More Stupid Church Signs

Having emerged unscathed from a 5.8 earthquake and a category 1 hurricane within the past week, I’ll comment on a couple of stupid church signs I saw recently.

The first sign said,

Jesus Christ is the Answer…

Now what is your question?

Okay. I’ll play along. My first question is:

What is the sum of 2 + 2?

I say it’s 4. You say it’s Jesus Christ. I don’t need to call for help, Howie, or ask the audience for a hint. I’ll stick with my answer.

Let’s try another one.

Why did an 11-year-old Virginia boy get killed by a tree limb that crashed through his house during yesterday’s hurricane?

You say Jesus Christ. Maybe you’ll expand on it a bit and say “God’s will.” Or “God’s ways are mysterious.” Or “Sin.” I say shit happens. It happens randomly to anyone at anytime. My answer sucks, but it’s a lot more palatable than thinking that some puppet master is jerking people around for his own amusement.

Here are my points. First, it’s presumptuous to assume that one has the answer to someone else’s question before one has even heard the question. Second, it’s beyond presumptuous to assume that one answer fits all questions. You’d think at least one fundie would be bothered by at least one of those facts.

Here’s the second sign I saw, which is even stupider than the first one:

God is All
All is Well

Seriously. I saw that sign in a Washington DC suburb two days before the region got hit by its biggest earthquake in recorded history (of course, it was a modest quake by Pacific Rim standards). If all is well and the past week is typical of the Christian god’s handiwork, he’s a piss-poor specimen of a deity. As far as theology goes, orthodox Christian doctrine is neither pantheistic nor panentheistic. It does not hold that “God is All.” Honestly. Don’t these people ever think about what they say?

Signs can be great advertising tools. They can also be wonderful instruments for exposing idiocy. These two signs accomplished the latter end with resounding success.

– the chaplain