are like potato chips in that you cannot eat just one.
“This does not have to happen, and indeed it may not. What we
are here to do is to decide whether or not it
will
happen. If we find
that man’s morality has improved adequately since we were last here,
then we will have reason to believe that he is capable of inheriting his
destiny. If not, then, as your celebrated sow says, that’s all folks. It’s
that simple. And this is no joke. We have scheduled Armageddon for
two weeks from today. It will be televised around the globe and you
are all encouraged to watch. For your sake, I hope it is something you
will enjoy, and that future generations will be able to watch it again
and again with pride. Thank you all for listening so patiently.”
The entire audience sat agape. Unsure what kind of reaction was
expected of them, they looked to Letterman for direction, but Dave
was uncharacteristically silent. After a pregnant pause, Yeshua sat
down.
In olden times, there were no celebrities because there was no media.
The closest thing were gods and goddesses, and in the same way that
modern actors and musicians provided what people didn’t have in
their daily lives (adventure, glamour and something to blow their
hard-earned cash on) the mythic gods and goddesses of old provided
this to those who believed in them. Of course, there was also no cash,
so instead of sacrificing currency to their idols the earnest faithful
sacrificed goats or small children.
Unfortunately, the gods were just as inaccessible then as modern
celebrities are today. You couldn’t just drop over to their house to
borrow a cup of sugar—this was a guaranteed way to get tossed right
off Mount Olympus. Because of this, people needed to be sure that
they were actually getting something for their trouble, which was why
priests were invented. Priests were the guys who had a special “in”
with the gods. You couldn’t talk to the gods directly, but the priest
could, and for the price of a few measly farm animals he would tell
you everything the gods had confided to him. He’d tell you what their
pet peeves were, which gods were sleeping with whom, how to join
their fan clubs, and so on. Things hadn’t changed much over the
intervening millennia. Our mythic heroes were now called rock stars,
actors and supermodels and the pagan priests were now called talk
show hosts.
In some ways, priests and talk show hosts were more powerful
than the gods they channeled. No one had more clout in the mind of
H O L Y S H I T !
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