What are we $$paying$$ for?

Two days ago I was standing in the checkout line of Walmart and this seventy-something year old man in front of me was holding an armful of groceries. The usual. Fruit, meats, and toilet paper. He turned around to face me and said, "Honey, I'm going someplace where I won't need all this stuff. Bought and paid for."

Normally I don't engage in religious talk with people I don't know. Call me quiet, call me something of a lover of peace; I just don't think it's wise to do it very often. But I took the bait anyway. I was in a magnanimous mood and so I humored him. I replied, "Oh, you mean heaven?"

He said, "Yep! Jesus paid for it with His blood and I paid for it with accepting Jesus as my savior."

I took a deep breath and dared. Yes. I did. Maybe it was cruel of me to do so to a man who was probably on death's door anyway but I still opened my mouth. "Why would you have to pay for something that's already free?" I asked.

Naturally a quizzical look appeared on his face and after thinking a moment he said, "Because of Eve's sin. She sinned and so we've all sinned. We have to pay for that."

"Oh, I see. The sins of the parents passed down to the children and all that...." We both nodded in understanding one another. He seemed happy with that and said no more.

As I pondered this conversation further the next few days it became more and more clear to me that this was plain bullshit brainwashing of the demiurge. Come on now. Use your common sense. Why would a deity force children to pay for the sins of the parents? Isn't that cruel? It's like credit card companies calling to harass the family for payment on old debts of a deceased family member. Legally they cannot collect. But if the family wants to pay out of the generosity of their hearts it's not like the credit card companies would turn them down. Your debt is written off/washed away with your death. But not your debt to Yahweh. Eve sinned so you've got to make the sacrifice. Extract and lay down your brain at the door to dogmatic Christianity; free thinking isn't allowed.