Saturday, July 05, 2008

Catching Up on a Few Things


I've been busy elsewhere lately, but a few things have crossed my radar.

Vatican Blesses Mary the Musical

Excerpt:

The Vatican is staging its first ever musical next week, a dramatisation of the life of the Virgin Mary.
Mary of Nazareth, A Story that Goes On features a former Miss Italy contestant in the lead role and music by a composer more famed for scoring exotic B-movies.

However, unlike Jesus Christ Superstar or Joseph and the Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat, it has been officially blessed by Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, the Vatican secretary of state.



Sounds Frothilishiously craptacular. It also stands as absolute proof that the Vatican condones fictional bullshit. There is no historical record of the life of Mar-yam. There is no biblical record either, so this is not even Official Bullshit. I feel perfectly safe in asserting that there is little probability that her life (granting she ever really existed) resembled in the slightest the portrayal in this self-serving product-ion. I don't even have to see it. If it was sufficintly revisionist and simplistic to soothe away the original thoughts of the Unofficial Cult of the Alleged Virgin Mary, it's drek.

Let's review: why is Mary a virgin? Deuteronomy 22:

22:17 And, lo, he hath given occasions of speech against her, saying, I found not thy daughter a maid; and yet these are the tokens of my daughter's virginity. And they shall spread the cloth before the elders of the city.

22:18 And the elders of that city shall take that man and chastise him;

22:19 And they shall amerce him in an hundred shekels of silver, and give them unto the father of the damsel, because he hath brought up an evil name upon a virgin of Israel: and she shall be his wife; he may not put her away all his days.

22:20 But if this thing be true, and the tokens of virginity be not found for the damsel:

22:21 Then they shall bring out the damsel to the door of her father's house, and the men of her city shall stone her with stones that she die: because she hath wrought folly in Israel, to play the whore in her father's house: so shalt thou put evil away from among you.

But there's a way out for our poor damsel...

22:28 If a man find a damsel that is a virgin, which is not betrothed, and lay hold on her, and lie with her, and they be found;

22:29 Then the man that lay with her shall give unto the damsel's father fifty shekels of silver, and she shall be his wife; because he hath humbled her, he may not put her away all his days.

Why Ya-sif, you old scamp!

Women were their father's property, to be bartered for 50 shekels of silver, or three goats and a hand job, or whatever one could barter with the Old Man as fair exchange. As long as someone could be found to pay for the "spoiled goods" AS IF she were still a vigin, the whole stoning to death for harlotry thing could be avoided.

Something tells me that won't even make the Director's cut.

****

Blogging about such things as atheism in Iran can get you killed.

Iran Seeks the Death Penalty for Blogging

They work so hard to convince their brainwashed minions that they're the good guys and we're the evil ones. Assholes. Self-serving control freaks. Feral little manipulating shits. Your ant-hill-of-bullshit civilization can't collapse soon enough.

****

Ingrid Betancourt Thanks Gawd for her release.

This kind of behavior apparently wins her an audience with the Pope

It also raises a few questions.

1. Did she thank God for making her 6 year imprisonment part of HIS PLAN?

2. Does she think she was on some kind of waiting list? If so, can she explain why she should get preferential treatment over several other eggregious wrongs in this world that have required righting for an even longer period of time?

3. Is she thanking God for making the rebels stupid enough to fall for this ruse? Is that not the same as thanking God for making them stupid enough to be recruited into FARC in the first place?

4. Is she thanking God for making the Colombian operatives smart enough to pull this off? Is that not an insult to the men and women who trained them and selected them for the mission?

5. What part of this experience does she attribute to magical intervention? If she is merely thanking HIM for allowing this rescue to happen, is that not the same as thanking HIM for not preventing it? "Thanks for not being an asshole on this one, God!"

She also said:

"I am so happy to breathe the air of France. I owe France everything," Betancourt was quoted as saying by BBC news after she was flown in to Paris to meet President Nicolas Sarkozy."

She also thanked her rescuers. Does this make her just another opportunistic politician?

****

Jesse Helms and Bozo the Clown (Larry Harmon) died on the same day. I don't think I need to say anything more about that.

6 Comments:

At 4:16 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

What a curmudgeon you are.
It's all just good clean cultural fun & it's the thought that counts. "Boy's will be Boys."

Seriously, though..."Mary the Musical"?

I agree, "Frothilishiously craptacular"

 
At 8:36 PM, Blogger Rev. Barky said...

I love how the bible is always quoted in early modern english - barely understandable for a product of the reformation where the common folk are supposed to be able to read it.

 
At 10:26 AM, Blogger breakerslion said...

handmaiden: Best compliment you could have given me. On the occasion of my recent "0-year" birthday, I declared myself officially old enough to be a curmudgeon.

rev barking nonsequitur: Anything to puff up the alleged importance and "mystery". Besides, if the language is confusing, the clergy can always fall back on the old "You're doing (reading) it wrong." excuse.

 
At 1:55 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

"0-birthdays" Bah humbug!

 
At 10:00 PM, Blogger Romeo Morningwood said...

*wipes tear from my eye

Will they be using the music from the Monkees?

Mary, Mary, where you goin to?
Mary, Mary, can I go too.
This one thing I will vow ya,
I'd rather die than to live without ya.
Mary, Mary, where you goin to?

Mary, Mary, tell me truly
What did I do to make you leave me.
Whatever it was I didnt mean to,
You know I never would try and hurt ya.
Mary, Mary, where you goin to?

What more, Mary, can I do
To prove my love is truly yours?
Ive done more now than a clear-thinkin man would do.

Mary, mary, its not over.
Where you go, I will follow.
'til I win your love again
And walk beside you,
But until then.
Mary, Mary, where you goin to?

Mary, mary, where you goin to?
Mary, where you goin to?
Mary, mary, mary, mary, mary, where you goin to?

 
At 4:03 AM, Blogger breakerslion said...

donnnnn: You know the songs won't be that good. I'm thinking more like a re-write of How do you solve a problem like Maria? from The Sound of Music.

 

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