Post by Dr. Jonathan Crane on May 2, 2010 22:40:12 GMT -5
“The fear of some divine and supreme powers keeps men in obedience.”
--- Robert Burton
Dr. Jonathan Crane was standing outside, alone in the rain. The storm had driven everyone who could to seek shelter. Even with their city crumbling around them, the people of Gotham were afraid to get a little wet. Across the street, Saint Hubertus’ cathedral stood silhouetted in the dark, stretching out to the heavens in a silent plea for help that would never come.
Religion. As if the concept were not already laughable, the pious and the faithful tried to pretend that their faith was rooted in hope. In the goodness and grace of a fair God (or gods, plural, depending on the belief system). Something to guard against the wicked and the corrupt, something to assuage their fear. They were wrong, of course. The fact of the matter is that religion is rooted in fear. Every religion is born out of fear and thereafter feeds off of the pure, unadulterated dread of its believers.
Stripped bare of fictitious characters, fairy tales, and morals, every religion comes down to a simple and basic fear of the unknown. A fear of the unexplainable strangeness and chaos of human existence, and, of course, a fear of pending mortality. These people need assurance that the world is meaningful, that death isn’t the end. Most of all, they need to know what comes next, or at least think they do, so they can work towards a goal of some sort of everlasting prosperity. Patently ridiculous.
An organized, ecclesiastical religion was different in that it was run as something of a government. A small group of like-minded bureaucrats and megalomaniacs working together to exploit society’s fears. But what really irked him was that they were allowed to go free, accepted as bringers of truth and righteous integrity, while he, The Scarecrow, was deemed insane and locked away. All because they, the clergy and the religious orders, masked their fear-mongering with pretty words and song and a sense of community. At least he was usually straightforward about it. His intentions were always fairly clear to anyone with half a brain. Of course, that excluded most everyone in this godforsaken city.
Even as a child, he could never understand the allure of religion. He tried. He honestly tried, even if it was just to humor his ill-tempered great-grandmother. His schoolmates would beat him. The woman who raised him actually fed him to crows. Perhaps they thought they could put the “fear of god” in him. Perhaps they just liked to hurt him. In the end, it didn’t really matter. Whatever their intentions, it has ensured he could never sincerely believe in some sort of higher being.
So, what was he doing here of all places, if he truly loathed religion as much as he said? Well, what he needed most was an isolated group of test subjects to experiment on with his toxins. The church, which was still holding regular services despite the recent cataclysm, offered him just that.
How does the old saying go? “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” If that really is the case, then the poor folks inside the cathedral would have quite a lot to fear soon enough.
--- Robert Burton
Dr. Jonathan Crane was standing outside, alone in the rain. The storm had driven everyone who could to seek shelter. Even with their city crumbling around them, the people of Gotham were afraid to get a little wet. Across the street, Saint Hubertus’ cathedral stood silhouetted in the dark, stretching out to the heavens in a silent plea for help that would never come.
Religion. As if the concept were not already laughable, the pious and the faithful tried to pretend that their faith was rooted in hope. In the goodness and grace of a fair God (or gods, plural, depending on the belief system). Something to guard against the wicked and the corrupt, something to assuage their fear. They were wrong, of course. The fact of the matter is that religion is rooted in fear. Every religion is born out of fear and thereafter feeds off of the pure, unadulterated dread of its believers.
Stripped bare of fictitious characters, fairy tales, and morals, every religion comes down to a simple and basic fear of the unknown. A fear of the unexplainable strangeness and chaos of human existence, and, of course, a fear of pending mortality. These people need assurance that the world is meaningful, that death isn’t the end. Most of all, they need to know what comes next, or at least think they do, so they can work towards a goal of some sort of everlasting prosperity. Patently ridiculous.
An organized, ecclesiastical religion was different in that it was run as something of a government. A small group of like-minded bureaucrats and megalomaniacs working together to exploit society’s fears. But what really irked him was that they were allowed to go free, accepted as bringers of truth and righteous integrity, while he, The Scarecrow, was deemed insane and locked away. All because they, the clergy and the religious orders, masked their fear-mongering with pretty words and song and a sense of community. At least he was usually straightforward about it. His intentions were always fairly clear to anyone with half a brain. Of course, that excluded most everyone in this godforsaken city.
Even as a child, he could never understand the allure of religion. He tried. He honestly tried, even if it was just to humor his ill-tempered great-grandmother. His schoolmates would beat him. The woman who raised him actually fed him to crows. Perhaps they thought they could put the “fear of god” in him. Perhaps they just liked to hurt him. In the end, it didn’t really matter. Whatever their intentions, it has ensured he could never sincerely believe in some sort of higher being.
So, what was he doing here of all places, if he truly loathed religion as much as he said? Well, what he needed most was an isolated group of test subjects to experiment on with his toxins. The church, which was still holding regular services despite the recent cataclysm, offered him just that.
How does the old saying go? “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” If that really is the case, then the poor folks inside the cathedral would have quite a lot to fear soon enough.