The world is replete with conflicts between various governments and various religious factions. Author and retired educator H. Kenneth MacLennan has come to realize that these conflicts will not be resolved until the believers of these religions and governments better understand the true nature of those things in which they believe. Everyman's Prayer Book is a humorous, satirical, and a sometimes serious look at the nature of how democratic governments and their courts using many of the same pillars and elements of the legal definition of witchcraft (crafty science, sorcery, and fortune telling) to procure tax payments from believers as Christianity uses in seeking offerings from believers. In considering the nature of democratic governments and their courts, you will find important truths and insights into human nature. Those insights and truths will be revealed through satirizing, ridiculing, lampooning, skewering, deflating, dissecting, embarrassing, undressing, unmasking, and exposing the illusion that the crafty science of democracy represents the people, and that there is such a thing as real justice in the courts of democratic governments. Without faith in the existence and power of God, although the concept of faith is without foundation and the opposite of reason, believers would not accept the power of religions or democratic governments and their courts.
Everyman's Prayer Book
Democratic Governments and Their Courts: The Other Great Religions
By H. Kenneth MacLennaniUniverse LLC
Copyright © 2014 H. Kenneth MacLennan
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4917-3891-7Contents
PREFACE, ix,
INTRODUCTION, xi,
PART 1 THE PILLARS OF CHRISTIANITY IN SEEKING OFFERINGS FROM BELIEVERS, 1,
INTRODUCTION, 3,
THE CHRISTIAN BUSINESS PLAN, 6,
CHRISTIANITY'S EIGHT FOUNDATION PILLARS, 11,
CHRISTIANITY'S THREE MARKETING PILLARS, 18,
THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH REVISES ITS BUSINESS PLAN, 20,
THE BIBLE AS GOD'S LAWS, 22,
CHRISTIANITY'S CRAFTY SCIENCE, 25,
WHO IS RECEIVING THE GREATEST BENEFIT?, 27,
CHRISTIAN SCHOLARS TELL A DIFFERENT STORY, 28,
RELIGION AND THE ADVERTISING LAW, 31,
RELIGION AS SPECULATION AND MAKE BELIEVE, 33,
Religion as a Security Blanket, 33,
Religion as a Social Club, 34,
SERMON ON THE MOUNT, 38,
PART 11 THE PILLARS OF DEMOCRATIC GOVERNMENTS IN SEEKING THE PAYMENT OF TAXES FROM BELIEVERS, 43,
INTRODUCTION, 45,
THE FIVE FOUNDATION PILLARS OF DEMOCRATIC GOVERNMENTS, 50,
THE THREE MARKETING PILLARS OF DEMOCRATIC GOVERNMENTS, 66,
WHAT IF A CHRISTIAN GOVERNMENT?, 69,
PART 111 THE PILLARS OF DEMOCRATIC GOVERNMENT COURTS IN PROVIDING JUSTICE FOR BELIEVERS, 73,
INTRODUCTION, 75,
THE FOUR FOUNDATION PILLARS OF DEMOCRATIC GOVERNMENT COURTS, 77,
THE THREE MARKETING PILLARS OF DEMOCRATIC GOVERNMENT COURTS, 82,
PART 1V RECOMMENDATIONS, 85,
SECULAR LAW SUPREME, 87,
FREEDOM OF RELIGION, 87,
TRANSPARENCY AND ACCOUNTABLILITY, 88,
GOVERNMENT SUBSIDY, 88,
DIRECT DEMOCRACY, 89,
WORLD GOVERNMENT, 89,
MEDIA REPORTING, 90,
FINANCIAL RESOURCES, 90,
CONCLUSION, 90,
APPENDIX A - THE CHRISTIAN VIRTUES, 93,
APPENDIX B - AN ODE TO OUR SUN, 98,
APPENDIX C - RELIGIOUS DISCRIMINATION, 100,
APPENDIX D - EVOLUTION OF THE UNIVERSE, 102,
BIBLIOGRAPHY, 105,
CHAPTER 1
PART 1 THE PILLARS OF CHRISTIANITY IN SEEKING OFFERINGS FROM BELIEVERS
INTRODUCTION
Scientists estimate our world to be about 13 plus billion years old, and our planet Earth about 4.5 billion years old. Single cell life did not begin until about 3.7 billion years ago, shortly after the creation of our planet Earth. Complex multi-cellular life in the form of animals-our precursors, known as tetrapods, with four limbs, that end in a maximum of five fingers and toes, only arose about 400 million years ago; early man six million years ago, and modern man, homo sapiens, only came upon the scene about 200,000 years ago. (Appendix D)
It was only after Homo sapiens, started to move out of Africa, and within the last 10,000 years, after the last major ice age, with the invention of tools, and the domestication of plants and animals, that modern day society began in the fertile crescent (Middle East), and sections of eastern United States, Central and South America, India, China, and Africa, when hunters of fish, fowl, and animals, and gatherers of plants, and fruit, were able to establish small villages or communities, eventually leading to larger chiefdoms and empires. In the early Roman and Greek empires we find the first worship of Gods, such as- our Sun, and the other physical features of our universe.
It was only after the invention of writing about five thousand years ago, that we find the birth of Judaism- worship of one God, in the likeness of man. It was not until about two thousand years ago, that we find the birth and worship of Jesus, and the rise of Christianity, and about fourteen hundred years ago, a revelation from God to Muhammad, and the birth of the Islamic religion. It was only within the last five hundred years, with the invention of the printing press (1450), that the alleged sacred books of Judaism, Christianity and Islam- the Torah, Bible and Koran, became public knowledge to the masses in competition with each other for offerings from believers, based upon claims of revelations from God.
With the invention of the printing press, we find the spread of knowledge- the beginning of the enlightenment of the masses; the Protestant reformation (1517); Copernicus (1473-1543) plotting the movement of the planets in the heavens, where he believed that the Sun was the center of the universe, and not the Earth, enraging the early Christian Church. The Roman Catholic Church published the Index of Prohibited books to protect the faith and morals of the faithful from reading of immoral books, or works containing theological errors, of which such errors included some scientific works by leading astronomers, such as -Johannes Kepler on the work of Copernicus. In 1600 A.D. Giordano Bruni was burned at the stake by the early Christian Church for suggesting that there were planets and suns in the universe other than our Sun.
In 1609, with the invention of the telescope, and with the improvements made by Galileo in its lens, Galileo was able to plot the actual movement of our sun and planets, and was able to confirm the work of Copernicus that the Sun, indeed, was the center of our local universe, and not the Earth, further enraging the Church, and being placed under house arrest. It was during this same period that we find the colonization of North and South America by the English, French and Spanish, and the founding of the United States of America, Canada, Mexico, and the other countries of Central and South America.
In 1859 Charles Darwin published his work on the origin of species, providing a scientific explanation for the evolution of man by natural selection, and the Church's claim that the first man and woman was Adam and Eve, became to be questioned. It was during this same period in our history, that Sir Isaac Newton provided his theory of gravity. Later in the early 1900's Albert Einstein confirmed Newton's theory of gravity, but provided a different explanation of gravity- that gravity resulted from the motion of the stars and planets in the heavens warping the space of those same stars and planets.
It was not until 1923, when Edwin Hubble discovered that there were other constellations, galaxies, and suns outside of our local universe, and the world was much greater than originally thought, as Giordano Bruni had earlier speculated, and that the Church sinned in 1600 in burning Giordano Bruni at the stake for suggesting that there were other planets and suns in the universe. It was not until Hubble's later discovery that the universe was expanding, that it was determined that neither the Sun, nor Earth were at the center of the universe, as with an expanding universe there could be no center of the universe.
It was not until 1964 that scientists were able to find evidence that the universe had a beginning, known as the Big Bang, in the discovery of a faint radiation hiss throughout the whole universe, where it was theorized that the universe began as a tiny bubble at high temperature, experienced a burst of inflation, expanded, and as the universe expanded, it began to cool, currently to a temperature 2.73 degrees above absolute zero. It was only recently with improvements in the telescope that scientists have been able to see the light, that was emitted shortly after the Big Bang. Scientists now believe that they have found the Higg's boson, the "God particle" that provides mass to the electron and proton, and all the other particles in the universe, including life.
Does the evidence for the Big Bang mean that there is no basis for the speculation and...
