Maybe I should of went to the Snakepit. If feel so confused, especially at night. During the day I'm usually feeling fine, but sometimes I feel lonely. But almost always at night I want to be doing something with someone. I don't know why, I don't know why the night makes it any different.

Finished reading another book. Guess I'll finish off another one tonight if I keep feeling lonely and stay up, which I inevitably do If I feel lonely. I shouldn't feel lonely I have a million people on AIM to talk to, I just have them all blocked, because they annoy me and have nothing interesting to say. Nothing against them, they just don't share their insides with me. They all say I'm the most interesting and kind and nicest person I've met, they only say that because I actually say *things*, and I'm even quiet too. I have 2 unanswered emails from a person, a day old by the end of tonight, and a GP thing I should respond to. I guess I will do that sometime. It just gets progressively more depressing when you meet boring after boring person.

Here's conversation I have with people that talk, since I feel like copying from a board I post to once in a while (about being gay, and a million other related and unrelated things).
some things that I said in a thread that somehow started from vampires and went to discussions of faith:

Re: Today's topic: Real Vampires Certainly the concept of those needing blood of others is not new, but the lack of published and peer reviewed research in scientific journals is of course lacking. Chalk it up to conspiracy theories, or what have you.

Those that truly believe that they need blood [of other's] to survive manifest symptoms of hypogammaglobulinemia, which can be heredity (gives credence to biting and passing it on if you so wish, but the correlation is weak and stretching it thin), or aquired (also you can see this as aquiring the disease from someone that already has it it, typically through a blood transfution - but if you want, biting gone bad, etc.). Without treatment they have variable immunodeficiency, which can be anything from getting colds often to severe HIV-like symptoms.

Typical treatment is supplementation with injections of intravenous immune globulin [the protein part of blood, milk, muscle, etc.].

It is easy to see how one could come to the conclusion, if you had this disease and did not know it, that you needed blood to survive, because drinking blood provides you with the necessary antibodies and globulin that you are lacking. Although I seriously question if drinking blood and having denatured [broken down] antibodies and globulin would help, but I haven't really looked into the subject of vampires; this is all biology to me.

As to whether vampires do exist, well I don't like to ruin anyone's dreams, so I leave the question open-ended, but there certainly is room for speculation.
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(a post later, in response to someone)

It would lead credence to the term 'Methusulah' [oldest man that lived, according to bible] being used to describe a very old vampire. Although I don't believe in literal transubstantiation [eating the flesh and blood of Christ] as Catholism prescribes, it would raise serious moral questions if one did believe in this and vampires at the same time.

Firstly, if you believe in vampires, would this make Christ the first vampire? He did, afterall, rise from the dead (although this was later added to the bible and was not in the original text). Is Christianity an infectious disease, infecting "normals"? And if they truely are vampires (certainly some of them suck the life out of me when trying to debate with them - but I have no problem with them myself), then what does this say about the religion itself?

This of course has all been talked about by people interested in vampires and I'm just skimming briefly over it, as I don't remember much.

It does raise interesting quandries for those of this faith and who happen to believe in the supernatural (you must, if you believe in the trinity, so why not believe in vampires?; most priests believe in 'angels' and 'demons'. Are angels merely those not infected by Christ, and are demons those who's blood has been tainted?

Etc, etc. We've all sinned, but we're a baptism away from forgivement, or a few more steps depending on your flavor of Christianity. Does that make those who are vampires that are baptised, "safe" & "pure", ie. forgiven for their earthly sins? While the rest of us are happily wandering around, the sinful people that we are, unaware that we are vampires?

Not to light any fires, but when the council [can't recall which] made transubstantiation a literal reality, I think they were really stretching it a bit.
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(in response to someone that turned it into a religious issue when I was only joking)

Joanie, if any offense was taken, I apologize, it was more in friendly jest than anything.

But, yes, I think partaking in the Eucharist requires quite a leap of faith, much more so than believing in say a mythological creature that draws from old stories and such. To believe in the Eucharist literally requires you to believe in miracles, and to believe in the miracle of transubstantiation is quite a miracle to believe in. The Council of Trent only made this change to further draw the line between them and radical protestants at the time (ie. Martin Luther, Angelicans, etc.) - their own counter-reformation to try to keep their own believers from converting to other faiths; consubstantiation is a much more believable thing for one of the faith (the Lutheran view), where the presence of Christ is in the Eucharist, but it is not literal, but symbollic. Getting offtopic, but reading St. Thomas Aquinas and his defense of transubstantiation makes more sense than the reasons the Council of Trent really had in mind, ie. it is unnatural for one to eat the flesh of one's species, so it is given to the lay people in a form that is accepetable, along with other reasons.

Biologically speaking, no I don't believe in vampires, at least where the term ascribes unhuman powers to those people; but if one wishes to call people afflicted with that disease "vampires", then why not. A little romantisicm never hurt. A disease must start somewhere however, and that's where calling Christ a vampire came in as a jest, transmitting it through blood is the easiest way and of course falls in line with the biological reference I mentioned previously and common mythological beliefs regarding transmission of being a vampire (ie. Anne Rice, etc.). Dedicated theologians against Catholism would have a field day, but I don't really care; it was meant as a joke, again an apology.

I don't believe in transubstantiation in any faith, but consubstantiation, where the "presence" is there, I do believe in, and falls in line with my own pagan beliefs; that is a leap of faith I can make, the other I cannot. The belief of a "presence" during ritualistic practice is present in so many other faiths that I don't think anyone really thinks of it as unusual. Miracles I can't believe in (transubstantiation, the virgin birth, along with most things in the Old Testament), being so grounded in my schooling, my mind just can't except it, but it does not preclude me from having a faith and believing in it.

As for other canons made during Catholic councils, I don't believe any come close to the leap of faith required for what was discussed previously except for when they defined the holy trinity, and even that doesn't come close; and I could believe in that if that was my faith. There are of course many canons that are not enforced, nor do most people even know about (ie. Protestants are declared heretics - certainly not enforced).

Theology is admittedly a very weak point in my studies, as I'm drawing mostly from my history and philosophy studies, but it's nonetheless enjoyable to discuss.
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(further response by me after some replies)

For me, there is the issue of whether or not God speaks directly to those of his faith. If you are Catholic then he speaks soley to the Pope, and he his your method to communicate with god.

If you are Protestant, God speaks directly to all of the faith, every single person counts.

I think that's the fundamental difference that would prevent me from going whole hog with the Vatican.

Why bother praying? God isn't going to commune with you or give you a vision, his sole speaker is the Pope as per canon law; albeit people pray anyway.
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(what I posted today in the thread)

I actually wish I had grown up Catholic, it seems so foreign compared to growing up Protestant, then switching to Bapist of my own will, "tried" Scientology (talk about mindfuck and brainwash), several other things for a short bit (was really turned off to faith after Scientology), and finally settled on greco/roman traditional paganism, probably a lot different from what people think is paganism or how a lot of pagans "practice" their faith. But it felt right to me, and whatever feels right to people is good.

There is so much "mysticism" it feels like in Catholism, there is a whole abstraction layer between the lay people and God (sacrements to redeem yourself not mentioned explictely in the bible, not supposed to interpret the bible it is interpreted for you by a priest or other elite, the whole transubstantiation, idololitry is forbidden, yet the church is so garish, concept of tithing, etc.), and it's very interesting coming from an outsiders view.

I had friends grow that grew up Catholic and it's always interesting to talk to them about how they practiced their religion, in a lot of ways it reminded me of a very obtuse kind of paganism (lots of rituals, with very heavy symbolism, an abstracted nature to the whole thing, etc).

I like Catholic churches, very pretty, and I like watching Christmas mass on TV, etc.
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Blah, blah, blah boring. I think the only reason I go to college is so I can find other people that know stuff and learn from them. It's the most orgasmic thing in the world to me, really, to learn something new from someone; something so utterly shocking and new that it fills my head with wonder. I like that feeling. I hate dull people, but only because they dull me and I don't know what to say. Being a student in college for life doesn't sound that bad sometimes.
This sure is a self-indulgent post where I talk about myself, but hey, it's a private journal so I can do that; and there's nothing really to talk about except feeling lonely and I've droned on about that for enough, or my current lust for a femme boy (one in particular, but I'll leave names out), or my attraction towards Erin (since I've already mentioned her).

I like things slow. I like peeking and probing and digging deep into someone's mind and heart and tickling every little bit of information out of them and giving them everything I know about myself. It's so rewarding. I guess that's what me and Erin are doing by not calling or sharing pictures, etc. Although I'm slightly twisting the rules by giving her lots of gifts. I can't help it, I have to make someone feel satisified in every possible way they'll let me, and she likes to get things, and she likes to send me things. So it's very fun and always brings a smile to my face when I make something or receive a letter in the mail.