"POSITIVE MORRIS"? HARDLY

Let me first say that my initial intention for this blog was nothing more than to vent my inner thoughts on the occurances within my small town. It was not meant as an expose' or for the purpose of stirring up trouble as some blogs are wont to do, which incidentally is fine with me. I simply comment on things I perceive in order to formulate my own thoughts. With that said, I will expound on another occurance which raised interest for me solely from the psychological and sociological perspective.

Apparently the ever-so-righteous "Positive Morris" is under the impression that he is under attack by what he perceives as "satan disciples". I had received a number of messages to the effect that one or more particular blogs had been posted Thursday night and then deleted the following day. Now, if it were only one individual claiming this, I would have let it go, but there were quite a few and I didn't want the comments to become redundant. The words stated in one of the deleted blogs were as follows:

"The Silver Tongue Speaks Against Christians
Xo and other Satan disciples attack me, Positive Morris.

Typical of the other blogs and the most recently established xo blog.
Morris and this Country is under attack my atheist, war mongering, death loving, and specifically idol worshipping liars.
Unite and get Rid of this Establishment. I have personally experienced within my family, businesses like this, in which they try to change the culture and thought process of our youth.
Let me be the one to say " X it out of town!"
To my atheist foes:
Christ Has Risen!
Easter is upon us,
God Bless you!"

It seems that "Positive" Morris views anyone who disagrees with or questions his particular Christian positivistic bent as being not only a cohort with Satan, but an "atheist, a war monger, a death lover and an idol-worshipping liar". I ran Positive Morris' deleted blog post by a friend of mine who studied psychology in college and asked her opinion of this statement. Her answer was, "Sounds like paranoia stemming from some sort of personality disorder that encompasses megalomania and delusionalism where there's a devil hiding behind every corner. Have you been talking to Pat Robertson?"

From what I gather, he seems to think that the owner of a recently opened store in Morris is pushing some sort of satanic "agenda" (deja vu aka the "pastor" and his Walmart rampage). There's been a lot of buzz about it in recent weeks, mostly because of articles posted in the local paper, which I view only online, since I don't subscribe to the paper. I had visited the store's website out of curiosity and found a link called "News: False Bloggers". The page outlines the correspondence of various letters written to the Voice of The People and a number of negative blog comments to the articles which were obviously written by one individual. The owner made attempts to defend her position in light of these attacks in order to protect her reputation and business.

The accusations of Positive Morris, that "they are trying to change the culture and thought process of youth" is for the most part a non sequitur. In case Positive Morris hasn't realized this yet, the culture has already changed as has the thought process of modern youth, not to mention modern society. This store is simply providing them what they previously lacked here and ventured to Joliet for. But again, try to state that to an individual who resides in a proverbial glass bubble, as per my first blog; it falls on deaf ears.

I received a message from the owner of the store who stated that she was appalled when she read Positive Morris's blog subject. She had replied with the following:

"??? Huh? What the heck are you talking about? I don't read this blog for a week and a half and all of a sudden I log on and my store's name is on this post as well as the previous, being accused of all sorts of things? LOL If you remember PM, I actually gave you kudos you when you first started this. Btw, I AM a Christian and if you don't believe me go ahead and test me. Wait..never mind, I'll tell you myself. Jesus is God incarnate, He died and rose on the 3rd day to save man from sin, He sits at the right hand of the Father, yea I believe in the trinity, yea I believe in salvation by grace thru faith alone as per Ephesians 2:8,9. If you'd like to test me in other areas of doctrine or if there's anything else you'd like to say to me, you know where I am. You can come and talk to me face to face and that goes for ANYONE else. Funny though...noone's approached me in person and in regards to any other accusations, I always post my name or initials"

This particular comment was censored by PM. One can only guess as to why. It's apparent this woman, at least by all traditional Christian doctrine standards that I am aware of, would be deemed a Christian and yet she is accused of being in cohorts with satan simply because her cultural viewpoint doesn't conform with that of PM's. Positive Morris had been offered an open opportunity to discuss his concerns with the owner, yet what does he choose to do under the guise of his religiosity as well as anonymity? Go on the attack in what I would deem a deceptive manner.

My question is this: If one does not claim to follow the teachings of the bible which clearly states that it is wrong to lie and deceive, ("satan" being the father of lies and deception according to the bible from what I remember), then is it hypocrisy when that individual chooses to deceive since he holds to no external defining moral basis from which to base his actions? On the other hand, if one DOES claim to follow the teachings of the bible holding to a defining moral plumbline and then makes a conscious, willful decision to deceive, does that individual not go against the grain of what he holds to be morally correct thereby consituting himself a hypocrite?

It has been my own experience that when one continually and willfully acts against the moral standard of his conscience of what he holds to be morally correct and true, a war of conscience will ensue resulting in guilt. I envision guilt as somewhat of it's own entity, almost a physical blob-like substance like a cancer. Because the "guilt", like a physical illness has to go somewhere, I believe it is either internalized or externalized. When internalized it may result in depression, blame, anger, and hatred toward oneself. When externalized, it may result in blame, anger and hatred toward others. Personally, I believe the christian concept of confession may be an antecdote for this problem. Without getting too graphic, let's just say its akin to what occurs after one has over imbibed and finds themselves hugging a toilet. The body needs to rid itself of the poison in order to be healthy again.

Maybe there's something to this Christianity after all. But it's nothing less than tragic when those who claim to believe in it, twist it and distort it for their own self aggrandizing purposes.