Tag: christians

The Saint Racket

Yet even more religious BS from our December 2, 2006 issue. This time we dare to criticize…cue the lightning and thunder… the catholic church. We think it’s pretty humorous that the head honchos in the catholic church are responsible for choosing saints and not God(not that we believe God exists). We would think that God would be more than capable of selecting the holiest of the holy for heavenly glory instead of letting humans select saints as if it were voting for some sports hall of fame. What are the requirements for sainthood? We think you need two miracles, 200 saved souls and 500 home runs but we could be wrong on that.

Dead Priest Misses Out On Sainthood Again

Recently, Pope Benedict XVI canonized five new saints while once again passing over former Missouri priest Fr. Buford Wiggins. Wiggins, died fifty years ago on a farm while attempting to stop the wedding of a man and his male cousin when he tripped into a moonshine still and triggered an explosion killing himself in the process. Wiggins, has become very distraught over the repeated snubbings.

“I’ve been sitting up here in the great beyond playing the banjo for half a century and I still gets no respect,” said Wiggins, puffing on a corncob pipe. “Whaddya gotta do to be a saint? Not to take anything away from that Reverend Cruchaga, but I worked with the young and the poor, too. But I got blown to kingdom come trying to stop the unsanctity of a gay wedding. Doesn’t that count for something? Goddamnit! Ooops! Good thing I’m already in heaven.”

Another rejectee, Brunhilda Von Mannheim, a devout schoolteacher in 1940’s Germany who was killed by the SS, said “I, too, am vexed by not being chosen. Come on. The new Pope is German. I thought I’d be a shoo-in. Shouldn’t the saint making process be done by God or some of the other saints here in heaven? Why should humans on a tiny little planet floating in galaxy ASPWQ12489393877, sector ZNCB8376676667368743887, quadrant LJJYW93439892877492 decide who gets to be the holiest of the holy? Quite frankly, I think the Grumplians on planet Felxnar in galaxy KDKLS889478923787, sector HWWEU834893888, quadrant RSBCX7673643628 are far better suited to choose saints. I know, my friend Yeep, who is a Grumplian, is highly upset that he isn’t a saint. He was strung up by his doobledorn for his beliefs. Humans don’t even know he even exists for that matter. It’s very frustrating for him.”

Heaven spokesman, St. Sixtus said, “People, people…calm down. Not everyone can be a saint okay. I know some of you died spectacular deaths and we appreciate it, we really do. But it’s a numbers thing okay. I tell you what. I’ll talk to J.C. and see if you people can’t get promoted to angel or something okay?”

Wiggins continued his rantings. “No one prays to me. I want people to start praying to Saint Buford of the Still. Well that tears it! It’s all a racket! That Pope John Paul bypasses me and now his buddy Benedict puts him on the fast track for sainthood. That Benedict wouldn’t know a real saint if he came up and flogged himself right in front of him. I tell you what. I know a few creatures up here. I’m going to get a whole bunch of Blovards from the planet Rigel BX10 in galaxy PEWKD843827492898, sector LMEUR763647626482, quadrant ILEJD3674264623877 and go down to Earth and do a little haunting at the Vatican. Those Blovards look like Roseanne Barr on steroids. That ought to put the fear of God in Pope Benny and get me sainted.”

The Powah of Prayer

Here’s more religious BS from our September 10, 2007 issue, not long after Hurricane Felix slammed Central America killing 130 people and causing $720 million in damages.

Man Forgets To Pray; Causes Hurricane Felix

Members of the Fourth Evangelical Church have announced that they have found a suspect they believed caused Hurricane Felix. The church says that Gainesville, Florida resident, Dave Nielsen, caused the storm by neglecting to attend church and praying the Sunday before the hurricane hit Nicaragua and Honduras.

“We think that this man is responsible for that devastating hurricane that hit Central America because he didn’t come to church and pray this past Sunday,” said Pastor Jonathon Scheister. “Rumor has it that he was out drinking and womanizing Saturday night over at that den of sin, Gator Gulch, and was so tired he couldn’t drag his sorry behind out of bed to go and worship the Lord. There is no doubt in my mind that he caused this event, just as I’m sure all the gays and lesbians caused 9/11.”

Televangelist Maureen Kay said “Let this be a lesson to all of you, praise the Lord. Our Lord is a loving God, praise the Lord, but also a vengeful God, praise the Lord. You must put God first in your life, praise the Lord, and pray constantly or God will cause much pain and destruction, praise the Lord. Only by constantly acknowledging how great God is, praise the Lord, will the people of Earth be saved. Oh God, I hope I said enough praise the Lords. I better just repeat the phrase for another hour or so just to be safe. Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, praise the Lord…”

Thirty year old Nielsen said, “You gotta be kidding me! Hey, I worked a twelve hour shift Saturday over at the University laying concrete. I went out afterward with a few friends, shot some pool and had a few beers. I was zonked. I mean I worked 55 hours that week. I’ve got child support payments to make. I’ve got alimony to pay. I’ve got rent to pay. I’ve got insurance to pay. I’m sorry. Sometimes I just can’t make it to church. I’m sure Jesus would understand.”

Scheister took offense to Nielsen’s explanation. “How dare he say that Jesus would understand! He doesn’t know what Jesus thinks! I’m the pastor. I’m the only one in our church who truly understands what Jesus would do. I talk to Jesus all the time, just like our beloved President Bush and he tells me what is right and wrong. Like last night, Jesus said it was perfectly okay to use church funds to buy that new Armani suit for myself because if I’m going to sell the Lord’s word, I’ve got to look good, right? Hallelujah!”

When asked if Nielsen had indeed caused the Hurricane, heaven spokesperson St. Sixtus said, “Well we’ve traced our prayers in our prayer center and we’ve found that if we would’ve gotten one more prayer, say from one David J. Nielsen, God would’ve evaporated Hurricane Felix right there in the Caribbean-o. But noooooooooo. Mr. Beer Drinker, Mr. get-a-divorce-rather-than-stay-together-in-a-loveless-marriage, David J. Nielsen, had to skip church. So God done brung it. So don’t blame God, people of Central America; blame David J. Nielsen. And Bill Clinton, of course.”

God Prefers Patriots To Broncos; Athletes Love Bird Watching

Tim Tebow mania has gripped the sports world. All any sports pundit can talk about these days is how this young, fiery, evangelical christian is taking the football world by storm and leading the Denver Broncos on a football crusade to the promised land of Super Bowl XLVI. There was even a poll on CNN the other day asking people if they thought that Tim Tebow’s meteoric rise is due to God. Apparently, God must prefer Tom Brady and the Patriots to Mr. Tebow because the Broncos got trounced 41-23 today.

We here at the Bucket think the buzz about Tebow is pretty ridiculous anyway. We’re atheists, except for Lamebeard the Pirate, who as a Pastafarian, praises the noodly appendages of the Flying Spaghetti Monster.  We feel that if God did exist, he probably wouldn’t care that much about who won a mostly violent, sporting event on a small rocky planet in one of millions of galaxies that exist in the universe. We would think an all-powerful God would have much more fun manipulating nuclear fusion to create a star, starting the celestial mechanics of a fledgling solar system or keeping black holes in line from consuming too much matter and energy. But more and more athletes these days point to the skies after they score a touchdown, make a bucket or hit a home run. We would think that these athletes should always be grateful to their God, not just on good plays. So baseball players shouldn’t just point to the sky after a home run, but also after striking out with the bases loaded, popping out in foul territory or grounding out into an inning ending double play. After all, a good baseball hitter fails seventy percent of the time. Also, if God is supposedly all around us, why point just to the sky? Why not point to a blade of grass, the dirt or a wall. Instead, on sports web sites, we get ‘action’ photos of athletes pointing to the sky instead of smacking a baseball or slam dunking a basketball or hauling in a football with an over the shoulder grab. Hmmm…Methinks there might some christians in professional athletics.

Here’s a photo-toon from our June 26, 2007 edition which offers another possible explanation for athletes pointing to the sky.

Baseball players have been pointing to the sky frequently in recent years showing off their obvious love of bird watching.

 

Con-a-thon 2012

The Republican comedy tour continues this fall and now it looks like there is a new front runner. Former pizza magnate Herman Cain, has surged to the top of Republican polls touting his plan 999 from outer space in order to save the planet. Sounds like another flavor of the month to us.

We’ve held off as long as we could, but we’re going to start our coverage of the upcoming election, Con-a-thon 2012. Today we present the leading GOP comedians candidates: Sarah Palin, Michelle Bachmann, Rick Perry, Mitt(Spiff) Romney, Herman Cain and Newt Gingrich.

Holy Huckster Pat Man!

Pat Robertson recently made the news by making yet another controversial statement. Big surprise, right? This time Mr. 700 stated that he thought it might be okay for a man or woman to get a divorce if their spouse had Alzheimers, which kind of goes against the phrase “’til death do you part” in christian wedding ceremonies. Compassionate conservatism in action, folks! Well, who are we to question Power Pat. After all he talks to God on a daily basis just like Dubya and the Palinator and Michelle Bachmann and Rick Perry and… we’re sensing a trend here. For more comments from the hilarious Pat Robertson, click here.

Here’s a photo-toon from our June 19, 2006 issue, which came out not long after the then 76 year old claimed he could leg press 2000 lbs. The power of christ (and excessive bullshitting) compels ye!

Televangelist Pat Robertson, who recently claimed to leg press 2,000 pounds, hefts a ton of weights over his head. Robertson earlier in the day had defeated the Miami Heat and the Carolina Hurricanes singlehandedly.

In the Beginning, There Was BS

The evangelical christians have sure been showing their true ignorance lately with Pat Robertson and Michele Bachmann proclaiming that the east coast hurricanes and earthquakes are signs from God. Bachmann later recanted saying she was just jesting and that she has a fantastic sense of humor (well that statement made us howl with laughter). But what cracks us up here at the Bucket is religious conservatives’, especially GOP Presidential candidate Rick Perry, insistence that evolution is “just a theory” and that creationism should be taught in school on an equal footing with evolution. Of course they ignore that the Bible is a first century book of mythology and has tons of holes in it but we guess that’s just what’s called ‘faith’. Even Pope John Paul II said that evolution was “more than just a hypothesis.” But we like Biologist Richard Dawkins’ response to Rick Perry the best. Here’s the link.

Here’s one of our favorite photo-toons from our June 2, 2007 issue commemorating the opening of that bastion of ‘intelligent design’, the Creation Museum.

The Creation Museum, based on the teachings of the book of Genesis in the Bible, opened recently in Petersburg, Kentucky and contains such thought provoking, scientifically accurate displays as this one which depicts humans and dinosaurs co-existing peacefully in a sun-kissed, peachy keen world.

 

A Reading From The Book of Profits

GOP Presidential candidates Michele Bachmann and Rick Perry have emerged as front runners in the Republican race. Both candidates are fervent evangelical christians, claim to have an intimate relationship with God, and are very popular with the Republican base, which consists of scores of evangelical christians.  Preachers like James Dobson, Pat Robertson and all those PTL preachers on TBN sure do rake in a lot of money. Isn’t it funny that all the preachers on television are impeccably dressed and can afford to build theme parks, finance movies and creationism museums. But just like many corporations, churches don’t pay taxes.  What a convenient, lucrative loophole! We think that in order to participate in the political process, you should at least pay taxes. And then there’s the prosperity gospel. Prosperity theology teaches that a combination of faith, positive speech, and donations to christian ministries(of course) will always cause an increase in material wealth…material wealth for the preachers that is. According to the little known Book of Profits, the churches can fleece their flocks with Jesus’ blessing. What makes this even more preposterous is that the biblical Jesus was pretty much a socialist and these hypocrites worship him as their lord and savior. Well, I guess if Bachmann and Perry make it to the White House (Zeus help us all!), at least they’ll have Americans ready for the Rapture. Hallelujah!

Here’s an old Pic O’ The Week photo-toon from our November 16, 2008 issue that addresses the teachings of capitalist Jesus.

Some conservative christian Republicans have lately been touting the little known capitalist teachings of Jesus.