Reply #7: The question is not silly at all [View All]

[kcwayne]

I had a discussion once with a scholar that had studied the early days of the Catholic church, with particular interest in how certain "laws" became embedded in the Church's dogma.

At one point in time many followers believed that the most logical way to guarantee a good eternal life was to seek absolution for their sins, do pentance, and then commit suicide, before they had a chance to sin again. It was large enough of a problem that the Church then made suicide a sin.

The response to that was to kill your newborn children so they could enter heaven before they sinned. The horror of this, along with falling revenues from tithing because the farms were not as prosperous with fewer people elicited the "go forth and multiply" edict.

It strikes me as entirely logical for someone to want to get into their heaven ASAP, especially if their life is miserable. Of course it would be a lot more logical if one got their instructions about heaven directly from their God, and not conveyed through some perfumed and big haired dandy on television. It might make the roadmap a little more of a sure thing than a big assed sucker bet.