God would rather fulfill the needs of the devil rather than save the Philippines away from the same old evil – why should the leaders of this Republic continue to have faith and trust in divine providence? Where is our science and technology to remedy the religious mess that is keeping us Filipino poor as a people and the Philippines backward as a nation? Yours sincerely, POCH SUZARA June 15, 2005

Rizal, the first Flipino Humanist

Before he died at the age of 98, mathematician-logician-philosopher-humanist Bertrand Russell said, “If we must die, let us die sober, and not drunk with lies.”
As a great admirer of Jose Rizal, I believe he died sober; but those in power who had him executed at the age of 30, and those who concocted his retraction story, were the ones drunk with lies.
I defy anyone who believes Jose Rizal, the first great humanist the Philippines has ever produced, died a coward engrossed in childish fairy tales.
And why do I say Rizal was a great humanist? What else do you call a man who was committed to the application of reason and science and to solving human problems of the here and the now?
What else do you call a man who deplored efforts to denigrate human intelligence, who did not seek to explain the world in supernatural terms, and who did not look outside nature for salvation? A man who wanted to leave this world one day a better place than he found it.
What else do you call a man who valued scientific discoveries that have contributed to the betterment of human existence? Who was concerned with securing justice and fairness by eliminating discrimination and intolerance in society?
What else do you call a man who attempted to transcend divisive parochial loyalties based on race, religion, gender, nationality, creed, class, sexual orientation, ethnicity and who worked for the spread of common human decency?
What else do you call a man who believed that developing his creative talents to the fullest constituted the greatest happiness in life here and now?
What else do you call a man who believed in the cultivation of moral excellence, respected the rights of others, believe in human integrity, and was open to critical and rational way of thinking?
What else do you call man who was concerned with the moral education of children? Who wanted to nourish them with the passion for reason, love, and compassion?
What else do you call a man who rejected the theologies of despair, the ideologies of violence, and the sacraments of mediocrity?
And finally, what do you call a man who believe in optimism rather than pessimism, hope rather than despair, learning in place of dogma, truth instead of sacred lies, joy rather than guilt and sin, tolerance in place of fear, love instead of hate, compassion over selfishness, beauty instead of ugliness, and reason rather than blind faith?
Jose Rizal, indeed, believed in the fullest realization of the best and noblest that anyone is capable of as a human being, He was the greatest of Filipino humanists. And he died intellectually sober, not drunk with religious lies.
To Jose Rizal, wherever you are, I have the greatest love you as a fellow human being, and I have the highest respect for you as a priceless rarity among Filipinos.
Poch Suzara

Rizal's Unfinished Revolution in our country

Rizal called for the revolution of the mind to throw off the exploitation of man by man under the inspiration of superstition.This was a century ago. But due to our fear of the Lord and our love for that pie in the sky, Rizal’s call for that revolution of the human intellect ended up to what is recognized today in the history of the Filipino people as “the unfinished revolution.” Rizal wrote: “ I am not writing for this generation, but for those yet to come. If this one could read what I have written, it would burn my books, my whole life’s work. But the generation that deciphers these characters will be a learned generation; it will understand me and say: Not everyone slept during the night of our forefathers! These strange characters – the sense of mystery they will create – will save my work from the ignorance of men, just as strange rites and the sense of the unknown have preserved many truths at the hands of priests. ” Poch Suzara

Lies About Rizal

Rizal never said or wrote: “It was my pride that ruined me.” Those words were written by his official prize-winning biographer Leon Maria Guerrero who believed, as a Catholic, the Rizal retraction story concocted by the sciolistic friars. Moreover, Rizal never “got rid of his political appetite, moral perplexities, and intellectual pride.” On the contrary, Rizal chose to die proudly. After the friars stripped him of his dignity, it was no longer possible for him to go on living as a thinking man should. Poch Suzara

Rizal and the Spanish Friars

If the Spanish friars had only introduced the concept of humanism instead of establishing in the Philippines organized barbarism and other forms of supernaturalism, Filipino priests like Gomez, Burgos, and Zamora need not have been garroted to death for wanting reforms within the Catholic Church in their time. Moreover, great thinkers like Jose Rizal need not have been executed by firing squad for writing to promote common human decency for the Filipino enjoying throughout the land pride and dignity. Poch Suzara

Rizal A Great Thinker

Rizal was a great thinker. He saw clearly in his day what we vaguely see around us today: religion and diseases flourishing hand in hand under ignorance, filth, hate, and poverty. What irked the friars against Rizal was his refusal to continue to believe in Christian values and beliefs; for, he learned to be on the side of humanity. For my part, if there’s life after death, it’s great thinkers like Rizal that I should wish to be with. Otherwise, if I will just find myself in the company of the likes of Opus Dei gang – the kind of people who had Rizal put to death, please Lord, I would rather be in hell. Poch Suzara

Rizal's Enemies

Rizal’s enemies were the theologians who gave themselves fancy titles: soothsayers, seers, charmers, prophets, enchanters, sorcerers, wizards, astrologers – all more popularly known as the Spanish friars. In brief, Rizal’s enemies were fear, ignorance, and superstition as embodied in the Catholic Church that felt threatened by Rizal’s writings. Rizal indeed aimed first at redeeming the Filipino mind damaged by indoctrination, as well as redeeming the Filipino heart impoverished by revelation. Rizal was a heretic in the eyes of the theologians – the power behind the Spanish authority. It is said by millions of Filipinos today that it does not matter whether Rizal retracted or not. This is so ridiculous; for, if Rizal had retracted why was he still executed and not exonerated to benefit from the sacrament of forgiveness? Poch Suzara

A Century After Rizal's Death

After a hundred years, how influential has Jose Rizal been on the Filipino as a people? Millions today would readily give credence by listening to the words of a Mike Velarde of El Shaddai preaching pastoral nonsense derived from bible – a book written not by Filipinos but by foreigners. Only a handful of scholars would care to read and understand the real Rizal and carry out his principles and ideals for the achievement of pride, dignity, intellectual and scientific honesty for the Philippines as a nation. And to think, the Jews, the Chosen People of God, never considered the bible as a holy book at any time in their history. Poch Suzara

Rizal The Humanist

Rizal struggled not against Spain, but against superstition. He fought not in the battlefield, but in the minds and hearts of men and women. Rizal was Asia’s first scientific-humanist thinker put to death a century ago by a theocracy behind musketry. The same theocracy today that is keeping the Filipino youth via education to fear new and fresh ideas in the free market of ideas, and to hate, at the same time, the freethinkers. “Blotting out their brains,” Rizal wrote, “in faith, prayers, masses, novenas, superimposed these onto native superstition.” Poch Suzara

Rizal's Threat to the Friars

Due to his highly developed intellect in the scientific way of thinking, Rizal got to be a threat to the friars. That is why the friars worked hard to get rid of him. If Rizal, however, had retracted, the friars would have been the first to spare his life and used Rizal’s intellect to perpetuate more power for the Church in the Philippines. But Rizal was nevertheless executed which paved the way clear for more of the same commercial in cahoots with the theological activities throughout the land. The result for the Philippines? She got to be one of the most religiously faith-based and therefore the most backward country in Asia today. Poch Suzara

Rizal's Education

Jose Rizal pointed out that evolution in education, ( not reliance on foreign investments ), is the best hope of the nation to enjoy the highest standard of living and thinking. The system of education for the Filipino must be based on science and technology, and not on prayers and theology. Indeed, according to Rizal, a free nation can rise no higher than the standard of beliefs and values set in its schools, colleges, and universities. In there hope for the Philippines? Yes, there is! But first its system of education must be radically revamped. No more stupid prayers to support stupid theology. Only the intelligent scientific way of thinking to generate more science and technology. Poch Suzara

Rizal Versus Jesus

Rizal was more involved not only with the cultivation of the freedom of the mind but also with the development of the human intellect. The exact opposite of what Jesus Christ stood for – infantile emotions, sentimental illusions and delusions. Consider Jesus: he never uttered a word against slavery or even tyrannical oppression. Jesus appealed not to the intellectual power of man, only to man’s childish hopes and dreams. And to think that most Filipinos have more love and respect for Jesus who was born in a foreign country some 2000 years ago, than they care to study and learn from a great Filipino thinker born in the Philippines some 150 year ago. Poch Suzara

Rizal's College Years

Rizal was a product of Ateneo and Santo Thomas; yet both Catholic universities continue to assassinate the character of this great humanist only because he learned on his own initiatives, outside academic walls, how to think more deeply and how to embrace intellectual honestly. Indeed, to this day, all Catholic universities still teach that during Rizal’s last day on this earth, just hours before he was executed for his principles, noble values, and rational beliefs, he retracted and went back to the Catholic Church. What brazen lies! It is no less than a tall story. Otherwise, after his death, he would have been given a Catholic burial and his dead body not just put inside a sack and thrown in the Paco Cemetery in the corner where heretics are stashed away or just buried. Poch Suzara

The Shame in Rizal's Life

The shame in Rizal’s life is not the retraction of his deeds, writings and conduct. Such retraction was only a frailocratic figment of the imagination. The real shame comes from the Filipino historians and other Catholic writers who believed not in Rizal’s power of intellect, but believed instead his enemies – the friars – who invented sacred lies about this great thinker. Via the control of the system of education in the Philippines, these friars have and still are blocking, expediently and consistently, Rizal’s qualified and legitimate entry into the world stage as one of mankind’s greatest thinkers. But then again how can the world know of Rizal since even the Filipinos themselves know so little of his scientific intellect? Poch Suzara

Rizal's Biographer

Rizal’s biographer – Leon M. Guerrero, clearly notes that Rizal returned to the Church of his youth in extremes of self-abasement, frenziedly in childlike fashion, spending the remaining hours of earning indulgences from purgatory by confessing four times, and obsequiously attending to Fr. Balaguer and Villaclara’s wishes. In brief, according to this biographer, Rizal died as a timid coward. According to this official government commissioned biographer, our national hero in the end turned out to be a turncoat.
Four years before his death, however, Rizal in 1882 wrote a letter to Gregorio Aglipay: “In all parts of the world where an honest man tries to achieve reform he is crucified on Golgotha. Christ had nowhere to lay his head, when Pilate governed. It is probable that I will be executed – then they will try to bring along my moral death by covering my memory with slander.” Poch Suzara

Rizal's Revolution of the Mind

Unlike the rest of our national heroes, Rizal was the first and only Filipino revolutionary of the mind. He was the first Filipino who thought human dignity and intellectual integrity should be at the foundation of Filipino culture. And so, due to the successful retraction lies, Filipinos today believe of Rizal not as a great freethinker, not as the revolutionary of the mind, but only as a faithful servant of the priesthood industry. Poch Suzara

Rizal's Retraction

If Rizal had retracted from his attacks against the teachings and practices of the Catholic Church, and if, according to his Catholic biographer Leon M. Guerrero, Rizal had gone to confession four times, heard mass in his death-cell, and received holy communion before he was executed, then Rizal should be branded a traitor to all freedom fighters. He deserves not to be respected or admired as a hero. He should, instead, be worship as a saint. But then again, if Rizal had retracted, why then should the church feel dedicated as its friars feel consecrated to get Rizal’s true character expunged out of the Filipino psyche? The truth of the matter was that the Church did everything possible to counteract Rizal’s honest-to-goodness scientific temper of mind. Indeed, in his Noli and Fili, Rizal exposed the Philippine damaged culture caused by organized superstition otherwise known as Christianity. Thus, the story of his retraction was nothing more than a theological concoction to sanitize, if not to lower the volume of Rizal’s intellectual messages. Poch Suzara

Our Asian Neighbors

The secret why other Asian countries are ahead of the Philippines is no secret at all. Our Asian neighbors have not only adopted, but have also substantiated to the fullest extent possible what Jose Rizal, the nation’s chief hero, was precisely saying to fellow-Filipinos more than a hundred years ago: “Wake up! Embrace science! Utilize the scientific way of thinking! Start to emulate the freethinkers! Knowledge is the heritage of mankind, but only the courageous inherit it! We can only serve our country by telling the naked truth. However bitter it may be!” Poch Suzara

JESUS CHRIST part 2

MORE ON JESUS CHRIST ( part two )

Jesus admitted that: “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” Yet, at crucial moments, Jesus did not know where he was or even what he was talking about. Here are a few examples:

I and my father are one. - John 10:30

I go unto the Father: for my Father
is greater than I. John 14:28

Jesus said: “Resist not evil: but whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also.” Now what is so noble about turning the other cheek, if one knows that each time he does so, he is piling up greater heavenly rewards, while the one who strikes is earning his rewards in hell?

And Jesus said unto the crucified thief: “Verily, I say unto thee, Today shalt thou be with me in paradise.” Luke 23:43. Note: This promise could not have been delivered, unless Christ went to heaven that day, which is contrary to the Christian doctrine that when he was dead he spent the succeeding three days and night in the heart of the earth or (according to the Apostle’s Creed ) in hell.

If a man keep my saying, he shall never see death, Whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. John 11:26. Of course how can a dead man see himself already dead? Meanwhile, immortality must be the condition of a dead man who refuses to believe that he is already dead.

Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you. Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life. John 12:47.The Jews then and the vegetarians now have yet to figure out what exactly Jesus meant by this taste for cannibalism.

Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Matt. 4:17. There be some standing here, which shall not taste death, till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom. Matt. 16:28. Jesus was confident that the day of judgment was coming in the first century. However, in this 21st century – in the whole of Asia, only the Filipinos are waiting for the Second Coming of Christ. The rest of Asia are already enjoying not only a higher standard of living, but also a much higher standard of thinking. They can even afford to hire Filipino workers to do household work for them.

Jesus said: “ I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.” St. John 8:22. But in the bible Lucifer too was the bringer of light. He is identified with rebel Archangel who brought enlightenment to man. But combining together the light from Jesus and the light from Satan, why is there is so much spiritual darkness, for example, in the Philippines – the only Christian country in Asia?

There were more than six million Jews, Gypsies, homosexuals, political opponents, prisoners of war, freedom fighters throughout Europe who were utterly slaughtered not only by poison gas inside crematoriums, or starved to death, shot to death, but eliminated mainly by stupid religion. In his MEIN KAMPF, Adolf Hitler wrote: “I believe I am acting in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator: by defending myself against the Jews, I am fighting for the works of the Lord.”

Now I am told by my devout Christian friends that Christianity is the religion of love of God and love of neighbor? Well, I ask: What ever happened to that Christianity in the Philippines where we Filipinos love only God up there but we do so by hating one another down here? Poch Suzara

Jesus Christ part 1

JESUS CHRIST ( part one )
Every scholar who has critically investigated Gospel story of the life of Jesus Christ admits now that, whether the narrative contains factual history or not, a mass of myth has surrounded it. Here, however, we are concerned with the record as it stands.

It is probable that Jesus at first expected that God would intervene on his behalf and that he could be acclaimed as the Messiah. When he saw more and more clearly that a revolt against the Roman power was hopeless he declared that the Kingdom of God is not of this world. At this stage of his mission he prepared for his martyrdom. But till the last act of the drama he was persuaded that he was under God’s care and protection, and shortly before the end he announced that his second advent was near at hand.

He spoke “with authority,” a claim which no other teacher could make in the same sense, he raised the dead, he was Lord of the Sabbath, and through him alone could man live forever. Despite all this “authority,” at his death, which was the culmination of his mission to save mankind, he “began to be sorrowful and very heavy,” prayed that his cup of bitterness “might pass from him,” and at the very last exclaimed, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?” Was this a matter of a God forsaking himself?

Many “liberal” Protestants today deny that the strong language used by Jesus about the future life was meant to be taken literally. Let them settle that themselves. What matters is the tragic fact that for almost two thousand years his language convinced Christians that an eternal hell is a real place, and that its penalties are incurred as the result of “Unbelief.” No other “spiritual” authority has done so much to drench our world in blood, enough to keep even the US Navy afloat.

Most of the sayings of Jesus regarding violence or non-resistance were intended to apply chiefly to personal, not to global relationship. He said virtually nothing of international conflicts. What he did say showed placid acceptance of the war syndrome:


“And ye shall hear of wars and rumors of wars: see that
ye be not troubled: for all these things must come to
pass, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise
against nation, and kingdom against kingdom.” Matt. 2:6-

“But when ye shall hear of wars and commotions, be
not terrified: for these things must first come to pass;
but the end is not by and by. Then said he unto them,
Nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against
kingdom.” Luke 21: 9-10

These verses have a more direct bearing on war as we now know it than any of his other sayings. They show his belief in the inevitability of war. Apparently, despite his power to perform miracles, he did not feel himself competent to counteract militarism. He offered no program for arbitration of international or border disputes, no ideas to substitute death and destruction between nations, no policy for world peace or path towards global sanity. Mankind continues to live in a welter of organized hatreds and threats of mutual extermination.

Many a good man is a failure from a worldly point of view, but failure is not what one would wish to emulate. Jesus sought to save the world. Surely no one looking at the world today can say that he succeeded. His plan of salvation was a failure; it did not work out as Jesus intended. An ideal teacher is needed now almost as much as two thousand years ago. If the world is gradually improving, as seems probable, it is in spite of the miracles of the past, not because of them.

Indeed, Jesus failed to provide the conditions so much needed by man to enable him to shape his course through the good life inspired by love and guided by knowledge. No one knows how to live correctly, how best to meet each situation, what action is suited to the occasion. Jesus did not tell us what to do. His sayings are interpreted in many different ways. He failed to predict the needs of the future of mankind.

Moreover, Jesus did not explain the healthy relations between husband and wife, nor between employer and employee, nor how to educate children, nor how to preserve health, nor how to earn a living, nor how to prevent internecine hatred, poverty, and suffering. Jesus gave little practical information, and his spiritual advice was not clearly enough expressed to enable man to apply it to modern conditions. Jesus neglected to instruct how to live under common human decency. His knowledge of the world was less than the average mediocre politician of today in the government of Christian countries like the Philippines.

Hypatia

Here’s Hypatia – one of the greatest woman who ever lived - as described by Carl Sagan in his book Cosmos:
“The last scientist who worked in the Library (Alexandria) was a mathematician, astronomer, physicist and head of the Neoplatonic school of philosophy – an extraordinary range if accomplishments for any individual in any age. Her name was Hypatia. She was born in Alexandria in 370. At a time when women had few options and were treated as property, Hypatia moved freely and unselfconsciously through traditional male domains. By all accounts she was a great beauty. She had many suitors but rejected all offers of marriage. The Alexandria of Hypatia’s time – by then long under Roman rule – was a city under grave strain. Slavery had sapped classical civilization of its vitality. The growing Christian church was consolidating its power and attempting to eradicate pagan influence and culture. Hypatia stood at the epicenter of these mighty social forces. Cyril, the Archbishop of Alexandria, despised her because of her close friendship with the Roman governor, and because she was a symbol of learning and science, which were largely identified by the early Church with paganism. In great personal danger, she continued to teach and publish, until, in the year 415, on her way to work she was set upon by a fanatical mob of Cyril’s parishioners. They dragged her from her chariot, tore off her clothes, and, armed with abalone shells, flayed her flesh from her bones. Her remains were burned, her works obliterated, her name forgotten. Cyril was made a saint.” Poch Suzara

Giordano Bruno ( 1548 – 1600 )

A Roman Catholic scholar, an astronomer, and philosopher – for suggesting that there exists an infinity of worlds and that many are inhabited – and for reading forbidden books, Bruno was charged with heresy, and even unjustly accused of murder. An ordained priest – he abandoned the Dominican Order in 1578 - challenged papal authority. Bruno was hunted down from land to land, until he turned on his pursuers with fearful invectives - for this he was entrapped at Venice - imprisoned for 6 years in the dungeon of the Inquisition at Rome - then burned alive, his ashes scattered to the winds. For always talking and talking about his ideas and beliefs, Bruno was gagged to prevent him from speaking while being burned alive at the stake. Those personally responsible for Bruno’s death were Pope Clement VIII and his personal theologian Cardinal Robert Bellarmine who was canonized a saint.
Here’s the way biographer Michael White described Bruno’s death in his book: - THE POPE AND THE HERETIC:
On the morning of his execution Giordano Bruno was visited by members of the Brotherhood of Pity of St. John the Beheaded, a group who ministered to any heretic they could in an effort to do what the Inquisition had failed to do: lead the meekly back to the one true faith. From the records of the Brotherhood we learn that, “At the second hour of the night, information came that justice would be done on an impenitent friar in the morning. Hence, at the sixth hour of the night, the Comforters and the chaplain assembled at St. Ursula and went on to the prison in the Tower of Nona, entered the chapel, and offered up the winter prayers. To them was consigned the man, Giordano Bruno, son of Gioan Bruno, an apostate friar of Nola in the kingdom, an impenitent. He was exhorted by our brothers in all love, and two Fathers of the Order of St. Dominic, two of the Order of Jesus, two of the new church and one of St. Jerome were called in. These with all loving zeal and much learning, showed him his error, yet he stood firm throughout and to the end in his accursed obstinacy, setting his brain and mind to a thousand errors and vain-gloryings.
What must Bruno have thought during those final hours? Did he despair, finally? Did he reach the conclusion that he has been wrong all along? Or did he feel vindicated, confident that his thoughts would survive the flames? Did he perhaps wonder if, far away on the alien worlds he imagined, other creatures burned their dreamers too?
At 5.30 a.m. on 19 February, a Thursday and a feast day in Rome, Bruno was led in chains from San. Ursula. He was dressed in a white, ankle-length robe illuminated with the cross of St. Andrew and dotted with painted devils holding their long, barbed tails against a backdrop of crudely daubed crimson flames. The route was crowded with the virtuous and the curious. Much has been made of this burning. A primitive form of newsletter, avvisi e ricordi, had even been printed to inform people of the occasion: “An entertaining judicial burning was expected,” it declared. According to this tabloid of the day, “Bruno has declared he will die a willing martyr and that his soul will rise with the smoke to paradise.” Copies of the newsletter had been passed throughout the excited crowd and trampled upon along the wet road. As the parade moved on Bruno became animated and excited. He reacted to the mocking crowds, responding to their yells with quotes from his books and the sayings of the ancients. His comforters, the Brotherhood of St. John, tried to quiet the exchange, to protect Bruno from yet further pain and indignity, but he ignored them. And so, after a few minutes the procession was halted by the Servants of Justice. A gaoler was brought forward and another two held Bruno’s head rigid. A long metal spike was thrust through Bruno’s left cheek pinning his tongue and emerging through the right cheek. Then another spike was rammed vertically through his lips. Together, the spikes formed a cross. Great sprays of blood erupted onto his gown and splashed the faces of the Brotherhood close by. Bruno spoke no more.
A few minutes later the procession arrived at the site of the execution, campo di fiori, the Field of Flowers where, in one corner, opposite the theatre of Pompeii, the stake had been prepared. The guards led Bruno to the thick wooden post, shoved him up against it and wrapped a thick rope around him, across his shoulders, his chest, his waist and his legs. The faggots ( about which Bruno has once joked ) were piled up to the condemned man’s chin and the torch placed between his feet. The flames caught quickly in the light morning breeze. It has been claimed that many victims of the stake were saved a slow death by arranging a payment to the executioner who would surreptitiously snap their necks as they were tied to the post. We know this did not happened to Bruno for as the fire began to grip, the Brothers of the Pity of St. John the Beheaded tried one last time to save the man’s soul. Risking the flames, one of them leaned into the fire with a crucifix, but Bruno merely turned his head away. Seconds later, the fire caught his robe and seared his body, and above the hissing and crackling of the flames could be heard the man’s muffled agony. After the fire had subsided, what remained of Bruno’s body was smashed to powder with hammers and the ashes were cast to the wind so that no one could save anything of the heretic as a relic. As far as the Inquisition was concerned, they had obliterated Bruno, destroyed his body, banished his memory, his ideas, his writings, his very thought, and he had been consigned to Hell.
The Pope saw nothing that Bruno wrote in prison and the two men never met in private as Bruno had hoped. As Giordano burned that festive Thursday, 19 February 1600, the crowd cheered and waved their banners, children ran as close to the flames as they dared and frightened mothers pulled them back. And when the spectacle was over and the world cleansed of another heretic, Bruno’s ashes settled on ledges and in nearby fields. There the rain carried into the soil molecules that has once composed parts of his body. Over time, the molecules were broken open, their atoms absorbed by plants. The plants were eaten by animals and some found their way to the tables of Rome and beyond. Other elements of Bruno fell into water and were recycled to splash upon the faces of bathers and into drinking goblets. And so, perhaps, on an atomic level at least, the Pope himself was conjoined with the heretic after all.” As Bruno would have it: the universe is infinite, and as one. We are all each other. Everything is everything else.” Poch Suzara

Questions for the theologians

Who are we in time? Where are we in space? These theological questions are ignored in the bible. Here, however, are answers from an atheist-humanist-scientist, the late Carl Sagan: “We find that we live on an insignificant planet of a humdrum star lost between two spiral arms in the outskirts of a galaxy which is a member of a sparse cluster of galaxies, tucked away in some forgotten corner of a universe in which there are more galaxies than people.” Poch Suzara

Man - The Credulous Animal

“Man is a credulous animal, and must believe something; in the absence of good grounds for belief, he will be satisfied with bad ones.” Bertrand Russell... However, due not from intelligent education, but precisely owing to silly indoctrination in schools, colleges, and universities - places where we learn to be insane morally and to be even more insane spirituality, instead of embracing the power of thinking, most men would rather have faith by sick believing... Poch Suzara Twitter# Facebook# Google#

Religious Fantasy

In the History of Western Philosophy, Bertrand Russell wrote: “Owing to their miraculous powers, priests could determine whether a man should spend eternity in heaven or in hell. If he died while excommunicate, he went to hell; if he died after the priests had performed all the proper ceremonies, he would ultimately go to heaven provided he had duly repented and confessed. Before going to heaven, however, he would have to spend some time – perhaps a very long time – suffering the pains in purgatory. Priests could shorten this time by saying mass for his soul, which they were willing to do for a suitable money payment.”
To think that this business arrangement has been going on for centuries but there are millions upon millions of religious believers today who still believe in this priestly religious fantasy. Poch Suzara

Science in the Bible

In astronomy – the sun rotates round the earth. In geology – the earth is not round, but flat with four corners. In Biology – a human is created by a superhuman. In zoology – a snake can talk. In medicine – diseases are caused by the devil. Unfortunately, science in the bible is not science. It is psuedo-science written by ignorant and unlearned inspired authors of God who Himself did not know what he was doind. Poch Suzara

God Loves Man

God loves man? Why does God allow man to suffer? Against dreadful diseases, deadly insects, vicious beasts, poisonous reptiles, not to mention hurricanes, blizzards, droughts, floods, tidal waves, tornadoes, volcanoes, and earthquakes? And to add insult
to injury, God sent his only begotten Son to earth who preached something like: “But those mine enemies which would not that I should reign over them, bring hither, and slay them for me.” Luke 19:27. Well, to add more insult to more injury, God above says of his son below: “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” Matt. 3:17 And to think the Son of God had a human mother who was already married woman to Joseph. Poch Suzara

Only A Fool

Only a fool says there is no God? On the contrary, the motto of a fool is: “Let me trust God even if he has always fooled me in the past.” Poch Suzara

God-inspired Authors

How could God-inspired authors write anything false in the bible? In the Old Testament, for example, it is written: “The world also is established, and it cannot be moved.” Psalms 93:1. In the New Testament, it is written: “Then he called his twelve disciples, and gave them power and authority over all devils, and to cure diseases.” Matt. 10: 1-8. Well, the earth not only rotates on its own axis daily, it also orbits around the sun yearly. Diseases have not been cured. They are still as deadly today as they were yesterday thanks to the miracles subject to expiration date from Jesus. Poch Suzara

Religious People

Religious people hate to talk about religion because it exposes their fear and ignorance. In order to justify a mindless spirituality, however, religious people must hide behind mediocrity and to hell with the beauty of veracity. Poch Suzara

Insanity

Among the rich and the poor are the insane. Among the young and the old are the insane. Among the politicians and the theologians are the insane. Among the powerful and the powerless are the insane. Among the Americans, the Arabs, the Chinese, and the Filipinos are the insane. Indeed, it is really difficult to say who amongst us is not as insane as the rest of us. Poch Suzara

Two Great Bible Characters

Consider the two great bible characters as the highest models of moral excellence, David in the Old Testament, and Paul in the New Testament. David, the man after God’s heart was a murderer, a thief, a plunderer, a polygamist with a harem of wives and concubines, a drunken debauchee, dancing half-naked before the maids in his household, a lecherous old libertine, abducting and ravishing the wife of a faithful soldier. On the other hand, Paul was a religious fanatic: first a Jew and later a Christian convert. As a Jew, in the name of Jehovah, he persecuted Christians; as a Christian, in the name of Christ, he persecuted Jews. And to think we are told that the bible is written by inspired authors of a holy God. I think it's time for us to entertain a new definition for the word "holy." Poch Suzara.

The Holy Trinity

“Christ, according to the faith, is the second person of the Trinity, the Father being the first, and the Holy Ghost the third. Each of these three persons is God. Christ is his own father and his own son. The Holy Ghost is neither father nor son, but both. The son was begotten by the father, but existed before he was begotten – just the same before as after. Christ is just as old as his father, and the father is just as young as his son. The Holy Ghost proceeded, from the Father and Son, but was equal to the Father and Son before he proceeded, that is say, before he existed, but he is of the same age as the other two. So it is declared that the Father is God and the son is God, and Holy Ghost God and that these three Gods make one God. According to the celestial multiplication table once one is three, and three times one is one, and according to heavenly subtraction if we take two from three, three are left. The addition is equally peculiar, if we add two to one we have but one. Each is equal to himself as the other two. Nothing ever was, nothing can ever be more perfectly idiotic and absurd than the dogma of the Trinity.” The above was written by the famous American agnostic Robert Green Ingersoll. The comments that follow are my holy baloney response: Indeed, moral bankruptcy plus spiritual poverty plus political stupidity equals social insanity. It is the sum total of the results of our sacred belief in the holy trinity. I am told that God has neither a beginning nor an end. This means that God has been in existence for more than 80,000,000 years and will continue to exist for another 80,000,000. Well, if we live to be 80 years, this means that the span of human life is but a split of a second, a wink of an eye, or a flash in the pan in comparison to God’s vast and endless existence. Now the dumbstruck morons who call themselves “theologians” claim that you and I are able to offend God with sin? Really, instead of being ashamed, we should be most proud of such an achievement. Moreover, such a God deserves neither love nor respect for having such a childish vanity. Imagine us powerless human beings, able to grab lightning away from God’s hand and we are able to hurt him at the same time. Wow! What an idiotic belief! Imagine a God getting offended with human activities on this piece of dust called earth lost in the vastness of space and time in which there are far more galaxies than there are people. Imagine a million (1,000,000) planets the size of earth can fit inside the sun. And our sun is not that gigantic either as 500 of our suns can be swallowed up by a bigger star called “Betelgeuse” in one small gulp. In the meantime, there are hundreds of billions of galaxies existing out there called the Cosmos. Where is the Holy Trinity in space and in time? How come he’s always only hiding out there but never to be found down here? And even if he reveals himself down here, according to the dumbstruck theologians, the holy trinity is still sacred mystery. Poch Suzara

Goodwill to all Unbelievers

Peace on earth and goodwill to all men can become a reality. If only the Christians can learn to reject God and his bible; if only the Muslims can learn to reject Allah and his Quran; and if only the Jews can learn to reject Yahweh and his Torah. Indeed, conflicting religious beliefs have always inspired the Christians, the Muslims, and the Jews to participate faithfully in man’s inhumanity to man in the name of an insane divinity. For my part, as an atheist, I say to all Christians, Muslims, and Jews: enough is enough. Your respective deity is not worth killing fellow humans. If we must live, let us live in the name of humanity; and if we must kill, let us kill the ideas and beliefs that encourages hate and war and other forms of rigid, if not obsolete, nay, childish mentality. Let us assume human responsibility for our local community and for global health and sanitation and international sanity. Poch Suzara.

Questioning Everything

Never belittle the power of questioning everything. It is not only the main source, but the very foundation of spiritual wealth. For example: what right does God have to tell us how to raise our children when he himself drowned his own during the days of Noah? And to think that those people killed were our distant relatives. But then again, why should we care about such relatives of the distant past? Under the Christian values taught to us to believe in our Christian schools, Jesus in the bible admonished: “if any man come to me, and hate not his father, mother, wife, children, brethren, sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.” Luke 14:26. Poch Suzara

The Souls of Men, if any

To believe that the souls of men, if any, will be happy or unhappy after the death of the body, is to pretend that dead men, dead women, and dead children will be able to see without eyes, to hear without ears, to taste without a palate, to smell without a nose, to feel without hands, to feel the pleasures of love without sex organs, and to think without brains. In the Philippines, as the only Christians country in Asia, we Filipinos believe ourselves very enlightened and potentially saved for the kingdom of God as we adopt faithfully such sick garbage as the foundation of our social and moral values. In the meantime, if it does not bother me one bit to realize that for millions of years before my birth I was existing as a NOTHING, Why should it now bother me to realize as well that for millions of years after my death, I shall again be existing as a NOTHING. Poch Suzara

Theology Defined

If theology were a science, it is the science of contradictions. Every religion is but a system imagined for the purpose of reconciling conflicting ideas against other irreconcilable ideas. Indeed, theology is but ignorance of natural causes reduced to a system. It is not what we know about divinity; it is what we do not know about humanity. Theology is the hope to understand, if not to justify, the mysteries of our faith. Those deeply impressed with theological claims, sad to say, are the frightened faithfools who prefer the unknown, the concealed, the fabulous, the incredible, even the terrible to that which is clear, concise, true, melodic, and realistic. In the meantime, if the theologians do not comprehend other theologians, why then is it expected of me that I should, for myself, comprehend the subject of theology - the study of the incomprehensible? Poch Suzara

Surviving Schizophrenia

According to SURVIVING SCHIZOPHRENIA, a manual for Families, Consumers and Providers, published in 1995 by Dr. E. Fuller Torrey, M.D., the distribution of the 1.8 million persons with schizophrenia in the U.S. are as follows: “100,000 are in Hospitals; 180,000 are in Nursing homes; 100,000 are in Jails & Prisons; 100,000 are in Shelters and Streets; 300,000 are Supervised living in Group Homes; 500,000 are living with family members; 550,000 are living independently.” What it fails to include, however, are those homicidal maniacs installed in the White House by the democratic process called “general election.” Poch Suzara

Pope Paul 11

"Don't you think that the irresponsible behaviour of men is caused by women?“ Pope John Paul II. I ask: how come no one blames the devil anymore? The same devil that God gifted with free will far more superior than man’s inferior free will? And to think the women of Poland today are freely inspired by the devil to celebrate the plan of Pope Benedict XVI to canonize Pope John Paul 11 a saint. How wonderful of Catholic Popes to canonize each other as saints of God. Poch Suzara

Dear Father Roy Cimagala

With great interest, I read your article: WE NEED TO STUDY THEOLOGY published in BusinessWorld ( May 11, 2005 ). You mentioned and I quite agree that there are lots of people who are real giants in the fields of modern technology and other sciences. Regrettably however, I am unable to agree with you that such scientists and technologists are ‘like babies or pygmies with clearly stunted growth in matters of faith and religion.” For my part, I am neither a scientist nor a philosopher. In fact, I am a high-school dropout. But as you are an expert in theology, perhaps you might be of great assistance in answering for my own enlightenment, the following theological questions: If God were the Designer of nature, how come He had to design 23,000 different kinds of beetles? What went wrong with the first beetle design? Or, if the human body were God’s design, how come there exist about 2 billion kinds of virus, germs, and bacteria living inside our body that will eventually self-destruct whether we have free will or not? If God created everything, including space and time, where was God located before he created space, and when was it before he created time? In fact, if everything needs a creator, who or what created God? The sun is a giant star that it can take one million ( 1,000,000 ) planets the size of earth and fit them all inside it. The sun, however, may be large but it is not the largest star in the sky. According to the science of astronomy, there is an even bigger star called Betelgeuse. It is 500 times larger than our sun. Comparatively, therefore, we humans are like the size of tiny parasites living on this grain of sand called “planet earth.” In this connection, what was God’s size when he created man in His own image and likeness? How could Adam and Eve be guilty of anything original, such as the Original Sin, since before everything else there was, first and foremost, - the Original Creator? God’s first Commandment: “Thou shalt have no other Gods before me.” Can you explain where those “other Gods” came from? Who created them? God was often personally involved in human affairs during the days of biblical antiquity. How come he is no longer personally involved in human affairs in any shape or form in these days of scientific modernity? If moral values were universally planted by God, then all people would believe the same things. There could never be disagreements over right and wrong. There would be no need for laws, courts, and battlefields. Can you explain why the history of the world has been a history of conflicts between moral values in God’s name? According to the National Catholic Almanac, God is “almighty, eternal. Holy, immortal, immense, immutable, incomprehensible, ineffable, infinite, invisible, just, loving, merciful, most high, omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent, patient, perfect, provident, supreme, true.” Can you explain: how was it possible for theologians to have declared God’s incomprehensibility and simultaneously list twenty-two additional attributes? If God cannot be comprehended, what’s the latest findings from the study of theology? Indeed, what’s new with God? If God were immutable and therefore cannot change the past, the present, and the future as God saw it, doesn’t that make our prayers utterly worthless because when we pray, we are asking God to change his mind? If God so loved the world, why does he tolerate the devil to inspire the believers of the same religion hate each other like we all do as a matter of survival in this only Christian country in Asia? Christ said that if someone smite thee on the right cheek, turn the left cheek also. What is so noble about turning the other cheek, if one knows that each time he does so, he piling up greater rewards in heaven, while the one who strikes is earning his rewards in hell? If Christ died on the cross to destroy the devil, how come the devil is still alive and quite a success inspiring the Filipino to grace not the growth of human civilization but only to be a disgrace in the rat race for eternal salvation? Theology is not what we know about divinity. It is what we do not know about humanity. As theology, however, is still at the very foundation of our system of education, is it any wonder that we come out of our schools not as fruitful thinkers in love with our country, but only as fruitless believers in love with divinity? Yours Faithfully, Poch Suzara

All in Heaven For What?

If Jesus and his apostles, Mohammed, Buddha, Brahma, Yahweh, Confucius, the writers of the bible, Quoran, Torah, Upanishads, Bhagavad Cita, Pope Paul 11, the saints of God, St. Francis of Asissi, Martin Luther, the disciples of Allah, including Hindu followers, Emperor Hirohito of japan, Hitler, Stalin, Churchill, Roosevelt, Truman, Nixon and Reagan, not to mention Marcos of the Philippines, etc. were all already in heaven with God up there, why are we all still hating and at war against each other for the sake of the devil in hell down here? Poch Suzara Twitter# Facebook# Google#

What If I am Wrong

What if it turned out that I am wrong all along and that God will meet with me after I am dead, what then? Well, I will immediately ask God to forgive me for having wasted my youth as a dumbstruck catholic when I was in grade school and high school at De La Salle University. But I will ask God: weren’t you such a dumbstruck of a God yourself for having created the silly devil gifted with a free will too? Poch Suzara

Reason and Faith

Can faith and reason be friends and work harmoniously together? Let’s see: Can you have faith that man has one rib less than a woman because reason tells you that God, according to the bible, created woman by taking a rib off Adam’s body? Indeed, how can faith and reason ever reconcile when faith proceeds like a mind stuck on hinges; and reason proceeds like a mind moving on wheels? Even if we assume that faith can merge with reason, we must see faith first merging with other faiths before reason can begin to entertain the silly merger. Poch Suzara

If God Sees Everything

If God sees everything, how come he is able to remedy nothing? Otherwise, if God were good, why not be good for something? Why be good only like the theologians and the politicians who are good not for something, but only good for nothing? Poch Suzara

Poverty and Wealth

The worst kind of poverty is the poverty of the mind. Such poverty explains the faith behind theism based on the unknowable. The best kind of wealth is the wealth of the mind. Such wealth explains the reason behind atheism based on the knowable. Poch Suzara

Two Philippine Associations

I am most proud and happy to be the chairperson of two unique but closely related associations in the Philippines. However, I must confess that each time I feel like I am such a failure intellectually, I am most proud to identify myself as the chairman of the Bertrand Russell Society, Philippines; but then again, each time I feel like I am such a success intellectually, I am most happy to identify myself as the chairman of the High School Dropout Association of the Philippines. Poch Suzara

Two Saintly Popes

"Don't you think that the irresponsible behaviour of men is caused by women?“ Pope John Paul 11. I ask: how come the Pope blames not the devil whose God gifted free will is far more superior than man's inferior free will? And to think the women in Poland today are freely celebrating the plan of Pope Ratzinger to beatify Pope and eventualy canonized John Paul 11 a saint of God. Poch Suzara

The Secret of Christianity

The power of reason leaves Christianity untouched, because Christianity does not pretend to reason. Christianity is build on faith, and appeals to the senses and to the imagination rather than to the intellect. When sense and hope are satisfied, the mind remains at rest; that is the secret of Christianity. Sadly, however, the power of science has long established the fact that the mind at rest is akin to the mind that is no longer at its best – another secret the Christian has not ceased hiding. Poch Suzara

DO WE LOVE ONE ANOTHER

Do we love our rivers and lakes and beaches? Do we love our flowers, plants, and trees? Do we love our birds, butterflies, and other living creatures of the forest? Do we love law and order? Do we love our policemen in the streets and our lawyers and prosecutors and judges in the courts? Do we love our mayors, governors, congressmen, and senators? Is ours a lovable government of the lovable people, by the lovable people, and for the lovable people?

Developing countries in Asia today are the results of, if not due to, developed minds and cultivated hearts. Thanks to the power of education based upon science and technology. Thanks also to that simple yet powerful human sentiment that has always been a traditional reality: love of country and love of fellow-citizens. Among Filipinos, however, -- love of country is as yet a traditional fantasy.

In Asian countries developing today, teamwork means dividing the effort and multiplying the effects. With us Filipinos, however, it is the exact opposite: teamwork means praying to God for miracles and to forgive us of our historical defects.

But then again, in this only Christian country in Asia, if we are not praying to God to lead us not into temptation, our high government officials too are praying to the same God to lead us not into deeper economic degradation. The results thus far: graft and corruption, political confusion, social dislocation, and especially pollution and population explosion.

Are we ever going to wake up in this country? When are we going to stop kidding ourselves enjoying the sacred lies we tell each other each day of every year? Are we ever going to solve, intelligently, our problems as a people and our troubles as a nation? Must we continue with our stunted sense of humanity as inspired by our love for incomprehensible divinity?

There was a time when every single man, woman, and child believed in a loving God. It was a time when no one dared to question anything. It was a time of spiritual poverty and moral bankruptcy. Everybody also believed the world was not round, but flat. It was a time of fear and mental paralysis. Everybody held on to faith not in the human capacity but faith only in human stupidity. It lasted for a thousand years( 5th to the 15th century ). Historians refer to those centuries as the Dark Ages.

We Filipinos are still living in the Dark Ages. We carry superstition on our backs and we are crippled by its weight. We make no bones about God being a panacea – that all our social troubles and economical and political problems will vanish into thin air if only each and every one of us will kneel down and once more have deep faith in God.

The holy bible is found in almost every Filipino home today. It is a book written not by Filipinos, but by foreigners. If, however, we wish to understand why love of country does not exist in the Philippines, please read the bible. It clearly states what we adhere to faithfully: “Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not with him. “ John 2:15. Indeed, why should we love our country when the bible clearly tells us that if we do so, the love of God is not with us?

Now if we wish to understand why we do not love each other as a people please read again carefully what Jesus admonished in the bible: “If any man come to me and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.” Luke 14:26. Is it any wonder why we all love God up there by hating one another down here?

In the meantime, hundreds of thousands of abandoned and hungry Filipino children struggle to exist in the streets of our major cities. Their bodies are rotting with malnourishment as they live off garbage and trash.

Well, millions of children too exist inside our school buildings. Their minds and hearts are rotting too. They are taught to believe that this world is depraved and sinful and corrupt and that this life is nothing but a transition to a better world to come after death with God in heaven. Indeed, these are the same millions of children who will become parents themselves one day. And like all of us parents and grandparents of today, they too will be the stupid victims of our so-called “ social, moral and religious values.”

We are born ignorant, not mindless. In the Philippines, we are made mindless with the power of education. Poch Suzara

FAITH

Faith is really a kind of convenient escape-hatch. Faith does not extricate any one away from contradictions and absurdities; it merely inspires one to believe and to have faith in spite of contradictions and absurdities. Indeed, faith is just another sacred word we often use to hide our irrationality, if not to justify our lazy mentality Poch Suzara

Super Qualities of God

According to the National Catholic Almanac, among the supernatural qualities of God is that he is incomprehensible. Obviously, if this were so, as God is therefore unknowable, it is utterly impossible to examine God’s other supernatural qualities. In the meantime, theology mutilates the human mentality. The theologians then present themselves as friends to those they have crippled intellectually. Happily, theology can never, not even by a long shot, reduce atheism to the same depths of insanity as the concept of silly divinity on the one side; and on the other side, the concept of silly deviltry. Poch Suzara

Favorite Saints of God

What is the difference between a first class moron and a third class moron? A first class moron reads the bible but does not understand it. The third class moron understands the bible but does not read it. Both, however, enjoy a similarity. They have equal chances down here to be canonized as favorite saints of God up there. Poch Suzara

A 16th century Catholic Cardinal

Cardinal Robert Bellarmine said: “To assert that earth revolves around the sun is as erroneous as to declare that Jesus was not born of a Virgin.” And to think that this famous Cardinal born not of a virgin himself, was canonized a saint of God. My dear Cardinal Bellarmine: I declare the earth revolves around the sun and I further declare that Jesus never existed. There is no such thing as a virgin birth. When Mary disclosed to her own relatives the scandalous nature of her miraculous pregnancy, they all said to her: “Go tell that story to the U.S. Marines.” Indeed, the same US Marines fighting today in Iraq to establish the truth behind Christian virginity to pave the way for American style of freedom and democracy. Poch Suzara

Gospel Writers

And set up over his head his accusation, written, THIS IS JESUS THE KING OF THE JEWS. Matt. And the superscription of his accusation was written over, THE KING OF THE JEWS. Mark 15:26 And a superscription also was written over him in letters of Greek,and Latin, and Hebrew, THIS IS THE KING OF THE JEWS. Luke 23:38 And Pilate wrote a title, and put it on the cross. And the writing was JESUS OF NAZARETH THE KING OF THE JEWS. John 19:19 The inspired Gospel writers were either blind with blind faith and could not see clearly, or they just thought that they could be poetic enough as 3 of them reported that Jesus was crucified in Golgotha and the other inspired poet reported that Jesus was crucified in Calvary. Again, there is a dispute as to whether Jesus was born in Bethlehem or in Nazareth, ( 60 miles apart) and the date of his birth has been placed anywhere from 4 b.c. to 7 a.d. Matthew says that Jesus was born “in the days of Herod”, while Luke says it was “When Cyrenius was governor of Syria.” Herod died in 4 b.c., while Cyrenius did not become governor of Syria until 7 a.d.. As so song goes - what’s going on? At any rate, what is most embarrassing for Christianity is that the theologians could easily explain how God could father a Jesus Christ via a virgin Mary, but the same theologians cannot explain how the place where Jesus Christ was born ( Israel ) some 2,000 years ago is today is not a Christian country, but a Jewish State! And to think that ancient Jewish literature have no mention whatsoever of a character named Jesus Christ. Anyway, all is not lost as there is a difference between an awestruck MORON and a dumbstruck MORON. The awestruck MORON understands the bible but does not read it; the dumbstruck MORON reads the bible but does not understand it. Fortunately, however, both have equal chances to be canonized as saints of God. Poch Suzara

Thoughts On Jesus

If we, humans, were all children of God, then Jesus was not the Son of God, but the grandson of God as Mary, His mother, was the daughter of God. The bible relates how Jesus possessed the power to perform miracles. He made the blind see, the lame walk, the deft hear, he got loaves of bread multiplied for the multitude. Jesus walked on water, changed water into wine, cured leprosy, raised the dead back to life. Curiously enough, not a single one of those grateful back-to-life corpses appeared in court to testify that Jesus was a miracle healer; not a trouble-maker. After getting resurrected, they all seem to have disappeared and never heard from again. Crucified on the cross, Jesus cried out: “My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?” Indeed, Jesus could have been more honest with himself if He had instead cried out: “My God, as your only grandson on this earth, this crucifixion ordeal is little bit absurd. How can I die on this cross to save mankind today if I am able to resurrect myself back to life tomorrow?” Jesus was indeed a failure. His divine mission to destroy the devil failed to materialize. The devil is still alive and quite a success living in the Philippines – the only Christian country in Asia inspiring the Philippine government to solve the problems of the nation with prayers. Indeed, the devil is quite proud of his accomplishments; especially since God makes Himself not omni-present, but always omni-absent to pave the way clear for the devil to win more stupid souls for himself, especially stupid souls from the Philippines - the only religiously fucked country in Asia since the 16th century. Poch Suzara

Left Behind Prophecy

I am in receipt of regular email messages from some outfit called LEFT BEHIND PROPHECY. It is the same old gloom and doom scenario trying to put me in fear so that I will join them to support their silly brand of superstition otherwise more popularly known as “religion.” Yes, it is also the same old lack of self-respect. They can email me but I am not allowed email them back. It’s a one way street. It is just like attending church services. Just attend and listen to some religious moron preaching biblical nonsense. No questions allowed. Perhaps, if LEFT BEHIND PROPHECY could rename itself as the RIGHT FORWARD STUPIDITY, it will be more based on reality, and not on fantasy. It is indeed incredible how in this 21st century, the faithful believers have not yet seen through the sanctimonious sacred hogwash written in the holy bible as inspired by a silly divinity. Instead of being masters, they are still the victims of religion. As an atheist, I am not trying to offer you prophecies of doom and gloom. The only thing I can do is to point out to you that there is a method by which everyone can obtain the ability to view objectively, without prejudice, the important issues of society. Thus eliminating religiously biased misconceptions concerning life and the aspirations of the human community. This will lead to the future development of a culture based on the power of reason. That method I am referring to is called “scientific method.” It deals constantly with objective reality. When you ask of me as I am an atheist: what do I have to offer you? The answer is your own MIND – the most precious gift from nature stolen away from you as a child at home and in school. I give you back your precious self as a whole man, standing on your feet, looking fair and square at the world. Its good facts and bad facts. Its beauties and its ugliness. Conquering the world with human intelligence and not kneeling down proud of divine negligence. Doing your own thing. Solving your own problems, having self-esteem and proud of your human capacities, and indeed, if you have any, - intellectual abilities. Poch Suzara

Quickly

Any modern thesaurus will tell you that another meaning for the word quickly is rapidly, speedily, hastily, swiftly, expeditiously, or promptly. In the ancient thesaurus, however, the word quickly meant something the exact opposite. Thus, when Jesus in the bible said: “I will come quickly,” He meant it to be in the next two thousand years or so, if at all, truthfully. Poch Suzara

The Second Coming

Jesus Christ has yet to deliver His promise of a Second Coming. Lucifer already beat Him to it with his 3rd Coming. As for me, I thank both God and the devil I have no problem coming. By the way, how come the Son of God had a Mother, but the devil has none? As a baby - Who delivered the devil into this God-forsaken world? Poch Suzara

The Son of God Jesus

The Son of an All-knowing God Jesus totally ignored to give knowledge to the world, especially the sciences: - astronomy, biology, anthropology, chemistry, geology, psychology, sociology, physics, mathematics and logic to help mankind grow, develop, and mature. Indeed, instead of the power of knowledge, Jesus gave the world his blood, parables, fables, and mysticism. Crucified, however, on the cross, Jesus dramatically cried out: “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.” As if Jesus Himself knew exactly what he was doing? Jesus Promised to come back precisely because He knew not what exactly He was doing! Poch Suzara

I have no Problem Coming

Jesus Christ has yet to deliver His promise of a Second Coming. Lucifer already beat Him to it with his 3rd Coming. As for me, I thank both God and the devil I have no problem coming. By the way, how come the Son of God has a Mother, but the devil has none? Who delivered the devil into this God-forsaken world of ours? Poch Suzara

Failures and Losers

If there were religious leaders who started the religion of the losers and the failures, it was no less than Jesus himself - the Son of God. Consider how Jesus allowed himself to be crucified on the cross by the losers and the failures of his backward community. On the cross, Jesus even cried out to another All-mighty Loser: “My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken me?” Poch Suzara

New Testament

In the New Testament, Jesus admonished his followers: “Be ye as wise as the serpent.” Jesus was referring to the same old serpent of the Old Testament. The snake who could walk and talk and was wise enough to have played the lead role in the fall of Adam and Eve who, to no fault of their own, never got to be exposed to the power of prayer or even to the Revealed Truth. Poch Suzara

The Lord’s Prayer

The faithful believers pray daily with these words: “And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, amen.” If Jesus were truly the Lord worthy of love, respect and admiration, he should have already eliminated evil out of this world. In this way, He need not waste any more time and energy leading his faithful followers into temptation. Poch Suzara

Jesus and Socrates

Socrates – the Greek philosopher was a better man and indeed a wiser thinker than the Jesus – the Son of God. For one thing, Socrates never invented the concept of hell for those who disagreed with his logic. Jesus, however, was more theologic. He said: “But those mine enemies, which would not that I should rule over them, bring hither, and slay them for me.” Luke 19:27. For my part, I have more love and respect for Socrates. He said: The unexamined life is not worth living for man. Poch Suzara

The Three Wise Kings

A wise king usually enjoys power and glory and authority over his people. Imagine a wise king being told that there is a pregnant Virgin Mary in some remote town who will soon deliver a child who will be the king of the world. The wise king not only believes the story, but also goes out of his way to notify two other neighboring wise kings to come along with him to visit with gifts and to adore the child-king of a virgin woman. If you can believe this Three Wise Kings story as true, you might as well believe also that you too can become a very wise king one day. Poch Suzara

Parental Love and Affection

Parental love and affection can never be repaid. It can only be passed on to our own children and they in turn to their own children. Not, however, according to Jesus Christ. In Luke 14:26, Jesus admonished: “If any man come to me, and hate not his father, his mother, and wife, and children, and brethren and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple.” Such were the sacred words uttered by Jesus - the Prince of Peace, the most lovable of men, and the Savior of the mankind. Poch Suzara

A Holy Spirit

A holy spirit existing way out there among the clouds that can actually experience emotional breakdown or psychological injury due to blasphemy from an atheist like me down here does not deserve to be called a holy spirit. In the scientific term, it deserves to be called a psycho-ceramic. Or, in the layman’s language, - a crackpot. Poch Suzara

The New Pope Benedict XV1

It is claimed that the newly elected pope receives an average of 56,000 e-mails a day. As if this were something to brag about. God receives an average of 56,000,000,000 prayers a year. One would think that these two powerful and famous characters would get together and have a heart to seriously introduce here and now - peace on earth and goodwill to all men. Poch Suzara

Failures and Losers

There are a variety of failures and losers in this world. The most prominent are those quite respectable. They made tons of money working for, if not got to be closely associated with, the wealthy land grabbers – among the biggest thieves in this only Christian country in Asia. Thanks to the inheritance from the Spanish Friars of centuries ago, who grabbed land for themselves and for their children and grandchildren and called it - blessings from God on the Philippines. Poch Suzara

G. K. Chesterson

He wrote: “When people cease to believe in God, they don’t believe in nothing, they believe in anything.” On the contrary dear sir, when people cease to believe in God, they are no longer encouraged by fantasy; in fact, they begin to develop a sufficient sense of reality. For my part, when I gradually ceased to believe in God, heavy theological baggage was unloaded off my back making it more comfortable for me to proceed with my happy life, brief and fleeting as it is, on this earth. Poch Suzara

Much Easier

It is much easier to believe than to think. Look at our sick society composed of sick believers. Golly, even our daily newspapers must cater to its readers as they are silly believers, but not to readers as they may be intelligent thinkers. Poch Suzara

What Is An Atheist

What is an Atheist

An atheist is not an object to hate. He is a person just like you to love. The right question to ask therefore is: Who is an atheist?
An atheist accepts that heaven is something for which we should work now – here on earth – for all men together to enjoy.
An atheist accepts that he can get no help through prayer but that he must find in himself the inner convictions and strength to meet life, to grapple with it, to subdue it and to enjoy it.
An atheist accepts that only in knowledge of himself and knowledge of his fellowman can he find the understanding that will help to a life of fulfillment. Therefore, he seeks to know himself and his fellowman rather than to know a god.
An atheist accepts that a hospital should be built instead of a church.
An atheist accepts that a deed must be done instead of a prayer said.
An atheist strives for involvement in life and not escape into death. He wants diseases conquered, poverty vanquished, war eliminated. He wants man to understand and love man. He wants an ethical way of life. He accepts that we cannot rely on a god nor channel action into prayer nor hope for an end of troubles in the hereafter. He accepts that we are - in a great sense – our brothers’ keepers in that we are first, keepers of our own lives; that we are responsible persons, that the job is here and the time is now.
Lastly, an atheist accepts that if we must die, we must die intellecutally sober, and drunk with religious lies. Poch Suzara

St. Augustine and Women

St. Augustine considered women as very inferior to men and blamed Eve for the fall of Adam. Did this famous saint make sense even as a Catholic? You be the judge. Listen to St. Augustine’s confession: “There is another form of temptation, even more fraught with danger. This is the disease of curiosity. . . It is this which drives us on to try to discover the secret of nature, those secrets which are beyond our understanding, which can avail us nothing and which men should not wish to learn. . . In this immense forest, full of pitfalls and perils, I have drawn myself back, and pulled myself away from these thorns. In the midst of all these things which float unceasingly around me in everyday life, I am never surprised at any of them, and never captivated by my genuine desire to study them. . . I no longer dream of the stars.” The time of Augustine’s death, 430 A.D., marks the beginning of the Dark Ages in Europe. From the 5th to the 15th century, the Dark Ages in God’s name and for His glory lasted for a thousand years. And to think that in this 21st century there are still religious fanatics who are in authority leading us back to the Dark Ages. Poch Suzara

What God

I never met God. He was not around the day I was born. He was never at home or in school with me. He never played any games or sports or danced or appreciated music together with ma. He never shared good and bad times together with me. We never laughed or cried together. God never showed up at my marriage nor was he there during the birth of my children. God and I never had breakfast or lunch or dinner together. My own father devoted most of his life to God; I was there at my father's death-bed, but I never saw God around anywhere. Now what reasons should I have in life to always take the side of God who was never there existing for me as a friend or even existing for my loved ones? Poch Suzara