Perplexed at Pareidolia

It seemed like a fairly average lunch time for me. I was sitting outside eating my meal from Taco Bell and the weather outside was very beautiful. I was about to take a bite out of my delicious Crunchwrap Supreme and then I saw it.

The face of Optimums Prime was staring right back at me. It was a sign of the Apocalypse and the end of my existence was about to take place. Immediately, I snapped a photo of my meal before the four horsemen began galloping into my direction.

Actually, there was not doomsday experience, in fact after I snapped the photo, I ate my food. For a brief second, I fell under the trap that many people do on a daily basis, they have an experience of Pareidolia. Simply put, these are those experiences are the ones we hear about on the news of people who see faces in every day objects. Some of the more popular ones were the people who see Jesus in food or the Virgin Mary in the sky. I found a website dedicated to this phenomenon (http://www.bad-language.com/popetart). It is incredible to me that people are so willing to pay thousands of dollars to purchase an object that is simply, an object.

As a Christian, I hear on a regular basis of people who have seen Jesus in the skies or Mary in their food which I can't help but be skeptical of this account. I think it is incredible that people's immaginations have gotten ahold of them and they are able to see these signs and call them wonders. Still, I can't wrap my head around why people are drawn to this artifcats because they don't help move our society forward, junk at the end of the day is still junk. Like my lunch above, they are part of our daily life, but they have no redeeming value in of themselves. If anything, it makes religon or any image that people claim to have seen become less credible. It's an icon that everyone is familiar with, like my Crunchwrap Supreme, I saw a icon from a tv show and movie.This did not help me become a better person, but in fact it put a smile on my face before I devoured my lunch. I guess that's why images within the relm of Pareidolia are so popular, because it puts a smile on our face and if that's the case, then let's look at it as art, instead of a sign from God.