Religion – OmegaBooks

Snippets of The Prodigal Band Trilogy Controversial Topics Series: Episode Two-Religion

Nothing—according to many pundits and persons—is as controversial as these two topics—politics and religion; politics was covered in Episode One of this Controversial Topics Snippet Series within The Prodigal Band Trilogy. Ipso Facto, Episode Two deals with religion.

While the trilogy books do mention Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism and the Druids of Wales (in the context of their practices against their fictional enemies, Crynnwagg and the Crag-Dwellers who were cannibals, whom the Druids ‘tied to oak trees’ as revenge for their rituals against the Druid priesthood youth), only the fictitious New Age cult led by Swami Negran and Cole Blessing, the Church of the Circle of Unity—and its red crystal of Corion, and Christianity are prominent. I made up the Unity Church cult based off the real cults of Hare Krishna (I had a friend years ago victimized by this cult) and Transcendentalism (led by the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, who influenced the Beatles and others).

I look at Christianity in a different way than most Christians and non-Christians do—a true Christian follows the Way, Truth and Life of Jesus Christ and accepts the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God the Father, and puts these ahead of doing what most folks think Christians do—go to church, tithe, hand out religious tracts, go to ‘mission conferences,’ and engage in conservative politics, among other things… and partake in Communion, baptism, marriages in churches, and other rituals that attach to various denominations (Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox, and other groups not affiliated with these). Yes, I was baptized (three times—as a baby, in a church where I was teaching in the 80s during Bible study sessions, and in a local baptistry). Yes, I do Communion at the local non-denominational church. Yes, I was married in a Catholic church (because my parents wanted it that way…I really wasn’t a practicing Catholic then). Yes, I read the Bible (without which I never could have completed this trilogy!). Yes, I pray. But that is not what makes me a committed believer on Christ. And that is not why God gave me the trilogy-writing mission to tell the world why they should consider accepting Christ as Savior. It is commitment to Christ by one’s own free will and then doing as such, not religious doctrines, dogmas, and rituals, that makes one a true Christian.

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Spiritual Snippets Within The Prodigal Band Trilogy: The Creator

These three-novels-in-one The Prodigal Band Trilogy book is listed as fiction. But is the One I call The Creator fiction? Some say yes; I say no. I truly believe The Creator, aka God, exists.

And why The Creator? Folks, I didn’t just come up with these novels strictly on my own; I believe I was divinely inspired. I think He should be called ‘The Creator’ because everything we know about and everything we don’t know about–black holes, for instance….do we really know everything there is to know about black holes?–had to come from something, some entity.

Take the so-called ‘Big Bang’ theory. This ‘big bang’ caused everything to be created, so the theory goes (as far as I know anyway). But what caused the big bang to begin with? Something had to ‘bang’ in a big way, or some things had to get together and ‘bang.’ And did these things that banged come out of nothing? And what comes out of nothing? Nothing!

How is that even possible? How does ‘nothing’ become ‘something’?

And when did this ‘nothing’ become ‘something’?

And for nothing to come out of nothing, nothing would have to be divided by nothing! Since nothing is represented by the number zero… And can one divide by zero? Mathematically, no. And math is truth. And 2+2 will never equal 5.

So when did ‘nothing’ become ‘something’?

That is, how did the dimension of time come to be? We have length, width, height, and time. The Earth exists in these four dimensions. But there are, supposedly, other dimensions we cannot feel, taste, touch, see, hear, and smell. Likely the spirit dimension is one of these, and in my novels, these spirits exist in and outside of time, simultaneously or not.

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Snippets of Reality within The Prodigal Band Trilogy: “Christian” Cults

I guess this ‘cult’ thing is just too interesting! After posting several snippets about the reality of New Age and Cult practices within the entertainment industry which influenced my The Prodigal Band Trilogy I took a break from that, posting about the reality of eating disorders within the fashion industry influencing a main female character.

Now, back to the ‘cult’ thing, only this time the cult is a ‘Christian’ one! That is, it is a cult that claims to be Christian, but is anything but.

Many atheists (one atheist has a YouTube channel which claims Christianity is a cult but Satanism is not) think all religions (except Satanism?) are cults–I know a few atheists, and that is what some of them think. Same with agnostics–and I used to be an agnostic (I could not quite bring myself to becoming atheist but the thought did cross my mind) so I know what I am talking about. But the funny thing is, Christianity is the only ‘cult’ or religion that atheists tend to attack…not Judaism, not Islam, not Hinduism, not Buddhism…they only attack Christianity. I will let the reader figure out why, but I have my own opinion which at this time is neither here nor there. I believe an atheist can think what they want; it’s between them and God (or the “flying spaghetti monster” or whatever).

Folks, I am being facetious, okay?

But while Christianity is a religion (IMHO) not a cult, there are in fact actual cults that claim to be ‘Christian.’ I am not talking about (what some consider cults) Mormonism or Seventh Day Adventism or Jehova’s Witnesses or any denomination or sub-denominations (by the way, I am strictly non-denominational), but actual cults that claim to be ‘Christian’ and are led by actual cult leaders. These cult leaders are actually looked upon by the followers as actual Messiahs or ‘gods.’ These folks live in cult-like cloistered-type communities. ‘Good behavior’ is awarded handsomely and ‘bad’ ones are punished severely. These bogus Christian cults are in many if not all nations.

The one that inspired the bogus ‘Christian’ cult in my trilogy is based on a movie I saw in the 1990s about a supposedly Christian cult in a rural region of Quebec, Canada. I do not remember the name of this cult but the name of the movie was “Savage Messiah.” This movie was based on an actual event where the cult leader was convicted of murder and other crimes. The cult I bring up in my books is loosely based on the notions set forth in the movie, but in the case of the books one form of punishment is getting hit over the head with a hard-cover Bible. A true Christian group, a true Body of Christ, would never do such a thing!

For the sake of making a simple and quick point, I will only include one snippet instead of the usual three or four. I could get more graphic, but that would be too much of a spoiler if you know what I mean (and if you want to read a much more dastardly snippet about this bogus Christian cult, buy the trilogy!

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