What we’ve done, for some strange reason, is make Jesus into the one who could keep us from pain later. We’ve missed the entire transformative message! Now it is only a message of gambling and bargaining with God, and attending religious services, often for people with low-level resentment who clearly do not want to be there (ask any parish priest!). Somehow, Jesus becomes the great problem-solver and answer-giver for the next world and not primarily the one who teaches us how to live with peace and freedom in this world. It’s fire-insurance religion instead of a banquet right now. That is a
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