But I am not prepared to take the latter on faith alone - b/c free will is a bitch. Allowing a Lord of the Flies type of situation means… well… this.
Do you ever wonder how life must have been in The Matrix? Like, I’ve heard that the Bay of Pigs scenario brought us within like a hairsbreadth of WWIII, and it was only narrowly averted by what amounts to a probabilistic confluence of factors, but if you modeled it multiple times you could end up with VERY different outcomes - like after the fighting settled USA on top, or Russia on top, but the vastly most likely ofc would be nobody on top but everyone (1st-world participants anyway) obliterated, etc. So would The Architect there allow those permutations, or did he guide them towards a desired end? And if so, why bother, if he got what he wanted regardless? Or perhaps he didn’t really care one way or the other, so long as sufficient people were alive to steal their energy from, but b/c of the latter he would work to prevent such a worst-case (to the machines’ purposes) outcome. But if the Russians were capable of threading that needle, and taking over the USA without obliterating too many human lives, then was there an incarnation of The Matrix where Neo (or you know, The One by whatever name) was born to a Russian province, a conquered USA? Fun thoughts…
But anyway, regardless of all the religiosity add-ons (people that try to use Him for their own selfish agendas), Jesus was just a most excellent dude!
As for whether He is (a) “God” or not, people ofc disagree. I think yes, but I also join with others of many faiths who regardless or even outright because of their religion - including atheism - try to be the change that we want to see in the world, without getting hung up on our philosophical differences. Ironically the main camp in opposition to that are fascists, which at this point heavily features evangelical so-called “Christians” in the USA (who are also so-called “Patriots”, so-called Pro-“Life”, so-called “defenders” rather than destroyers of democracy - they really aren’t big on telling the Truth, even/especially to themselves!).
This is the part where shit gets tough, b/c words no longer have meaning, if we (the tolerant) allow (tolerate) people (esp. the intolerant) to call themselves whatever they wish. Ofc nobody for one second would confuse Trump himself as an authentic “Christian” - they just use him for their own ends - but what then is a “Christian”? Is it someone who, like Jesus, is most excellent to one another by showing LOVE (kindness, patience, gentleness, compassion, etc.), or is it rather someone who Karens people, literally killing them… or worse (diddling kids, slavery, wage theft that is… is that even any different?!?)
Ironically, Jesus is only ever recorded to HATE one group of people: the intolerant religious butthurt crowd who say one thing, do the precise opposite, but expect you to go along b/c if you don’t they will literally, flat-out, straight-up kill you. As they did Him.
So yeah, I would hope that even atheists could join in on hating the “Christian”/“Patriot”/Pro-“Life” crowd, as Jesus Himself demonstrated that He did. To them I would say the message: don’t let the fascists confuse you with “words” - just b/c they call themselves something doesn’t make it true. What then is a “Christian”? Who da fuq even cares at this point, it may be a lost cause, but The (OG) Dude I thought was pretty cool:-), again imho.