Chariots of Fire

Movie Reference 14/31

Bit of a nothing day at work, which started by realising the guys who had put up our whiteboards at work, which were waiting for installation in the new office, and we'd been using just on top of bookcases till now, had managed to install both mine and my roomie's with the text we'd covered them with facing the wall.

That's right. Lovely blank whiteboards facing out the way. To do lists facing in... Maybe it was a memory test - although I got enough new stuff punted my way today that it didn't stay white for long.

No photos during the day, despite a wander in the wet at lunchtime (rather than a blander, given that lack of snapping), so decided just to mess about once home. Got Mel to throw some blueberries for the girls while I tried to get good shots of them running. Margot always managed to be out in front, clearly sprinting in this shot. And managing to levitate in this one. I've got another that I need to photoshop together, but the battery ran out before I had the chance to get the shots off the camera.

I did stitch together the Ascent of Travolta, which just goes to prove dear John's link to a neanderthal past (which may sit uncomfortably with his Scientology leanings). And before anyone thinks this may turn into a Scientology rant (and okay, it normally would) let's look at it in comparison to Christianity and see just how unbelievable it is...

Scientology - we're descended from a race of aliens who landed here thousands of years ago and have 'Thetans' clustered around us which we need to try and remove, with the object of reverence being a sci-fi writer who allegedly once said that the easiest way to become a millionaire was to invent a religion.

Christianity - we're descended from two people with kleptomaniac tendencies, and the objects of reverence are an almighty being who impregnates a virgin and lets people die because of free will, and his son who is killed brutally because of our sins and is resurrected (though belief in resurrection is only for the holy) and all of this is written in a book which may have been imperfectly translated, and is incomplete with various sections of it ruled out, or not making it into the new edition, possibly for political or power gain.

History makes one more believable (to many) than the other. In a thousand years, if Scientology is still around, it will have the same relevance and acceptance as Christianity. And if you don't believe me, remember Christianity was the crackpot religion once upon a time - an upstart offshoot from Judaism, in a world that reveled more in polytheistic beliefs of the Greek, then Roman, empires (which had, after all, the same gods and goddesses with pseudonyms adopted), that belief system (which we now see as daft and steeped in superstition) surviving longer than Christianity has thus far been on the go.

To accept one ideal absolutely you can only truly reject others because you have a 'hunch' (whether intentional or not) that you are right; because you cannot 'know'. You cannot say that one religion has silly ideas that are unbelievable, if your own religion promises that Shiva destroyed the earth so that it may be rebuilt; that Jesus rose from the dead; or that your soul may be carried when you die by an 8-winged angel. How crazy does descent from an alien race sound in comparison?

I don't want proof that god exists; that the Qur'an is the word of God; that the laws of Kashrut lead to greater purity of the soul. I want proof, unequivocal proof, that you are right, and they are wrong. The thing is, until I die, and I'm carried off by that 8 winged angel, or meet St Peter, or attain Nirvana, I'm not going to get that proof. You say I'm taking the risk of not getting it right; I say you're taking the risk of getting it wrong.

Tom-ay-to; tom-ah-to; let's call the whole thing off.