Sick and Tired of Being Sick and Tired
A little over a year ago, William K. Wolfrum wrote a blog post titled “Jesus Christ Quits Christianity After Viewing Republican Platform.” As it turned out, Wolfrum’s readers loved it, and now it’s making an encore appearance at Talking Points Memo. (Hat tip, Alan Colmes.)
Satirical, irreverent treatments of religious subjects aren’t everyone’s cup of tea. That said, I think the piece is not only wildly funny, but extremely well-written as well. So keep an open mind and give it a try. For a taste, try the first two paragraphs, below:
For years, Jesus Christ had kept quiet while his “followers” had killed and committed horrendous acts of intolerance in his name. They were the “birth pangs” of a new religion, his surrogates would say. One day he would be accepted by all as a liberator.
But in an announcement that has left his followers shaken, the Christ himself has come forward to announce that he is leaving Christianity, effective immediately. The reasoning: The 2008 Republican Platform. Reached for comment at a West Hollywood coffee shop, Christ said that he couldn’t deal with a world that so misinterpreted his words and actions.
Like it? Here’s more.
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14 Responses to “Sick and Tired of Being Sick and Tired”
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Just the type of disrespect I talked about in previous threads.
All in the name of parody and satire. I especially liked the comment below the article that said that Christ was “gay”.
Classy.
Although I agree that “fakers” in any party should never hide behind Christ as the article states.
But look what happens to a man of God in politics who is genuine. Mike Huckabee was ridiculed for it.
So as usual, Liberals attack from both ends.
Typical
I found this to be a good satirical giggle.
If some people do not understand that the point of satire is to make people laugh & rethink (but not necessarily change) their opinions then they will probably get pretty ticked at something like this.
Of course, I'm not a “Christian” (just ask my pentecostal Repugnican neighbor, he told me so), so who am I to talk?
I'm not a Christian either, and I don't even have to ask my neighbor.
Wolfrum is doing what many people do, and that is interpreting religion to support their own political views. In that sense he is no better than the people he's poking fun at. Kind of like Letterman making fun of other people's affairs.
I'm definitely not a Christian, but from the little I know about the man who inspired Christianity, he doesn't seem to have been someone who would be happy about most of the things the present-day political party known as the Republicans supports or stands for.
Kathy I would say both you and I are in a poor position to interpret Jesus's take on modern issues.
No poorer a position than anyone else who professes to speak on Jesus' behalf.
It is very hypocritical to invoke God or Jesus for political brownie points only to go about living a life of not following the teachings of the Bible, at least for those who claim to be Christians (Stanford cheating on his wife but wanting to force anti-abortion beliefs on others, ect.). To call non-Christians servants of the devil is and always will be a sin among the faithful. For too many years now, some within the Republican party have always viewed those who disagree with them on certain issues as either 1)non-Christian when they may have been Christian or 2) Agents of the devil, which in itself is a major sin IMO because you automatically claim to know God’s will, which no single person on Earth can no matter the religion. It has always been a major reason why I have distanced myself from the GOP (along with GWB) and I always had faith that that rhetoric would not be tolerated by the majority. However, I do not think it is fair to label the Republican Party as a whole because a few people within are too ignorant to understand what “Love thy neighbor” truly entails. I consider it a moral issue among the Christian community rather than a political issue, but since some Republicans see no problem in invoking God/Jesus for some things, I agree with what this thread is implying.
We're in as good a position as anyone else, given that Jesus lived 2,000 years ago, and as far as I know, no one living today knew him personally.
Many of our “modern issues” are just updated versions of the same issues that existed in Jesus's time. Hatred, war, narrow-mindedness and religious zealotry, existed then as now. Poverty, hunger, disease, persecution, existed then as now.
Not to mention the fact that Jesus was an observant, committed Jew — and I do know something about Jewish law and Jewish values. Based on my reading of the Bible combined with my understanding and knowledge of Jewish tradition, I would say it's more likely than not likely that Jesus placed a higher priority on social justice (of course, not calling it that, then) than on building weapons and enforcing rigid religious rules.
As always — YMMV.
Oh my gosh. LOL! I had not seen this when I posted my response to DaGoat just now. I must have read your mind.
I agree with what you've written. I would add that, imo, Jews can fall victim to a similar kind of hypocrisy. For example, although Orthodox Jews are a category that actually encompasses a lot more diversity than you might think, there still are many Orthodox and a fair number of Conservative Jews who are very hypocritical about taking the spirit of Jewish law as seriously as they do the form. Someone like Joe Lieberman, who is Orthodox, may observe Jewish law scrupulously, but as far as I am concerned, his enthusiasm for war and militarism, his opposition to meaningful health care reform, his slavish obeisance to lobbyists who give him huge amounts of money, and his cynical political style in general are the very antithesis of Jewish values and ethics. He may go to synagogue every Shabbat, observe all the other holidays to the letter, keep kosher, and do everything Jewish observance requires, but to my way of thinking, he is not very concerned with the ethical side of Judaism.
, I would say it's more likely than not likely that Jesus placed a higher priority on social justice (of course, not calling it that, then) than on building weapons and enforcing rigid religious rules.
Where I have trouble applying the teachings of Jesus to modern situations is that in my view Jesus focused on individual behaviors and faith as opposed to governmental actions. The goal was to get individuals into heaven, not to run governments.
Would Jesus have approved of dictators like Milosevic and Hussein? Probably not. Would he approve of bombing innocent people to remove Milosevic and Hussein? That's where it gets a lot murkier, I would say he probably wouldn't. Although Jesus valued individual actions to help the poor and encouraged his followers to do so, it's a leap to apply that to taxation and government budgets. What happens then is people appropriate the particular position of Jesus that justifies what they wanted to do in the first place.
I have real skepticism of trying to justify government policies by saying it's what Jesus would want, whether it's a liberal or a conservative saying it.
Fair enough.
DaGoat — This is a very good point, and it's certainly well-taken. I would like to point out that there is one side of the aisle who regularly uses Jesus as a cloak for what they propose as government actions, and there is one side who does not. I think it's clear which side is which here. The left may often use a retort of “I don't think Jesus actually would want what you're saying he would” (and this article is a satirical version of that) against those proposals by the religious right, but it's pretty rare to hear a lefty propose policy based on what Jesus would want.