Christianity: Essentially a cult based around human sacrifice?

Jesus died for our sins. He was beaten, ridiculed, tortured, stabbed and left to die nailed to a couple of planks of wood in the blazing sun of a middle eastern desert. All for us.

Thanks Jesus.

It was really pretty typical of the primitive cultures of the time. The Mayans were sacrificing people to their gods, the primitive Celts loved a bit of human sacrifice, or so we're led to believe. The Romans sacrificed anything and everything to their Pantheon of gods.

The only real difference is that the bible claims that Jesus was god. And also a man.

Let's think about this for a minute. Jesus is the son of God but he also is God.

God is all powerful, all knowing and all seeing. He has a plan for us all and yet still allows us free will, that's how great he is. He can do two completely opposite things at the same time. Wow.

Jesus is a man who feels pain, love, betrayal, abandonment, loneliness and probably a welter of conflicting and changing emotions. Like all of us, except Chuck Norris, who just feels well prepared, all the time. But, and here's the problem, he's also God and therefore feels no fear, pain, despair, lust, and presumably doesn't get that annoying itch from healing sunburn. A paradox? Not for God!

Think about him up on that cross, supposedly suffering. He's not really, is he? He's God; he knows he isn't going to die. He knows he can't go to hell or oblivion. He has planned this all along. He's going to come back to life in a couple of days time, put in a couple of guest star appearances and then bugger off back to his opulent retirement in heaven. Which, by definition, is the best place you can be. He not suffering he's laughing. Like the guy on the cross next to Brian in the famous Monty Python film, he was probably laughing and singing. 

As far as I can see (assuming that it's not all just bullshit of course) the whole thing with the cross, the crown of thorns, the spear and the sun burn was nothing more than cheap theatricality designed to impress the primitive, unwashed, uneducated peasantry of the time.

Suffer? He's God, he can't suffer.