The Other Son

Because, let's face it, it wouldn't be a true fraternichrist mockumentary unless overweight women were ridiculed.

God's house moves in mysterious ways

Daniel Pemberton is a prolific composer of TV themes/music as well as writing (he's the fella behind Shoreditch Twat). Here's a song he composed for a programme about feats of engineering skill involving a church being moved miles across the US on the back of a very big lorry.

Against a stark blue sky some of the footage is almost Fellini-esque or reminiscent of a LemonJelly cover, and when the music kicks in I'm reminded of Terry Gilliam's best work on Monty Python's Flying Circus.

Revival!

The WSJ reports on churches who are reviving the practice of shunning.

A church member asked her to leave, saying she was not welcome, but Mrs. Caskey told him she had come to worship and asked if they could speak after the service. Twenty minutes into the service, a sheriff's officer was at her side, and an hour later, she was in jail.

"It was very humiliating," says Mrs. Caskey, who worked for the state of Michigan for 25 years before retiring from the Department of Corrections in 1992. "The other prisoners were surprised to see a little old lady in her church clothes. One of them said, 'You robbed a church?' and I said, 'No, I just attended church.' "

That’s Entertainment ... Or Is It?

It all started with my favorite childhood movie, The Incredible Mr. Limpet. When I found the VHS, I was ecstatic to share it with my two children (then 15 and 16) and my wife. We were no more than ten minutes into the 1964 classic when I was caught off guard. “Do you realize our ancestors were fish?” Henry Limpet (played by Don Knotts) tells his friend.

“Whoa! Stop the tape, kids; we need to talk.”

Happy Monday

I don't think I've read anything this year that made me as happy as the following:

Athiests as a Majority

This is what it would be like, if the majority of people were athiests.
ATHIEST KID: Mom, I'm going to go fuck a hooker.
ATHIEST MOM: Okay, son.
ATHIEST KID: Afterwards, I'm going to go smoke pot with my friends, since it's "not addictive."
ATHIEST MOM: Okay, come home soon!

The athiest kid leaves the room. The father comes home from work several minutes later.

ATHIEST DAD: Hey!
ATHIEST MOM: Hi, honey! I'm pregnant again. I guess I'll just get another abortion, since "fetuses don't count as human life."
ATHIEST DAD: Okay, get as many abortions as you want!
ATHIEST MOM: Oh, and don't go in the bedroom.
ATHIEST DAD: Why not?
ATHIEST MOM: There are two gay men fucking eachother in there.
ATHIEST DAD: Why are they here?
ATHIEST MOM: I wanted to watch them do it for awhile. They just aren't finished yet.
ATHIEST DAD: Okay, that's fine with me!

Suddenly, their neighbor runs into the house.

ATHIEST NEIGHBOR: Come quick, there's a Christian outside!
ATHIEST MOM: We'll be right there!

The athiest couple quickly put on a pair of black robes and hoods. They then exit the house, and run into the street, where a Christian is nailed to a large, wooden X. He is being burned alive. A crowd of athiests stand around him, all wearing black robes and hoods.

RANDOM ATHIEST: Damn you, Christian! We hate you! We claim to be tolerant of all religions. But we really hate your's! That's because we athiests are hypocritical like that! Die, Christian!

THE END

Scary, isn't it?

Read more, here. You'll die. Laughing. And spend the passage of no time in oblivion.

Someone's in the kitchen with His Noodly Appendage

Edible Flying Spaghetti Monster! Make your own!

Tales of the Darkseid

This DIY Chick tract is almost as creepy as the real thing!

Pope prays to rid priesthood of paedophilia

The Times reports that

Pope Benedict XVI has instructed Roman Catholics to pray “in perpetuity” to cleanse the Church of paedophile clergy. All dioceses, parishes, monasteries, convents and seminaries will be expected to organise continuous daily prayers to express penitence and to purify the clergy.

Vatican officials said that every parish or institution should designate a person or group each day to conduct continuous prayers for the Church to rid itself of the scandal of sexual abuse by clergy. Alternatively, churches in the same diocese could share the duty. Prayer would take place in one parish for 24 hours, then move to another.

Well thank goodness they're organising it along scientific lines eh? It would be a real shame if god ignored their heartfelt pleas because of a technical prayer issue.

I'd advise anybody who works for a large organisation that has concrete proof of colleagues breaking the law, perhaps cooking the books or exploiting employees, to wish really hard that it wasn't happening - yeah that's probably the best solution.

Whether you believe in god and the efficacy of prayer or not it's hard to think of something more horrifically patronising than this news. When it comes to prayer I'm with Emo Phillips:

When I was a kid, I used to pray every night for a new bicycle. Then I realized that the Lord didn't work that way. So I just stole one and asked him to forgive me.

Hypothetically speaking...

Just as a thought experiment.

If somehow all trace of religiosity were removed from the planet earth; no believers, no texts, no cathedrals no trace at all... (I stress this is a hypothetical idea, I'm not advocating the complete removal of all traces of religion from planet Earth even if it were possible)

...what would happen within two generations? Within a hundred, a thousand?

My completely unqualified surmise is that faiths and religion would spring up, humans appear to be inclined toward it, it just wouldn't be Judaism, Islam Christianity or any of the current crop.