Tuesday, December 29, 2009

War on Christmas:DON'T MESS WITH THE MESSIAH!!

Opening a new defensive front from the Left against the Left, Garrison Keillor entered the War on Christmas with a column bashing Ralph Waldo Emerson, following your own path, Unitarians, and Jewish songwriters penning Christmas songs:

...Emerson tossed off little bons mots that have been leading people astray ever since. "To be great is to be misunderstood," for example. This tiny gem of self-pity has given license to a million arrogant and unlovable people to imagine that their unpopularity somehow was proof of their greatness...

...Unitarians listen to the Inner Voice and so they have no creed that they all stand up and recite in unison, and that's their perfect right, but it is wrong, wrong, wrong to rewrite "Silent Night." If you don't believe Jesus was God, OK, go write your own damn "Silent Night" and leave ours alone. This is spiritual piracy and cultural elitism and we Christians have stood for it long enough. And all those lousy holiday songs by Jewish guys that trash up the malls every year, Rudolph and the chestnuts and the rest of that dreck. Did one of our guys write "Grab your loafers, come along if you wanna, and we'll blow that shofar for Rosh Hashanah"? No, we didn't.

Christmas is a Christian holiday -- if you're not in the club, then buzz off. Celebrate Yule instead or dance around in druid robes for the solstice. Go light a big log, go wassailing and falalaing until you fall down, eat figgy pudding until you puke, but don't mess with the Messiah.

Christmas does not need any improvements. It is a common ordinary experience that resists brilliant innovation.


While Garrison Keillor is upset about Unitarians messing with "Silent Night," it should be noted that "Jingle Bells" was written for a Unitarian congregation in the 1800s. As for Christmas resisting innovation, the whole holiday seems to be lifted from other traditions. Here Stephen Fry speaks up for the sun worshippers, pagans, Celts, Teutonic tribes, the god Mithras, and Saturnalia.



Sunday, December 27, 2009

Virgin Births


From the Mahabarahta: "The sun-god said: O beautiful Pṛthā, your meeting with the demigods cannot be fruitless. Therefore, let me place my seed in your womb so that you may bear a son. I shall arrange to keep your virginity intact, since you are still an unmarried girl."
More virgin births from the world of science can be found at:

Sunday, December 20, 2009

Wise Bible Quotations


Proverbs 4:7 Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom: and with all thy getting get understanding.


1 Corinthians 1:19 For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.



Proverbs 3:13 Happy is the man that findeth wisdom, and the man that getteth understanding.



Ecclesiastes 1:18 For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow.

Thursday, December 17, 2009

R.I.P. Oral Roberts

I just saw the news that Oral Roberts died. To some, Roberts was a larger than life figure, but I'll always remember him for his vision of a larger than life Jesus. I searched the net but could not find Robert Mcafee Brown's analysis of how Roberts must have used the Pythagorean theorem to triangulate Christ's height, but Roberts revealed that Jesus was exactly 900 feet tall in his vision back in 1980. Not only did the Reverend Roberts inspire the faithful to send him money for his ministry, he also inspired rapper MC 900 Foot Jesus.