Yeah, you. I'm looking at you. Anyone reading this is a big fat sinner now (although I think we already were anyway). You may or may not have heard, the Pope released a whole new set of sins yesterday. They even have their own category, Social Sins. Apparently we have to update our list of sins when we become smart enough to commit them. These new sins are:
- 'Bioethical' violations (like birth control)
- 'Morally dubious' experiments (like stem cell research)
- Drug abuse
- Pollution of the environment
- Contributing to the widening gap between rich and poor
- Excessive wealth
- Creating poverty
Raise your hand if you've committed any of these sins. Wow, that's a lot of hands. Hey, is it me, or are the last three all interrelated? If you have excessive wealth there is less money for everybody else, automatically widening the gap between rich and poor... which means you commit three sins at the same time and there's not much you can do about it. That hardly seems fair. For a guy with a specially made popemobile in every city he visits the Pope seems to really hate rich people.
You know what's really nice about being a Atheist? When the Vatican tells you that you suck, it doesn't matter. I know I don't suck. I lead a moral life and it has nothing to do with fear of what's going to happen to me when I die, and everything to do with being raised by two moral parents who taught me how to make my own good choices. And yeah, I'm human, I make mistakes. But it's okay, I apologize to the person I've wronged and worry about their forgiveness here on earth, now, instead of what some fictitious judgmental floating trio holding a list of sins I forgot to admit to a priest says about letting me in the pearly gates. I've got way too much stress in my current life, I don't need to be worrying about the afterlife too.
I got back a week ago from a wonderful ski trip to Summit County in Colorado. Went with my mom and Homer, and we were joined for two days by Greg at the beginning of the week, and skied a day with Jerry and Jenna at the end. Even though I missed a day due to a re-emergence of bronchitis, and wasn't able to ski my best the last two days, it was a really great trip.
Here's a nice picture I took on our last day of skiing, driving back from A-Basin to the condo in Frisco. I've posted more pictures in the album Gone Skiing 2008. Enjoy!
