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<blockquote data-quote="parrotman" data-source="post: 1453634" data-attributes="member: 21872">Never noticed the thing with energy drinks. Looks like Zero HP Lovecraft was on target!The mark of the beast thing always worried me a lot as a kid.Then I became Catholic, and learned about our doctrine of mortal sin.Which, in this instance, is comforting! No physical augmentation, no implanted microchip, can inevitably damn anyone to hell. Only an unrepented mortal sin can send a baptized person to hell.I think there are probably a lot of people out there, the influential people who popularize this stuff, who want to push microchip implantations specifically because it sounds way too much like the mark of the beast. Maybe they get a sick laugh out of scaring the flyover states. Maybe they think it will demoralize Christians, paving the way for further Nietzschean revaluations.But I don't see any way that a mere physical implant can actually be something which, as Scripture seems to imply about the mark, leads to inevitable damnation.For whatever it's worth, I've heard it said that the mark &quot;on the forehead&quot; means it is in your mind, and &quot;on the hand&quot; means it is in your works. So in that interpretation, receiving &quot;the mark of the beast&quot; would mean that you are actually conforming to a social system which requires you to commit mortal sin as a condition of continuing to live under that system. Obviously, I don't know the future, so I don't know or have an opinion on whether this interpretation is correct....Also, I hope this doesn't count as a &quot;politics&quot; topic forbidden to new posters. I see it as a &quot;religion&quot; topic myself.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="parrotman, post: 1453634, member: 21872"] Never noticed the thing with energy drinks. Looks like Zero HP Lovecraft was on target! The mark of the beast thing always worried me a lot as a kid. Then I became Catholic, and learned about our doctrine of mortal sin. Which, in this instance, is comforting! No physical augmentation, no implanted microchip, can inevitably damn anyone to hell. Only an unrepented mortal sin can send a baptized person to hell. I think there are probably a lot of people out there, the influential people who popularize this stuff, who want to push microchip implantations specifically because it sounds way too much like the mark of the beast. Maybe they get a sick laugh out of scaring the flyover states. Maybe they think it will demoralize Christians, paving the way for further Nietzschean revaluations. But I don't see any way that a mere physical implant can actually be something which, as Scripture seems to imply about the mark, leads to inevitable damnation. For whatever it's worth, I've heard it said that the mark "on the forehead" means it is in your mind, and "on the hand" means it is in your works. So in that interpretation, receiving "the mark of the beast" would mean that you are actually conforming to a social system which requires you to commit mortal sin as a condition of continuing to live under that system. Obviously, I don't know the future, so I don't know or have an opinion on whether this interpretation is correct. ...Also, I hope this doesn't count as a "politics" topic forbidden to new posters. I see it as a "religion" topic myself. [/QUOTE]

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