Heaven Can Wait

The snarky headlines are already popping up all over creation. My favorite so far: “Apocalypse Not Now!”

I’m not one to so rapidly write off devout people of faith. After all, the Biblical calculations The Reverend Harold Camping relied upon to predict the Rapture never mention leap years.

The other aspect of this that no one seems to have considered is that maybe the Rapture has occurred and there were only like five or six Christians on the planet deemed worthy of saving.

That’s about how many I can name.

I was talking with a Gideon the other day -- and how many people can say that? I’m doing a story about how Gideons have managed to place nearly 2 billion Bibles and New Testaments in so many hotel rooms around the world.

It’s a fascinating movement. I’ve read about and interviewed people who’d entered hotel rooms thinking of suicide and found a Bible they credit with saving their lives.

On the flip side, I also talked to one hotel manager who said she wishes she had a nickel for every time she’s opened a drawer Bible and found a condom stashed inside.

There’s a whole range of stuff going on in our nation’s hotel rooms. Remember to always pack slippers.

I’ve found the Gideons to be sober and serious about their mission and certainly joyful about their impact. They should be proud. I remain disappointed that I didn’t find one Gideon so wildly enthused about Bible distribution that I could declare him or her a Giddy-on.

Maybe that’s a movement ripe for launching.

So I exaggerate when I say there are only five or six Christians worthy of saving.

There are, of course, multitudes that do so much good and I’m proud to have them as friends who, no doubt, pray for my miserable soul.

And I now have a Gideon saying prayers for me, which I find cool.

We concluded a lively interview with me asking all the questions before he turned the tables on me and asked: “Chris, are you a Christian?”

I wonder about myself. If he was a Scientologist or a Hindu and had asked me if I was of either of those faiths, would I have said, “Hell, yes!” just to ensure the story conclusion would be smooth?

I don’t think so.

I guess I’m a Christian who disdains Christians. That’s bad. I really should love my fellow Christians. That tenet is at the heart of my faith.

But I have trouble pulling it off when I see so many Bible-thumping Christians starting wars, hating gays, doubting presidential birth certificates and health care initiatives and pretending God whispers to them things like who He is and isn’t sending to hell.

I see so many Christians saying and doing things that lead me to believe Jesus Christ spends a lot of time in heaven slapping His forehead and lamenting, “Wrong! Wrong! Wrong!”

That might be what He was doing every Camping predicted today the world would end.

A friend of mine said he was disappointed I hadn’t written about Camping and the end of the world. I told him nothing gets past this blog.

I wrote about Camping way back on January 3. It’s about why I was looking forward to the Rapture so it would mean goodbye to aspects of earthly Christianity that have always ticked me off.

But since it looks like we’re all going to still be in this together for a while, here are some suggestions for evangelicals like Camping and his forlorn followers to help us get along until the next Doomsday.

• Let the hair grow. Jesus looked like a hippie, but today’s Christian evangelicals look like they all go to the same barber, the one based in Mayberry on TV Land.

• Stop using the oxymoron Christian rock. It may be Christian, but it ain’t rock. When it comes to rock, my sympathy’s for the Devil.

• Remember, having a great relationship with the Lord doesn’t mean you can treat the rest of us like crap.

• Don’t interrupt a really good football game by taking the time to thank God for opening up a hole on the right side allowing you to score. Instead, thank the right tackle.

• Be consistent: Don’t condemn all the gays then extend divine forgiveness when one of your high-profile believers or political supporters gets caught playing footsie in the mens room at the Minneapolis airport.

• Admit the difference between believing and knowing.

• For heaven’s sake, stop predicting an imminent end to a world many of us enjoy with gusto. If you’re going to Rapture, next time please keep it to yourselves.

And don’t let the Pearly Gates hit you on the ass on the way out.

Lazy day hybrid blog + tweets

There can be no dispute that the instinct I’m most likely to abide is the one that suggests utter laziness.

The ample evidence can be found in my skimpy list of professional accomplishments and certainly in my bank account.

Yet it is irresistible.

Take this morning. It’s a magnificent fall day here in western Pennsylvania. My wife and I are heading into Pittsburgh tonight to meet about 10 friends who visit every year to attend a Steeler game.

So I’m looking forward to two raucous nights of bourbon, cigars and laughter in the town I love more than any other.

Holding all my liquor won’t be a problem because I’m sure I’ll never set it down for even a moment.

So, clearly, my lazy sirens are all flashing red. 

Yet I’m in conflict because it’s been two days since I’ve blogged and unlikely I’ll write anything until my hangover abates round about Wednesday.

But I’m aware of a number of people who actually look forward to reading my posts. I hear from these people and am without fail flattered by the attention.

And these are people with salaries, nice vehicles and clean-cut families -- things to which I aspire.

This delights me and I wouldn’t want to disappointing a single one of them.

And, to be clear, I’d feel the same about my readers if they were exclusively convicts bored with porn -- a captive demographic I really should recruit.

So today I’ll split the difference. That means this is a hybrid blog -- and we all know how fashionable hybrids are these days. 

I’m going to give readers a taste of my tweets -- and I’m so new to Twitter that still sounds somehow provocative. I’ve tried not to duplicate what I’ve posted in the blog previously.

I have 55 followers @8days2amish. Feel free to tag along. Or just wait until the lazy siren wails again and I’ll do another twitter dump here on the blog.

It’ll probably be another week or so.

My lazy siren is employed more often than I ever am. 

Have a wonderful weekend! Be sure to do something lazy!

• How would we go about promoting a national No-Hype Week without contradicting the importance of our message?

• I still contend a day spent eating doughnuts, cheeseburgers and pepperoni pizza should be considered a well-rounded diet.

• “Confanity” is the boring, inoffensive over-dubbed words actors must mouth to make shows like The Sopranos acceptable to networks like A&E.

• The older I get the more convinced I am life's nothing but a cruel practical joke. It's amazing anyone ever bothers to wear pants.

• N. Korean children taught Kim Jung Il is so divine he neither poops nor pees. Yet, his palaces are abundant with toilets. How considerate.

• Friendly stranger asked daughter, 4, her age the other day. She said, "I'm 4 except when we go to the movies."

• Just heard Gladys & the boys singin' "Leavin on a Midnight Train to Georgia." Man, a day without sunshine is like a Knight without Pips.

• The most dedicated entomologists can't help but be anything but bug-eyed.

• Oversexed infidelity has left most American family trees all forked up

• Roger Waters brings The Wall to the 'burgh. Don't care. Never been a Pink Floyd fan. I prefer White Floyd, Andy's barber down in Mayberry

• I'm constantly striving to do things that would be feathers in my cap, but I wouldn't be caught dead in a cap with a feathers.

• I've had some delicious horseradish, yet I've never seen a horse gardening. What an amazing, multi-talented animal. Take that, cows!

• If matter can neither be created nor destroyed, how come the world doesn't smell like one gigantic fart?

• Too many people enjoy life in dainty little sips. Sip wine. Guzzle life.

• Clusterf*** sounds like it should be more fun than it is, like something you'd want to be invited to if you said you'd bring a covered dish

• Who was Nellie and what about her was so rapid that people had to keep telling her "Whoa!" If I ever meet Nellie, I'm gonna hang on to her.

• Kill Devil Hills, N.C., sounds like a great place to host a religious revival.

• Does anyone think all the other kids picked on Jeremiah because he was a bullfrog?

• Rhode Island isn't even Rhode Isthmus

• Ernie Borgnine to be given SAG lifetime achievement award. The man's a classic. When he goes, we're going to need to find an Ernie Borgten

• I wish no harm to any of my fellow man but for the sake of comedic irony, it will be funny if Sarah Palin gets mauled by a mama grizzly

• Not sure, but CNN reporter said "a police horse will be telling us." May have been "police source," but I'm hanging in hoping it's a pony.

• Anytime you hear of someone dying suddenly it should reinforce the need to ensure you're always living suddenly.