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Tag: Christianity

Sacrilegious Humor: Caller Punks Christian TV Host

Bruce Gerencser 0 Comments

This is the thirtieth installment in the Sacrilegious Humor series. This is a series that I would like readers to help me with. If you know of a comedy bit that is irreverent towards religion, makes fun of religion, pokes fun at sincerely held religious beliefs, or challenges the firmly held religious beliefs of others, please email me the name of the bit or a link to it.

Today’s bit is Caller Punks Christian TV Host.

Warning, many of the comedy bits in this series will contain profanity. You have been warned.

Video Link

Songs of Sacrilege: Satellite by the Hooters

Bruce Gerencser 5 Comments

This is the one hundred and twelfth installment in the Songs of Sacrilege series. This is a series that I would like readers to help me with. If you know of a song that is irreverent towards religion, makes fun of religion, pokes fun at sincerely held religious beliefs, or challenges the firmly held religious beliefs of others, please send me an email.

Today’s Song of Sacrilege is Heaven is Satellite by the Hooters.

Video Link

Lyrics

Hush little baby, don’t cry like that
God’s gonna buy you a Cadillac
He’s chosen you to do his will
You can spread the word in your coupe de ville

So jump in the river and learn to swim
God’s gonna wash away all your sins
And if you still can’t see the light
God’s gonna buy you a satellite

Look to the heavens and see it shine
Heals the sick and leads the blind
Tune it in and hear it say
It’s counting down to judgment day

So jump in the river and learn to swim
God’s gonna wash away all your sins
And if you still can’t see the light
God’s gonna buy you a satellite

Hey, satellite man, your time has come
Your word received by everyone
And should you fall, well, that’s okay
You love the ones that you betray

So jump in the river and learn to swim
God’s gonna wash away all your sins
And when at last you see the light
God’s gonna by you a satellite

So jump in the river and learn to swim
God’s gonna wash away all your sins
And when at last you see the light
God’s gonna buy you a satellite

Yeah, when at last you see the light
God’s gonna buy you a satellite
Hey, God’s gonna buy you a satellite

Look to the heavens and see it shine

Songs of Sacrilege: Heaven is Under the Sun by Beta Play

Bruce Gerencser 0 Comments

This is the one hundred and eleventh installment in the Songs of Sacrilege series. This is a series that I would like readers to help me with. If you know of a song that is irreverent towards religion, makes fun of religion, pokes fun at sincerely held religious beliefs, or challenges the firmly held religious beliefs of others, please send me an email.

Today’s Song of Sacrilege is Heaven is Under the Sun by Beta Play.

Video Link

Lyrics

Well you’ve got Jesus, I think that’s great for you
you’re allowed to believe in, but don’t tell me what you know
you say that I’ve been burning, since the day I was born

And you’ve got opinions, yeah that’s okay with me
but you make the decision, like I’ve got some disease
the tale you are spinning, it’s such a curious one

So you can preach all you want at the top of your lungs
but I ain’t hurting no one
and it feels like I already won
heaven is under the sun
heaven is under the sun

Invite me to your party, it’s an eternal one
but I’ve been tiny dancing around with Elton John
you say he’s not invited, I wouldn’t go in without him

So you can pray all you want for the devious ones
to me you’re speaking in tongues
and it feels like I already won
heaven is under the sun
and here I’m gonna make it on my own
here I’m gonna make it on my own

So you say someone lives inside me, I wouldn’t know who to be
but I know I’m the driver, behind this soul machine
not looking for revival, no I can handle myself

And if the high water come I will not be undone
my heart ain’t weighing a ton
it feels like I already won
heaven is under the
feels like I already won
heaven is under the
feels like I already won
heaven is under the sun
heaven is under the sun
heaven is under the sun
heaven is under the sun

I Am God and I Love You So Much

Bruce Gerencser 12 Comments

i am god

I regularly correspond with a handful of Evangelical pastors, missionaries, and evangelists who are having doubts about their faith. While some of them have deconverted — albeit secretly — others are caught in no-man’s land — the space between belief and unbelief. As any of these doubters will tell you, I make no effort to convert them to atheism. I am far more concerned with helping them work through their doubts, fears, and questions. Most of all, I want to provide them a safe place to honestly and openly say what’s on their minds.  They know that I once was where they are now. They also know that whatever they tell me will be kept in the strictest of confidence.

Earlier today, a man who, up until recently, spent most of his adult life holding revival meetings in Independent Fundamentalist Baptist churches, sent me a text about God and his love for us. I asked him if I could share his text with you, and he said yes.

I Am God and I Love You So Much

I am God. God is love. I love you so much.

I love you so much that I set you up to fail.

I love you so much that I taught a snake how to talk, tempt and deceive.

I love you so much that I created most of you knowing you’d reject me.

I love you so much that I made infinite torture the price of your finite rejection.

I love you so much that I’ll give all who reject me a special body that will never die and never stop feeling ultimate pain.

I love you so much that I’ve made sexuality one of your most intense desires but one of your most forbidden actions.

I love you so much that I’ll let some of you be rich, powerful and comfortable while most will be poor, miserable and weak.

I love you so much that I’ll make my forgiveness and salvation one of the most obscure, secluded, exclusive, elusive, difficult, ancient, senseless, illogical and bizarre, argued, debated, opinionated, sadistic, divisive, repulsive, reject-able, laughable, unverifiable, irrational, emotional, and psychological things ever conceived.

I love you so much that I’ll hurt you if you doubt me.

I love you so much that I’ll hurt you if you trust me.

I love you so much that I’ll hurt you if you stray from me.

I love you so much that I’ll hurt you if you are closer to me than to anyone.

I love you so much that I’ll hurt you if you don’t serve me.

I love you so much that I’ll hurt you if you serve me faithfully.

I love you so much that I’ll make your suffering for ignoring me very real in this life.

I love you so much that I’ll make your rewards for walking with me only real in the next life.

I love you so much that I’ll kill your loved ones, destroy your life, ravage your body and make your best friends think it’s your fault, just to teach the devil a lesson.

I love you so much that I’ll make everything you need to know about me and my love available to you in an ancient, translated, revised, edited, copied, argued, debated, contradictory, violent, terrifying, depressing, ambiguous, bizarre, embarrassing book written by dozens of disagreeing men, spanning thousands of years.

I love you so much.

God is love.

I am God.

Nancy Campbell’s “Vision” for Her Children and Grandchildren

Bruce Gerencser 2 Comments

all about jesus

According to the Above Rubies website, Nancy Campbell is an “internationally known author, speaker, and authority on Biblical Motherhood and Family.” Campbell preaches the old-time Fundamentalist  gospel of patriarchy — a world in which women marry, obey their husbands, bear lots of children, and keep the home. Recently, in a post titled A Higher Vision, Campbell detailed her vision for her children and grandchildren. Here’s what Campbell had to say:

I want children who love God above all else.
I want children who are growing into the likeness of Christ.
I want children who love righteousness and abhor evil.
I want children who have a biblical mindset and stand for God’s truth.
I want children who will not compromise godly standards.
I want children who will not be tainted by the spirit of this world.
I want children who will not give in to the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, but who will pursue the will of God.
I want children who love God’s Word and love to pray.
I want children who will blaze across this world with the gospel and message of truth.

Amen.

As you can see, Campbell’s vision for her progeny focuses on the Evangelical God and the Bible. Like many Evangelicals, her vision is singular and blinkered, making Campbell blind to the wonders of the world outside the narrow confines of the Christian box. All that matters to Campbell is that her children and grandchildren turn out to be good little Christians who follow the approved way of life.

I too have children and grandchildren, and like Campbell I have a vision for them. However, my vision is far different from that of Campbell’s:

I want children who think for themselves.
I want children who enjoy life.
I want children who treat others with respect.
I want children who love their families.
I want children who value hard work and enjoy the fruits of their labors.
I want children who aren’t afraid to stand against bigotry and racism.
I want children who will live every moment to its fullest, realizing that life is short.
I want children who value fun, pleasure, and relaxation.
I want children who will travel far and wide, enjoying the wonders of earth.
And most of all, I want children who are happy.

Amen.

Campbell’s vision is one of exclusion, whereas my vision is one of inclusion. Campbell’s vision focuses on right beliefs and obedience, whereas my vision focuses on embracing and enjoying life. Campbell’s vision sees the goal as a room in God’s celestial kingdom, where my vision sees the goal as a life well lived. Campbell envisions life as that of Pilgrim in John Bunyan’s The Pilgrim’s Progress. Trudge on dear Pilgrim, remembering that Heaven awaits you IF you make it to the end. What a sad way to live life, squandering the too-short time we have on earth.

I have more of a Dixie Chicks way of looking at life. In 1998, the Chicks released the single Wide Open Places. I think the song aptly describes how those of us who are rooted in there here and now view life:

Who doesn’t know what I’m talking about
Who’s never left home, who’s never struck out
To find a dream and a life of their own
A place in the clouds, a foundation of stone

Many precede and many will follow
A young girl’s dream no longer hollow
It takes the shape of a place out west
But what it holds for her, she hasn’t yet guessed

[Chorus]
She needs wide open spaces
Room to make her big mistakes
She needs new faces
She knows the high stakes

She traveled this road as a child
Wide eyed and grinning, she never tired
But now she won’t be coming back with the rest
If these are life’s lessons, she’ll take this test

[Repeat Chorus]
She knows the high stakes

As her folks drive away, her dad yells, “Check the oil!”
Mom stares out the window and says, “I’m leaving my girl”
She said, “It didn’t seem like that long ago”
When she stood there and let her own folks know

[Repeat Chorus]
She knows the highest stakes
She knows the highest stakes
She knows the highest stakes
She knows the highest stakes

Video Link

Wide open spaces, that’s what I hope my children and grandchildren find as the meander their ways through this life. Who knows what might lie ahead. Campbell wants to keep her children and grandchildren safe within the confines of the Evangelical box. (Please see The Danger of Being in a Box and Why it Makes Sense When You are in it and What I Found When I Left the Box) While there is great comfort and security that comes from knowing everyone is safely in the box, this is no way to live and enjoy life. That’s what Evangelicalism does. It confines people for life in Bible Prison, safe from the evil, sinful world. Humanism, however, opens wide the gate and says, You are FREE! Enjoy life. Embrace all that it has to offer, knowing that we don’t know what tomorrow might bring. Life is like the steam rising from a radiator on a cold winter’s day. It quickly dissipates into the air and then it is gone (James 4:14).  Solomon was surely right when he said:

There is nothing better for a man, than that he should eat and drink, and that he should make his soul enjoy good in his labour
….
All go unto one place; all are of the dust, and all turn to dust again. Who knoweth the spirit of man that goeth upward, and the spirit of the beast that goeth downward to the earth?
Wherefore I perceive that there is nothing better, than that a man should rejoice in his own works; for that is his portion: for who shall bring him to see what shall be after him?
….
Then I commended mirth, because a man hath no better thing under the sun, than to eat, and to drink, and to be merry: for that shall abide with him of his labour the days of his life, which God giveth him under the sun.
….
For to him that is joined to all the living there is hope: for a living dog is better than a dead lion. For the living know that they shall die: but the dead know not any thing, neither have they any more a reward; for the memory of them is forgotten. Also their love, and their hatred, and their envy, is now perished; neither have they any more a portion for ever in any thing that is done under the sun. Go thy way, eat thy bread with joy, and drink thy wine with a merry heart; for God now accepteth thy works. Let thy garments be always white; and let thy head lack no ointment. Live joyfully with the wife whom thou lovest all the days of the life of thy vanity, which he hath given thee under the sun, all the days of thy vanity: for that is thy portion in this life, and in thy labour which thou takest under the sun. Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might; for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave, whither thou goest.

Let me conclude this post with the advice I give on the ABOUT page of this blog:

You have one life. There is no heaven or hell. There is no afterlife. You have one life, it’s yours, and what you do with it is what matters most. Love and forgive those who matter to you and ignore those who add nothing to your life. Life is too short to spend time trying to make nice with those who will never make nice with you. Determine who are the people in your life that matter and give your time and devotion to them. Live each and every day to its fullest. You never know when death might come calling. Don’t waste time trying to be a jack of all trades, master of none. Find one or two things you like to do and do them well. Too many people spend way too much time doing things they will never be good at.

Here’s the conclusion of the matter. It’s your life and you best get to living it. Some day, sooner than you think, it will be over. Don’t let your dying days be ones of regret over what might have been.

 

Church of Christ Preacher Al Shannon Says Women Who Dress “Immodestly” Risk Rape by Lustful Men

Bruce Gerencser 57 Comments
christian modesty
Graphic from The Head Covering Movement Website

Church of Christ preacher Al Shannon wants pubescent teen girls and women to know that if they dress “immodestly” and are raped it is their fault. And if parents don’t teach their girls to dress modestly and they end up being impregnated by Christian horndogs it is the fault of lax mothers and untrained daughters. Shannon writes:

Mothers with young girls will do them a real favor by teaching them while little to learn to dress in modest apparel. It just may keep your unmarried daughter from being raped or getting pregnant out of wedlock.

Shannon also wants sexually aware girls and women to know that if they dress inappropriately and some poor, hapless, weak, pathetic teenage boy or man lusts after them, it is their fault. Shannon writes:

The Bible teaches that we must dress in modest apparel. “In like manner also, that women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with shame facedness and sobriety” (1 Tim. 2:9). A failure to dress properly induces others to sin. Mary Quant, the London fashion designer and mother of the miniskirt said, “Mini-clothes are symbolic of those girls who want to seduce a man . . . and leads to sex.

Modesty Enforcer Shannon also wants teen girls and women to know that if they wear skimpy bathing suits they shouldn’t be surprised if teen boys and men lust after them and want to fuck them. Shannon warns:

Women on board the hi-jacked pleasure ship Santa Maria left off wearing “enticing clothing of shorts, halters and swim suits” and stayed out of the ship’s pool for fear the rebels might have designs on them sexually! This was in the 1960’s. If you plan on swimming, you need to pick a place other than where there is mixed swimming. When women dress in such a way as to entice men, don’t be surprised when they want to do more than just look! Women of the millennium wear macro [sic] bikinis that reveal every aspect of he [sic] human anatomy. In other words, women of today parade themselves naked before the eyes of the world to see and cause them to lust after their bodies.

What about how teen boys and men dress, Preacher Shannon?  Here’s what he had to say:

Fathers need to also talk to their boys about proper attire. Way too often today we see boys wearing their underwear on the outside of their pants and revealing the imprint of a certain body part. This is totally indecent.

Oh my God, teen boys are showing off their underwear by wearing it outside of their pants and this somehow indecently shows the imprint of “certain” body parts! I wonder what that “certain body part could be? Penis? Dick? Or any of the dozens of euphemisms men have for their rod? Is Preacher Shannon ashamed to say the word “penis,” lest he corrupt the minds of his readers? How does wearing underwear outside of your pants show off your penis any more than wearing underwear inside of your pants?  And why doesn’t Shannon mention men’s bathing suits?

While women continue to make inroads outside of the Evangelical church, within its walls they are still viewed as the keepers of zippers. If teenage boys and men are to keep their “certain” body parts in their pants, it is up to teen girls and women to make sure that they never dress in ways that will cause lustful Johnny to reach for his package. Once Johnny unzips his pants and lets loose his manhood, why, there’s no telling what he might do. And if he impregnates or rapes a woman he’s not to blame!  Remember, the Bible says in Proverbs 7:

 For at the window of my house I looked through my casement, And beheld among the simple ones, I discerned among the youths, a young man void of understanding, Passing through the street near her corner; and he went the way to her house, In the twilight, in the evening, in the black and dark night: And, behold, there met him a woman with the attire of an harlot, and subtil of heart. (She is loud and stubborn; her feet abide not in her house: Now is she without, now in the streets, and lieth in wait at every corner.) So she caught him, and kissed him, and with an impudent face said unto him, I have peace offerings with me; this day have I payed my vows. Therefore came I forth to meet thee, diligently to seek thy face, and I have found thee. I have decked my bed with coverings of tapestry, with carved works, with fine linen of Egypt. I have perfumed my bed with myrrh, aloes, and cinnamon. Come, let us take our fill of love until the morning: let us solace ourselves with loves.For the goodman is not at home, he is gone a long journey: He hath taken a bag of money with him, and will come home at the day appointed. With her much fair speech she caused him to yield, with the flattering of her lips she forced him. He goeth after her straightway, as an ox goeth to the slaughter, or as a fool to the correction of the stocks; Till a dart strike through his liver; as a bird hasteth to the snare, and knoweth not that it is for his life. Hearken unto me now therefore, O ye children, and attend to the words of my mouth. Let not thine heart decline to her ways, go not astray in her paths. For she hath cast down many wounded: yea, many strong men have been slain by her.

Never, ever forget that when men lust women are ALWAYS to blame. If teen girls and women would just dress like they did in the days of Little House on the Prairie or wear some sort of Christian burka, burning male lust would be extinguished, women would no longer be raped, and no children would be born out of wedlock. Or so say the Al Shannons of the world. Perhaps the real solution is for women to stay away from Evangelical churches, much as they would dimly-lit alleys late at night. If Christian men are so easily aroused that exposed cleavage, legs, or tight clothing causes them to lust and have thoughts of rape, wouldn’t women be safer if they spent Sundays at home?

 

The Sounds of Fundamentalism: Abortionists, Gays, and Secularists to Blame for 9-11 by Jerry Falwell

Bruce Gerencser 2 Comments

jerry falwell

This is the fifty-fourth installment in The Sounds of Fundamentalism series. This is a series that I would like readers to help me with. If you know of a video clip that shows the crazy, cantankerous, or contradictory side of Evangelical Christianity, please send me an email with the name or link to the video. Please do not leave suggestions in the comment section.  Let’s have some fun!

Today’s Sound of Fundamentalism is a clip taken from a Pat Robertson interview of Jerry Falwell. These words were uttered two days after 9-11.

Video Link

Songs of Sacrilege: Kill the Lights by Matt Nathanson

Bruce Gerencser 0 Comments

This is the one hundred and tenth installment in the Songs of Sacrilege series. This is a series that I would like readers to help me with. If you know of a song that is irreverent towards religion, makes fun of religion, pokes fun at sincerely held religious beliefs, or challenges the firmly held religious beliefs of others, please send me an email.

Today’s Song of Sacrilege is Kill the Lights by Matt Nathanson.

Video Link

Lyrics

My head’s a stereo I can’t turn off.
You said I should learn to sing along.
In your bedroom out on taraval,
We were haunted by everything we wanted.

Kill the lights,
I’m afraid of nothing.
The church of your curves,
The ghost inside us,
The last temptation.

The night is young, but we are younger.
Time is on our side.
Kill the lights.

I found religion at the record store.
I found heaven on your kitchen floor.
You be stunning, baby, I’ll be stunned.
Keep glowing, I’ll follow your explosions

Kill the lights,
I’m afraid of nothing.
The church of your curves,
The ghost inside us,
The last temptation.

The night is young, but we are younger.
Time is on our side.
Kill the lights.

Of all the things I left undone,
I don’t miss a single one.
When everything felt good
I’d fall apart.

All the things I couldn’t see,
Standing right in front of me.
Your body pushed against me
In the dark

The Final Judgment

Bruce Gerencser 9 Comments

guest-post

Guest post by Melody

Heaven and hell are big in Evangelical Christianity. One might say larger than life even. As a believer I was told over and over again that I did not have to fear hell. Jesus had saved us all. He had saved me and I was bought and paid for forever. Despite officially being part of a more Arminian background, predestination did figure in our beliefs as well. From our side (humans) we had free will and a choice, but from God’s side it was still predestination. I tried to understand this conundrum but failed to. Since I knew quite a few people in high school who were Calvinists, I figured we actually were quite Arminian, despite these caveats. The Calvinists I knew were not able to decide for themselves: they had to be elected by God and even then they were put through serious tests of faith to determine their worthiness and the truth of their claim.

As I was quite convinced I would go to heaven, I did not fear hell for myself. For other people, however, I did. What I did fear for myself was Judgement Day. It scared the living daylights out of me. The idea of standing before God’s throne and have every sin you’ve ever committed read out, or shown, before you; it was an unbearable thought. In our specific explanation of the Bible, there would be two moments of judgement: Christ’s judgement and God’s judgement. After the Rapture, we Christians would be judged by Christ. This was not to determine if we’d go to heaven or not, however, it was about the number of cities we would reign, based on The Parable of the Ten Minas. We’d be judged for our fruits: for the outcome of our Christian lives. Only after the End Times and perhaps even after the Thousand years of Christ’s reign would the ultimate Final Judgement take place: God’s judgement. This was the moment where it would be determined who went to heaven or to hell. Since we would already be living with Jesus for a long time by then, it would not be clear what the outcome would be for us. We would still have to be judged though, just like everybody else, which was only fair.

For true Christians these two moments were not meant to hurt or humiliate us, instead they were meant to increase our love for Christ even more. If we were faced with all our sins, including the long-forgotten ones, we would understand even better and deeper the love and work of Christ for us. Despite being told this positive spin on the judgement, seeing it as an evaluation rather than as a trial, I couldn’t shake my fear of it. I did not want to be confronted with all my failings and sins. I didn’t care if the one who defended me would also be the one judging me, i.e. Jesus. It was scary and something I feared immensely. I looked forward to being in heaven and living with Christ but this moment would inevitably come as well. What would I see? What sins would be shown? Would other people get to see all my sins too? Would they hate me or mock me for it? The answer to that last one would be no, since heaven is all about happiness and no-one would be bullied there.

Still, the Bible wasn’t all that clear on the specifics so my imagination had room to run wild. Judgement Day featured in my fears both for others and myself. Whatever attempts were made to sugarcoat the whole thing, in the end it was all about sin and heaven and hell. It was about the failure of the human race, about Adam’s fall and, in particular, about all my wrong-doings. I couldn’t lighten up about it. Looking back that makes perfect sense. If you take your religion very seriously, you won’t be able to lighten up about it. If sin features so heavily in your beliefs, judgement over sin will too.

Sometimes I was a little angry at God/Jesus over this. We were saved for ever and ever, but we would still be judged over our past mistakes. Did that mean that we even were fully forgiven? Shouldn’t forgiveness mean that you don’t mention it again? That the burden is completely lifted? Of course, it didn’t mean that and I was wrong to ask. We were not going to hell and we should be (and would have to be) eternally grateful for it. The short, small pain of going through a divine judgement should not have to faze us. However, it did faze me enormously and didn’t help my trust in God either. My questions and longing to understand were met time and time again with even more questions and non-answers. Paradoxes and doublethink are a huge part of Evangelical Christianity and I did not fare well with them. When claims about the One Actual Truth are made, they do not serve any clear purpose and shouldn’t play a role. If the truth is clear and self-evident, it should be just that.

What kind of teachings did you learn about the Judgement? Were there two or one of them and did they intersect with apocalyptic teachings as well?

Thanks for reading and thanks to Bruce for posting this post!

Bruce Gerencser