I love Marvel Comics, and, as a result, I am also falling in love with the Marvel Superhero movies. I spent this morning drooling over the Flash TV series which has that wonderful comic book wiseacre flavor. And I decided that Dallas needs its own superhero.
So, using the toxic pollution in the city air and the natural ability of the human body to adapt to anything, Muck Man is born. Yes, Muck Man, the toxic hero who smells so bad that bad guys don’t have a chance. Severe odor is his super power. He can remove his shoes and take down a regiment of evil villain minions with a wave of foot-fungus incredo-stink. He can radiate infected ear-wax smells through the earwax antennas on his helmet. And, of course, he can go fully nuclear with a Muck Man power fart.
The Magnificent Muck Man has a secret identity too. He is a mild-mannered retired school teacher by day, pursuing a mundane and forgettable career as a writer until the city is threatened by a super villain. And he is coming.
Behold, the Angry Orange King. He is tramping toward us in Angry Tramp Boots looking to tramp all over the basic human rights of people he doesn’t like. Especially poor people he doesn’t like. He gives rude finger gestures to the masses with the fingers of his tiny, tiny hands. And he likes to build gigantic things and make other people pay for them. He has recently defeated the homegrown lizard-man super villain that represents our state. He used his super villain power to hang insulting nicknames on people, and we all know that nicknames can be fatal, especially to lizard-people. Many would argue that the Angry Orange King hasn’t won total victory yet. He still has to defeat one more opponent before the frightened nation turns the keys to the kingdom over to him. But there is no guarantee that he will be beaten, as no other contender has beaten him yet, despite everything the wise monkeys claim to be true.
So the confrontation is set to happen. Blow-hard insult master against the world’s greatest source of stinky justice. Who will win? Nobody knows for sure. But for me, I tend to side with goodness over evil.
Sunday Sermons in More Innocent Times
There are definitely tendencies in those of us who are really atheists and non-believers in our heads to look back fondly at a time when God and religion filled our childish hearts every Sunday Morning. I have been told that idiots like me with a penchant for writing humor ought not to indulge in making fun of religion and politics. But I look at modern humorists making fun of both those things with impunity and too often end up admiring their success. Because, not only does the the subject of religion provide an easy target for satire and mockery, but we can’t really keep something sacred in our porcelain and breakable human hearts for very long without making sure it is fire-tested. That’s why I intend to take a flame-thrower to it in today’s Sunday Sermon. And I don’t mean I will only make fun of belief in God, but making fun of belief in atheism as well.
Here is a piece of music that gives your heart peace that you might need to play in the background if you really plan to read this purple-paisley-prose post. It is Pachelbel’s Canon in D Major, a very spiritual piece to play for peace of personhood and a pinch of paradise.
Now, of course, the first thing to acknowledge in this idiot’s Sunday sermon is the idea of God Himself.
Is there a God?
Remember, I pass the test for believing what atheists normally believe. That should disqualify me from making the following statement. But remember too, I also identified myself in this essay as an idiot. So, I will say it anyway.
There is a God, not in Heaven, but in us. There has to be. I talk to Him all the time, and He answers me. And I keep asking Him, “If you don’t exist, then how can you be answering me?”
“Well, Michael, you are an idiot. And things don’t have to make sense for you to believe them. But also, I am the part of you that never gives up on you even when you have given up on yourself.”
And I try to look as intelligent as I can as I say, “What…?”
“People, Mickey, my son, have a secret power inside of themselves that, when they are in troubled times and dire dangers, they can reach deep into their souls for it and pull it out to save themselves from the situation in the best way possible.”
“So, if people use this power correctly, say the right words and everything, they can save their lives in any situation and even live on after death?”
“I know you are an idiot, my child, but try not to be quite so idiotic all the time.”
“But people who are very religious believe in eternal life of some kind, don’t they?”
“You are not the only idiot out there, my beloved.”
“So, we don’t get eternal life for praying the right things and doing the right things and fulfilling all the elements of the Live Forever Spell?”
“There is no such thing as eternal life nor eternal torment. But you exist. And existence is eternal. There was no life before you are born, and there is no life after you die. But once you exist, you always exist, even outside of the time-frame of your mortal life.”
“That’s why I call myself a Christian Existentialist, right?”
“You are, indeed, that flavor of idiot, yes. But the Christian part means you have to adhere to Christian values. And not the ones Christian Fundamentalist idiots interpret from the Old Testament. The real ones based on choosing love over hate.”
“So, is that all I need to bring this sermon to an end?”
“Well, you should probably thank William Bouguereau for providing most of the internet images you illustrated this thing with. He died before you were born, but he still exists.”
“Thanks, Billy B. You paint lovely naked angels.”
“And you should recognize that this idiotic thing you have written is not a sermon, but, rather, a fantasy dialogue. And then stop adding more to it like a good little idiot.”
“Amen.”
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Filed under commentary, humor, insight, philosophy, religion
Tagged as atheism, Christianity, religion, satire