10/13/97 - Tantamount to Cultism.

     As the laundry churns (will Monica and Steve
     finally go through with their plans to have
     an affa...oh.), one comes up with some
     interesting things to think about.  Me?  I
     avoided thinking for awhile and turned on
     the telly, as my English parents surprisingly
     do not call it.  You can't help but just
     STOP at the Trinity Broadcasting Network,
     more commonly known as Comedy Central II,
     an idea I think ripped off from ESPN/ESPN2.

     Some guy named Pastor Hill was giving a sermon
     to his congregation.  Get this channel, folks.
     24 hours a day do you get the same one or
     two basic messages spread out into hour-long
     programs.  Do a word bank of the sermons and
     you'll probably get five words total.  "Love",
     "God", "Jesus", "I", and something else...

     God, that was funny stuff.  The speech went
     along the lines of this:  "You have to LOVE
     in order to be LOVED and you need to LOVE
     your wife in a LOVING way more special than
     the way you LOVE your friends, but not as
     special as the way you LOVE God and if you
     LOVE God then he will LOVE you and you will
     LOVE your LOVE for God's LOVE."  Insert
     the screaming audible level on every noun.

     I think all he was trying to say throughout
     the whole program was "love your wife."
     I didn't see the whole thing, and they
     even cut him off at the end.  Videotapes
     available, apparently.

     It just strikes me how silly it all is...
     Those are HORRIBLE sermons...terrible.
     They accomplish nothing except get
     everyone riled up and happy and proud
     to be one of God's select children.

     A more convincing sermon would be one
     given to only a few people, at a personal
     and individual level, so the sweeping
     energy wouldn't be so influential to
     everyone...getting swept up in the
     excitement, as they say.

     So, cool...this guy made me laugh more
     than the comedian on the Late Show with
     Letterman.  I kept watching, waiting for
     my sheets and clothes to dry.

     Next was some show purporting to be a
     news show.  But you know it's just
     more religious propaganda shit.  Claims
     in the intro to be one of the best news
     shows today.  So I was interested...you
     know -- how up-to-date would the news
     be?

     Uh oh, the anchorman and anchorwoman
     are husband and wife.  Oh well.  The
     anchorman starts some story about how
     Peter is watching the gates of Heaven
     and a married man who has just died
     comes up.  Peter says, "There's one
     thing still for you to do to get into
     Heaven.  Spell 'love.'"  "Why, that's
     easy!" the man responds, and proceeds
     to spell it correctly.

     Peter tells the man he must go off and
     run and errand and asks the man to stay
     and watch the gates.  He does.

     The man's wife has also died, I guess,
     and the man, mimicking Peter, asks her
     to spell a word.

     "Oh, honey, you know I'm not good at
     spelling!"

     "I did it!  It'll be easy for you too!
     The word is Czechoslovakia."

     The anchorman and woman laugh about the
     bad joke for awhile, and then the man
     says, "Aww, I'd never ask you that.  I
     would ask you to spell 'honeybun' because
     that's what I call you."

     The woman looks all blushy and they
     look so disgustingly in a fake sort of
     love.  Bleah.

     Thank God (heh) the laundry was done soon
     afterwards.  Rescued from the pits of
     TV Hell.

       "There sighs, lamentations and loud
        wailings resounded through the
        starless air, so that at first it
        made me weep; strange tongues,
        horrible language, words of pain,
        tones of anger, voices loud and
        hoarse, and with these the sound
        of hands, made a tumult which is
        whirling through that air forever
        dark, as sand eddies in a whirlwind."

                              -Dante

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