"...what is not true, as everyone knows, is always immensely more fascinating and satisfying to the vast majority of men than what is true. Truth has a harshness that alarms them, and an air of finality that collides with their incurable romanticism. They turn, in all the great emergencies of life, to the ancient promises, transparently false but immensely comforting, and of all those ancient promises there is none more comforting than the one to the effect that the lowly shall inherit the earth." - H.L. Mencken

For The Love Of God, Please Shut Up

"Have you accepted Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior?"

"Messianic worship is an indirect path to enlightenment."

"What?"

"Idol fetish makes me nauseous."

"Um, oh. Well, when was the last time you went to church?"

"Oh, I still go to an old Roman Catholic Mass once in a while for the theater of it. And to see if I can catch the priest giving one of the alter boys a leering eye."

"Well, we're not Catholic, we're.."

"Yeah, I know, you're Sunni Christians and they're Shiite Christians and you award them your condescending patience as they misread your book. Look, let me ask you something. Doesn't it bother you that the New Testament is a mishmash of conflicting declarative statements written long after Jesus was dead by people who believed the Earth was flat, and that the whole idea of His divinity was concocted by a committee of greedy landlords to employ everlasting influence and power over the peasantry?"

"It's the word of God."

"Oh, that's right, I forgot about that. It's the word of God. Here's what puzzles me. When I was learning Dutch I noticed that whenever I would translate a paragraph from English to Dutch or Dutch to English, the meaning would change, just slightly, but definitely. And when I imagine translating the entire bible through, what, at least five languages? Latin, Greek, Aramaic (the native language of Jesus).."

"Biblical scholars have.."

"I know all about that. My question is to you, not them. If you, standing in front of me right now, with that shit-eating grin on your face, if you really believe that the New Testament is absolutely the unalterable, written word of God, why have you not even given it the respect of taking the time to learn how to read it in the language in which it was written?"

"You know, in bible study our teacher said.."

"Yeah, I'm sure he did. You know, you spend so much of your life walking around all smug and pious and superior as you preach the gospel, but when it comes down to taking a few months of language classes so that you might actually know what the fuck you're talking about, well, that's a little too inconvenient, isn't it? It's only the word of God."

"Well, OK, it was nice talking to you."

"Hey, where are you going? You're gonna leave me here? You just give up on the souls that are hard to reach? Come back here! I have a soul that needs saving! You're shirking your duties, Jesus Jr.! OK, well, if you change your mind, I'll be over here with the beggars, hookers and thieves, where the REAL renegade rabbinical students hang out. See ya!

copyright 2007 John Bizarre