There
is something so deliciously pagan about exorcisms. Trolls living under bridges. Leprechauns.
Gnomes. So many ways to imagine
demonic creatures that thwart your best laid plans, make a fool out of you, and
lead you down the wrong path.
They’re
not all bad, of course – don’t forget the tooth fairy – but the ones that are
worth their salt certainly are. The
Koran tells you man was made of earth and the genies were made of fire and are
invisible. Some are good genies, but the
bad ones can come get you if you’re not watchful.
When I was a kid there were prayers after the
mass to Saint Michael the Archangel (and you could get slapped for asking if an archangel
was to an angel what an archbishop was to a bishop, by the way). Michael, we were taught to say, “thrust into
hell Satan, and all the evil spirits, who prowl about the world seeking the
ruin of souls.” Which was confusing since
I thought Satan already was in hell.
It’s
no wonder the old Italian ladies I worked with at the hosiery when I was
sixteen would wear garlic around their neck and hide under the table kissing repeatedly
the crucifix they always wore during thunderstorms. When you teach people to fear unseen
monsters, there’s no telling where they’ll take it.
You’ve got to love this pagan bishop running
things in Springfield, Illinois. He’s
fixin’ to get out his abracadabras and his holy water and fling some Jesus at
the Cathedral they put him in charge of.
“Out, damned spot!” “Away with
ye, oh spirits of darkness!” Hit the
road, heathens! Buzz off, Beelzebub.
I wonder how we might get tickets.
I used to piss off some of my gay friends when
I came to the defense of Pat Robertson and Jerry Falwell. Just as straight people often miss the point
that drag is theater and satire, not to be taken literally, and it’s not about “men who want to be women,” gay people too
often miss the theatrical value of the clowns leading the homophobic mobs. Bishop Paprocki is just another
Falwell. And if you sit back and give
these jokers enough rope to hang themselves, you get some hilarious
entertainment. Pop some popcorn, I used
to say, when Robertson blamed the lesbians for hurricanes in South Carolina and
Falwell and Robertson put their two quarter brains together and came up with
the half-brain notion that 9/11 was brought on by homosexuality.
Paprocki made a name for himself long ago
trying to drum Catholics out of his church.
For years, now he has been demanding that Catholics who don’t toe the
line on birth control, abortion and homosexuality have no place at the
altar. Get way from the Blessed
Sacrament, you heathen Democrat. Jesus
is MINE!
Paprocki can weasel-talk with the best of them. I’m not telling you who to vote for, he says,
just before telling you who to vote for.
The exact quote is:
I am not telling you which party or which candidates to vote
for or against, but I am saying that you need to think and pray very carefully
about your vote, because a vote for a candidate who promotes actions or
behaviors that are intrinsically evil and gravely sinful makes you morally
complicit and places the eternal salvation of your own soul in serious
jeopardy.
The Democratic Party, you may
have noticed, supports a woman’s right to have an abortion; the Republican
Party does not. The Democratic Party
endorses LGBT rights; the Republican Party does not. Any questions?
If you were a Martian and you
looked through the information you could gather from Marsgoogle on Earth People
you’d no doubt be struck by their propensity to fight each other over which one
had the exclusive authority to speak for the imaginary man they believed lived
in the sky. And by the elaborate
physical and mental structures they had built to assure their power to dominate
the conversation.
You’ve got to feel sorry for
the Roman Catholic clerics at the top.
Running a world-sized organization is like herding cats. Heretical notions keep popping up. You’ve got these troublesome women who want
to be priests. People pissed at you for
getting rid of the prayers to convert the Jews.
For kicking out liberation theologists and welcoming home Holocaust
deniers. Your program of reminding the
world that 6200 child molesters in the U.S. aren’t all that many, considering
how many molesters there are out there, has fallen flat. And there is still so much work to do to fix
the damage done by John XXIII at Vatican II.
And then there are all those
Blessed Virgin sightings to sort out.
Too late to deny Guadalupe and Lourdes and Fatima. They are mainstream by now. But there’s still work to do to take down the
sighting at Medjugorje. That one was just too far over the top. 295 sightings. What a bitch.
We’ve only been able to authenticate 12.
Do you know how much work that took?
Almost
as tough as finding the requisite number of miracles performed by the last couple
of popes so we can promote them to saints.
Obviously, if you can’t get God to change the laws of nature – more than
once – you don’t deserve the prize.
And
then there’s the matter at hand. How do
you tell who the real demons are that need the services of an exorcist? So many people out there are wearing tinfoil
hats these days. All those psychos with
guns and knives. Deciding when to call
in the shrink and when to call in the cops and when to call in the exorcist,
well that work isn’t for sissies.
In
this case, though, there is little doubt.
When you find your parishioners supporting people who express love and
affection and a desire to share both richer and poorer with each other, well,
you can’t go to the cops. It’s no longer
illegal in most places to love somebody.
And you can’t go to the shrinks.
The American Psychiatric Association back in 1973 fell for the Fallen
One’s line and announced there was nothing wrong with homosexuality. Then the (weak-willed?) American
Psychological Association followed suit two years later.
So
much for getting help from the shrinks. Looks
like it's the Exorcists by default.
And
that’s where Paprocki comes in. Next
week, when that sinner Governor Pat Quinn signs the same-sex marriage bill in
Chicago on November 20th, Paprocki will offer prayers of exorcism at the
Cathedral in Springfield.
Be
there, or be square.
Bring
your own popcorn.
4 comments:
"When you teach people to fear unseen monsters, there’s no telling where they’ll take it."
Those who can be made to believe absurdities, can be made to commit atrocities. -- Voltaire
interesting idea. inspired me to write this: http://thisculturalchristian.blogspot.com/2013/11/american-bred-ignorance-voodoo.html
And just after he completes the ritual, expect all the good people of Minnesota to rise up and demand that marriage equality be rescinded, an lo, it shall come to pass.
Since I don't really think the guy is stupid enough to believe that will happen based on his incantations and incense, then the cynic in me knows it's little more than a payback (or pay forward) to the conservative policitians for whom he's been carrying water for so long.
If they can just keep the anti-gay meme on life-support for one or two more elections, the Republicans can take over all the state legislatures, and all three branches of government...and make no mistake, that is the aim. (I think they're starting to realize the target they thought they could take on next, women's rights, may not be the best idea, but they can still he hatin' on the gays.)
BJ....Minnesota has enough problems with Neinstedt's follies...ca't take credit for this clown too...Illinois - he is all yours. Personally, I won't see him if the tickets were free
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