27 Aug 10 Christian behaviour Part 1 – Love thy Holiday, screw thy family

If you ever need to organise a religious ceremony, you might find out how little religious spirit all your church-going relatives have. Knowing that we don’t love our neighbours, we are learning that our brother-in-law (apparently soon to be made Lord Lieutenant of Cheshire – though I imagine he needs to screw over the existing one first) has a bit of the twat about him.

The story begins…

John the Baptist was doing river ducking on people who were old enough to know what they were getting into and big enough to hit him back if they weren’t up for it

So the kids decide they want to be Christened (in spite of my best heathen efforts). I’d put my foot down when they were born saying that it was a decision they could make when they were old enough. I have always been a bit confused about the child dunking ceremony. The Bible has John the Baptist doing river ducking on people who were old enough to know what they were getting into and big enough to hit him back if they weren’t up for it. But these days the Church tends to make sure any vestage of freewill is not available to the dunkee. Which I find bizarre in another way, since most of the questions that priests cannot answer about God, heaven, sin, belief, creation and all the other catechismal cataclisms, that prove their entire existence is a big fairy story, are universally answered by puffing out the chest and saying ‘That’s because God gave us freewill’. (Don’t even get me going on the inconsistent triad, Plato, the ontological argument or anything St Thomas Acquinas had to say about this, because it all amounts to no one having a clue. But the church invented a get out of jail card for awkward upstarts like me. It is called Freewill).

The further readings of David Hume, Anselm, arguments from design, cosmology and other remote parts of the county library have not really been factored in

Anyway, young as they are, the further readings of David Hume, Anselm, arguments from design, cosmology and other remote parts of the county library have not really been factored in by them. The big book with colourful pictures has as with and the big smiley lady with the dog-collar – and it all looks like nice songs, no one being nasty and good fun, so the Yateslets are signing up for it.

Your arse belongs to God or is it Santa (they look very similar, hairy, grey, big white beard, naughty list, angels/dwarves)

Baptism is a type of marketing. It is banned in any other walk of life. Imagine at three months old being, signed up by Lloyds TSB, or enrolled into the Labour Party. Mind you it doesn’t take long before you are ‘burgered’ by MacDonalds usually with complete disrespect for your parents wishes because some other kid has an E Number birthday celebration at the shrine of Ronald MacDonald. The point being  that, like MacDonalds, your religious choice is designed to be made for you before you know whether you are a rock, a plant, a mollusk or anything else. It makes sure that whatever else, you are a Christian and your arse belongs to God or is it Santa (they look very similar, hairy, grey, big white beard, naughty list, angels/dwarves) although only one of them is an anagram of ‘Satan’.

Stay away from the spawn of the devil, namely: Catholics, Presbytarians, Unitarians, Seventh Day Adventists, The Osmonds and Tom Cruise

I guess Baptism is indoctrination. It is a ‘water mark’ that says, “You’re ours, your parents have made this decision for you, and this means that by circular reference you now have to ‘honour your mother and father’ so don’t go believing those pagan Jews, Muslims and Buddhists. And you really need to stay away from the spawn of the devil, namely: Catholics, Presbytarians, Unitarians, Seventh Day Adventists, The Osmonds and Tom Cruise.” In our case, we purposely didn’t make the decision for our children, they went all Jam and Jerusalem on us via the local C of E primary school.

We are organising a bloody event that we would not choose to go to if we were invited

So, carrying the burden of our childrens’ freewill amply about our shoulders we go about defending their right to it by organising a bloody event that we would not choose to go to if we were invited.

Carolyn spent weeks sorting out a mutually suitable date for the kids, the vicar, and three sets of god parents (you have to have three), two sets of grand parents, two uncles, two aunts, a mixed bag of cousins, two children, two parents and God of course, who we are assuming will have some kind of divine version of Microsoft Outlook and will have received an invite from the vicar. All the humans are scattered across two countries and five counties and God of course from an entirely seperate plain of existence.

And the date was thus carved in stone, money paid, paperwork completed, party organised and everyone knew where and when they were supposed to be. Until Bobby Skittle (my brother in law) goes into arrogant fuckwit mode (actually these days that is his only setting – arrogant fuckwit bordering on boorish bore).

More later…