Pages

Sunday, September 30, 2012

116. Churches

I wish you could have seen C.W. this morning. Dolled up is not the term for it. His tailored suit must have cost close to five thousand dollars and I could have combed my hair using the reflection in his hand-made shoes. The cost of his tie would have provided me with a week’s supply of clothing. A jewel-encrusted Rolex sparkled on his wrist.

But the best part of it was his hair. It must have stood up four inches from his head and not a hair was out of place. I couldn’t help staring.

“What?” He said, looking up from a Bible he was holding.

“Nothing,” I said.

“Then leave me alone. I’m about my father’s work.”

I turned to leave.

“Aren’t you at least curious?”

I looked around. “No.”

“I’m starting a new church,” he said. “A real one-liner.”

“A what?”

“You know,” he said, pointing to a text. “A church formed from one selected line.”

“I don’t get it.”

“Somebody already took the handling of serpents,” he paused. “Besides, I don’t like snakes.”

I was mystified.

“And Joseph Smith grabbed ‘Be fruitful and multiply.’ Now the Duggers have it copyrighted.”

“Would you explain to what you are talking about?”

“Money,” he said. “More money than you can imagine. Do you know how many cars, boats, and mansions Joyce Meyers owns?”

“A bunch I think.”

“More than a bunch. Now I plan to cash in”

“You make it sound simple,” I said.

“It is. All you have to do is find one line in here,” he said waving his Bible at me. “And you form your church around it.”

I must have looked mystified.

“Have concerns about your sexuality and want to overcompensate? There’s a line that lets you start a church based on preaching against members of your species born with a same-sex physiology.”

“So I have heard.”

“If you enjoy your same-sex physiology, there’s a line for that too,” he said. “That’s the beauty of it.” He looked at his Bible lovingly.

“So what’s yours?”

“I thought you would never ask,” He said. Then he looked at me with a conspiratorial wink. “You know how I hate physical labor.”

“I have noticed a tendency to, as they say, get rich quickly and easily.”

“Quite so,” He said. “So here it is.” He turned to a bookmarked page. “Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin.” He looked up and smiled. “It goes on further to say don’t worry, your heavenly father will provide for you.”

“So?”

“Don’t you see the appeal of a church that teaches it is a sin to work?”

I thought for a moment. “But won’t someone have to?”

I was going to base my church on a
commandment of gluttony but that
was aleady taken. - C.W.
“Sure, the unrighteous,” he said. “And maybe Methodists and Jews.

“What if they don’t want to?”

“That’s the secret to it,” he announced with a note of triumph. “Don’t you realize that yours is a Christian nation and the government will make them?”

“Now who told you that?” I said.

“Joyce Meyers.”

No comments:

Post a Comment