8 Deadly Sins

I do not believe in nor do I endorse the tradition Judeo/Christian concept of sin, that is something whether it be an action or or a mental condition that is un Godly and is therefore deserving of punishment.

If that concept were real it would be the ultimate cosmic set up, foisted upon us by our creator, who, having given us our five wonderful senses and an abundant supply of free will and temptation, would then punish us for using them. That, of course, would not be fair, and God is just, never punishes and is – in the end – the most human of all humans, having created us – and the universe that we live in – in his image. He totally understands and I believe that he loves us unconditionally regardless of what manner of foolishness we resolve to put ourselves into.

I believe that the word sin should be used as in the expression, “It was a sin that my team didn’t win that game last week”, using the word to express disappointment, pity or shame rather than guilt. I believe that anything that keeps our minds and our attention away from seeking and hopefully finding God, is a sin or rather a shame for us, not for Him. He is simply just disappointed but, having an infinite supply of time and patience, waits lovingly for us to get our act together.

We live in a time of the most powerful distractions, never in the history of this planet have humans had so many physical distractions and God – the ultimate creator – is forgotten by his creation who are collectively hating each other more. We kill more efficiently, we consume without thanks and amass huge fortunes by raping His planet, we crave more of what the other guy has, lust after each other relentlessly, and the irony is that we – the temporary custodians of His planet – are proud of ourselves. The one possible hope and supposedly the salve for all of our questions from time immortal – religion – is in most cases our worst enemy.

The desire by man to understand God and his purpose for us ignorant humans and our most well intentioned requests for information on how to conduct ourselves in order to be in the best position to attract God’s grace have been hi jacked, perverted and bought and sold by organized religion Their ambition, intransigent beliefs and rigid dogma have led to some of the most violent and hateful conflicts on Earth and are still – to this day – the cause of the greatest, mistrust, hatefulness and divisiveness. At a very early age I saw through this and reasoned that this could not possibly be God’s work, it was the work of some other dark force whose purpose was to keep us divided, spiritually earthbound and in a state of delusion as regards our true purpose.

I did not take on the task of making a modern version of an old spiritual classic lightly. I closely studied the work of Bosch and Bruegel, two of my favorite artists from the early 16th century – who created probably the two most famous versions of the SEVEN deadly sins – made in that time of fear, superstition and spiritual ignorance – known as the Dark Ages. The challenge was to make a modern version without being “preachy”, (preaching is something which I detest with a vengeance) and so, having started from the premise of NOT believing in the traditional concept of sin, I began looking at my own life and how I am daily seduced by my senses, how I willingly wander away from my own intuitive search for my creator and laugh outrageously at the cosmic soap opera that I find myself playing a part in. It is not my wish to offend any that faithfully follow the traditional religions, we all have our own path to follow, but we are told by the humble yet enlightened beings that come to this planet to teach us, that eventually we will ALL find God and in the end will ultimately understand and see the joke for what is was, a refining process, and finally, when we don’t desire TV, chocolate cake, that house on the hill, fame and fortune, our neighbor’s wife, husband or his big car, and once the search for our own personal ultimate “high” is fulfilled and our senses tell us – enough – then we will truly see and be in blissful harmony with the true wonder of the universe – our creator.

This then is the stage on which I set my version of the deadly sins, with what I believe to be one timely additional sin – religion.

I hope that you get the joke, I have been laughing my ass off continuously during the creation of the work.

The Eight Deadly Sins