A Lesson in Hypocrisy

By The Apostle | August 21, 2007

Discovered this through Stones Cry Out (complete with pictures!) and verified through TruthorFiction.com and Snopes.

LOOK OVER THE DESCRIPTIONS OF THE FOLLOWING TWO HOUSES AND SEE IF YOU CAN TELL WHICH BELONGS TO AN ENVIRONMENTALIST.

HOUSE # 1:
A 20-room mansion (not including 8 bathrooms) heated by natural gas. Add on a pool (and a pool house) and a separate guest house all heated by gas. In ONE MONTH ALONE this mansion consumes more energy than the average American household in an ENTIRE YEAR. The average bill for electricity and natural gas runs over $2,400.00 per month. In natural gas alone (which last time we checked was a fossil fuel), this property consumes more than 20 times the national average for an American home.
This house is not in a northern or Midwestern “snow belt,” either. It’s in the South.

HOUSE # 2:
Designed by an architecture professor at a leading national university, this house incorporates every “green” feature current home construction can provide. The house contains only 4,000 square feet (4 bedrooms) and is nestled on arid high prairie in the American southwest. A central closet in the house holds geothermal heat pumps drawing ground water through pipes sunk 300 feet into the ground. The water (usually 67 degrees F.) heats the house in winter and cools it in summer. The system uses no fossil fuels such as oil or natural gas, and it consumes 25% of the electricity required for a conventional heating/cooling system. Rainwater from the roof is collected and funneled into a 25,000 gallon underground cistern. Wastewater from showers, sinks and toilets goes into underground purifying tanks and then into the cistern. The collected water then irrigates the land surrounding the house. Flowers and shrubs native to the are! a blend the property into the surrounding rural landscape.

HOUSE # 1 (20 room energy guzzling mansion) is outside of Nashville,Tennessee. It is the abode of that renowned environmentalist (and filmmaker) Al Gore.

HOUSE # 2 (model eco-friendly house) is on a ranch near Crawford, Texas. Also known as “the Texas White House,” it is the private residence of the President of the United States, George W. Bush.
- from TruthorFiction.com

Now, I’m not looking to get into any kind of political quagmire here, but the lesson is simple: Walk the walk, if you want people to be listen when you talk the talk.

Back in 2005, the BBC commissioned a poll on what the new “cardinal sins,” aka “deadly” sins ought to be. Hypocrisy was one of them, with 6% of respondents choosing it as the one they would add.

I’m really not sure that Hypocrisyfits in as a “sin” in the Church of Man, though. Sure, it is discrediting, humiliating, and annoying – even infuriating. But I’m not sure its so serious an act as to cut oneself off from one’s fellow man. It can be unintentional, or an area in one’s personal life that, while inconsistent with your preaching, gets overlooked by yourself.

After all, not everyone’s hypocrisy is quite as big as Mr. Gore’s.

I believe hypocrisy ultimately falls better under the heading of “dishonesty” as a sin, which happened to have come in just above hypocrisy at 7%. This would include intentional (or intentionally ignored) aspects of one’s life that do not meet the standards that you set in judging others.

Tags: , , , , , , ,

Topics: In the News | No Comments »

Did you know you have dogma?

By The Apostle | August 20, 2007

This one aptly describes a facet of the Church of Man:

“The modern world is filled with men who hold dogmas so strongly that they do not even know that they are dogmas. It may be said even that the modern world, as a corporate body, holds certain dogmas so strongly that it does not know that they are dogmas.”
-G.K. Chesterton, Heretics

And holding of beliefs so strongly they form dogmas is evidence of a religion, and people sharing that religion is evidence of a church…

Tags: , , , , ,

Topics: Quotations, Regarding the Church of Man | No Comments »

‘The Poor You Shall Have With You Always’

By The Apostle | August 19, 2007

Recently a verse from the Christian Bible has stuck with me in an odd way. “The poor you will have with you always…” (Matthew 26:11).

I’m not so concerned with the context (it has some alleged connection to the whole Mary Magdalene issue) but in that particular phrase.

It can be taken as a gloomy prophesy from a holy or wise man, but for the sake of our universal base, I’ll assume it’s inspired by wisdom, and thus an gloomy insight. What does this say about humanity as a whole, that some 1600-year-old document states that poverty will never be eradicated and, thus far, it has not been proven wrong? For one, it says we’re a greedy, selfish lot.

I remember hearing the world distribution of wealth being represented as a restaurant with 100 customers. They were seated by levels of wealth, and were served accordingly. The rich at one table, the poor at another, and varying classes seated at tables in between the extremes.

The analogy (which I cannot seem to find now) hits home when the service is described – the wealthiest table, with only a handful of people seated there, is overflowing with food, while the poorest table is overcrowded and served a small or modest portion for all to share.

Is it really a matter of the human condition that we cannot share? That there are those of us in America with roofs over our head, ample food for our families, and even cable TV dare allow ourselves to be labeled “poor” in comparison to the poverty that is experiences elsewhere in the world?

Tags: , , , , ,

Topics: For Consideration | No Comments »

More Quotes to Consider from ayn Rand’s ‘Atlas Shrugged’

By The Apostle | August 18, 2007

While I don’t have the time at the moment to expand on these further, I expect to revisit or use these quotes in the future:

“If that’s the price of getting together, then all be damned if I want to live on the same earth with any human beings! If the rest of them can only survive by destroying us, then why should we wish them to survive? Nothing can make self-immolation proper. Nothing can give them the right to turn men into sacrificial animals. Nothing can make it moral to destroy the best. One can’t be punished for being good. One can’t be penalized for ability. If that is right, then we’d better start slaughtering one another, because there isn’t any right at all in the world!”

“What’s the most depraved type of human being?”
“The man without a purpose.”

“You see, Dr. Stadler, people don’t want to think. And the deeper they get into trouble, the less they want to think. But by some sort of instinct, they feel that they ought to and it makes them feel guilty. So they’ll bless and follow anyone who gives them a justification for not thinking. Anyone who makes a virtue – a highly intellectual virtue – out of what they know to be their sin, their weakness, and their guilt.”
“And you propose to pander to that?”
“That is the road to popularity.”

[on finding a reputable philosopher working in a diner]
“What is it? A stunt? An experiment? A secret mission? Are you studying something for some special purpose?”
“No, Miss Taggart. I’m earning a living.” The words and the voice had the genuine simplicity of truth.
“Dr. Akston, I… it’s inconceivable, it’s … You’re… you’re a philosopher … the greatest philosopher living … an immortal name… why would you do this?”
“Because I am a philosopher, Miss Taggart.”

Tags: , , ,

Topics: Quotations | No Comments »

« Previous Entries Next Entries »