Monsignor John Skehan, who was pastor at St. Vincent Ferrer Catholic Church in Delray Beach, Florida for over 40 years, was arrested Wednesday night on charges that he stole $8.6 million from the church, using the money to buy property and other assets, CNN reported.
The 79-year-old priest was arrested at Palm Beach International Airport as he returned from Ireland and was being held on $400,000 bond on grand theft charges.
Another priest, Francis Guinan, who succeeded Skehan as church minister three years ago, has disappeared. Police said he allegedly stole money to take gambling trips to Las Vegas and the Bahamas.
Forty years! No wonder ministers call their congregations their "flock" — what a herd of sheep, ripe for shearing.
Jesus Christ | Christian | Christianity | Catholic | Priests | Born Jesus
Thursday, September 28, 2006
Monday, September 25, 2006
NBC edits Jesus, God and the Bible out of cartoon 'Veggie Tales'
NBC has stirred up the pot — of vegetable stew.
Two weeks ago, the network began airing episodes of the Veggie Tales video series in its Saturday morning children's lineup. The popular series encourages moral behavior based on Christian and biblical principles.
NBC has edited the programs to reduce or get rid of totally references to God and the Bible. The show's creator, Phil Vischer, said he had no idea such editing would be done, or he wouldn't have signed the contract.
Jesus Christ | Christian | Christianity | Veggie Tales | Cartoons | Born Jesus
Two weeks ago, the network began airing episodes of the Veggie Tales video series in its Saturday morning children's lineup. The popular series encourages moral behavior based on Christian and biblical principles.
NBC has edited the programs to reduce or get rid of totally references to God and the Bible. The show's creator, Phil Vischer, said he had no idea such editing would be done, or he wouldn't have signed the contract.
Jesus Christ | Christian | Christianity | Veggie Tales | Cartoons | Born Jesus
Wednesday, September 20, 2006
'Jerusalem. There is no such city!'
Jerusalem — three of the world's "great religions" call it home and consider it holy.
Recently tens of thousands of city sightseeing brochures were published saying there's no such place as Jerusalem.
"Jerusalem. There is no such city!" the Jerusalem municipality said in the English-language version it had published originally in Hebrew.
The correct translation: "Jerusalem. There is no city like it!"
Jerusalem | Judaism | Christianity | Muslim | Israel | Born Jesus
Recently tens of thousands of city sightseeing brochures were published saying there's no such place as Jerusalem.
"Jerusalem. There is no such city!" the Jerusalem municipality said in the English-language version it had published originally in Hebrew.
The correct translation: "Jerusalem. There is no city like it!"
Jerusalem | Judaism | Christianity | Muslim | Israel | Born Jesus
Monday, September 18, 2006
Put a Huggable Jesus doll under your kid's Christmas tree
When I was a wee lad being dragged to Sunday School kicking and screaming, my little sister would mangle the lyrics to the hymn "Love Lifted Me" by singing "Love Tiny Tears," a reference to a doll of that name that was then popular.
Today, maybe they actually write hymns about dolls, for all I know.
Just in time for Christmas, that most pagan of all Christian holidays, Boston Bible-thumper Cliff Rockwood and his unnamed wife are hawking $9.99 Huggable Jesus, Huggable Esther and Huggable Moses, plush dolls "that pack fun and faith into one lovable, kid-sized package."
Huggable Moses holds two pilliow-like tablets and recites the Ten Commandments. Huggable Esther, wearing royal robes and a crown, says, "God had a plan for my life just like he has one for yours."
Rockwood told reporters, "I wanted [my daughter] to have a doll that delivers a message of love and moral grounds. It's better than giving a toy gun."
Were those the only two choices, sacrilegious dolls or a toy gun?
Huggable Jesus recites John 14:6: "I'm the way, the truth and the life. No one can come to the father except through me." You can hear all his words on the Huggable website.
The couples' website calls the dolls "a wholesome alternative to teddy bears and stuffed animals."
Are stuffed animals and teddy bears unwholesome? Oh, yeah, now I remember the Satanic stink over the stuffed rainbow-colored "My Little Pony" several years ago.
Future Huggable Old Testament dolls are planned, including Jonah, David and Noah. No word yet on whether the couple will also offer "bad guy" dolls like Satan, King Herod, and the Caananites for the good guys to trounce and destroy.
My favorite remarks about the Huggables comes from blog Conservatives for American Ideals:
Jesus Christ | Christian | Christianity | Toys | Huggable Jesus | Huggable Moses Christian Toys | Born Jesus
Today, maybe they actually write hymns about dolls, for all I know.
Just in time for Christmas, that most pagan of all Christian holidays, Boston Bible-thumper Cliff Rockwood and his unnamed wife are hawking $9.99 Huggable Jesus, Huggable Esther and Huggable Moses, plush dolls "that pack fun and faith into one lovable, kid-sized package."
Huggable Moses holds two pilliow-like tablets and recites the Ten Commandments. Huggable Esther, wearing royal robes and a crown, says, "God had a plan for my life just like he has one for yours."
Rockwood told reporters, "I wanted [my daughter] to have a doll that delivers a message of love and moral grounds. It's better than giving a toy gun."
Were those the only two choices, sacrilegious dolls or a toy gun?
Huggable Jesus recites John 14:6: "I'm the way, the truth and the life. No one can come to the father except through me." You can hear all his words on the Huggable website.
The couples' website calls the dolls "a wholesome alternative to teddy bears and stuffed animals."
Are stuffed animals and teddy bears unwholesome? Oh, yeah, now I remember the Satanic stink over the stuffed rainbow-colored "My Little Pony" several years ago.
Future Huggable Old Testament dolls are planned, including Jonah, David and Noah. No word yet on whether the couple will also offer "bad guy" dolls like Satan, King Herod, and the Caananites for the good guys to trounce and destroy.
My favorite remarks about the Huggables comes from blog Conservatives for American Ideals:
...This is not a stuffed representation of the Jesus we all know and love. This is not the Jesus that hates sodomites, loves unfettered free market capitalism, and supports the War on Terror. This doll is a false idol of a false god created by liberals who want to undermine our Christian faith. These liberal nonbelievers co-opted Christ and remade him in their own twisted image. They created a pseudo-Jesus who preaches tolerance toward all, respect for women, and a concern for the poor. I hate this so-called Christ with every fiber of my being.
Jesus Christ | Christian | Christianity | Toys | Huggable Jesus | Huggable Moses Christian Toys | Born Jesus
Saturday, September 16, 2006
Eris proves science exists, but she's lying, it's true
In honor of Eris, newest member of our Solar System, we offer the following pages from Principia Discordia, or How I Found Goddess and What I Did to Her When I Found Her. No hot dog buns.
GP: Is Eris true?
M2: Everything is true.
GP: Even false things?
M2: Even false things are true.
GP: How can that be?
M2: I don't know man, I didn't do it.
THE MYTH OF THE APPLE OF DISCORD
It seems that Zeus was preparing a wedding banquet for Peleus and Thetis and did not want to invite Eris because of Her reputation as a trouble maker.*
This made Eris angry, and so She fashioned an apple of pure gold** and inscribed upon it KALLISTI ("To The Prettiest One") and on the day of the fete She rolled it into the banquet hall and then left to be alone and joyously partake of a hot dog.
Now, three of the invited goddesses,*** Athena, Hera, and Aphrodite, each immediately claimed it to belong to herself because of the inscription. And they started fighting, and they started throwing punch all over the place and everything.
Finally Zeus calmed things down and declared that an arbitrator must be selected, which was a reasonable suggestion, and all agreed. He sent them to a shepherd of Troy, whose name was Paris because his mother had had a lot of gaul and had married a Frenchman; but each of the sneaky goddesses tried to outwit the others by going early and offering a bribe to Paris.
Athena offered him Heroic War Victories, Hera offered him Great Wealth, and Aphrodite offered him the Most Beautiful Woman on Earth. Being a healthy young Trojan lad, Paris promptly accepted Aphrodite's bribe and she got the apple and he got screwed.
As she had promised, she maneuvered earthly happenings so that Paris could have Helen (the Helen) then living with her husband Menelaus, King of Sparta. Anyway, everyone knows that the Trojan War followed when Sparta demanded their Queen back and that the Trojan War is said to be The First War among men.
And so we suffer because of the Original Snub. And so a Discordian is to partake of No Hot Dog Buns.
Do you believe that?
________________
* This is called THE DOCTRINE OF THE ORIGINAL SNUB
** There is historic disagreement concerning whether this apple was of metallic gold or acapulco.
*** Actually there were five goddesses, but the Greeks did not know the Law of Fives.
What We Know About ERIS (not much)
The Romans left a likeness of Her for posterity — She was shown as a grotesque woman with a pale and ghastly look, Her eyes afire, Her garment ripped and torn, and as concealing a dagger in Her Bosom. Actually, most women look pale and ghastly when concealing a chilly dagger in their bosoms.
Her geneology is from the Greeks and is utterly confused. Either She was the twin of Ares and the daughter of Zeus and Hera; or She was the daughter of Nyx, goddess of night (who was either the daughter or wife of Chaos, or both), and Nyx's brother, Erebus, and whose brothers and sisters include Death, Doom, Mockery, and Friendship. And that She begat Forgetfullness, Quarrels, Lies, and a bunch of gods and goddesses like that.
One day Mal-2 consulted his Pineal Gland* and asked Eris if She really created all of those terrible things. She told him that She had always liked the Old Greeks, but that they cannot be trusted with historic matters. "They were," She added, "victims of indigestion, you know."
Suffice it to say that Eris is not hateful or malicious. But She is mischievous, and does get a little bitchy at times.
*THE PINEAL GLAND is where each and every one of us can talk to Eris. If you have trouble activating your Pineal, then try the appendix which does almost as well. Reference: DOGMA I, METAPHYSICS #3, "The Indoctrine of the Pineal Gland"
Image: Courtesy Grouchogandhi, the beer that made Milwaukee famous
This article is stolen from either BurningTaper.com or SacredFems.com. We're not sure.
Eris | Goddess of Discord | Goddess Discordianism | Malaclypse the Younger | Omar Ravenhurst | Burning Taper | SacredFems.com | Born Jesus
GP: Is Eris true?
M2: Everything is true.
GP: Even false things?
M2: Even false things are true.
GP: How can that be?
M2: I don't know man, I didn't do it.
THE MYTH OF THE APPLE OF DISCORD
It seems that Zeus was preparing a wedding banquet for Peleus and Thetis and did not want to invite Eris because of Her reputation as a trouble maker.*
This made Eris angry, and so She fashioned an apple of pure gold** and inscribed upon it KALLISTI ("To The Prettiest One") and on the day of the fete She rolled it into the banquet hall and then left to be alone and joyously partake of a hot dog.
Now, three of the invited goddesses,*** Athena, Hera, and Aphrodite, each immediately claimed it to belong to herself because of the inscription. And they started fighting, and they started throwing punch all over the place and everything.
Finally Zeus calmed things down and declared that an arbitrator must be selected, which was a reasonable suggestion, and all agreed. He sent them to a shepherd of Troy, whose name was Paris because his mother had had a lot of gaul and had married a Frenchman; but each of the sneaky goddesses tried to outwit the others by going early and offering a bribe to Paris.
Athena offered him Heroic War Victories, Hera offered him Great Wealth, and Aphrodite offered him the Most Beautiful Woman on Earth. Being a healthy young Trojan lad, Paris promptly accepted Aphrodite's bribe and she got the apple and he got screwed.
As she had promised, she maneuvered earthly happenings so that Paris could have Helen (the Helen) then living with her husband Menelaus, King of Sparta. Anyway, everyone knows that the Trojan War followed when Sparta demanded their Queen back and that the Trojan War is said to be The First War among men.
And so we suffer because of the Original Snub. And so a Discordian is to partake of No Hot Dog Buns.
Do you believe that?
________________
* This is called THE DOCTRINE OF THE ORIGINAL SNUB
** There is historic disagreement concerning whether this apple was of metallic gold or acapulco.
*** Actually there were five goddesses, but the Greeks did not know the Law of Fives.
What We Know About ERIS (not much)
The Romans left a likeness of Her for posterity — She was shown as a grotesque woman with a pale and ghastly look, Her eyes afire, Her garment ripped and torn, and as concealing a dagger in Her Bosom. Actually, most women look pale and ghastly when concealing a chilly dagger in their bosoms.
Her geneology is from the Greeks and is utterly confused. Either She was the twin of Ares and the daughter of Zeus and Hera; or She was the daughter of Nyx, goddess of night (who was either the daughter or wife of Chaos, or both), and Nyx's brother, Erebus, and whose brothers and sisters include Death, Doom, Mockery, and Friendship. And that She begat Forgetfullness, Quarrels, Lies, and a bunch of gods and goddesses like that.
One day Mal-2 consulted his Pineal Gland* and asked Eris if She really created all of those terrible things. She told him that She had always liked the Old Greeks, but that they cannot be trusted with historic matters. "They were," She added, "victims of indigestion, you know."
Suffice it to say that Eris is not hateful or malicious. But She is mischievous, and does get a little bitchy at times.
*THE PINEAL GLAND is where each and every one of us can talk to Eris. If you have trouble activating your Pineal, then try the appendix which does almost as well. Reference: DOGMA I, METAPHYSICS #3, "The Indoctrine of the Pineal Gland"
Image: Courtesy Grouchogandhi, the beer that made Milwaukee famous
This article is stolen from either BurningTaper.com or SacredFems.com. We're not sure.
Eris | Goddess of Discord | Goddess Discordianism | Malaclypse the Younger | Omar Ravenhurst | Burning Taper | SacredFems.com | Born Jesus
So much for papal infallability: The Pope incites a riot
Pope Benedict is sorry Muslims were offended by a speech that provoked fury in the Islamic world and led to calls for the leader of the Catholic church to apologize personally, the Vatican said on Saturday.
"We feel he has committed a grave error against us and that this mistake will only be removed through a personal apology," the Brotherhood's deputy leader, Mohammed Habib, told Reuters.
Muslims are so easily offended.
"The Holy Father is very sorry that some passages of his speech may have sounded offensive to the sensibilities of Muslim believers," Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone said in a statement.
Basically, the Pope said that early Muslims had spread their religion by violence. I can't believe the fact is disputed. Of course it was.
But so was Christianity.
Religion is the number one cause of war, hatred and injustice.
Read the Five Steps to Peace.
Jesus Christ | Christian | Christianity | Muslim | Pope Benedict | Born Jesus
"We feel he has committed a grave error against us and that this mistake will only be removed through a personal apology," the Brotherhood's deputy leader, Mohammed Habib, told Reuters.
Muslims are so easily offended.
"The Holy Father is very sorry that some passages of his speech may have sounded offensive to the sensibilities of Muslim believers," Vatican Secretary of State Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone said in a statement.
Basically, the Pope said that early Muslims had spread their religion by violence. I can't believe the fact is disputed. Of course it was.
But so was Christianity.
Religion is the number one cause of war, hatred and injustice.
Read the Five Steps to Peace.
Jesus Christ | Christian | Christianity | Muslim | Pope Benedict | Born Jesus
Monday, September 04, 2006
Fake rabbi scams Christians
A con man pretending to be a rabbi pulled the lambskin over the eyes of a fake rabbi conned a churchfull of Christians in Oregon. Masquerading as a Jewish leader from Milkwaukee, "Ari Crockett," whose real name is Timothy Wilton Ehrmantrout, didn't fight in the invasions of Panama or Grenada. And he really didn't lose a leg to a terrorist bomb, but in a motorcycle accident.
Ehrmentrout tried to steal $7,000 from the church, which eventually led to the congregants discovering his true past, which included not only a stint in a Federal prison, but time on the lam after a prison break. He had boasted of having been a college professor, a computer scientist, an international lawyer, and of being friends with Steven Spielberg and Bill Gates.
Not all the congregants have abandoned the good rabbi. Over 80 members still attend his services at Beth El church in Milwaukee. Beth El is affiliated with the Church of God.
"Who you were yesterday is not what God cares about," said Ann Seregow, a Beth El spokeswoman. "It's what you do right now that matters."
Crockett responded to recent inquiries from the press with a statement.
"Even since the earliest days of our ministry we have never hidden the fact that I had been a convicted criminal, in fact we promote it," Crockett wrote.
"Beth El is a place of second chances for all who have been damaged by bad choices in life. God has given me a second chance, and I wish to dedicate my life to living that out that chance and not just talking about it."
Jesus Christ | Christian | Christianity | Religious Fraud | Church of God | Born Jesus
Ehrmentrout tried to steal $7,000 from the church, which eventually led to the congregants discovering his true past, which included not only a stint in a Federal prison, but time on the lam after a prison break. He had boasted of having been a college professor, a computer scientist, an international lawyer, and of being friends with Steven Spielberg and Bill Gates.
Not all the congregants have abandoned the good rabbi. Over 80 members still attend his services at Beth El church in Milwaukee. Beth El is affiliated with the Church of God.
"Who you were yesterday is not what God cares about," said Ann Seregow, a Beth El spokeswoman. "It's what you do right now that matters."
Crockett responded to recent inquiries from the press with a statement.
"Even since the earliest days of our ministry we have never hidden the fact that I had been a convicted criminal, in fact we promote it," Crockett wrote.
"Beth El is a place of second chances for all who have been damaged by bad choices in life. God has given me a second chance, and I wish to dedicate my life to living that out that chance and not just talking about it."
Jesus Christ | Christian | Christianity | Religious Fraud | Church of God | Born Jesus
Sunday, September 03, 2006
Evangelist drowns trying to walk on water
Several sources, including World Net Daily, have reported that evangelist Rev. Frank Kabele, of Libreville, Gabon, in Africa, told his congregation that he could emulate Jesus by walking on water. He then walked into the sea and promptly drowned.
An eyewitness said, "He told churchgoers he'd had a revelation that if he had enough faith, he could walk on water like Jesus. He took his congregation to the beach saying he would walk across the Komo estuary, which takes 20 minutes by boat. He walked into the water, which soon passed over his head and he never came back."
If it hasn't happened already, I'm sure he'll soon be nominated for the distiguished Darwin Awards.
Jesus Christ | Christian | Christianity | Stupidity | Darwin Awards | Born Jesus
An eyewitness said, "He told churchgoers he'd had a revelation that if he had enough faith, he could walk on water like Jesus. He took his congregation to the beach saying he would walk across the Komo estuary, which takes 20 minutes by boat. He walked into the water, which soon passed over his head and he never came back."
If it hasn't happened already, I'm sure he'll soon be nominated for the distiguished Darwin Awards.
Jesus Christ | Christian | Christianity | Stupidity | Darwin Awards | Born Jesus
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