Is a scene from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. In the scene, Indiana and his father travel to Berlin just before the start of WWII in order to retrieve his father’s diary. While there, they witness a book burning in the town square, with hundreds of people cheering as the Nazis pile books upon the flames. Indiana’s father, played by Sean Connery, turns to him and says, “My boy, we are pilgrims in an unholy land.”
That accurately describes how I feel each and every day when I awaken. Knowing that it will be yet another day of dealing with the lunacy which has overtaken not just my country, but people I have known for years - people I recently thought of as friends and family. I begin to feel like Charlton Heston in The Omega Man - the last sane person in a world gone haywire.
I read an article recently while researching something, an article with which I would normally not agree as it was written by a very religious person - not that I have anything against religious people, just that many of them seem to be very much against me. I thought of this article just now because it too referenced the quote from Indiana Jones regarding pilgrims.
But taken in a different context than the author intended, the article actually spoke to me. The author wrote thus:
But you know what the truth of the matter is? If you are a Christian, you ARE a pilgrim in an unholy land. Seriously. Part of the definition of the word “pilgrim” is- “one who journeys to foreign lands”. We are living in a foreign land, regardless of what “land” we live in. Why? Because we are called to be IN the world, but not OF the world. We are called to be counter-cultural. And I KNOW that sounds crazy to some. Abby Hoffman was counter-cultural. Lenny Bruce was counter-cultural. The hippies of Haight-Ashbury were counter-cultural. And we are NOTHING like them…are we?
Well…yes and no. We probably don’t look, act or dress like them. BUT…we are called to speak out against that which is not of God. We are called to NOT simply “give in” and be like everybody else but instead be who God calls us to be, regardless of what others think. We are called to stand our ground. We are called to be pilgrims…in an unholy land.
The key lines here being, ”We probably don’t look, act, or dress like them. BUT…we are called to speak out”.…. “We are called to NOT simply ‘give in’ and be like everybody else but instead to be who God calls us to be, regardless of what others think. We are called to stand our ground. We are called to be pilgrims…in an unholy land.”
Isn’t amazing how that quote fits our own situation? Yes, we are counter-cultural, in that we are opposed to the culture of MAGA, the culture of Trumpism. And as such, we are travelers in a foreign land - pilgrims in a land not of our making. But a land in which we are called to be who God made us, rather than what society would have us be.
In the words of Martin Luther, “Here I stand. I can do no other. God help me.”
Be that pilgrim in an unholy land.
Comments
I respect your feelings
But seeing as I don't believe in gods of any sort, how about nobody called you it was simply a random chemical happening that caused who you are and perhaps you speak out for the injustice you see perpetrated against others like you. That can be a powerful feeling as most of us are mostly nice people who care about others and one mad monkey in the white house can affect millions around the world, he already is. Damn him.
Angharad
I was raised as a Lutheran…….
But early on in life I became disenchanted with organized religion. My father’s family was Episcopalian, but the only group I ever met who were worse hypocrites than his family were the Baptists who lived all around them. My mother’s side were Lutheran, hence why we were raised as such. They weren’t as bad as my father’s family, but you could still hear many of them standing on the steps of the church after services gossiping and ripping apart their neighbors.
Classic Sunday Christians.
I do know that if you go back a few more generations there were some true Christians in my father’s family, as can be evidenced by their works and legacies. But somewhere along the line the chain was lost.
As for me, organized religion lost any hold on me in my early teen years, and I lost my faith in any God in my twenties while in the service. One can only see so much, live through so much, before the blinders fall off.
I had a professor in college, a very intelligent and learned man, who told me that even science proved that there was some greater force which sat over everything. And that is what many refer to as God. Of course, his proof, his evidence if you will, of the existence of “God” or “Gods” was based on the “laws” of science - which are simply postulations which we have found to be true, but we cannot actively prove will never be broken. Entropy and Enthalpy being good examples that he used to support his claim.
As for me, I suppose I am an agnostic. I don’t believe, but I don’t know, and therefor cannot be sure. But something made me the way I am; whether outside force or random collection of chemicals, I am still me and can be no other.
D. Eden
“Hier stehe ich; ich kann nicht anders. Gott helfe mir.”
Dum Vivimus, Vivamus
I'm very tempted
This isn't the place or the forum, whatever, to discuss religion, but you've opened the door. I won't talk about what it takes to be a Christian, because, unless I'm talking to like minded people, I get accused of try to force my beliefs down everyone's throat. I presume that's because for me there is no debate.
What I will do is try to debunk the notion the being Christian has anything to do with religion. Too many denominations are legalistic. The say, the Bible says you should do this and the Bible says you shouldn't do that. Then they go about judging a persons Christianity by how well they follow the do's and don'ts.
That's not what being a Christian is about. As a Christian, I too don't like organized religion. That said, I do attend church. That's because I found a group of like minded people who gather on Sunday for fellowship. But I digress.
Being a Christian is a person relationship with God and has very little to do with what you should do or don't do. I have too many instances in my life that smack of a God that interacts with me on a personal level; and I'm not talking about how I feel, I'm talking about where God stepped in and did something physical that I can't explain any other way..
If anyone is interested in hearing my testimony, I'll be glad to share it in a PM. But in this post I've probably overstepped the bounds of what should be talked about.
'Nuff said.
Hugs
Patricia
Happiness is being all dressed up and HAVING some place to go.
Semper in femineo gerunt
Ich bin ein femininer Mann