stradasphere

Santana, My Cross, And Crazy Faith

This just in from What is Enlightenment magazine. I ran into this e-zine a while back and get newsletters. While not a huge fan of Santana, I did love his old stuff, he has always been vocal about spirituality. I love what he says at the end. Read the whole article HERE.

WIE: You grew up Catholic, and then at a certain point became interested in Eastern religion, and then returned to Christianity. Does Christianity, or any traditional religion, continue to play a role in your life?

CARLOS: Well, it's indoctrination; that's just what it is. It's like branding a cow with guilt, shame, judgment, condemnation, and fear?that's what religion has meant to me. I get in trouble a lot with the press and with TV because I say that I don't subscribe to the three P's: politicians, pimps, and the Pope. I think that all three of them are designed to sell you fear. And if we are going to move to a new world, we've got to work with joy?the opposite of guilt, shame, judgment, condemnation, and fear. There's nothing spiritual about telling people, "You've got to be like a Christ. You've got to carry your own cross." What the hell is that? Are you telling me that we only come to this world to suffer? What kind of perverted God would do that? But nevertheless, a lot of religions have that as their basic foundation. And people swallow it, believe it, and then you have a whole bunch of seriously professional victims.

DID CHRIST ONLY SUFFER?
Don't get hung up on the "You've got to be like Christ" part, his focus is on the perception of so many people, mostly Christians, that we were sent here to suffer and carry our cross. Honestly, I am damn tired of lugging around my cross. I am tired of dragging my garbage with me where everI go. It's tied around my neck so when I want to jump up and down like a joyful child, I am pulled back to the ground..."where I belong"...well bullshit. I may have this whole cross thing out of context but chalk it up to reading Hunter S. Thompson. And look at him now!

I have suffered so much in my life. As a child, I witnessed terrible things. I survived incidents that would make good fiction. But God told me He would take all that away from me. And He does, when I let Him. Often times I don't. I listen to the demons. I listen to the old voices. I jump in freedom, and I get pulled down by the neck.

CRAZY FAITH
I was driving my son home from his youth group the other night and we talked about faith. He gave me a huge compliment. I told him you need to have insane crazy faith in God and go for it. I ranted about religion versus spirituality. I was yelling and laughing and driving quite erratically. Then he said something to the effect of...

"How come you are the only person I know who acts like that? Not even people at church talk that way. You have crazy faith. I don't get that at church."

I was a proud man. At that moment in time, I didn't have shit hanging around my neck to pull me down. I was honored by a skinny, handsome, talented, 13 year old boy. I was blessed by God. He reminded me what I have inside of me. A wild barbaric faith. In lies hope and intense love. He talked through my son, because He knows many times I can't hear His.

posted by Unknown @ 11:22 AM