No, said Aziraphale, it's ineffable.

Deep Dish Nine: Worth

Part 8, apparently.

12,000+ words

by Lady Yate-xel

A story about a death, context (or lack thereof), and a dinner.

This bit is for Tinsnip, for her birthday, which was a shamefully long time ago, I am sorry my dear, but I worked on it just for you and now here it is!

Read below or on AO3.

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It [does] no good that most nominal Christians disavow all this [extremist] behavior, for I discovered all too quickly that hardly any of them had the moral fiber to stand up to it, an ominous echo of a phenomenon of apathy and spinelessness we find quite amplified in the Islamic world. Few make much effort to defend in public their apparently kinder, gentler message of tolerance and love against the Righteous Hoard, and fewer still would call me ally. Why would they? Jesus himself tells everyone I am damned, and if the most informed, wise and compassionate being in the universe condemns me utterly, deeming me worthy of unquenchable fire and immortal worms, far be it for any mortal to have a kinder opinion of me.
Worse, the liberal Christians have no text. In any Bible debate, the liberal interpreter always loses, for he must admit he is putting human interpretation, indeed bold-faced speculation, before the Divine Word of God. Appeals to “direct inspiration by the Holy Spirit” win no one over, for the rest of us call that opinionized guessing. And without a believable Revelation or the Bible to stand on, a Christian can be condemned as an unbeliever in disguise. Since being thought an atheist is worse than being thought a whore, not many believers raise their head against Fundamentalism.

Carrier, Richard. “Sense and Goodness Without God.”

I stand by this. Although I have no shame in calling these fundamentalists out, there are those in this world who do, for one reason or the other, believe in and assert a higher power, seeing a “god” or creator in all the beauty of the natural world. This kind of spiritual perspective is equal to the beauty the nonbeliever or so-called “agnostic” perceives of the world; sans the fundamentalist fervor and literal interpretation of any ancient text, superimposing it onto the universe and brandishing it amongst society in the face of all we’ve come to understand amidst the reality that we exist in.

There’s no place for religious extremism in our society. These are symptoms of adolescence as a collective and improperly educated species. Fundamentalism and religious extremism via literal interpretation of primitive scripture is a psychosis which - although one of the present ‘black eyes’ of our civilization - has the influence to either destroy life on this planet by way of willful ignorance; or, fade into the history pages as a chapter we’re all grateful for surpassing. Whether or not you “believe,” science and technology will persist in advancing us further and we would be wise to keep up.

Those who truly do wish for a better world should question everything and as Carl stated: “if it can be destroyed by the truth, it deserves to be destroyed by the truth.” And as I suggested, “do not fight for what you believe; fight for what you know to be true.”

It’s time for believers (of all race, gender, ethnic creed and religion) who disavow this dangerous and insidious 'fundamentalist extremism’ to distance themselves from anyone denying this destructive behavior and take a firm and loud stand for not just humanity, but all life on this isolated spaceship we call Earth and preserve our home. If natural selection teaches us anything, it’s that the persistence and continued survival of our genetic material truly is our purpose and responsibility to this planet and this cosmos.

cultplanet

Oh look it’s time for “Caitlin’s Secret Fandom”!

Holy shit I loved the Dragonlance: Legends trilogy. One of my friends in high school made the mistake of giving me “Time of the Twins” and I fell in love with Raistlin hard and pretty damn instantly. I devoured all three books and then tried to go back to read the original trilogy, but was spoiled by a high concentration of Raistlin that I didn’t want to read books not centered on him. Oops.

So here’s a bunch of Raistlin, sexy, sexy Dalamar with his stupid pageboy cut, and Crysania, who I adore. I shipped her and Raistlin so damn hard, to the point where I think this may have been my first ship where I was so desperate for two characters to bang, and it was just a slippery slope from there. I may have to draw more because this was fun and these three characters are THE BEST. I may have to exploit my love for Kitiara too. Not Caramon though. I hate him.

Also who makes your neutral magic mage cloak RED for chrissake. Seems to be just asking for your neutral ass to go evil. I do love the color-codedness of the mages though. “Oh, you’re gonna be evil now? TIME TO CHANGE YOU’RE WHOLE WARDROBE.” It’s fantastic.

See, that’s what the app is perfect for.

DD9: Worth