Template:WCR:Week 11, 2008
(Extracted from http://wiki.mindcloud.org/wiki/WCR:Week_11%2C_2008 ;-D)
Friday March 14 has obviously been and gone, but the topic of this church sermon is just too amazing to just let it slip by and be forgotten.
Some people might think "What the fuck!?" upon seeing this sign, and have no idea whatsoever as to what it could be about. Some may think "Ah yes! I know exactly what they're saying!!".
Those of us who still have no idea what this is about could begin to speculate. But fortunately we don't have to. The internet can speculate for us.
After less than a second of speculation, the internet tells us that the topic of this sermon is probably the same topic covered in a book of a similar name, which someone at this church may have read on the bus one day, or something, and had thought to themselves; "Yes, this explains everything!". This ejaculatory surge of insight into the workings of our world may have been so strong that it encouraged the reader to venture upon a course to have a church sermon dedicated to the topic, so that others can experience the warm, runny feel of cognitive dissonance being crushed and your pre-existing belief's being confirmed.
It was either that, or there is some other equally enlightened individual touring around the country promoting these ideas.
"But exactly what are the concepts and arguments put forth in this book?", the curious mind may ask. The precise arguments of the book are best conveyed and illustrated by stealing a few snippets from the largely glowing reader reviews on Amazon.com:
"A Spiritual Battle of Epic Proportions"
WOW What a eye opener! <@> <@> (emoticon eye thingys by original author)
GREAT Book! Blows the LID Off of the TRUTH About Aliens!
Chilling and Profound
God = Science, or Science = god? Find out here!
All very exciting you might say, but not very descriptive. Until we see these ones:
Finally, a book about UFOs/Aliens that gets it right. I've been saying this for years: Aliens are actually demonic beings, under command by Satan himself to deceive the world and turn people away from Jesus Christ.
It'll make a believer out of you! At first I was skeptical. Who really believes in aliens? What insights could Mr. Bates possibly offer on such a clear-cut topic? How surprised I was!
UFOs + Evolution=Devil's ploy to deceive the gullible masses. Now, this really boils down to a cosmic battle for the hearts and minds of men, and the Archdeceiver knows well that in order to deceive people into accepting a different account of Creation and human history he must first invade the halls of academia and those individuals without a biblical worldview (hence their rejection of all things to do with the God of creation, Jesus the Christ) to make us believe two things: 1. If evolution happened on earth, it could have happened elsewhere, hence the Genesis account is invalidated and there is no point in reading God's word, let alone taking what it says seriously 2. We're "not alone" in this "evolving" universe, but there are other civilizations of living beings in our galaxy who want to "make contact" with us. Having established these lies, Satan takes advantage of man's gullibility and fallen nature so as to have us believe anything, including the following: 1. There is no God. 2. There are no spirits, especially demons as evil as he is (this also applies when contacting the "dead").
So the premise of the book Alien Intrusion: Ufos and the Evolution Connection by Gary Bates, and subsequently the likely topic of the church sermon, is basically that Aliens, Ufo's and Evolution are all part of some elaborate ploy of Satan et al. to over throw the Earth etc etc. Most fundamentalist Christians know well the end of this story, but I bet there's no way they could have foreseen the familiar ending given such a creative start.
When it comes to ufo's, aliens, and all that jazz, peoples' beliefs are divided largely into three main camps:
- 1) Aliens and ufo sightings are all real, they have been visiting us and abducting people, pretty much all ufo sightings are Alien spacecraft.
- 2) Aliens and ufo sightings might be real, although most encounters are not genuine alien spacecraft/abuctions, but there are some difficult ones to explain and these could be real aliens.
- 3) Aliens and ufo's are most likely not caused by genuine alien encounters and alien spacecraft visiting earth, and these experiences are better explained by the quirks of human perception and psychology, cultural expectations that strange things in the sky are aliens, individuals playing pranks or attempting scam people, or people just outright lying about their experience.
There is now a fourth camp:
- 4) Aliens and ufo's are real, observable phenomena and experiences, but they are in fact an elaborate ploy (that also includes the theory of evolution) by the evil forces of Satan and his demons, to achieve various nefarious ends.
| Theological importance | 5 --Reminds us all that Satan is still out there doing his thing, and people need to be constantly vigilant. |
| Insanity | 3 --Pretty crazy from the outside sure, but it all makes sense if you're just willing to have an open mind ! ! ^_^ |
| Entertainment Value | 4 --A gripping tale. This should be turned into a movie. |
| Cognitive Dissonance | 6 --"You want answers?" "I want the truth" "You can't handle the truth!" link |
| Overall | 5 |
| Verdict | A high score this week. I think this sets new highs for the levels that people can go to skew information gathered from their observations and experiences to support pre-existing, deeply held convictions. |
