[Overpaid Slacker]

I eat cheeseburgers. As often as I can, in fact. God, according to Old Testament scholars, forbids mixing "milk and meat".

I can't believe The Big G really cares whether I have ink. He gave me spots, for Heaven's sake. He cares if I play connect the dots?!

I think literalists take the Bible as the "Word of God", and they're missing the true importance of the Book. It is, to me, an expression of earnest, faithful people attempting to conceive of, explain and relate to God. The words are mens'. How many words did Jesus write in the NT? Are Paul's and/or John's words "God's"? Even if written decades after Jesus' death, in Greek, by people that could not have been present at the time the events occurred?

What about the apocrypha -- several "books" (like the Gospel of Thomas) were widely considered part of the Bible for a long time, until ecumencial or other councils decided that such books really weren't "on point" for the political, social and/or theological message that was convenient. Were they omitting the Word(s) of God? What constitutes our Bible (and who is "our", anyway -- Catholics, Protestants, etc.), especially the New Testament is the result of political decisions by the respective hierarchies of the religion(s), made (in most cases) hundreds and hundreds of years ago.

I can have faith in the message w/o indulging the obvious fiction that God "wrote" the message.

One of my tattoos was inspired by a great book -- How the Irish Saved Civilization, and it is a cross (Celtic, natch) celebrating both the devout Catholic heritage, and the still lively pagan heritage of the Irish. Unlike most of Europe, Catholicism didn't eraditcate the indigenous Irish culture, as much as it was absorbed into it.

But, hey, don't get inked if you don't want to.

JP