Don't Talk to Strangers

According to well-known wack job/evangelist Pat Robertson, God has personally told him to expect a terrorist attack on the United States by the end of 2007 that will result in "mass killing."

"I'm not necessarily saying it's going to be nuclear," Robertson coyly confided on his long-running divine comedy show on the Christian Broadcasting Network.
"The Lord didn't say nuclear. But I do believe it will be something like that." said the 76-year-old preacher and one-time presidential candidate, who claims God gave him the dish during their yearly cozy little private gabfest, uh, prayer retreat.

Oh, that Lord God! What a tease! Such a kidder, not letting us know whether we need to build fallout shelters or stock up on Cipro. What a kind and caring piece of news from on high and no mistake!

Robertson blethers on that God has informed him that major U.S. cities and millions of people will be affected by the terrorist attack, which will happen after September. So there’s still time to be saved, my friends.

"The evil people will come after this country, and there's a possibility - not a possibility, a definite certainty - that chaos is going to rule," predicted Robertson, and encouraged listeners to pray, and, I’m sure, send him money.

"God said he's going to restrain the evil, but he isn't necessarily going to restrain it in the beginning," Robertson said. Well, hey, what a mensch that God dude is! Robertson goes on to assure us that “A lot of these things can be reversed; we just need to do a lot of praying."

Soooo…God is gonna smite us and deliver us over to terrorists, at least at first, and not help, but if we pray hard enough (or clap our hands to save Tinker Bell, or send enough money), then he’ll change his big old vindictive mind?

Huh. Who knew it was so easy to sway a divinity? Last year, you may recall, Robertson said that God told him the Pacific Northwest would get creamed by a tsunami. Guess what? Nobody's toes even got wet. Well, perhaps God got it wrong. Though Robertson hedges his bets by noting that record rainfall did wreak havoc on the state of Washington last year. Considering how rainy that state usually is ANYWAY, I’m thinking that was a pretty safe call. Maybe it was an air tsunami, like playing air guitar, or one that just dripped down from the sky.

"I put these things out with humility," Robertson said. No, you self-aggrandizing little crapweasel, you put them out with publicity and control and greed. And we haven’t forgotten, either, how you suggested last January that God personally punished Ariel Sharon with a stroke for ceding Israeli-controlled land to the Palestinians. What a hateful deity you believe in, Robertson, and foist off on your flock, perpetuating the message of divine retribution. I thought your boy Jesus was all for loving forgiveness? Or am I wrong to think so?

You know, if you or I went around claiming God tells us claptrap like this once a year in a private fireside chat, our compassionate families and friends would put us on major medication and see that we spent our remaining years at a secure yet pleasant little country bin. Or at least in a nice padded room.
But because Cadillac-drivin', television-hoggin', sadistic and venal “ministers” dish this swill out to credulous saps and pathetic nonthinkers, their flocks who are indeed sheep in all too many ways, it all gets coated with some sort of spurious “legitimacy.”
Perhaps one gets the deity one really deserves, and the cleric too. And if you end up with a heavenly despot and an earthly bully, or a punishing godfather and a pedophile-protecting misogynist pope, or an infidel-condemning desert deity and a bunch of bloodthirsty jihadist imams, hey, it's your own damn fault. Nobody said you had to buy into any of it. You might try thinking for yourself.

Well, you know, I just talked to Dionysus, who is kind enough and enjoys my converse enough to talk with me way more than once a year, if I may brag so, and HE says "Yes, there probably will be something bad coming down the pike sooner or later but you guys already knew that didn’t you and you certainly didn’t need to hear it from me—and I don’t lob sinners down to hell or call for jihad against anyone who doesn't believe in me or lean on little old ladies to send money, either, not like some other Gods I could mention."

And he’s quite right. And Dionysus has done a lot more positive stuff for mankind than the nasty fundie God from whom Robertson only hears once a freakin’ year. No doubt because that’s as frequently as God can stand to talk to the toxic creep.

Robertson, maybe YOUR God is a vengeful, spiteful, petty little tyrant. Most people beg to differ. What is it they say, “God created man in his own image. Man, being a gentleman, returned the compliment.” That would explain a lot about both you and your deity, wouldn’t it.

Except, of course, that you’re no gentleman. And neither is the God you claim to talk to.