@Gwendolyn2018 ". . . the mind wanders." unless occupied with survival or confronted by someone assuming that you can read their mind.

@Gwendolyn2018 very control freakish - because a person's hands or feet are not occupied does not mean that they are not busy nor alert.

@Gwendolyn2018 - I thought the first novel was in the Talmud then followed by the bible?
On Gulliver's I took great cognisance of the Houyhouyhnms philosophy arising from their ability in having speech - to me it is an elemental truth. If followed then there would be neither politicians nor priests and if politicians & priests didn't exist then Swift would have had no need to satirically write about their lying.

@Gwendolyn2018 What did Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions, a satirical novella by the English schoolmaster Edwin Abbott Abbott, first published in 1884, engender in the intended readers?

@Gwendolyn2018 Well worth a read. It identifies many things that people are incorrectly taught. There are copies at Gutenberg ebooks.
[gutenberg.org]

@Gwendolyn2018 lol GT nearly 60 years since I read it. I missed burning to memory the egg allegory

@Gwendolyn2018 IMO if religion & "God" are man made constructs then the aforementioned books cannot be anything other than novels!

@Gwendolyn2018 lol, you have proof of the existance of Jewish & xtian gods together with irrefuteable proof of the stories?

When 14 I had an English teacher who was adamant that ancient Greece was a democratically governed country. We never had mutual respect thereafter because I asked "how can it be democratic if women & slaves do not have the right to vote & elect representatives?"
He could not answer only turn bright red & splutter.

@Gwendolyn2018 I fully understand that you were taught something that I do not believe is correct and that "proof" in the indoctrination taught to you is not working for me. In other words I do not enjoin you in the delusional folie en masse. I liken it to flat earther's proof.

My experience with the catholic church wasn't as bad as that with the evangelicals. Catholics in this country at least are less conservative than evangelicals. It's more of a buffet, take what you want, leave the rest. The hierarchy is a different story though, it has been becoming more conservative.

Religion is all tales of morbid brains.

@Gwendolyn2018 that would make me complicit.

@Gwendolyn2018 correlation not made?

@Gwendolyn2018 thank you. I was not aware of that - I thought they all communed together in testosterone fueled immorality. I was led to believe that grounds for divorce from a woman (& children) includes joining a monastery.

@Gwendolyn2018 lol. Some years back I read that Australia has over 2000 registered groups which probably means that there are as many unregistered groups of lunatics out there.
On Buddhist nuns I wonder if women's lib has resulted in an increase in their numbers or the opposite?

@Gwendolyn2018 any port in a quandary. May I suggest that you form a "Followers of Profesor Cipolla's Concept of Intelligence Group"?
[en.m.wikipedia.org]

These are Cipolla's five fundamental laws of stupidity:

1. Always and inevitably everyone underestimates the number of stupid individuals in circulation.
2. The probability that a certain person (will) be stupid is independent of any other characteristic of that person.
3. A stupid person is a person who causes losses to another person or to a group of persons while himself deriving no gain and even possibly incurring losses.
4. Non-stupid people always underestimate the damaging power of stupid individuals. In particular non-stupid people constantly forget that at all times and places and under any circumstances to deal and/or associate with stupid people always turns out to be a costly mistake.
5. A stupid person is the most dangerous type of person.

Corollary: a stupid person is more dangerous than a pillager.

@Gwendolyn2018 I employ the thougtful emoji because I was torn between ,& !

Followed by drop the streaming.

@Gwendolyn2018 have you asked her why she follows a creed only supported by lunatics? And what does that make her?

@Gwendolyn2018 You can love without believing in a religion or its deity.
Why socialise with deluded people?
See also my response at "I find this thought comforting: You haven’t yet mr all the people you will love. "

@Gwendolyn2018 Of course, everything boils down to money.

@Gwendolyn2018 The church is a fabulous money generating business.....and they don't pay taxes.

@Gwendolyn2018 When I was a teenager my father was friends with a Catholic priest. He often came by our house to talk with my father. When I was a senior in High School the Priest said he could get me in a seminary to become a priest. I refused....but I often wondered what it would be like to have a job where you only work on Sunday mornings. Who knows...I could have been a Cardinal by now....maybe the Pope.

@Gwendolyn2018 I'm pretty covid 19 wasn't mentioned in those other books...