Shining One, I see where you're going, but I have to for the most part disagree.

I, too, am a Christian. If you read my earlier post, well, I was saying that I don't believe Tool really want's you to take them THAT seriously. They just want to get us thinking and talking about things and the world we live in, with the goal of getting us to look into things for ourselves and make our own decisions.

Other than asking us to open our eyes and think for ourselves, they never preach this is bad, this is right, or anything like that.

I'm going to point out two of the most common of Maynard's perceived "attacks" on Christianity.

Opiate, the song, is not an attack on Christianity, but is an attack on those who dedicate themselves to the religion, both the preachers and the followers, with insincere or false intentions.

Judith isn't an attack on Christianity, but the rantings of a frustrated son who can't understand his mother's ceaseless devotion to a God who left her paralyzed.

I don't believe that anyone in Tool is a Christian, but I do believe that any apparent attack on Christianity by the band is purely for shock value and only to, quite simply, get people riled up.

Regarding the occult, evil is a point of view, after all, and there are many perfectly honest and upstanding people who find the occult fascinating.

I consider myself a Christian, but I also believe that one's beliefs, even a satanist's, does not make that person evil, or good, for that matter.

It's just rock and roll. It's up to the listener, and I think you underestimate what young minds are capable of. I was a teenager when Opiate (the album) came out, and I didn't take the Gaping Lotus Experience as anything evil. I thought it was funny, and I found Maynard's biblical references in Sober to be thought-provoking, not evil. There's no way to better understand your own beliefs than to have someone make you uncomfortable about them. Now that I understand the song better, I know what he was talking about. It was both simple and a little complicated at the same time. But never was it so deep that I had to become a slave to it.

Besides, I knew a guy once who played the figure of a good, Jesus-loving man who sang church songs for little kids all day long. He was a well-liked man in the community with a million dollar smile and the scriptures memorized like the back of his hand. Turns out he was molesting those little boys he was singing the songs to.