My great friends from high school, Henry and Patricia Farrish, posted this on my Facebook wall.
I have no idea why.
LOL.
I have no idea why.
LOL.
Showing posts with label hell. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hell. Show all posts
Monday, August 5, 2013
Friday, April 26, 2013
Grocery School
I've watched the documentary "Waiting For Superman" twice in the last few weeks. The damn thing haunts me.
Go here for details.
Basically, the film follows five or six kids from failing or inadequate public schools in their effort to be accepted in charter schools.
It comes down to a drawing. A lottery. Pure, blind luck.
Imagine being trapped in a public, bureaucratic hell-hole for 12 years, where the only thing that matters is having your ass counted as "present" in a seat.
Ugh.
Don Boudreaux likes to make the supermarket analogy. I'm going to reprint part of it here.
Suppose that we were supplied with groceries in same way that we are supplied with K-12 education.
Residents of each county would pay taxes on their properties. A huge chunk of these tax receipts would then be spent by government officials on building and operating supermarkets. County residents, depending upon their specific residential addresses, would be assigned to a particular supermarket. Each family could then get its weekly allotment of groceries for “free.” (Department of Supermarket officials would no doubt be charged with the responsibility for determining the amounts and kinds of groceries that families of different types and sizes are entitled to receive.)
Except in rare circumstances, no family would be allowed to patronize a “public” supermarket outside of its district.
Residents of wealthier counties – such as Fairfax County, VA and Somerset County, NJ – would obviously have better-stocked and more attractive supermarkets than would residents of poorer counties. Indeed, the quality of public supermarkets would play a major role in determining people’s choices of neighborhoods in which to live.
Of course, thanks to a long-ago U.S. Supreme Court decision, families would be free to shop at private supermarkets that charge directly for the groceries they offer; such private-supermarket families, though, would get no discount on their property-tax bills.
When the quality of supermarkets is recognized by nearly everyone to be dismal, the resulting calls for “supermarket choice” would be rejected by a coalition of greedy government-supermarket workers and ideologically benighted collectivists as attempts to cheat supermarket customers out of good supermarket service – indeed, as attempts to deny ordinary families the food that they need for their very survival. Such ‘choice,’ it would be alleged, will drain precious resources from the public supermarkets whose (admittedly) poor performance testifies to the fact that these supermarkets are underfunded.
And the small handful of people who call for total separation between supermarket and state would be criticized by nearly everyone as being, at best, delusional and – it would be thought more realistically – more likely misanthropic devils who are indifferent to the malnutrition and starvation that would sweep the land if only private market forces governed the provision and patronizing of supermarket. (Some indignant observers would even wonder aloud at the insensitivity of referring to grocery shoppers as “customers”; surely the relationship between suppliers of life-giving foods and the people who need these foods is not so crass as to be properly discussed as being ‘commercial.’)
….
Does anyone believe that such a system for supplying groceries would work well, or even one-tenth as well as the current private, competitive system that we currently rely upon for supplying grocery-retailing services? To those of you who might think so, pardon me but you’re nuts.
To those of you who understand that such a system for supplying grocery-retailing services would be a catastrophe, why might you continue to count yourself in the ranks of those who believe that government schooling (especially the way it is currently funded and supplied) is the system that we should continue to use?
Think of the millions of lives wasted in the public school-to-prison pipeline.
You cannot give me a good reason why we're still doing this.
Go here for details.
Basically, the film follows five or six kids from failing or inadequate public schools in their effort to be accepted in charter schools.
It comes down to a drawing. A lottery. Pure, blind luck.
Imagine being trapped in a public, bureaucratic hell-hole for 12 years, where the only thing that matters is having your ass counted as "present" in a seat.
Ugh.
Don Boudreaux likes to make the supermarket analogy. I'm going to reprint part of it here.
Suppose that we were supplied with groceries in same way that we are supplied with K-12 education.
Residents of each county would pay taxes on their properties. A huge chunk of these tax receipts would then be spent by government officials on building and operating supermarkets. County residents, depending upon their specific residential addresses, would be assigned to a particular supermarket. Each family could then get its weekly allotment of groceries for “free.” (Department of Supermarket officials would no doubt be charged with the responsibility for determining the amounts and kinds of groceries that families of different types and sizes are entitled to receive.)
Except in rare circumstances, no family would be allowed to patronize a “public” supermarket outside of its district.
Residents of wealthier counties – such as Fairfax County, VA and Somerset County, NJ – would obviously have better-stocked and more attractive supermarkets than would residents of poorer counties. Indeed, the quality of public supermarkets would play a major role in determining people’s choices of neighborhoods in which to live.
Of course, thanks to a long-ago U.S. Supreme Court decision, families would be free to shop at private supermarkets that charge directly for the groceries they offer; such private-supermarket families, though, would get no discount on their property-tax bills.
When the quality of supermarkets is recognized by nearly everyone to be dismal, the resulting calls for “supermarket choice” would be rejected by a coalition of greedy government-supermarket workers and ideologically benighted collectivists as attempts to cheat supermarket customers out of good supermarket service – indeed, as attempts to deny ordinary families the food that they need for their very survival. Such ‘choice,’ it would be alleged, will drain precious resources from the public supermarkets whose (admittedly) poor performance testifies to the fact that these supermarkets are underfunded.
And the small handful of people who call for total separation between supermarket and state would be criticized by nearly everyone as being, at best, delusional and – it would be thought more realistically – more likely misanthropic devils who are indifferent to the malnutrition and starvation that would sweep the land if only private market forces governed the provision and patronizing of supermarket. (Some indignant observers would even wonder aloud at the insensitivity of referring to grocery shoppers as “customers”; surely the relationship between suppliers of life-giving foods and the people who need these foods is not so crass as to be properly discussed as being ‘commercial.’)
….
Does anyone believe that such a system for supplying groceries would work well, or even one-tenth as well as the current private, competitive system that we currently rely upon for supplying grocery-retailing services? To those of you who might think so, pardon me but you’re nuts.
To those of you who understand that such a system for supplying grocery-retailing services would be a catastrophe, why might you continue to count yourself in the ranks of those who believe that government schooling (especially the way it is currently funded and supplied) is the system that we should continue to use?
Think of the millions of lives wasted in the public school-to-prison pipeline.
You cannot give me a good reason why we're still doing this.
Friday, May 4, 2012
Why we didn't open up a West Coast Warehouse in California
When my employer, Jukt Micronics, decided to open up a West Coast Warehouse, I was thinking somewhere near San Diego or Long Beach California.
The owners wouldn't dream of it.
You see, those places are regulatory hells. Our west coast warehouse is in....Phoenix, Arizona. A long, long way from the Pacific ocean.
Here's something from Material Handling and Logistics Magazine on why logistics folks should avoid California. (Sounds fascinating, I know. Hey, it's my job !!!) This editorial also covers why you should be politically involved, no matter what your profession.
The silly season of a new presidential election year is upon us. Both parties will pump millions of dollars into campaign ads telling you why you shouldn’t hire the other guys. Next will come the debates where the candidates take on that task. The mix of half truths and total lies slung about will make reasonable people want to ignore politics altogether and focus on their own jobs.
You can do that IF your West Coast warehouse is in Phoenix.
If your job is in logistics, ignoring politics right now would be a mistake. Amidst the potshots the warring factions are taking at each other, supply chain professionals across the country are likely to suffer some collateral damage from various regional battles over the environment. Two of those battles are taking place on opposite sides of the country.
On the West Coast, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California stopped the California Air Resources Board (CARB) from enforcing the Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS). But last week the Ninth Circuit Court granted CARB’s motion for a stay of the lower court’s injunction while it considers CARB’s appeal of the lower court’s decision.
That means CARB can resume enforcement of the LCFS standard, which CARB believes will reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and thus “drive the investment and innovation that creates new jobs and provides the next generation of clean fuels to all Californians,” CARB stated.
Dammit, dammit, dammit, the point of "new jobs" is for people to be doing something productive, something that others will voluntarily pay money for. Not bureaucratic make-work.
The International Warehouse Logistics Association (IWLA) believes such enforcement will do the opposite. In a newly released statement, IWLA calls this decision “an attack on the jobs of blue-collar Californians.” It cited the findings of an independent economic study: The Impact of the Low Carbon Fuel Standard and Cap and Trade Programs on California Retail Diesel Prices, conducted by Stonebridge Associates for the California Trucking Association.
The study states that CARB will raise “California-only” diesel fuel wholesale prices by an additional $2.22 per gallon. This translates to a retail diesel price increase of 50 percent: $6.69 per gallon of diesel by 2020.
While this is a cost California companies would bear, there are supply chain implications affecting a broader population of logistics professionals. IWLA surmises that $7 a gallon diesel fuel could shut down the supply chains surrounding the ports of Oakland, Long Beach and Los Angeles and restart a statewide recession.
“While CARB designs a ‘one-state’ diesel-fuel emission policy that drives our members out of California, ports outside the state are more than happy and willing to take the business away,” said Joel Anderson, IWLA president and CEO. “In essence, CARB’s message to shippers in the Pacific Rim is to bypass California ports and change course to Seattle and Canada—or plan to use the Panama Canal when it widens in 2014.”
Or have everything unloaded in Phoenix, just to piss 'em off.
And that takes us to the other side of the country, where a recent legal challenge to port expansion may prevent the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) from dredging the Savannah River, which, in turn, would preclude the Port of Savannah from being able to accommodate the entry of Post-Panamax containerships that the Panama Canal expansion would allow.
According to Enan Stillman, an attorney with the law firm of Nelson Mullins Riley & Scarborough who specializes in logistics matters, the outcome of this case could spur similar legal challenges in federal and state courts across the East and West Coast port corridors that may delay or prevent federal and state agencies from dredging and deepening river channels.
So you, dear logistics professional, whether you like it or not, are smack dab in the middle of politics. That means decisions politicians and lawmakers hash out in the next few months will have a direct impact on your job. As tempting as the prospect of burying your head in the sand is right now, what these factions are doing above ground could determine if your business gets buried too. Exhume your head and let your representatives know what you think.
The owners wouldn't dream of it.
You see, those places are regulatory hells. Our west coast warehouse is in....Phoenix, Arizona. A long, long way from the Pacific ocean.
Here's something from Material Handling and Logistics Magazine on why logistics folks should avoid California. (Sounds fascinating, I know. Hey, it's my job !!!) This editorial also covers why you should be politically involved, no matter what your profession.
The silly season of a new presidential election year is upon us. Both parties will pump millions of dollars into campaign ads telling you why you shouldn’t hire the other guys. Next will come the debates where the candidates take on that task. The mix of half truths and total lies slung about will make reasonable people want to ignore politics altogether and focus on their own jobs.
You can do that IF your West Coast warehouse is in Phoenix.
If your job is in logistics, ignoring politics right now would be a mistake. Amidst the potshots the warring factions are taking at each other, supply chain professionals across the country are likely to suffer some collateral damage from various regional battles over the environment. Two of those battles are taking place on opposite sides of the country.
On the West Coast, the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California stopped the California Air Resources Board (CARB) from enforcing the Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS). But last week the Ninth Circuit Court granted CARB’s motion for a stay of the lower court’s injunction while it considers CARB’s appeal of the lower court’s decision.
That means CARB can resume enforcement of the LCFS standard, which CARB believes will reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and thus “drive the investment and innovation that creates new jobs and provides the next generation of clean fuels to all Californians,” CARB stated.
Dammit, dammit, dammit, the point of "new jobs" is for people to be doing something productive, something that others will voluntarily pay money for. Not bureaucratic make-work.
The International Warehouse Logistics Association (IWLA) believes such enforcement will do the opposite. In a newly released statement, IWLA calls this decision “an attack on the jobs of blue-collar Californians.” It cited the findings of an independent economic study: The Impact of the Low Carbon Fuel Standard and Cap and Trade Programs on California Retail Diesel Prices, conducted by Stonebridge Associates for the California Trucking Association.
The study states that CARB will raise “California-only” diesel fuel wholesale prices by an additional $2.22 per gallon. This translates to a retail diesel price increase of 50 percent: $6.69 per gallon of diesel by 2020.
While this is a cost California companies would bear, there are supply chain implications affecting a broader population of logistics professionals. IWLA surmises that $7 a gallon diesel fuel could shut down the supply chains surrounding the ports of Oakland, Long Beach and Los Angeles and restart a statewide recession.
“While CARB designs a ‘one-state’ diesel-fuel emission policy that drives our members out of California, ports outside the state are more than happy and willing to take the business away,” said Joel Anderson, IWLA president and CEO. “In essence, CARB’s message to shippers in the Pacific Rim is to bypass California ports and change course to Seattle and Canada—or plan to use the Panama Canal when it widens in 2014.”
Or have everything unloaded in Phoenix, just to piss 'em off.
And that takes us to the other side of the country, where a recent legal challenge to port expansion may prevent the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) from dredging the Savannah River, which, in turn, would preclude the Port of Savannah from being able to accommodate the entry of Post-Panamax containerships that the Panama Canal expansion would allow.
According to Enan Stillman, an attorney with the law firm of Nelson Mullins Riley & Scarborough who specializes in logistics matters, the outcome of this case could spur similar legal challenges in federal and state courts across the East and West Coast port corridors that may delay or prevent federal and state agencies from dredging and deepening river channels.
So you, dear logistics professional, whether you like it or not, are smack dab in the middle of politics. That means decisions politicians and lawmakers hash out in the next few months will have a direct impact on your job. As tempting as the prospect of burying your head in the sand is right now, what these factions are doing above ground could determine if your business gets buried too. Exhume your head and let your representatives know what you think.
Saturday, April 28, 2012
Blog Comment Of The Decade
I'm sick and tired of messing with bureacracies.
I'm tired of the "city" of Richland Hills. I'm tired of their code enforcement Nazis, and their chief, a little guy who is surfing the First Baptist Church Of Euless website every time I've walked past his office.
I'm tired of the Department Of Transportation making up arbitrary rules about how far my guys can travel, how long they have to rest, what kind of paperwork they have to have on board, and blah, blah, blah. Look up CSA 2010 when time permits.
I'm tired of getting emails from online Sherpas who promise to help me navigate all the CSA 2010 bullshit.
The government digs a ditch, and then those who dug the ditch go into the private sector and set up shops to help you navigate the ditch.
I'm tired of The Federal Reserve printing money so George Bush, Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and John Boehner can pay their bills without passing legislation or tax increases. I'm disgusted by the (recent) revelation that The Fed has an entire "education" wing that goes out to propagandize school kids, but can't debate or even discuss their policies with a political party.
I'm sick of Barack Cokehead Obama carrying out raids on medical marijuana dispensaries.
I'm p.o.'d about all the highway patrolmen suddenly pulling over people around Loop 820, a stretch of interstate where I've seen very few accidents. This has nothing to do with safety, and everything to do with revenue. Between my workplace on the northside and my meeting area on the west side, I typically see 4 revenue generators with radar guns. It's nuts, nuts, nuts.
Glenn Reynolds recently linked to a Reason magazine blog comment that I think is freakin' brilliant. Here goes:
It's not a coincidence. Politicians, pundits, and professional, revolving-door bureacrats are 100% revenge of the f***ing nerds. Every loser in high school or college that just knew he was smarter and better than everyone else is in DC pacticing politics, writing about politics, and arbitrarily f***ing up the lives of everyone else with regulations just because they can.
Yep. And we're going to keep putting up with it for how much longer?
The picture of bureaucratic hell came from here.
I'm tired of the "city" of Richland Hills. I'm tired of their code enforcement Nazis, and their chief, a little guy who is surfing the First Baptist Church Of Euless website every time I've walked past his office.
I'm tired of the Department Of Transportation making up arbitrary rules about how far my guys can travel, how long they have to rest, what kind of paperwork they have to have on board, and blah, blah, blah. Look up CSA 2010 when time permits.
I'm tired of getting emails from online Sherpas who promise to help me navigate all the CSA 2010 bullshit.
The government digs a ditch, and then those who dug the ditch go into the private sector and set up shops to help you navigate the ditch.
I'm tired of The Federal Reserve printing money so George Bush, Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and John Boehner can pay their bills without passing legislation or tax increases. I'm disgusted by the (recent) revelation that The Fed has an entire "education" wing that goes out to propagandize school kids, but can't debate or even discuss their policies with a political party.
I'm sick of Barack Cokehead Obama carrying out raids on medical marijuana dispensaries.
I'm p.o.'d about all the highway patrolmen suddenly pulling over people around Loop 820, a stretch of interstate where I've seen very few accidents. This has nothing to do with safety, and everything to do with revenue. Between my workplace on the northside and my meeting area on the west side, I typically see 4 revenue generators with radar guns. It's nuts, nuts, nuts.
Glenn Reynolds recently linked to a Reason magazine blog comment that I think is freakin' brilliant. Here goes:
It's not a coincidence. Politicians, pundits, and professional, revolving-door bureacrats are 100% revenge of the f***ing nerds. Every loser in high school or college that just knew he was smarter and better than everyone else is in DC pacticing politics, writing about politics, and arbitrarily f***ing up the lives of everyone else with regulations just because they can.
Yep. And we're going to keep putting up with it for how much longer?
The picture of bureaucratic hell came from here.
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
Kim Jong-Il is dead !
I've been swamped at work for about two weeks, and have gotten behind.
So....
KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD ! KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD ! KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD ! KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD ! KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD ! KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD ! KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD ! KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD !
Ah..., that felt good. I don't believe in any of the various Hells, but in the words of my friend Denny, I kinda hope they invent one just for that Totalitarian bastard.
How bad a dictator was Kim? He was so bad that even our State Department wouldn't give him any support, training, or money, despite their willingness to hand out money to every other despot who asked. Now that's a bad dictator.
Let us all hope that Kim is closely followed by Fidel Castro.
I'm not the only person to post this bit o' greatness from "Team America: World Police" in honor of this occasion:
The Kim goes to hell cartoon came from here.
So....
KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD ! KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD ! KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD ! KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD ! KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD ! KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD ! KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD ! KIM JONG-IL IS DEAD !
Ah..., that felt good. I don't believe in any of the various Hells, but in the words of my friend Denny, I kinda hope they invent one just for that Totalitarian bastard.
How bad a dictator was Kim? He was so bad that even our State Department wouldn't give him any support, training, or money, despite their willingness to hand out money to every other despot who asked. Now that's a bad dictator.
Let us all hope that Kim is closely followed by Fidel Castro.
I'm not the only person to post this bit o' greatness from "Team America: World Police" in honor of this occasion:
The Kim goes to hell cartoon came from here.
Saturday, May 29, 2010
Sunday, July 26, 2009
The Burning Hell, Part Eight, Tim Gets Saved
For the last couple of months I've devoted my Sunday blog space to the cinematic wonders of New Albany, Mississippi's Reverend Estus Pirkle.
Back in the mid-1970's, this guy's movies made their way through most of the Baptist churches of the southeast. Back then they were horrifying. Why? Because they were the only movies we'd ever seen about the Hell we heard preached from pulpits every Sunday.
I no longer believe in the hell for infants.
I no longer believe in the hell for Chinese 10-year-olds who die without hearing about Jesus.
I don't believe in the hell for Brazilian teenagers who die in some remote part of the Upper Amazon without access to the broadcasts of Jimmy Swaggart.
I don't believe in the hell for old men who can't believe that God created us with "original sin", then impregnated a Palestinian virgin with himself as her child so he can have himself killed as a sacrifice of himself to himself to save us from the sin that he originally condemned us to. (If you can't follow that, you're not alone.)
I've gotten to know a lot of preachers in the last few years who don't believe it either.
I don't even believe in the hell for serial killers, Chairman Mao, or Stalin. I don't believe in the justice of eternal punishment for a temporal offense.
I do believe in giving Estes Pirkle hell, though. So let's continue.
You can hit the Pirkle tab at the bottom of this post to see what's happened in previous episodes of THE BURNING HELL. In short, two hippies named Tim and Ken have rejected Brother Pirkle's theology of Hell. When they're riding away from the church, Ken has a motorcycle accident and his head is cut off, so Tim staggers back into the church for some preachin'.
Pirkle's sermon is illustrated by actors from his congregation, the B-movie troupe that followed Ron and Tim Ormond into the Christsploitation film industry, or whichever Mississippians were wandering past the set that day.
Pirkle also supports his argument with cameo appearances by Jack Hyles and Bob Gray, two famous preachers who were later accused of molesting their flocks. Especially the little ewes.
God, I know that I'm a sinner, and I ask that you, and the victims of these two witch doctors please forgive me for making that joke. Couldn't help myself.
Let's get started. If you find my commentary helpful, it continues below the final excerpt from THE BURNING HELL.
:00 An early example of waterboarding gone wrong. There are reports that Nancy Pelosi knew about this, although she denies it.
:55 Tim has hallucinations of biblical murderers.
1:10 Satan appears, looking like Cesar Romero as The Joker in the old Batman TV series.
2:30 "He's steeyull uhlaave! He's steeyull uhlaaave ! But this tahm, ah'll kill 'im !"
3:20 Tim snaps out of his Pirkle-induced trance, overcome with the vivid pulpit imagery.
4:00 The altar call begins. "Why don't you get up from where you are right now...." If I had a dollar for every time I've heard that phrase, I could outsource this website to some other bitter ex-southern baptist.
4:35 Tim kneels at the altar. In a few minutes they're going to vote him into the church, they're going to come down front and "extend the right hand of Christian fellowship", and then they're going to take up a collection to get that boy a haircut.
And that's all there is to see of THE BURNING HELL. I think next week I'm going to start dissecting another Pirkle production called "If footmen tire you, what will horses do?"
Back in the mid-1970's, this guy's movies made their way through most of the Baptist churches of the southeast. Back then they were horrifying. Why? Because they were the only movies we'd ever seen about the Hell we heard preached from pulpits every Sunday.
I no longer believe in the hell for infants.
I no longer believe in the hell for Chinese 10-year-olds who die without hearing about Jesus.
I don't believe in the hell for Brazilian teenagers who die in some remote part of the Upper Amazon without access to the broadcasts of Jimmy Swaggart.
I don't believe in the hell for old men who can't believe that God created us with "original sin", then impregnated a Palestinian virgin with himself as her child so he can have himself killed as a sacrifice of himself to himself to save us from the sin that he originally condemned us to. (If you can't follow that, you're not alone.)
I've gotten to know a lot of preachers in the last few years who don't believe it either.
I don't even believe in the hell for serial killers, Chairman Mao, or Stalin. I don't believe in the justice of eternal punishment for a temporal offense.
I do believe in giving Estes Pirkle hell, though. So let's continue.
You can hit the Pirkle tab at the bottom of this post to see what's happened in previous episodes of THE BURNING HELL. In short, two hippies named Tim and Ken have rejected Brother Pirkle's theology of Hell. When they're riding away from the church, Ken has a motorcycle accident and his head is cut off, so Tim staggers back into the church for some preachin'.
Pirkle's sermon is illustrated by actors from his congregation, the B-movie troupe that followed Ron and Tim Ormond into the Christsploitation film industry, or whichever Mississippians were wandering past the set that day.
Pirkle also supports his argument with cameo appearances by Jack Hyles and Bob Gray, two famous preachers who were later accused of molesting their flocks. Especially the little ewes.
God, I know that I'm a sinner, and I ask that you, and the victims of these two witch doctors please forgive me for making that joke. Couldn't help myself.
Let's get started. If you find my commentary helpful, it continues below the final excerpt from THE BURNING HELL.
:00 An early example of waterboarding gone wrong. There are reports that Nancy Pelosi knew about this, although she denies it.
:55 Tim has hallucinations of biblical murderers.
1:10 Satan appears, looking like Cesar Romero as The Joker in the old Batman TV series.
2:30 "He's steeyull uhlaave! He's steeyull uhlaaave ! But this tahm, ah'll kill 'im !"
3:20 Tim snaps out of his Pirkle-induced trance, overcome with the vivid pulpit imagery.
4:00 The altar call begins. "Why don't you get up from where you are right now...." If I had a dollar for every time I've heard that phrase, I could outsource this website to some other bitter ex-southern baptist.
4:35 Tim kneels at the altar. In a few minutes they're going to vote him into the church, they're going to come down front and "extend the right hand of Christian fellowship", and then they're going to take up a collection to get that boy a haircut.
And that's all there is to see of THE BURNING HELL. I think next week I'm going to start dissecting another Pirkle production called "If footmen tire you, what will horses do?"
Sunday, July 12, 2009
The Burning Hell, Part Seven, Dr. Bob Gray Edition
This is a picture of Dr. Bob Gray, who died in prison shortly before his pedophilia trial was scheduled to begin.
Filmed in the early 1970's with the help of B-movie kings Ron and Tim Ormond, Pirkle's "The Burning Hell" scared the daylights out of every church youth group that saw it. I'm posting excerpts from the film each week because I saw the movie when I was twelve or thirteen, believed every minute of it, built a lot of my life around it, and therefore suffered extreme mental, spiritual, psychic, and emotional harm.
Now I'm getting even by parsing it every Sunday morning. This is cheaper than a psychotherapist, and causes less long-term harm to the community than climbing into a tower with an assault rifle.
To recap the previous episodes.... Two hippies, Ken and Tim, have a discussion with Brother Pirkle about the reality of hell. Their preacher has taught them that hell is only a metaphor. Pirkle disagrees. Pirkle vividly paints a picture of non-believers burning for eternity in a massive field of mud and slop. Ken and Tim object to Pirkle's reasoning and leave the church on their motorcycles.
Ken has an accident, and is decapitated.
Rather than wait around for the police or an ambulance, Tim decides to go to church.
You can hit the Pirkle label at the bottom of this post to see each episode in its entirety. Even if you're in a hurry, you've GOT to see episode #4 with the worms.
At the end of last week's clip, Pirkle was telling the biblical story of Dives and Lazarus. Lazarus was a good man who died poor. Dives had refused to give Lazarus any money, died suddenly, and woke up in hell. In the middle of last week's episode, Father Abraham, who has an unlikely "just south of Memphis" accent, was explaining to Dives why he wouldn't be able to warn Dives' family about hell. (Luke 16:19).
If you find my commentary helpful, it continues after the clip.
:00 Father Abraham, on loan from his job as a Memphis Mall Santa Claus, finishes his explanation about why warning Dives' family about hell just wouldn't be fair.
:08 The undead live and walk among us.
:50 Think about it. Let's assume there was a wealthy ruler named Dives. According to fundamentalists, Dives is STILL being Bar-B-Qued without a break for things that happened 2,000 years ago. This puts Stalin, Mao, Saddam and Hitler into perspective, doesn't it?
2:20 Pirkle: "Neither words nor pictures can describe all of (Hell's) terrors". Including that tie.
2:35 The timeline begins. Hundreds, Thousands, Billions, and Millions of years. Then comes the chart. Everyone who saw this movie remembers the decapitation, the worms, and this chart.
3:00 The chart. That's a lot of zeros.
3:40 Now we have a word from Dr. Bob Gray. (Pirkle likes to have guest preachers popping in and out of his movies.) While researching one of the previous guest speakers, Dr. Jack Hyles, I found that Dr. Hyles had been involved in some sex scandals.
What are the odds against Pirkle selecting two preachers with the same problem for one movie?
To read about Dr. Bob Gray dying in prison before his pedophilia trial could get underway, go here. (Gray pled the 5th amendment 150 times during questioning.)
We'll get to Dr. Bob in just a moment, because another Sunday morning is here and it's time to visit the Mississippi Baptist Hell of Reverend Estus Pirkle.
Filmed in the early 1970's with the help of B-movie kings Ron and Tim Ormond, Pirkle's "The Burning Hell" scared the daylights out of every church youth group that saw it. I'm posting excerpts from the film each week because I saw the movie when I was twelve or thirteen, believed every minute of it, built a lot of my life around it, and therefore suffered extreme mental, spiritual, psychic, and emotional harm.
Now I'm getting even by parsing it every Sunday morning. This is cheaper than a psychotherapist, and causes less long-term harm to the community than climbing into a tower with an assault rifle.
To recap the previous episodes.... Two hippies, Ken and Tim, have a discussion with Brother Pirkle about the reality of hell. Their preacher has taught them that hell is only a metaphor. Pirkle disagrees. Pirkle vividly paints a picture of non-believers burning for eternity in a massive field of mud and slop. Ken and Tim object to Pirkle's reasoning and leave the church on their motorcycles.
Ken has an accident, and is decapitated.
Rather than wait around for the police or an ambulance, Tim decides to go to church.
You can hit the Pirkle label at the bottom of this post to see each episode in its entirety. Even if you're in a hurry, you've GOT to see episode #4 with the worms.
At the end of last week's clip, Pirkle was telling the biblical story of Dives and Lazarus. Lazarus was a good man who died poor. Dives had refused to give Lazarus any money, died suddenly, and woke up in hell. In the middle of last week's episode, Father Abraham, who has an unlikely "just south of Memphis" accent, was explaining to Dives why he wouldn't be able to warn Dives' family about hell. (Luke 16:19).
If you find my commentary helpful, it continues after the clip.
:00 Father Abraham, on loan from his job as a Memphis Mall Santa Claus, finishes his explanation about why warning Dives' family about hell just wouldn't be fair.
:08 The undead live and walk among us.
:50 Think about it. Let's assume there was a wealthy ruler named Dives. According to fundamentalists, Dives is STILL being Bar-B-Qued without a break for things that happened 2,000 years ago. This puts Stalin, Mao, Saddam and Hitler into perspective, doesn't it?
2:20 Pirkle: "Neither words nor pictures can describe all of (Hell's) terrors". Including that tie.
2:35 The timeline begins. Hundreds, Thousands, Billions, and Millions of years. Then comes the chart. Everyone who saw this movie remembers the decapitation, the worms, and this chart.
3:00 The chart. That's a lot of zeros.
3:40 Now we have a word from Dr. Bob Gray. (Pirkle likes to have guest preachers popping in and out of his movies.) While researching one of the previous guest speakers, Dr. Jack Hyles, I found that Dr. Hyles had been involved in some sex scandals.
What are the odds against Pirkle selecting two preachers with the same problem for one movie?
To read about Dr. Bob Gray dying in prison before his pedophilia trial could get underway, go here. (Gray pled the 5th amendment 150 times during questioning.)
To read about the fifteen women who came forward saying that Gray sexually abused them as children, go here.
To read about the church kinda knowing it had been going on for a long time, go here.
To read the best single page summary of the whole sordid mess this Witch Doctor created, go here.
Unbelieveable.
4:40 In an outbreak of Christian compassion, Pirkle tells Tim that Ken is roasting in Hell, and will be there forever.
5:00 Pirkle digs deep into the Book Of Revelation to find some of the creatures called Locusts that inhabit hell. They have the body of a horse, an iron breastplate, hair like a woman, a tail like a scorpion, and teeth from the Wal-Mart Halloween aisle.
5:50 Scenes of horror as the Mississippi Drama League portray Biblical and contemporary sinners of all ages being tortured forever. Why? Because they didn't, wouldn't, or couldn't agree that Jesus (1/3rd of a single supernatural being) was born to a virgin mother somewhere in Palestine 2,000 years ago and was killed by the Roman army in order to satisfy an obscure requirement in Jewish rituals about animal (blood) sacrifices being required for the forgiveness of sins.
6:45 The story of Cain and Abel.
7:24 Back to Dives, resting with his souvenir from Burger King.
I started posting clips from this movie as a joke, more or less. This thing really did have an impact on me when I was a kid. The more I look into it, 35 years later, the more perverse satisfaction I'm getting from learning that clowns like Jack Hyles and Bob Gray had no more spiritual or moral authority than anyone else.
Never, ever trust authority.
Sunday, July 5, 2009
The Burning Hell, Part Six, Songs For Children edition
Another Sunday is upon us. That means it's time to visit the wonderful world of Reverend Estus Pirkle.
Back in the early 1970's, Pirkle's "The Burning Hell" terrified the crap out of every church youth group in the southeast. I'm posting excerpts from the film each week because I saw the movie when I was twelve or thirteen, believed every minute of it, built a lot of my life around it, and therefore suffered extreme mental, spiritual, psychic, and emotional harm.
Now I'm getting even by ripping the lid off of it every Sunday morning. This is cheaper than a psychotherapist.
To recap the previous episodes.... Two hippies, Ken and Tim, have a discussion with Brother Pirkle about the reality of hell. Their preacher has taught them that hell is only a metaphor. Pirkle disagrees. Pirkle vividly paints a picture of non-believers burning for eternity in a massive field of mud and slop. Ken and Tim object to Pirkle's reasoning and leave the church on their motorcycles.
Ken has an accident, and is decapitated.
Rather than wait around for the police or an ambulance, Tim decides to go to church.
You can hit the Pirkle label at the bottom of this post to see each episode in its entirety. Even if you're in a hurry, you've GOT to see episode #4 with the worms.
At the end of last week's clip, Pirkle was telling the biblical story of Dives and Lazarus (Luke 16:19).
If you find my commentary helpful, it continues after the clip.
:01 Wild debauchery, as conceived and filmed in a 1973 Myrtle Mississippi Baptist fellowship hall. The candlesticks have appeared in two generations of wedding photos. Check out Mrs. Dives at the :12 mark - her tiara betrays her as an Ole Miss Tri-Delta pledge.
1:45 The screenplay of Pirkle, the directing of B-movie king Ron Ormond, the acting of The Mississippi thespians, and the music of Handel. Which one doesn't fit?
2:10 Lazarus discovers that in the next life, everyone gets a pre-resurrection shave.
3:05 The Santa Claus beard is pressed back into service, and this time Abraham is wearing it. The shots of heaven were filmed in whichever Magnolia State property got "Yard Of The Month" during production.
4:29 Proof that at least two trips were made to Burger King.
4:40 The Roman soldier has a Pavolovian response to the wine. Priceless editing.
5:15 The Dives Funeral - "Mr. Dives was a personal friend of mine...." "and while he was not faithful to attend many of the services...." "I'm sure that God understands that he was a busy man" All of these are straw men that Pirkle is about to kick over. Plus, how many kings are addressed as "Mr" ????
5:50 Dives in hell. "Father Abraham, have mercy on me. Send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am tormented in this flame".
This doesn't sound like a typical Jesus parable, does it? The folks at The Jesus Seminar, my go-to guys for biblical scholarship, are divided on whether it's authentic. The doctrine of salvation through faith hadn't yet been developed by Paul, and John 3:16 wouldn't be written down for another 60 years after the death of Jesus. So who knows?
The story did inspire a catchy African-American spiritual called "Poor Man Lazrus". The lyrics are as follows:
Poor man Lazrus sick and disabled. Dip your finger in the water, come and, cool my tongue, 'cause I'm tormented in the flame. He had to eat crumbs from the rich man's table. Dip your finger in the water, come and, cool my tongue, ‘cause I'm tormented in the flame.
Chorus:
I'm tormented in the flame. I'm tormented in the flame.
Dip your finger in the water, come and, cool my tongue,
'cause I'm tormented in the flame.
Rich man Divies he lived so well. Dip your finger in the water, come and, cool my tongue, 'cause I'm tormented in the flame. And when he died he went straight to hell. Dip your finger in the water, come and, cool my tongue, 'cause I'm tormented in the flame. (Chorus)
I love to shout, I love to sing! Dip your finger in the water, come and, cool my tongue, 'cause I'm tormented in the flame.
Back in the early 1970's, Pirkle's "The Burning Hell" terrified the crap out of every church youth group in the southeast. I'm posting excerpts from the film each week because I saw the movie when I was twelve or thirteen, believed every minute of it, built a lot of my life around it, and therefore suffered extreme mental, spiritual, psychic, and emotional harm.
Now I'm getting even by ripping the lid off of it every Sunday morning. This is cheaper than a psychotherapist.
To recap the previous episodes.... Two hippies, Ken and Tim, have a discussion with Brother Pirkle about the reality of hell. Their preacher has taught them that hell is only a metaphor. Pirkle disagrees. Pirkle vividly paints a picture of non-believers burning for eternity in a massive field of mud and slop. Ken and Tim object to Pirkle's reasoning and leave the church on their motorcycles.
Ken has an accident, and is decapitated.
Rather than wait around for the police or an ambulance, Tim decides to go to church.
You can hit the Pirkle label at the bottom of this post to see each episode in its entirety. Even if you're in a hurry, you've GOT to see episode #4 with the worms.
At the end of last week's clip, Pirkle was telling the biblical story of Dives and Lazarus (Luke 16:19).
If you find my commentary helpful, it continues after the clip.
:01 Wild debauchery, as conceived and filmed in a 1973 Myrtle Mississippi Baptist fellowship hall. The candlesticks have appeared in two generations of wedding photos. Check out Mrs. Dives at the :12 mark - her tiara betrays her as an Ole Miss Tri-Delta pledge.
1:45 The screenplay of Pirkle, the directing of B-movie king Ron Ormond, the acting of The Mississippi thespians, and the music of Handel. Which one doesn't fit?
2:10 Lazarus discovers that in the next life, everyone gets a pre-resurrection shave.
3:05 The Santa Claus beard is pressed back into service, and this time Abraham is wearing it. The shots of heaven were filmed in whichever Magnolia State property got "Yard Of The Month" during production.
4:29 Proof that at least two trips were made to Burger King.
4:40 The Roman soldier has a Pavolovian response to the wine. Priceless editing.
5:15 The Dives Funeral - "Mr. Dives was a personal friend of mine...." "and while he was not faithful to attend many of the services...." "I'm sure that God understands that he was a busy man" All of these are straw men that Pirkle is about to kick over. Plus, how many kings are addressed as "Mr" ????
5:50 Dives in hell. "Father Abraham, have mercy on me. Send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, for I am tormented in this flame".
This doesn't sound like a typical Jesus parable, does it? The folks at The Jesus Seminar, my go-to guys for biblical scholarship, are divided on whether it's authentic. The doctrine of salvation through faith hadn't yet been developed by Paul, and John 3:16 wouldn't be written down for another 60 years after the death of Jesus. So who knows?The story did inspire a catchy African-American spiritual called "Poor Man Lazrus". The lyrics are as follows:
Poor man Lazrus sick and disabled. Dip your finger in the water, come and, cool my tongue, 'cause I'm tormented in the flame. He had to eat crumbs from the rich man's table. Dip your finger in the water, come and, cool my tongue, ‘cause I'm tormented in the flame.
Chorus:
I'm tormented in the flame. I'm tormented in the flame.
Dip your finger in the water, come and, cool my tongue,
'cause I'm tormented in the flame.
Rich man Divies he lived so well. Dip your finger in the water, come and, cool my tongue, 'cause I'm tormented in the flame. And when he died he went straight to hell. Dip your finger in the water, come and, cool my tongue, 'cause I'm tormented in the flame. (Chorus)
I love to shout, I love to sing! Dip your finger in the water, come and, cool my tongue, 'cause I'm tormented in the flame.
Jester Hairston, the great choral composer, did the best arrangement of the song. Here's the Asbury College Men's Glee Club singing in the college chapel service. Kinda like singing an upbeat ditty about Abu Ghraib.
6:30 Tim remains in the congregation listening to Pirkle explain why it is that who goes where in the next life.
6:40 Dives asks for another chance, just to warn his family about the dangers of THE BURNING HELL.
7:00 Abraham shoots him down. In full Faulkner/Tennessee Williams mode, the father of his race says "They hayuv Moses 'n' thuh prophets. Let theyum hear theyum. If they heer not Moses 'n' thuh prophets,,,,
To hear what other words of comfort Father Abraham said to the burning Dives, come back next Sunday.
Sunday, June 28, 2009
The Burning Hell, Part Five, Autoharp Edition
I apologize for posting this so late in the day, since I know that many of you begin your Sunday morning devotions with a visit to this site.
For the last couple of months, I've been posting clips from the evangelical films of Reverend Estes Pirkle. Back in the early 1970's, Pirkle's "The Burning Hell" may have been required viewing for every church youth group in the southeast.
I'm posting these each week because they terrified me when I was a kid, and I've found that this is good therapy.
To recap the previous episodes.... Two hippies, Ken and Tim, have a discussion with Brother Pirkle about the reality of hell. Their preacher has taught them that hell is only a metaphor. Pirkle disagrees.
Pirkle vividly paints a picture of non-believers being burned for eternity in a massive field of mud and slop. Ken and Tim angrily disagree, and leave the church on their motorcycles.
Ken has an accident, and is decapitated.
Rather than wait around for the police or an ambulance, Tim decides to go to church.
You can hit the Pirkle label at the bottom of this post to see each episode in its entirety. Even if you're in a hurry, you've GOT to see episode #4 with the worms.
At the end of last week's clip, Pirkle was telling the biblical story of Dives and Lazarus (Luke 16:19). If you find my commentary helpful, it continues after the video.
:00 - Candid shots of The Mississippi Thespians, on location in Israel with their Sears & Roebuck bathrobes and Amish head scarves. Pay attention to the music. It's an autoharp.
:40 - Pirkle actually gives us a glimpse of the woman playing the autoharp. Wait a minute.... Did they have autoharps in the middle east, circa 30 A.D. ???
1:10 - A zoom shot of the autoharp ! ! In the middle of ancient Palestine ! ! And autoharps weren't invented until the 1890's ! ! Why didn't Pirkle also include someone playing a Fender Stratocaster with a whammy bar ??
1:30 - I think this guy is the one trained actor in the film, and he took an acting class for one semester at Mississippi Delta Junior College.
2:50 - Dives wants nothing to do with the evangelists. The cameraman wants nothing to do with Dives, and doesn't bother to keep his face in the frame.
4:00 - Dives proves that he's a George H.W. Bush "compassionate conservative".
4:20 - Twenty seconds of meaningless dialogue shot at an ancient amphitheatre, to justify the travel budget.
6:30 - We're back in 1970's Mississippi. Ken's headless body is bleeding in the ditch, Tim is in church, and Pirkle is preaching.
6:50 - Pirkle's vision of ancient decadence looks suspiciously like the set of The PTL Club.
That's all for this week. No burning sinners, no worms consuming the faces of heretics, and no headless hippies. All of that will change next week on THE BURNING HELL ! ! !
For the last couple of months, I've been posting clips from the evangelical films of Reverend Estes Pirkle. Back in the early 1970's, Pirkle's "The Burning Hell" may have been required viewing for every church youth group in the southeast.
I'm posting these each week because they terrified me when I was a kid, and I've found that this is good therapy.
To recap the previous episodes.... Two hippies, Ken and Tim, have a discussion with Brother Pirkle about the reality of hell. Their preacher has taught them that hell is only a metaphor. Pirkle disagrees.
Pirkle vividly paints a picture of non-believers being burned for eternity in a massive field of mud and slop. Ken and Tim angrily disagree, and leave the church on their motorcycles.
Ken has an accident, and is decapitated.
Rather than wait around for the police or an ambulance, Tim decides to go to church.
You can hit the Pirkle label at the bottom of this post to see each episode in its entirety. Even if you're in a hurry, you've GOT to see episode #4 with the worms.
At the end of last week's clip, Pirkle was telling the biblical story of Dives and Lazarus (Luke 16:19). If you find my commentary helpful, it continues after the video.
:00 - Candid shots of The Mississippi Thespians, on location in Israel with their Sears & Roebuck bathrobes and Amish head scarves. Pay attention to the music. It's an autoharp.
:40 - Pirkle actually gives us a glimpse of the woman playing the autoharp. Wait a minute.... Did they have autoharps in the middle east, circa 30 A.D. ???
1:10 - A zoom shot of the autoharp ! ! In the middle of ancient Palestine ! ! And autoharps weren't invented until the 1890's ! ! Why didn't Pirkle also include someone playing a Fender Stratocaster with a whammy bar ??
1:30 - I think this guy is the one trained actor in the film, and he took an acting class for one semester at Mississippi Delta Junior College.
2:50 - Dives wants nothing to do with the evangelists. The cameraman wants nothing to do with Dives, and doesn't bother to keep his face in the frame.
4:00 - Dives proves that he's a George H.W. Bush "compassionate conservative".
4:20 - Twenty seconds of meaningless dialogue shot at an ancient amphitheatre, to justify the travel budget.
6:30 - We're back in 1970's Mississippi. Ken's headless body is bleeding in the ditch, Tim is in church, and Pirkle is preaching.
6:50 - Pirkle's vision of ancient decadence looks suspiciously like the set of The PTL Club.
That's all for this week. No burning sinners, no worms consuming the faces of heretics, and no headless hippies. All of that will change next week on THE BURNING HELL ! ! !
Sunday, June 14, 2009
"The Burning Hell" - Episode Four - Where The Worm Never Dies
It's Sunday morning, and time for another visit to the video collection of New Albany Mississippi's Reverend Estus Pirkle.
Every weekend I'm posting a clip from "The Burning Hell", Reverend Pirkle's early 1970's masterpiece. The film depicts the eternal consequences of disagreeing with Brother Pirkle's theology.
This movie me nightmares when I saw it in church one night in the early 1970's. I spent years praying and worrying about friends and relatives who might be "lost".
So now I'm making fun of it every Sunday morning.
If you want to watch the previous episodes, hit the Estus Pirkle label at the bottom of this post.
To recap:
In episode one, Pirkle's troupe of Mississippi thespians reenact Israel's disobedience toThor Zeus Santa Claus Billy Gibbons of ZZ Topp Moses, and shows the earth swallowing the disobedient Jews into hell.
Episode two begins the story of two hippies, Ken and Tim, who disagree with Reverend Pirkle's theology. They've been corrupted by someone named Dr. Long, who teaches that God would never send anyone to hell forever. Within minutes, Ken and Tim are severely punished. Ken's head is cut off in a motorcycle accident and Tim has to endure flashbacks of every incident where he rejected God's saving sacrifice.
Episode three has Tim staggering back into Reverend Pirkle's Sunday A.M. service, taking a seat near the front, and listening to stories about eternal damnation. The North Mississippi All-Stars cover themselves in mud, slime, and clothes from their tenant houses, set a pasture on fire, and run around saying "Ah Hate Chew".
One of the more influential demons reunites Ken's head with his body and carries Ken away to be roasted for a few billion decades.
Reverend Jack Hyles, who went on to financial scandals, child abuse scandals, etc., etc., etc., makes a cameo appearance to explain why he loves the idea of hell, and wouldn't bother getting out of bed in the morning without it.
That gets us to #4, the part we all remember. For those of us who saw this movie at church, at a youth retreat, or at a lock-in, this episode has the money shots. Some of us stayed up for weeks worrying about dead relatives and worms.....
If you find my commentary helpful, it continues below the YouTube clip.
:24 Reverend Hyles reads a list of Hell's characteristics, a list that sounds similar to the goings-on at his last church.
Every weekend I'm posting a clip from "The Burning Hell", Reverend Pirkle's early 1970's masterpiece. The film depicts the eternal consequences of disagreeing with Brother Pirkle's theology.
This movie me nightmares when I saw it in church one night in the early 1970's. I spent years praying and worrying about friends and relatives who might be "lost".
So now I'm making fun of it every Sunday morning.
If you want to watch the previous episodes, hit the Estus Pirkle label at the bottom of this post.
To recap:
In episode one, Pirkle's troupe of Mississippi thespians reenact Israel's disobedience to
Episode two begins the story of two hippies, Ken and Tim, who disagree with Reverend Pirkle's theology. They've been corrupted by someone named Dr. Long, who teaches that God would never send anyone to hell forever. Within minutes, Ken and Tim are severely punished. Ken's head is cut off in a motorcycle accident and Tim has to endure flashbacks of every incident where he rejected God's saving sacrifice.
Episode three has Tim staggering back into Reverend Pirkle's Sunday A.M. service, taking a seat near the front, and listening to stories about eternal damnation. The North Mississippi All-Stars cover themselves in mud, slime, and clothes from their tenant houses, set a pasture on fire, and run around saying "Ah Hate Chew".
One of the more influential demons reunites Ken's head with his body and carries Ken away to be roasted for a few billion decades.
Reverend Jack Hyles, who went on to financial scandals, child abuse scandals, etc., etc., etc., makes a cameo appearance to explain why he loves the idea of hell, and wouldn't bother getting out of bed in the morning without it.
That gets us to #4, the part we all remember. For those of us who saw this movie at church, at a youth retreat, or at a lock-in, this episode has the money shots. Some of us stayed up for weeks worrying about dead relatives and worms.....
If you find my commentary helpful, it continues below the YouTube clip.
:24 Reverend Hyles reads a list of Hell's characteristics, a list that sounds similar to the goings-on at his last church.
:48 Tim has a flashback to other church services where he didn't give his heart to Jesus.
1:50 For those of you who didn't grow up with altar calls, this is one of them. At the end of a worship service the choir and congregation sing something evangelical while the preacher tries to talk people into becoming Christians.
It would make sense to do this on streetcorners or in shopping mall parking lots (if you buy into the concept), but it makes absolutely no sense to do this inside of a church.
Why?
Because the people inside a church, for the most part, are already Christians. The man is fishing inside his own aquarium. But it gives the congregation the feeling that they're part of some large evengelistic outreach.
I can't tell you how many hours of my life I've spent listening to this stuff.
2:25 God is love. He is defined by love. He loves you so much that he sent his son (1/3rd of himself but also 100% of himself - it's a long story) to die in your place.
But if you can't believe this story, this is what he's going to do. Bring plenty of water with you.
3:15 This is what gave me the willies back in 1974. Isaiah 14:11 and Mark 9 talk about worms as a form of punishment.
3:45 Reverend Pirkle goes back to the original Greek to explain that these aren't symbolic worms. These are genuine maggots.
4:05 Number one, where did they get the maggots? Number two, how much did they have to pay these people for the stunt work? Number three, can you imagine people watching this and taking it seriously and literally? People with doctorates?
4:30 Pirkle and the Delta Dramatists are now at an amphitheatre, putting on a performance of "The Death Of Herod - With Worms", complete with costumes and special effects. Tom Savini can rest easy.
5:08 Pirkle: Herod would soon be just a dim memory as the worms devoured his organs. They feasted on his black heart, relishing his ???? intestines. They devoured his eyeballs and face and all of him until nothing was left but the odorous rotten form of what was once the evil Herod. What a horrible sight to behold. What a stench there must have been. Does this give you a nauseating feeling?
Well, yeah.
5:35 Reverend Pirkle begins the parable of Lazarus and Dives.
That's all for this week. In closing, may I direct you to one other website? Here's an account (with pictures) of a recent showing of "The Burning Hell". Be sure your sound is turned on.
Notice the contrast between the look of the website and the contents of this movie?
Come back next week for Episode 5 of THE BURNING HELL ! ! !
Sunday, June 7, 2009
The Burning Hell, Part Three, with a Jack Hyles cameo appearance
It's Sunday morning, and time for another visit to the video collection of New Albany Mississippi's Reverend Estus Pirkle.
Every weekend I'm posting a clip from "The Burning Hell", Reverend Pirkle's early 1970's masterpiece. The film depicts the eternal consequences of disagreeing with Brother Pirkle's theology.
This movie scared the bejeebers out of my when I saw it as a middle-schooler in Mississippi. I spent years worrying about friends and relatives who might be "lost". I might have had a shot at becoming a normal human being if it weren't for this damn movie.
So now I'm making fun of it every Sunday morning.
In the first episode, Pirkle gave us some background on the doctrine of eternal torture. There's a reenactment of the story in Exodus where disobedient Israelites were swallowed by the earth. (They had disobeyedSanta Claus Moses.) Pirkle, as narrator, steps in and out of the picture, causing one to wonder if Phil Donahue ever did any live reporting during the Bronze Age.
The second episode begins the story of two hippies, Ken and Tim, who confront Reverend Pirkle one Sunday morning before church. Ken and Tim have been turned from The One True Path by a Dr. Long, who teaches that a loving God would never condemn anyone to be burned forever and forever in a place like Hell.
Pirkle tries to set them straight, explaining that if you die without accepting Jesus as your personal lord and savior, God is going to make Hitler look like Mary Poppins. The hippies disagree, leave Pirkle's study, and ride away on their motorcycles.
Ken, the more abrasive of the two heathens, drives his motorcyle recklessly and is beheaded.
Yes, his head and helmet are removed from his body.
Episode 3 begins after the accident, with the viewers wondering if Tim will call the police, wait on the hearse, mourn the death of his lost friend, or abandon Ken in the ditch and go back to Pirkle's church for another heaping helping of Jewish mythology.
If you find my commentary helpful, it continues below the video.
:05 Tim abandons Ken in the ditch and goes back to Pirkle's church for another heaping helping of Jewish mythology.
:40 Tim dramatically staggers down the aisle, and Pirkle stops his sermon. Tim asks if Ken is merely in his grave, or is he being tortured in Hell. Estus Pirkle puts on his Pastoral Counseling Hat and gently, lovingly tells Tim that "Chances are, he's burning in the flames of Hell right now."
1:20 Pirkle gives Tim a seat on the aisle among an assortment of Mississippi Hausfraus, and continues his sermon.
2:01 Pirkle: "There is no such thing as friendship in Hell. There will be no TV programs to watch or movies to go see. There will be no cookouts to enjoy or sunsets to watch together. No vacation trips with the family. All will be one long night of sorrow, remorse, and regret forever and ever. Ohhhh.....how such memories will haunt you in Hell, you will not be able to get away from them. Go back in your mind ! Think !! Perhaps you made fun of somebody handing out tracts on a busy street corner. You thought it all a big joke ! ! "
2:30 A flashback to Tim and Ken (?) making fun of Orville Redenbacher handing out Gospel tracts on a busy street corner, and thinking it's all a big joke.
Reverend Pirkle's films are not subtle.
3:59 One of the church ladies puts her hand on Tim's knee, and he looks uncomfortable.
4:05 Pirkle tells the story of Belshazzar. I believe the actors are all Mississippians, except for The Demon In Charge, who may have been played by Dom Deluise. You might also be wondering about the special effects. How did they ever convince so many asylums to coat their inmates in mud and cow manure and herd them through a burning Tupelo cotton field?
It remains a mystery.
5:25 "Ah hate chew, Ah hate chew ! !"
6:20 Ken's head, but not his helmet, is reunited with his body. Dom Deluise is waiting to carry Ken into The Outer Darkness.
7:00 It's 1974, but Pirkle's church is already equipped with a video screen ?? He shows his congregation a clip from Reverend Jack Hyles, who claims that "if there is no Hell, I'd close my Bible. If there is no Hell, I would not preach another sermon as long as I live. If there's no Hell, I would take life easy, I would not go day and night...."
And that's the end of this week's clip from The Burning Hell. I hope it has been instructive.
Jack Hyles invented the Bus Ministry concept. He took a small church in Indiana and grew it into a massive organization with more than 100,000 members. Go here to read about the inevitable scandals.
Even if you distrust Wikipedia, their Jack Hyles entry has a good collection of links to mainstream media accounts of the scandals, the child abuse, and the missing money.
And this is from a website devoted to the former followers of Reverend Jack:
I remember some of the meetings that the college girls would have with "The Preacher" (Dr. Hyles). If anyone would have walked into the room, they would have thought that all these college age girls were waiting for Elvis to return. We were taught to actually worship him and treat him as an idol. There was a song that we would sing to him to make him come out to the stage:
"We love you preacher, oh yes we do, we don't love anyone as much as you. If you're not with us, we're blue, Oh Preacher we love you"!
Every weekend I'm posting a clip from "The Burning Hell", Reverend Pirkle's early 1970's masterpiece. The film depicts the eternal consequences of disagreeing with Brother Pirkle's theology.
This movie scared the bejeebers out of my when I saw it as a middle-schooler in Mississippi. I spent years worrying about friends and relatives who might be "lost". I might have had a shot at becoming a normal human being if it weren't for this damn movie.
So now I'm making fun of it every Sunday morning.
In the first episode, Pirkle gave us some background on the doctrine of eternal torture. There's a reenactment of the story in Exodus where disobedient Israelites were swallowed by the earth. (They had disobeyed
The second episode begins the story of two hippies, Ken and Tim, who confront Reverend Pirkle one Sunday morning before church. Ken and Tim have been turned from The One True Path by a Dr. Long, who teaches that a loving God would never condemn anyone to be burned forever and forever in a place like Hell.
Pirkle tries to set them straight, explaining that if you die without accepting Jesus as your personal lord and savior, God is going to make Hitler look like Mary Poppins. The hippies disagree, leave Pirkle's study, and ride away on their motorcycles.
Ken, the more abrasive of the two heathens, drives his motorcyle recklessly and is beheaded.
Yes, his head and helmet are removed from his body.
Episode 3 begins after the accident, with the viewers wondering if Tim will call the police, wait on the hearse, mourn the death of his lost friend, or abandon Ken in the ditch and go back to Pirkle's church for another heaping helping of Jewish mythology.
If you find my commentary helpful, it continues below the video.
:05 Tim abandons Ken in the ditch and goes back to Pirkle's church for another heaping helping of Jewish mythology.
:40 Tim dramatically staggers down the aisle, and Pirkle stops his sermon. Tim asks if Ken is merely in his grave, or is he being tortured in Hell. Estus Pirkle puts on his Pastoral Counseling Hat and gently, lovingly tells Tim that "Chances are, he's burning in the flames of Hell right now."
1:20 Pirkle gives Tim a seat on the aisle among an assortment of Mississippi Hausfraus, and continues his sermon.
2:01 Pirkle: "There is no such thing as friendship in Hell. There will be no TV programs to watch or movies to go see. There will be no cookouts to enjoy or sunsets to watch together. No vacation trips with the family. All will be one long night of sorrow, remorse, and regret forever and ever. Ohhhh.....how such memories will haunt you in Hell, you will not be able to get away from them. Go back in your mind ! Think !! Perhaps you made fun of somebody handing out tracts on a busy street corner. You thought it all a big joke ! ! "
2:30 A flashback to Tim and Ken (?) making fun of Orville Redenbacher handing out Gospel tracts on a busy street corner, and thinking it's all a big joke.
Reverend Pirkle's films are not subtle.
3:59 One of the church ladies puts her hand on Tim's knee, and he looks uncomfortable.
4:05 Pirkle tells the story of Belshazzar. I believe the actors are all Mississippians, except for The Demon In Charge, who may have been played by Dom Deluise. You might also be wondering about the special effects. How did they ever convince so many asylums to coat their inmates in mud and cow manure and herd them through a burning Tupelo cotton field?
It remains a mystery.
5:25 "Ah hate chew, Ah hate chew ! !"
6:20 Ken's head, but not his helmet, is reunited with his body. Dom Deluise is waiting to carry Ken into The Outer Darkness.
7:00 It's 1974, but Pirkle's church is already equipped with a video screen ?? He shows his congregation a clip from Reverend Jack Hyles, who claims that "if there is no Hell, I'd close my Bible. If there is no Hell, I would not preach another sermon as long as I live. If there's no Hell, I would take life easy, I would not go day and night...."
And that's the end of this week's clip from The Burning Hell. I hope it has been instructive.
**********************************
But speaking of Jack Hyles....
Jack Hyles invented the Bus Ministry concept. He took a small church in Indiana and grew it into a massive organization with more than 100,000 members. Go here to read about the inevitable scandals.
Even if you distrust Wikipedia, their Jack Hyles entry has a good collection of links to mainstream media accounts of the scandals, the child abuse, and the missing money.
And this is from a website devoted to the former followers of Reverend Jack:
I remember some of the meetings that the college girls would have with "The Preacher" (Dr. Hyles). If anyone would have walked into the room, they would have thought that all these college age girls were waiting for Elvis to return. We were taught to actually worship him and treat him as an idol. There was a song that we would sing to him to make him come out to the stage:
"We love you preacher, oh yes we do, we don't love anyone as much as you. If you're not with us, we're blue, Oh Preacher we love you"!
Gag me with a dirty diaper. She continues with this:
He would not come out until the girls were in a frenzy. What happened to only preaching Christ and him crucified? Even at the time, these meetings made me very uncomfortable. They seemed to be very sexual in nature. He would speak to us as if we were his girls that he was trying to court or swoon. Being a mother today, I would NEVER allow my daughter to attend these meetings. Hyles' Church and college have hurt many people. Many of the young pastors that have looked up to him (like the one that I spoke of) carry on his legacy of man-worship. I feel mostly for the women who suffer the degrading remarks and humiliation that comes from their beliefs.
According to the theology of Estus W. Pirkle and Reverend Jack Hyles, none of this really matters. Jack Hyles believed in Jesus, and is now in paradise. Gandhi didn't, and he's now being roasted by demons.
Come back next Sunday for another episode of THE BURNING HELL ! ! !
Saturday, May 30, 2009
The Burning Hell, Part Two
It's Sunday morning, and time for another visit to the video collection of New Albany Mississippi's Reverend Estus Pirkle.
Every weekend I'm posting a clip from "The Burning Hell", Reverend Pirkle's early 1970's masterpiece. The film depicts the eternal consequences of disagreeing with Brother Pirkle's theology.
Every weekend I'm posting a clip from "The Burning Hell", Reverend Pirkle's early 1970's masterpiece. The film depicts the eternal consequences of disagreeing with Brother Pirkle's theology.
But first, a review of last week's offering. This is from my college dorm mate, Scott M, who now lives in Memphis, Tennessee:
OMG, when I saw your link, I got so excited! I have told so many people about that movie, as an example of what is was like to grow up in a Baptist church in MS. I never thought to look on YouTube. My personal faves, that have always stuck with me, were the decapitated head from the motorcycle accident, and the worms gnawing at the faces. Like it did with you, this movie scared the holy crap out of me when I saw it at a lock-in. It is now the funniest thing I have ever seen in my life!
Scott, the best is yet to come. You don't remember the stuff toward the end of the film, where it looks like a Tupelo community theatre production of "Cat On A Hot Tin Roof" was dumped onto the set of a Clive Barker movie.
I followed the link to your rant on Hell -- loved it. I couldn't agree more. I never thought about the irony of Jesus becoming a sacrifice, when that's the very system he railed against.
(Please read that link before disagreeing with anything Scott says below.)
I have often thought of how it seems he really wanted to reform Judaism, and was a Jew himself, but now most Christians think the Jews are the enemy (they killed Jesus! Um, ok -- I guess the Romans didn't really have anything to do with that.).
Loved the Vonnegut/Tom Robbins reference. Sounds like we have had very similar journeys in the last twenty-five years. (Except for the political thing ;-)
Scott has left the nurturing bosom of The Libertarian Party, most likely as a result of becoming a thug for The Musicians' Union.
Thanks again for making my freakin' week! We so need to get together sometime. I'll see when the Red Sox are in Arlington, maybe then.
And one day soon, we will get together. It is now destined.
Last week's episode of The Burning Hell ended with some disobedient Israelites being swallowed by the desert because they disobeyed Santa Claus Moses. If you find my commentary helpful, it's below the YouTube clip.
(P.S. - No Jewish people were harmed in the production of this video. )
(P.S.S. - I don't think any Jewish people were involved in the production of this video.)
:15 Are we to believe that Brother Pirkle has been standing by indifferently while the yawning-earth fire pit swallows half the tribe of Israel?
:45 Pirkle's wife has allowed two hippies into the preacher's office. The one on the left is nervously clutching a blue book. The one on the right says "Like, man, we come to talk to ya 'bout Jeeee-sus". I think the background music is someone playing a melody on an autoharp, which is more difficult than it sounds, since they're designed for chords only. Mother Maybelle Carter (Johnny Cash's mother-in-law) could do it, and I once heard Mike Seeger, Pete Seeger's brother, play some autoharp melodies at a book/CD signing.
If you're wondering why I'm going on and on with this digression about the soundtrack instead of focusing on the dialogue, its because at this point the script is lame. The two hippies are setting up theological straw men for Estus Pirkle to kick over.
1:50 Tim explains that his blue book is by a Dr. Long, whose church teaches "a new thing, in keeping with the trends of today's world." Well, Tim, that's what happens when you allow preachers to get doctorates.
2:07 Pirkle rises from his chair to retrieve the only book that matters. "This Bible talks about a literal hell where sinners burn forever and forever". Tim responds that according to Dr. Long, "God would never condemn anyone to a burning hell."
2:30 This section doesn't portray any beheadings, fiery punishments, or Mississippians in the afterlife, but it's still one of my favorite moments in Pirkledom. Tim, who up to this point has been portrayed as a confused hippie seeking meaning, betrays some knowledge of Greek, the King James Bible, hermeneutics, and if pressed he could probably knock out a quick commentary on what Paul really meant in 2nd Corinthians.
2:55 Listen closely.... You'll hear a clock striking four times. But everything in the plot is structured around the hippies going into the preacher's study one morning immediately before the church services begin. Whoops.
3:20 This section lets you know Ken deserves what's coming to him.
4:30 I still own some of these clothes, but don't have as much of the hair.
4:45 You may have asked yourself how many people go to hell per hour, and sometime this morning I might post the question on Yahoo! Answers, just to see how many people get it wrong.
The Pirkle Principle Of Perishing Persons is as follows: The Bible says that more people are going to hell than heaven. Statistics prove that 6,000 people die every hour. That means that every hour over 3,000 people go to hell.
Let's see Disneyworld beat those numbers.
5:20 Foreshadowing. Pirkle says "at this precise minute, someone is headed to a burning hell."
Cut to Ken riding down the highway on his motorcyle, his helmet shaking around like he's a Bobble-Head doll. (Now that I've typed that sentence, the business with Ken's head bobbling around in the helmet is intentional, and acts as a sophisticated foreshadowing device.)
6:50 If internet discussion boards are to be trusted, a staggering number of children who saw this movie in church have remembered this scene for the rest of their lives. Tim rides over the hill to see that Ken has had an accident. Ken's body is off in the woods, the motorcyle is on its side with blood on the muffler, and Ken's head is about 10 feet away from his body. Inside the helmet.
7:00 Tim's friend has died. Does Tim go somewhere to call the police? Does he wait on the ambulance to show up and take Ken's body to the morgue? Or does he abandon Ken's corpse in the woods so he can have more discussions with Reverend Pirkle about the exegetical nuances between "hell" and "hades" in the original Greek?
The ending of this YouTube clip gives us a tantalizing hint, but no more than that.
Please come back next week for episode 3.
If you think I'm beating a dead horse with these weekly rants about a bad 1970's horror film, check out these quotes from a Christian message board.
It was a very good tool and helped win untold thousands and thousands to the Lord.
Can you imagine the agony of perpetually falling with molten hot flames roaring through every part of your body, excruciating agony with no relief, pain that horrible even our worst nightmares couldn't prepare us for, pain so bad you would weep for eternity, pain so gruesome that teeth would be gnashed in an agonising frenzy, consciously aware of those deeds we have done in the flesh those we have hurt, tormented by our WORST fears and more for all eternity
I think our churches are failing people by preaching all Love and don't get around to explain the consequences of Rejecting Jesus. Hell!I like you,know where i am going and am very thankfull to God for Sending his Son to take my place on that Cross,and shed his Blood for Me, so i will be in Heaven with the rest of you and will not be in everlasting torment.
Thanks for posting that. I enjoyed watching it.
The Burning Hell is a favorite and has been used in many evangelistic meetings since I was a child.
Sunday, May 24, 2009
The Burning Hell, Part One
It's Sunday, so that means it's time to review the cinematic efforts of New Albany, Mississippi's Reverend Estus Pirkle. Last week's offering was well-received. It was a short film called "Does This Excite You?", which gave us a view of heaven from The Deep South/Total Immersion States.
I first saw the next Pirkle epic, The Burning Hell, during a Sunday night church service about 35 years ago. Our Mississippi church advertised it for weeks before screening it.
I first saw the next Pirkle epic, The Burning Hell, during a Sunday night church service about 35 years ago. Our Mississippi church advertised it for weeks before screening it.
This thing scared the crap out of me.
To understand why, you have to understand that Hell was, and still is, a very real concept for a lot of people. It's not just a metaphor, and it's not merely a symbol for a life removed from God.
It's the place reserved for everyone who doesn't accept Jesus Christ as the sacrifice for their sins.
After a few years, you start to wonder what kind of Being would create things with an inclination towards disobedience so they could be tortured in fire forever. Click here for a rant on that topic. (Sorry for the digression, but don't disagree with me in the comment field unless you've read that link.)
Since a Pirkle film of this length is almost like too much candy, I'll be presenting this in eight parts over the next few weeks. Unfortunately, the first section is kinda like making that first defective pancake. It includes the preliminary throat-clearing and scene setting to introduce all the characters (Moses, Dathan, Mississippi preachers, etc.). If you find my commentary helpful, it's below the YouTube clip.
:05 - You might be the most devout Baptist that ever dunked a drunkard, but if you can see that "powered by" text underneath the satellite and not laugh, then you're taking this waaaay too seriously.
:45 - Harry Truman appears.
1:40 - Estus Pirkle appears for the first time, but his voice doesn't appear for another 10 seconds. The video and sound are out of sequence on this clip. Not that it matters.
3:15 - Three of Israel's most powerful leaders, dark semitic men of the desert, are portrayed by what look like Alabama deacons.
3:40 - If that isn't an off-the-shelf Santa Claus wig....
4:30 - You've heard that same accent in a lot of other movies, usually explaining to Yankee meddlers why we Southerners don't take well to no race-mixin'.
4:40 - I think the actors were told to look terrified, but most of the facial expressions are asking the eternal question "Who Farted?"
And the clip ends just when we were getting to the good part.
If anyone thinks I'm beating a dead horse here, this is from the IMDB comments on "The Burning Hell". Someone calling herself Charlottes Web 1952 writes:
I have watched this movie several times and I am very impressed with the way it was made. It really gives a person an idea of what hell will be like, although I know hell will be much worse than anyone can imagine. Mr. Pirkle has captured a small portion of what hell will be like. I know when I watch it that I want to do the will of God and I know in my heart that Jesus did die on that tree so that I wouldn't have to go to hell. This movie was made in the seventies I believe, and as far as the actors and actresses were concerned, I believe they did a wonderful job with their parts. I noticed someone was talking about the fake beards but most movies that someone has to have a beard is almost always fake. I can say I really enjoyed watching the movie and I want to be a better person by watching it. God bless.
The mind recoils.
Wednesday, December 24, 2008
Leaning On The Everlasting Arms - of Big Brother
Unless you've heard news of a cruise ship sinking in the Carribean, I'm still alive and well but on vacation. Our guest blogger today is Gar from Gar's Random Ramblings. For a good example of Gar's handiwork, check out his post on The Big 3 Bailout, which asks the question "Just why aren't we getting shares in these companies?"
Anyway, when I asked some of my favorite writers to contribute posts this week, the topic I threw out there for them was the difficulties of the Libertarian Party (or the difficulties of libertarianism in general) in this age of Disaster Socialism, Buddy Bailouts, and the like.
The Random Rambler took it all the way back to root causes. Here's what Gar sent me:
Libertarianism, in it's current incarnation will never be a party of choice. In a democracy the majority elects the officials. The majority of people expect government to take care of them. Poor people believe that personal freedom is more important than financial freedom. They will vote for Democrat. Rich people believe that financial freedom is more important than personal freedom. They will vote Republican. That leaves Libertarians with the votes from the intelligent folks that want both financial and personal freedom. Do you remember when you took your SAT's how you ranked on the national scale? Perhaps you were in the top 5%? Perhaps only in the top 10%. That still leaves a large portion of the population not intelligent enough to play this "freedom" game. Perhaps these people need the government to help them out either financially or personally.
The idea of Libertarianism is too scary for most people. If government doesn't have power then who will control the big corporations from jacking up gas prices and price fixing? The CEO's of these companies already have their lifestyles mapped out. They don't care if a loaf of bread costs $10. It's a drop in the bucket. If you open up the doors of financial freedoms where does it stop? How does the "majority" of people who don't have millions maintain the power to keep the billionaires from running the country without government controlling some of their finances? It's a scary proposition for the majority of people.
But, it's also engrained in the majority to not accept Libertarianism. From an earlier post: "Libertarianism holds that agents are, at least initially, full self-owners. Agents are (moral) full self-owners in that they morally own themselves in just the same way that they can morally fully own inanimate objects." Christianity does not believe this. Life is a test to see whether or not you live forever in happiness or live forever in a burning pit of hell. No one asked you if you wanted to take the test. That fundamental flaw in our upbringing prevents people from accepting the idea of Libertarianism. From before you were born a higher power has been making the decisions for you.
Ouch.
Saturday, February 2, 2008
Downs Syndrome Victims and Victims of God's Will
Someone strapped explosives to two women with Downs Syndrome, led them to a crowded market in Baghdad, and then detonated the explosives via remote control. At least 73 people were killed. This was apparently an Al-Qaida operation.
If and when the perpetrators of this abomination are captured, I predict they will claim they were doing the will of God, Allah, Zeus, or some other deity.
They will claim that their goal justified using any means necessary, whether the goal was destroying the infidel, bringing about a Sharia government, making things like they used to be, halting the slide toward liberal heresy, changing the direction priests face during communion or which magic words the priests use. (Any Means Necessary now includes using mentally retarded women as bombs, terrorism, destruction of innocents, corruption, bribery, hijacking airliners, intimidation, etc.)
I predict that the perpetrators of this atrocity heard the voice of God, Allah, Zeus, or some other deity telling them to do this. The fact that no one else heard the voice will be irrelevant. That God, if truly omnipotent, could easily make his/her will known to everyone simultaneously if he/she took an interest in these topics hasn't occured to them.
Here's my question: We have, on average, 70 years of life. Some people claim that life on earth is just a sorting process in which the worthy are separated from the unworthy. Therefore, any time unenlightened opponents are silenced or at least intimidated, it has eternal (positive) consequences for much of humanity.
If there is a Higher Power who is going to split humanity into eternal heaven and eternal hell categories, not for actions but for beliefs, are there any crimes in support of these beliefs that can't be justified?
Addition from February 20th, from the great Bob Ray Sanders of The Fort Worth Star-Telegram. Same conclusion, Same topic, different logic.
If and when the perpetrators of this abomination are captured, I predict they will claim they were doing the will of God, Allah, Zeus, or some other deity.
They will claim that their goal justified using any means necessary, whether the goal was destroying the infidel, bringing about a Sharia government, making things like they used to be, halting the slide toward liberal heresy, changing the direction priests face during communion or which magic words the priests use. (Any Means Necessary now includes using mentally retarded women as bombs, terrorism, destruction of innocents, corruption, bribery, hijacking airliners, intimidation, etc.)
I predict that the perpetrators of this atrocity heard the voice of God, Allah, Zeus, or some other deity telling them to do this. The fact that no one else heard the voice will be irrelevant. That God, if truly omnipotent, could easily make his/her will known to everyone simultaneously if he/she took an interest in these topics hasn't occured to them.
Here's my question: We have, on average, 70 years of life. Some people claim that life on earth is just a sorting process in which the worthy are separated from the unworthy. Therefore, any time unenlightened opponents are silenced or at least intimidated, it has eternal (positive) consequences for much of humanity.
If there is a Higher Power who is going to split humanity into eternal heaven and eternal hell categories, not for actions but for beliefs, are there any crimes in support of these beliefs that can't be justified?
Addition from February 20th, from the great Bob Ray Sanders of The Fort Worth Star-Telegram. Same conclusion, Same topic, different logic.
Sunday, December 23, 2007
Merry Christmas Again, and possibly for the last time, depending on whether I spend $75 for wireless access
We're on a plane headed to San Diego. Instead of leaving two vehicles at the airport for a week, or going through the hassles of having friends drop us off on a Sunday morning, and then pick us up on the return trip, we tried a van service.
The driver was a refugee from Iraq.
He had a copy of the Koran on the dashboard, plus a Haddith (sp?) by the seat.
Wonderful man. He turned off the radio and put in a CD of Christmas Carols for our benefit. He got a kick out of my daughter announcing that she looked forward to beating me at tennis in a foreign country.
We got to the airport, which was a freakin' zoo. Everyone travelling for Christmas and New Years. All that PLUS a higher security level.
Lots of soldiers and sailors in unform.
I spent a lot of time thinking about how many people's lives have been lost, how many lives have been disrupted, and how the economy has been slowed down with security and inspections because a tiny percentage of one of the world's major religions decided that they hated everyone who disagreed with them.
(Had to stop a moment while the plane took off....Read this week's Weekly Standard if you get a chance. There's a wonderful article in there by a P.O.'d ex-Mormon. He's got some good things to say about the ridiculous mess going on between Southern Baptist Huckabee and Mormon Romney in Iowa. Will give the guy a link on this post if I ever get a chance to find it online....)
I'm now in the "Library" of the cruise ship. It's the Princess Dawn, excuse me, The Dawn Princess sailing from San Diego. We're docked across from the U.S.S. Ronald Reagan and the wooden ship that Russell Crowe captained in the "Master And Commander" movie.
Here's another thing: If I were taking this trip prior to 9/11, security wouldn't have been so tight. I KNOW I could've gotten my own liquor onto this boat.
There are people from all over the world on this cruise. I briefly sat at the bar with a man from Jordan and talked with him for a while. Great person, except for the fact that he made his wife (in a traditional head covering) wait for him outside the bar.
If there's a point to this post, it's this: Life is a great thing. People are generally good. If you try to be a nice friendly person, they'll like you. They'll be more likable if you try. We don't need to be issuing Fatwah's against each other, we don't need to assure our team that God Won't Hear The Prayers of People On Their Team. We don't need to invent any more Hells for each other, here or in the next life. (With the exception of the person who wrote the Big Band arrangement of "Let It Snow" that's booming all over this damn boat. He's going to hell.)
Everybody have a great Christmas. Happy New Year. Hannukah. And Kwanzaa.
The driver was a refugee from Iraq.
He had a copy of the Koran on the dashboard, plus a Haddith (sp?) by the seat.
Wonderful man. He turned off the radio and put in a CD of Christmas Carols for our benefit. He got a kick out of my daughter announcing that she looked forward to beating me at tennis in a foreign country.
We got to the airport, which was a freakin' zoo. Everyone travelling for Christmas and New Years. All that PLUS a higher security level.
Lots of soldiers and sailors in unform.
I spent a lot of time thinking about how many people's lives have been lost, how many lives have been disrupted, and how the economy has been slowed down with security and inspections because a tiny percentage of one of the world's major religions decided that they hated everyone who disagreed with them.
(Had to stop a moment while the plane took off....Read this week's Weekly Standard if you get a chance. There's a wonderful article in there by a P.O.'d ex-Mormon. He's got some good things to say about the ridiculous mess going on between Southern Baptist Huckabee and Mormon Romney in Iowa. Will give the guy a link on this post if I ever get a chance to find it online....)
I'm now in the "Library" of the cruise ship. It's the Princess Dawn, excuse me, The Dawn Princess sailing from San Diego. We're docked across from the U.S.S. Ronald Reagan and the wooden ship that Russell Crowe captained in the "Master And Commander" movie.
Here's another thing: If I were taking this trip prior to 9/11, security wouldn't have been so tight. I KNOW I could've gotten my own liquor onto this boat.
There are people from all over the world on this cruise. I briefly sat at the bar with a man from Jordan and talked with him for a while. Great person, except for the fact that he made his wife (in a traditional head covering) wait for him outside the bar.
If there's a point to this post, it's this: Life is a great thing. People are generally good. If you try to be a nice friendly person, they'll like you. They'll be more likable if you try. We don't need to be issuing Fatwah's against each other, we don't need to assure our team that God Won't Hear The Prayers of People On Their Team. We don't need to invent any more Hells for each other, here or in the next life. (With the exception of the person who wrote the Big Band arrangement of "Let It Snow" that's booming all over this damn boat. He's going to hell.)
Everybody have a great Christmas. Happy New Year. Hannukah. And Kwanzaa.
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
People are going to hell.
I know a preacher in Mississippi named Brother Bob. That's not his real name.
Brother Bob believes that God created the world, put a couple of people in it, one of these people sinned, and that made us all sinful. God then set up a system where people "atone" for their sins by sacrificing small animals to God. See the book of Leviticus for excessive details.....
Judging by the biblical prohibitions against the practice, people sometimes went overboard and even sacrificed their own children. (You don't make laws against spitting on the sidewalk if nobody has ever spat on the sidewalk.)
The sacrificial system didn't work out very well.
Brother Bob believes that God is all-knowing. Therefore God knew from the beginning that 1) the first people (Adam and Eve) would sin, and 2) the sacrificial system wouldn't work.
Brother Bob believes that God had a son. God sent the son to earth to teach and preach what God really wanted for us to do: Be decent to each other. Love God. Love your neighbor. Kick over the money-changers' tables in the temple, throw out all the sacrificial animals.
That was enough to get God's son killed. Cruelly. Horribly.
God's son rose from the dead. It turns out that God's son was intended to be the perfect sacrifice for everyone. All you have to do is believe that God's son, in his death, was the atonement for our sins.
If you fail to give your assent to this doctrine, you will eventually die in a state of sinfulness, and not be allowed to enter paradise. Instead, you will be tortured in a lake of fire for eternity. Torture beyond any length of time Hitler, Stalin, or Mao could accomplish.
That seems extreme - torture for eternity because of disagreeing for 70 years (or less) with the story outlined above. But that's the narrative that defines Brother Bob's life. If you met Bob, you would probably like him.
I know another man that I'll call Mike. He's a semi-homeless man that we sometimes help feed. He shares those same beliefs with Brother Bob. He quotes scripture without ceasing, and he's been institutionalized a few times for "religious mania". If you were to meet Mike, you would probably avoid him after the 2nd or 3rd encounter.
Brother Bob and Mike are my only acquaintances who believe Jesus died to save me from hell.
I repeat....Brother Bob and Mike are my only acquaintances who believe Jesus died to save me from hell.
I've known and met enough Christians to fill up Texas stadium.
But Brother Bob and Mike are the only people I've ever met who continually behave as if they believe it.
I'm not talking about morals or good behavior or being a good example to others. Morals, in the Jesus-died-for-my-sins atonement system, are almost irrelevant. (Please, please don't send me emails about how a changed outside reflects the change on the inside, or faith without works being dead....)
Bob and Mike live their entire lives under the assumption that those who haven't accepted Jesus as their atoning sacrifice are going to be burned for eternity. Neither of them can relax around you until they're assured you're safe. With Brother Bob, it comes across as caring. With Mike, it comes across as a ritualistic obligation.
I'm not saying that all the other fundamentalist Christians besides Bob and Mike are hypocrites. I'm saying that there's something jarring about professing a belief in an eternal punishment for refusing to believe something (while surrounded by people who don't believe it) and then sitting down to watch The Super Bowl, mow your yard, paint the house, take vacations, or even taking the risk of birthing children who could go to hell for eternity.
Somewhere, there's a disconnect that I've never understood.
If a house was on fire and you knew that there were children inside that you could safely remove from the burning house, would you not do everything in your power to get the kids out? Would inconvenience be an adequate excuse? Lack of training? Not feeling "called" to be a fireman?
How can someone then claim that the "unsaved" will be tortured forever, and not dedicate their piddling seventy years of life to "saving" them, 24 hours a day, seven days a week?
I've discussed this over the last 30 years with about a dozen individuals, all of whom could probably pass polygraph examinations affirming their belief in the story above. They claim to believe that Jesus was divine and atoned for us all, and all we have to do is accept his atoning sacrifice. A few of them continually invite people to their church, and occasionally go out of their way to share the Jesus story with others. They are serious about it. But they don't hesitate to go home and watch "60 Minutes" or play video games, while at the nursing home a few miles away people are dying and going to hell. People are sent to Hell forever and ever, while Christians play "World of Warcraft".
And please don't send me emails stating that God doesn't send people to hell because people send themselves to hell. My point remains the same either way. Some people don't see it as their job or their "calling" to convince anyone of the truth of the story. They see it as God's job to change people's minds. If that's the case, then God sends people to hell.
In my House On Fire analogy, that's a cop-out called "failure to render aid", isn't it? People get arrested for that, whether they have a "calling" to render aid or not.
So what am I missing? If I claim that aliens will dehydrate my brain if I ever take off my aluminum foil hat, my claim won't have much credibility to begin with. It will have even less credibility if I seldom wear my aluminum foil hat.
Maybe you disagree with every word I've written. You believe the John 3:16 business describes the purpose of the universe. If that's the case, why aren't you standing outside the synagogues and mosques explaining it to the "lost"? Why are you wasting a precious few minutes of your 70 years of life reading this?
Could it be that a theology has evolved that allows people to 1) condemn those who disagree with them, 2) ignore pain, suffering, and injustice because this life isn't important, and 3) give God all responsibility for who goes where in the next life?
Is there a possibility that the message of Jesus - Love each other, take care of each other - got hijacked?
I saw a video last week featuring a theologian named Culver Nelson who has crystallized a lot of this for me. Nelson hypothesized that Jesus hated the sacrificial system, and that's why he drove the buyers, sellers, money changers, and animal salesmen out of the temple. That's what got him crucified. But the early church was so conditioned by the idea of letting something/someone else atone for their mistakes, they simply projected their atonement system onto the life of Jesus after his death.
That would be one of life's great ironies, wouldn't it? Jesus lives his life trying to change the system, gets killed for sabotaging the system, and after his death everyone makes him part of the system.... We need a Kurt Vonnegut or a Tom Robbins to tell that story.
Maybe you believe the "atonement system/Jesus died for my sins" concept is necessary for anyone to call themselves a Christian. Perhaps you have to believe that people are going to hell at the rate of 50,000 a day. If that's the case, I can predict what you're going to do about it.
Not a damn thing.
I have a good idea who reads this blog. Brother Bob and Mike don't. They're too busy.
Brother Bob believes that God created the world, put a couple of people in it, one of these people sinned, and that made us all sinful. God then set up a system where people "atone" for their sins by sacrificing small animals to God. See the book of Leviticus for excessive details.....
Judging by the biblical prohibitions against the practice, people sometimes went overboard and even sacrificed their own children. (You don't make laws against spitting on the sidewalk if nobody has ever spat on the sidewalk.)
The sacrificial system didn't work out very well.
Brother Bob believes that God is all-knowing. Therefore God knew from the beginning that 1) the first people (Adam and Eve) would sin, and 2) the sacrificial system wouldn't work.
Brother Bob believes that God had a son. God sent the son to earth to teach and preach what God really wanted for us to do: Be decent to each other. Love God. Love your neighbor. Kick over the money-changers' tables in the temple, throw out all the sacrificial animals.
That was enough to get God's son killed. Cruelly. Horribly.
God's son rose from the dead. It turns out that God's son was intended to be the perfect sacrifice for everyone. All you have to do is believe that God's son, in his death, was the atonement for our sins.
If you fail to give your assent to this doctrine, you will eventually die in a state of sinfulness, and not be allowed to enter paradise. Instead, you will be tortured in a lake of fire for eternity. Torture beyond any length of time Hitler, Stalin, or Mao could accomplish.
That seems extreme - torture for eternity because of disagreeing for 70 years (or less) with the story outlined above. But that's the narrative that defines Brother Bob's life. If you met Bob, you would probably like him.
I know another man that I'll call Mike. He's a semi-homeless man that we sometimes help feed. He shares those same beliefs with Brother Bob. He quotes scripture without ceasing, and he's been institutionalized a few times for "religious mania". If you were to meet Mike, you would probably avoid him after the 2nd or 3rd encounter.
Brother Bob and Mike are my only acquaintances who believe Jesus died to save me from hell.
I repeat....Brother Bob and Mike are my only acquaintances who believe Jesus died to save me from hell.
I've known and met enough Christians to fill up Texas stadium.
But Brother Bob and Mike are the only people I've ever met who continually behave as if they believe it.
I'm not talking about morals or good behavior or being a good example to others. Morals, in the Jesus-died-for-my-sins atonement system, are almost irrelevant. (Please, please don't send me emails about how a changed outside reflects the change on the inside, or faith without works being dead....)
Bob and Mike live their entire lives under the assumption that those who haven't accepted Jesus as their atoning sacrifice are going to be burned for eternity. Neither of them can relax around you until they're assured you're safe. With Brother Bob, it comes across as caring. With Mike, it comes across as a ritualistic obligation.
I'm not saying that all the other fundamentalist Christians besides Bob and Mike are hypocrites. I'm saying that there's something jarring about professing a belief in an eternal punishment for refusing to believe something (while surrounded by people who don't believe it) and then sitting down to watch The Super Bowl, mow your yard, paint the house, take vacations, or even taking the risk of birthing children who could go to hell for eternity.
Somewhere, there's a disconnect that I've never understood.
If a house was on fire and you knew that there were children inside that you could safely remove from the burning house, would you not do everything in your power to get the kids out? Would inconvenience be an adequate excuse? Lack of training? Not feeling "called" to be a fireman?
How can someone then claim that the "unsaved" will be tortured forever, and not dedicate their piddling seventy years of life to "saving" them, 24 hours a day, seven days a week?
I've discussed this over the last 30 years with about a dozen individuals, all of whom could probably pass polygraph examinations affirming their belief in the story above. They claim to believe that Jesus was divine and atoned for us all, and all we have to do is accept his atoning sacrifice. A few of them continually invite people to their church, and occasionally go out of their way to share the Jesus story with others. They are serious about it. But they don't hesitate to go home and watch "60 Minutes" or play video games, while at the nursing home a few miles away people are dying and going to hell. People are sent to Hell forever and ever, while Christians play "World of Warcraft".
And please don't send me emails stating that God doesn't send people to hell because people send themselves to hell. My point remains the same either way. Some people don't see it as their job or their "calling" to convince anyone of the truth of the story. They see it as God's job to change people's minds. If that's the case, then God sends people to hell.
In my House On Fire analogy, that's a cop-out called "failure to render aid", isn't it? People get arrested for that, whether they have a "calling" to render aid or not.
So what am I missing? If I claim that aliens will dehydrate my brain if I ever take off my aluminum foil hat, my claim won't have much credibility to begin with. It will have even less credibility if I seldom wear my aluminum foil hat.
Maybe you disagree with every word I've written. You believe the John 3:16 business describes the purpose of the universe. If that's the case, why aren't you standing outside the synagogues and mosques explaining it to the "lost"? Why are you wasting a precious few minutes of your 70 years of life reading this?
Could it be that a theology has evolved that allows people to 1) condemn those who disagree with them, 2) ignore pain, suffering, and injustice because this life isn't important, and 3) give God all responsibility for who goes where in the next life?
Is there a possibility that the message of Jesus - Love each other, take care of each other - got hijacked?
I saw a video last week featuring a theologian named Culver Nelson who has crystallized a lot of this for me. Nelson hypothesized that Jesus hated the sacrificial system, and that's why he drove the buyers, sellers, money changers, and animal salesmen out of the temple. That's what got him crucified. But the early church was so conditioned by the idea of letting something/someone else atone for their mistakes, they simply projected their atonement system onto the life of Jesus after his death.
That would be one of life's great ironies, wouldn't it? Jesus lives his life trying to change the system, gets killed for sabotaging the system, and after his death everyone makes him part of the system.... We need a Kurt Vonnegut or a Tom Robbins to tell that story.
Maybe you believe the "atonement system/Jesus died for my sins" concept is necessary for anyone to call themselves a Christian. Perhaps you have to believe that people are going to hell at the rate of 50,000 a day. If that's the case, I can predict what you're going to do about it.
Not a damn thing.
I have a good idea who reads this blog. Brother Bob and Mike don't. They're too busy.
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