Mary May

The month of may, according to most Christian religions, celebrates Mary, the mother of Christ. I, for one, love this concept. I love everything to do with Mary and the idea of Christ, not only being, you know, Christ-ish, but also being someone's kid. Yeah yeah, He's the son of God, but he was also HER FREAKING KID. Certainly, He was probably a pretty good baby and most likely didn't have a bad case of the terrible twos but even still...She was a Mother going through the same thing all mother's deal with on a daily basis: Raising a human. Feeding, caring, diaper changing, kissing boo boos, trying to get her kid to go to sleep (and stay in their own stinking bed)..
Just something to think about. I'll stretch my mind for a good "next up topic". I think it will be something Mormony..hint hint..Awesome Utah Road Trip?

Emoto Water Needs New Glasses

Water makes up 70% of this planet, and roughly 70% of our bodies. We drink water to nourish ourselves, flush out toxins, and stay alive. Obviously, we rely on clean water for our existence. But, is clean water enough? How about happy water? With good self esteem? What about the religion of water?
Enter Dr. (of something) Masaru Emoto.
I used to work at a bookstore...You know, those places where people used to go to buy books-no, not e-books, pieces of paper with words printed in ink and bound together. Yes, they still make them...and one of my favorites in the store was Masaru Emoto's The Hidden Messages in Water. Emoto, spiritual guru and ultimate hippie conservationist, believed that because our bodies and the Earth are composed mainly of water, water, therefore, has it's own energy. The more positive it's energy, the better we as people function and the healthier the planet is.

To prove his point, he took tap water and yelled at it. 

Ok, that needs a little more explaination. But really, he did. He took a bottle of water, called it a fool, played it some Metallica or Japanese death metal or something and then froze it. Later, he took pictures of the water's frozen crystals to see if he could see the effect the negative music and harsh words had on the water's self esteem. The crystals looked like this:

adhikara.com

Then he did the same thing to another bottle of water, but told it something nice and played it some Mozart or CCR or something..The crystals looked like this:

richardmartel.ca

Makes sense, the vibrations effected the water. You can read into the spiritual stuff if you want to. Anyhoo,

more recently, Emoto has emerged with a new theory that water can not only listen to it being called names, but can actually read mean words written about it. This poses some serious questions, like, "Water has eyes?" So, in the same fashion as the previous experiments, Emoto took bottles of water and showed it pictures of insulting words, and also pictures of Hitler. Here are the results:

covenconstruction.wordpress.com

Now, you are probably wondering what this has to do with anything I usually blog about, but people who believe this, REALLY BELIEVE IT. This is being adopted as a way of life, and is almost religion status. Praying to water, praying for water and living for water. Emoto is gaining spiritual followers, and who is to say what is far fetched anymore? I mean, honestly, how far out is this idea when you place it on the mantel next to E-meters, Kaparot and exorcism? 

Just some food for thought...or drink..that didn't really work, but you get it.

For more information check out

www.masaru-emoto.net

Its in the water!

Water has it's place in the spiritual realm. Some get dunked in it, others sprinkled. It can be the blood of Christ, or.... 

purchased at the bodega on the corner!

Next up: Emoto Water Needs New Glasses!

 ...stay tuned...

होली

 Happy Holi! I hope you brought your beating sticks and you don't mind a lot of chalk in the ol' peepers!
Here in Utah, we have a Krishna temple waaaay down in Spanish Fark.."The Lake Elsinore of Utah". The Sri Sri Radha Krishna Temple, built to house Utah's booming Hindu community (..Booming? Really?) puts on great festivals throughout the year. The Festival of Colors, otherwise known as Holi, is by far the most well attended event at the temple all year, and commemorates.. well...stuff. Lots of stuff. So much stuff that I decided to only choose 3 stuffs to talk about. So here it goes!

First of all, Holi is a spring celebration. The seasons are changing, flowers are blooming, colors are bright, animals are doin' it...everything that comes with spring. To commemorate that, people throw colored chalk, or spray liquid pigment all over each others faces and bodies. So there's that.

Secondly, Holi commemorates the story of the evil non burning, burning witch..Which begins with the story of Hiranyakashyapu...and involves a boon. The story made little sense to me, until I looked up what, exactly, a boon is. Contrary to my belief, a boon is not a shortened word for Baboon. This story, sadly, has no monkeys in it. A boon, is a blessing earned through penance. Anyways, Hiranyakashyapu asked that for his boon, he be granted immortality. The whole not dying thing eventually went to his head, and he began to demand that he be worshiped as a god. Everyone around pretty much went along with it, because..ya know..he was invincible and that makes a pretty good argument for godliness, except for his son, Prahlada, who worshiped Vishnu instead. Well, that didn't sit well with Pops, so he called in his sister Holika, who had a magical shawl that protected her from fire, to kill his son. Prahlada, who was a good kid but not the brightest, decided to climb into a bonfire with weird aunt Holika. I dunno, the idea sounded good at the time I guess. Shockingly, Prahlada started to burn (again, not the smartest kid), but as he chanted Vishnu's name for help, a gust of wind blew Holika's shawl off and the flames jumped off Prahlada's body and onto Holika's instead. So at Holi, to commemorate Holika's virtuous nephew and her dick brother, an effigy of her is burned while people shout "Burn the Witch!". So there's that stuff, too.

Thirdly, there is my favorite Holi tradition,and by far the best of the many, many rituals (there are seriously a crap load of rituals depending on the village Holi is celebrated in), which involves women beating the shit out of men with sticks while bystanders sing sexy tunes. This tradition originates in the city of Barsana, and is called Lath mar Holi. According to Wikipedia (I write a blog, not for Frommer's, so I can source Wiki),

 "Barsana is the place to be at the time of Holi. Here the famous Lath mar Holi is played in the sprawling compound of the Radha Rani temple. Thousands gather to witness the Lath Mar holi when women beat up men with sticks as those on the sidelines become hysterical, sing Holi Songs and shout Sri Radhey or Sri Krishna. The Holi songs of Braj mandal are sung in pure Braj Bhasha.

Holi played at Barsana is unique in the sense that here women chase men away with sticks. Males also sing provocative songs in a bid to invite the attention of women. Women then go on the offensive and use long staves called lathis to beat men folk who protect themselves with shields." 

Do we really have to guess why this happens? Are you dying to know? This ritual commemorates this one time when the women of Barsana got pissed off at Krishna for making fun of them and chased him off with sticks. Imagine, women getting mad for being relentlessly  teased. So there's that stuff, too.

Regardless of tradition, or religion, Holi is a time to celebrate spring, rebirth, bonfires and man beatings. And yes, I saw God for a brief second..no not during Lath mar Holi..but looking around at the thousands of people gathered together, dancing to bad cover bands, acting like painted idiots, having a good time together. Lets face it, the majority of Utahn's at Holi weren't Hindu, but that didn't matter. We were all just people, having an experience together.
Some pictures from the festival...

color throwings

the main throwing that occured after the lighting of the bonfire and effigy burning

the temple

Once again, I have failed at blogging! Time to catch you up!

Hello bloggsville. I have returned, determined to resume regular posting.
Allow myself to reintroduce, myself..Julie Marie, 26, currently living in Utah, newly divorced with one 5 year old lil' girl (Ave). Baptized Latter Day Saint (Christian faith) at 8 years old, lost my faith around 13 and have never really understood or cared to return to or find another faith to practice. Oddly enough, around October of last year (growing up makes you second guess all those posh, hip beliefs you, at 18, adopted as truths..Just ask my right arm's Vegan tattoo) I started thinking about churches, and God and the connection between the two. Does God live in a church? Do I need a church to find God? And in a Seinfeldish manner, I had to ask myself and the world, "What's the deal with all these Churches?" How do you choose which one to go to? I didn't have a choice as a kid. I just went..Unless there was a new Ren and Stimpy on. I don't know how everyone else was raised to view religion, but I was brought up in one church, one faith, one idea. Just one. Yah, I've got some Jewish blood running through my veins (the Jew Hair don't lie), but I've only been to temple a handful of times, and only around high holidays or before bar mitzvas.
So, curious to act on this new interest to learn more about church, religion, God, prophets, mysticism, myths and everything else under the broad, broad heading of THEOLOGY, I started this blog back in January. I started out strong, determined to visit a new church every week, but after a month of heavy church exploration I only found myself more confused and burnt out than ever. So in March, the blog went on hiatus and I chilled out.
Now, I'm back. Tah Dah! And what a time to be back! Easter, Lent, Pentecost, Spring, Rebirth...I'm such a sucker for timing.
Up next: Holi Fest, AKA the Festival of Colors. Yeah, I went. In Utah. I know, right?

Hello, again.

Midterms are over. Blogging commences.

..Back to those praise breaks and Pentecostal behaviors I promised to explain...

For the most part, Pentecostal practitioners believe that gifts-- like speaking in tongues-- still exist in the latter days. The religion focuses on having an extremely personal experience with God, like so personal that He completely fills you up and you can't help but run, and jump around. Also, the idea is that God doesn't care that you look silly and are speaking in gibberish, because you're only communicating with Him during these times.This concept, while not universal to all Pentecostals, is pretty widely accepted and practiced, hence the allotted time during Sunday services to express oneself.. So Jump, Shake and Shimmy the Godly sillies out, and rock on, Praise Breaks! 

Verdict:

I'm a pretty shy person..I have to have quite a bit of liquid courage to even rhythmically shift my weight back and forth in public, in a dark night club. Sorry Pentecostals, I don't think your church is right for me.. unless you increase the size of those lil' plastic communion wine cups and use vodka RedBulls to represent the blood of Christ.

 I have this in my head now..had to add it.

An explaination of the Holy Ghost Explosion Praise Break Extravaganza

Will come tomorrow. I have been waiting for my neighbors to reset the modem all day so I can steal their internet...figures they reset it AFTER 4 Jim Beams.
Huzzah, tomorrow will answer all those lingering questions surrounding those APDGA's (Apostolic Public Displays of Godly Affliction).