Natural Baptism

I'm still on Diana's Baths in mind, because another thing occurred to me that I forgot to write about. The whole time I wanted to lie back into the water to get that falling Shamanist sensation, and because of my surroundings I thought about a lot of Christian Baptisms of adults that I've seen on TV where they take the person and have them sort of trust fall backward into a river.
Then since I was in the wild I thought about John the Baptist and Jesus. You know I feel like because Christianity is such a major religion with serious die hard practitioners that it makes the discovery of who the people in these books, legends, myths, harder to be reached by the common person. I see all these preachers on TV talking about how they are concerned that they are becoming irrelevant to the younger generation, and yet "The Bible" got major viewership on TV.
What I'm saying is, you can make a comic Book about Thor and Odin, and translate those myths in very accessible language for today's readers, but do that with even the New Testament and you have to be careful how you interpret things and indeed who you are.

Anyway, we don't talk about John the Baptist a lot. A guy a lot like the "wolfman" of Santa's Village, except spiritual. An ascetic, shaman (but Jewish so monothesitic) with visions and eating wild things and clothed in wild things. And Jesus (who also famously spends time a lone in nature and has visions) goes to the river to be Baptized by him. There is a Bible version of this and many film versions of it. Maybe it didn't even happen. But it doesn't seem too far fetched that one Religious leader would seek out and be baptized by another so probably it did happen. That scene, for me seems more spiritual than a church or something more structured.
I guess the same is true for a lot of American Christians too because there were a lot new types of Christianity sprouting up in American woods and deserts or just being more tied to nature and indeed mixing with the Native American Traditions, or Native American traditions mixing with Christian influence. It is easier to think about Christian ideas, ideals and spirituality when you drop most of the Church politics, rules, and strict adherence to scriptures. When you just think about the rituals as customs, and the stories as well, stories, things become easier to swallow and to understand.