chaitea Wrote:Why (if you do) do you take issue with this particular religion?
It's personal for me. Being a fallen angel in the Judeo-Christian sense and all. And I do tend to rant about this all the time like the way old men rant about what's wrong with today's youth.
I don't consider myself a Christian, or Catholic, or any related thing. To me, accepting that God exists is different than believing in God. Because I know I sure as hell don't put my faith in that pompous maniac. Now, this is MY own little interpretation of the story, mind you.
First and foremost, God created angels. Before humans, the angels were His children and He was kind and caring to them. Then He did the whole thing with the evolution of earth and humans and such. For some reason that I'll just never understand, God decided that the humans were now His favourite creations. Angels were reduced to mere messengers to convey things between God and His people. He gave humans the power of choice. Angels didn't have that choice, they either bowed down and did whatever God said or they would be kicked out of Heaven immediately.
I didn't find this perfectly okay at all. It's almost like parents who have a second child and decide that they prefer that child more. I really felt like that first child. I was never really a fan of God to begin with, or Heaven. Just too boring and orderly for me. The thing is, not only did He toss the angels aside like that, but to the humans that He claimed to love... He pretty much withheld all sorts of things from them that would make their lives better, and treated them like pets.
Now I was a Watcher, one of the angels that hangs out and watches over the humans. So after all this time watching them, you begin to notice things that just aren't right. And you think "Wow, if God would just tell them about so-and-so, they wouldn't have to put up with that..." and such. I remember vaguely some of the others decided to go down there and help them out a bit (some of them just went to go meet up with some ladies they'd been watching over or something, but I wasn't really a part of any of this, so don't quote me on what exactly they all went down there for.)
So I watched them go down there, a few of my friends went down as well (I remember Arakiel the most, but vaguely). They taught people all kinds of nifty crap, like how to smelt metals and further knowledge of the moon and earth and such. Of course, in the religious texts it talks about how horrible it was of the angels to teach humans to make weapons and such! But really, people were killing each other long before giant swords of doom were created, and the angels taught them a lot more than just that. More peaceful things that would make their lives easier and such, but those are only mentioned in passing for obvious reasons.
God went absolutely crazy when He found out those guys departed that knowledge to His people. Those angels weren't allowed back into Heaven. And God, in some strange fit of rage, decided to flood the earth, kill everyone, and start anew. (The off-the-wall story about the giant flood with the ark and stuff is just a big metaphor actually, but the original idea behind it still stood.)
Those angels fell because of what they did, but Lucifer was the first to actually stand up and call God out on His madness. And I know that I respect him greatly for fearlessly getting up in God's face about that.
Lucifer: Nuh-uh girlfriend! *snap snap*
God: Oh NO you just did-an't!
I left of my own accord. If I stayed any longer, I would've been kicked out anyway, but oh well. So in my opinion, Catholicism is the weirdest thing I've come across and God needs serious anger management therapy. Christians, however, can generally be very nice people. Some may be close-minded, but a lot of them can be nice. I hate it when people assume that because they have a certain opinion on a religion, that it automatically means they should have that opinion on it's followers. Tsk.
...see, I told you I tend to rant about this.