The Flying Spaghetti Monster

Often, at night, I spend my time perusing the internet, looking for things that are interesting or funny, so as to keep myself light-spirited before I slip into a gentle, highly medicated slumber. I've found my dreams are more pleasant that way.

Tonight's post is on something I ran across on wikipedia- not the most reliable source of information, but sometimes it can be fairly entertaining. The article, located HERE, is about a new type of....parody religion. Now, I'm not condoning the degradation of any religion, I just found it hilarious that someone would add as their deity a "spaghetti and meatballs" kind of guy, and have people who follow this "religion" call themselves pastafarians. Believe it or not, there are more followers to this religion than you think!

All this stems from a ruling to present intelligent design in schools in Kansas, and a letter to a school board suggesting that pastafarianism be allotted the same amount of time as evolution and intelligent design. Really, the idea of evolution versus creation is pretty dangerous territory, but this just added a satirical punch to the mix. Surprisingly, it actually caught on! And they end all their prayers with R'amen.....great double entendre, pastafarians!

I believe the whole purpose of this is that anyone- including the creator of the flying spaghetti monster- could be correct about how the universe came to be. This is a very controversial topic- I take the agnostic theism stance, meaning I believe there is a higher power, but I don't give any attributes such as gender, race, or even mannerisms. Some people don't like that, but that's ok, because in my beliefs, I am NOT saying they are wrong. I am allowing the variance of my higher power because who knows who is really "correct"?

The bible was written thousands of years ago- by humans who said that God spoke to them. This may or may not be true. I can't say, I wasn't there. Perhaps they were hallucinating schizophrenics with really good writing (although this is doubtful, it's possible, anything is possible really). People have been on the planet for thousands of years, we all know that. The bible starts with the six days of creation and the seventh day of rest.

I think here is a time to post a joke that I heard, which might give a little perspective to how I see that.

Man: In heaven, how much is a penny?
Higher Power: As much money as you can imagine.
Man: In heaven, how long is a second?
Higher Power: Billions of years
Man: Can I have a penny?
Higher Power: In a second......

As humans, we have no perception of time outside of the way we define it, where planets orbit the sun, and the earth spins, day turns to night and back to day again. In heaven, time could be measured exceedingly differently. So, when the bible states that God created the world in seven days.....how were those days measured? Revolutions of the sun? God's watch? Each day could have been thousands of years as we measure it. Thereby giving time for different species to develop certain characteristics, live, and die off before humans ever arrived on the scene.

So could there be some evidence of evolution WITHIN creationism? That's a point of view that I rarely, if ever, hear considered- most people are strong in their believe that it is one or the other, but the two cannot coincide. Being close-minded leaves so many people stuck with what they believe in (although they usually don't mind that), and I think the world could use some more open-minded people.

Do I believe evolution should be in schools? Why not? Things do evolve, even if the earth wasn't formed by evolution. Do I believe creationism should be in schools? Well, I believe children should have a fair chance to look at all the sides of the story, not just one, and make up their own decision. Religion, though, is not science, and should by no means be masked as such. It should be an option for those that choose to open their mind to alternate beliefs. Should the government have the right to decide? I'm not going to comment on that one, because sometimes, government intervention is good, sometimes it's not, depending on who is in charge (regardless of party lines).

Honestly, my biggest thing is having an open mind and being an accepting person. If you don't allow opportunities, then sometimes you'll miss something major that could have been good for you. I, personally, don't want to miss out on anything great. Some are afraid of this- that's ok, because they're doing what's comfortable for them, and I have no right to tell them they need to think a certain way- another thing I'm open-minded about. Nobody should be forced to be open or close-minded, although being open-mindedness is a good quality to have. It's the way to get the most opportunities out of life. We all want a better life, right?

I have to say, though, that the flying spaghetti monster was a great way of capturing peoples' attention, and expanding on it makes it hilarious. It may seem offensive to those with strong religious views, but it's really just a method of trying to get people to see other opportunities out there. I am not, however, converting to pastafarianism.