Dearest Rachel –
Sometimes, I don’t know what to do or think about Daniel. Some of the views he listens to and believes seem so ‘out there’ that I wonder where they come from. I realize just about any kind of crazy idea can be found out there on the internet, but how is it that he’s come to settle on this collection of ideas? And why is it that, when either I or the folks make any attempts to dissuade him from the line of thinking that he’s been put on, he’s far more likely to put stock in these internet preachers and ‘prophets’ (as well as the pundits and press people) than in anything we might say to him?
The funny thing is, we’re more or less on the same side of the aisle. It’s just that he seems to be so far to the right that he makes me look like a flaming liberal in comparison. And I cannot fathom how he got here – or how to get him back. Much of what he believes in would require me to prove various negatives in order to debunk them, which, as you know, are logical impossibilities.
Grossly oversimplified, he appears to believe that virtually everyone with any level of power in the world – be it the power of political office, great wealth, bureaucratic position, scientific discovery or influence through celebrity status (or any combination thereof) – has achieved that power through literal sacrifice. Not so much the expenditure of time, effort or money, or the neglect of one’s relationships in pursuit of one’s dreams of fame and/or fortune; no, I’m talking literal sacrifice, to literal ‘gods.’ I’m talking black magickal rites, including the consumption of various bodily fluids (often not their own) as part of these rites, in homage and supplication to these ‘gods.’ ‘Gods’ such as Ba’al, Chemosh and Marduk, who in particular demand child sacrifice. Even our bastions of scientific research, such as CERN, with the Large Hadron Supercollider, are built upon ruins of ancient temples (in CERN’s case, one evidently dedicated to Apollo, despite the distance between Greece and Switzerland). Forget the Illuminati, the Bilderburg Group and the Freemasons; this is some grand unifying theory that combines them all into one great big evil cabal.
As far as I’m concerned, this is far beyond tinfoil hat territory. At this point, he’s practically encased himself bodily in aluminum foil, like those corpses when they are prepared to be put into cryonic stasis for revival in however long it takes for their fatal disease to be rendered curable. And I don’t know how to thaw him out. Oh, I can offer my opinions on these subjects, but to him, they’re just proof that I’m not ready to hear the truth. Not that it matters to me, as I’m not one to be exposed by this truth, but still…
For my part, none of this makes sense. Most of the alleged ‘gods’ being ‘worshipped’ and sacrificed to that he cites are part of pantheons from long-gone polytheistic religions. Indeed, polytheism itself (apart from Hinduism, which I’ll admit certainly has a great deal of followers) seems to be mostly off the world stage. It may be my Western, Judeo-Christian monotheistic upbringing, but it seems to me to be axiomatic that a ‘god’ who cannot take care of everything is no ‘god’ at all. Sure, our Catholic siblings have their patron saints, who are supposedly in charge of their little worldly departments, but that appears to be because they (the faithful, not the saints themselves) believe we humans are not worthy to approach the throne of God on our own merits (in which case, they aren’t exactly wrong), and need someone to mediate between us and Him (again, that’s quite true, but that’s Jesus’ role, after all). Most of the polytheistic religions – the Kemetics, led by Ra and Osiris; the Canaanites, led by Ba’al and Ashtoreth; the Babylonians, led by Marduk and Tiamet; the Greeks and Romans, led by Zeus/Jupiter and the rest; the Norse, led by Odin and his family; the Aztecs, including Huitzilopochtli and Quetzalcoatl – are effectively extinct, largely because of this understanding that a less-than-‘omni’-God isn’t a god at all. Even if one were to claim these extinctions were simply because the civilization(s) that worshipped these pantheons were wiped out by the more powerful Western nations, doesn’t that just further prove the impotence of these alleged gods, since they were unable to protect their devotees? In which case, why would any of them be worthy of following now?
Now, Daniel claims these people are infact worshipping and serving actual demons, who go by the names of those old gods, and do have and can provide real power. And there have been people who have done and continue to do so, but folks like Aliester Crowley and Anton LeVay made no secret of their following of such beings. Why would there be such a need for secrecy, especially if this is the ticket to the prosperity and notoriety they and so many others crave? If nothing else, there are those who have come to power and influence – both for good (Billy Graham, Mother Theresa) and for evil (Shoko Asahara, any money-grubbing televangelist) – through religion; why not bring this out into the open and amass followers through the demonstration through the appeal of this raw power? It doesn’t add up to me.
Although, as far as I can tell, the devil’s best weapon is in convincing people that he (and his Opponent) doesn’t exist. We are men of reason, our species tells ourselves; we are beyond such silly superstitions. We have studies to do, money to make, policies to enact and performances to rehearse for and put on; we have no time for any old-timey religion. Indeed, I suspect that most self-made men, if they have faith in anything, are likely as not to worship their creator above all, and I mean that with a small ‘c.’ In other words, we consider ourselves to be our own gods. This goes back to one of the aspects of the forbidden fruit; that it was alleged to make the eater ‘wise’ like God Himself. All of which flies in the face of the idea of a pagan temple being refurbished and restored for use by the likes of the CERN crowd, in particular. When knowledge is your god, who needs another?
But none of these arguments can persuade him to give up this Ba’al game.
The weird thing is that he (through the word of these online preachers) is convinced that out former president was on a mission to discover and expose these Ba’al worshippers for who they are, so that humanity could purge them, at least from power. And yet, he too comes from great wealth, which would suggest he’s as much a part of the cabal as any of them. Moreover, it would seem that he has actually endorsed at least one such alleged devotee for high office, which Daniel admits is a puzzlement, because it confounds this entire theory. But it seems the contradictions in his story doesn’t seem to prevent him from buying into it. All I can hope for is that he doesn’t pour too much money into it; bad enough that it chews up so much of his time and interest.
What’s worse is that he can’t focus on the things that God has done, so much he dwells upon the thoughts of ‘what’s to come.’ Late last week, when he was out with Kerstin, and I was home alone, they went to some meeting with a preacher, supposedly at the Methodist Campgrounds. It turned out to be at somebody’s home (and I don’t know whether was at the camp grounds or not, but it really doesn’t matter that much). The pastor was telling about having been to visit every one of the 50 state capitals, and meeting with various government officials at each of them. From his perspective, they seemed receptive to his message and plans, suggesting a certain level of revival is already underway. But as Daniel was relating all this to me, the narrative slowly shifted focus towards the punishment of those currently in charge that are leading the country down the wrong path. I had to stop him and ask him “Was this something that the preacher you were listening to was saying?” at which point, he had to acknowledge that it wasn’t, but he ‘knew’ it was coming on the heels of this revival, as much a part of it as anything that was being said.
Hanlon’s Razor instructs us not to generally attribute to malice what could easily be due to stupidity or incompetence, and I really think that’s what we’re dealing with here. I’m not a fan of our so-called betters – I would believe in the threat of climate change more, for example, if the folks that lecture us about it didn’t fly about in private jets all the time, or buy oceanfront property (although maybe Greta walks across the Atlantic to dress down the nations at the U.N.) – but the idea that they’re doing unspeakable things to children seems ridiculous. And even if it were true that our alleged leaders were a.) as evil as all that, and b.) this ‘truth’ is on the verge of exposure, it seems that there are many people, some with a great deal of intelligence and education, who would be willing to ignore any and all of it simply because of their animus for the individual who is expected to be exposing this ‘truth.’
***
Honey, I don’t know if in your current state you have all the answers to the universe and existence, as bestowed upon you by God as you arrive in heaven. For all I know, you may simply be, as both Jesus and Paul refer to it (however figuratively or not) as ‘asleep,’ awaiting the final trumpet just as much as we who are alive. Either way, you’re unable to give us the answers that we seek about the future, as if this world really matters any in light of eternity. This will all pass eventually, and I can only hope the same goes for his interest in these supposed ‘prophecies,’ especially should they not come true. Until then, I have to let him go and do his own thing (he’d continue on this path regardless if I were to forbid him from it – ‘must obey God rather than men,’ and all that), and hopefully he will discover the truth in due time.
In the meantime, sweetheart, please keep an eye out for each of us, and wish me luck; I’m going to need it.
Letters to Rachel 