Tuesday, November 9, 2010

The First Hypocritical Church of Christ



I am a huge fan of satire, I've actually exhausted the category on stumbleupon several times. The Onion, Betty Bowers, Landover Baptist Church and several youtube channels are frequent lurking grounds for me on the interwebs, and that pales in comparison to my religious devotion (irony noted) to The Daily Show and The Colbert Report. I'm certainly not the only person on the internet consuming sarcasm and the like, devouring laconic ironies for breakfast, sardonic videos for lunch. One of my most popular stand-up jokes involves lampooning racists, something nearly everybody gets behind, so it shouldn't be too surprising that I started a satirical facebook group called The First Hypocritital Church of Christ. It's obviously satire, isn't it? I mean, isn't it?
 
I've thought of making it bigger and having a web-site designed, selling some t-shirts, making some videos, all poking fun of the obviously hypocritical things that are pervasive in our culture (Also, daddy has bills to pay and needs constant attention). But before I move forward on that I really need to find out why average Christians find it so offensive. I'll admit I didn't think it through all the way and added pretty much my entire friend's list without thinking on whether or not they'd be offended, and I certainly won't blame facebook for letting just anybody add you to any group without your permission (Although in light of this they should probably change it before some bored miscreant puts everyone they know in a group called 'rapists and thieves), but it is interesting how people get so defensive about the groups they belong to without thinking about it.

I wonder if there's a way to phrase it to dull the emotional reaction without losing the edge that makes it funny. It's not my intent to insult people, well not most people, but to really point out how irritating hypocrisy is. For example, is there anything more Christ-like than to sell everything you have and give it to the poor (Matt 19:21) or taking care of the sick (Matt 25:36)? Yet how many 'religious' people are against universal health care or social programs to help the needy? How many religious leaders have to molest children before there is a real outcry of the people? Why do we condemn children confused about their sexuality in a culture with more mixed messages on the subject than clarity to the point where they lose so much hope that they take their own lives? I may not believe in the divinity of Jesus, but if the words in his book are a true reflection of his personality as a man, I'm pretty sure I can extrapolate how he'd feel about it (hint: not good). Even his Father hates hypocrisy (Job 13:16) to the point where they don't even get into heaven...

We are all hypocrites. None of us lives up to our own ideals, few of us are innocent of driving in the same ways that enrage us, and even David, the man after god's own heart, had a man killed so he could steal his wife. Yet it's not God's forgiveness that's important, it's each others. It is the forgiveness of your neighbor's faults that we all share, more or less each in their part, that makes a society strong. I try to do my best daily and I try specifically to be a douche as little as possible, just like most of  us, but what irks me is the person who stands up and loudly proclaims what they believe and then openly does the opposite. And if it offends you that they are the subject of my ridicule, than I guess you just don't get it.

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