Failure to Communicate

 Holy crap! In true Robert Langdon fashion I’ve just puzzled out the major mysteries of the bible, and all in one day. It just came to me like manna from heaven. All my life I’ve wondered about the inconsistencies of the bible and have tried to reconcile the idea of a loving god with some of the, quite frankly, clinically insane instruction that can be found in the west’s favorite holy book.  

And I’ve finally figured it out…..God can only talk to crazy people. Not moderately crazy people like the old, homeless woman who throws cats at you when you try to give her a bologna sandwich. Not even the tortured artist, ‘mail an ear as a Secretary’s Day gift’ kind of crazy is crazy enough. The big Dude can only talk to the foamy lipped, danger to themselves and others kind of crazy people. They must be the only ones who can hear his gentle, elegant, singsong-y pitch.  

An iphone might have helped.

Because of this communication barrier with the world, God’s messages kept getting all muddled up with the insane ramblings of lunatics throughout the ages. And the variety and scope of mental illnesses were as varied then as they are now. Although to me it seems that God happened to use people with debilitating OCD more than any of the other mental defectives.  What I figure happened is this; God took his messenger up on the mountain or sat him down in the front seat of a 78 Cadillac with the stereo blaring (to avoid the feds listening in) and told him (it was always a him because it takes ‘man crazy’ to hear God) a really simple message. Then by the time that person relayed the message to the people it was completely discombobulated. 

God was probably just trying to warn mankind that womankind has a tendency to get cranky during auntie Flo’s monthly visit. By the time it got passed down to the common folk there were all the ritualistic rules about who to ostracize and how much hand sanitizer to use when one accidentally came into contact with a menstruating babe.     

Maybe God was actually trying to warn us about eating genetically modified grains and how fugly and regrettable polyester would come to be when what got interpreted were the super-OCD rules not allowing two crops in the same field or people to wear mixed fabrics. Or would those rules be more indicative of Asperger’s Syndrome? Maybe he was just warning us that some people may be allergic to shellfish and that overindulging in pork can lead to obesity when we got the abomination here and the hand washing (and wringing) there.         

Even now, the catholic faith practices strict OCD adherence with their 10 Lord’s Prayers and 50 Hail Mary’s for swearing….I should know. Now I’m also wondering about the Ten Commandments. I’ll bet there were 7 or 9 or something and Moses just HAD to make it an even, round number. And although OCD seemed to be the most prevalent affliction of the messengers, there were also many others with far worse conditions. I don’t think that anyone who is familiar with biblical history would argue my assertion that Paul was a megalomaniac with delusions of grandeur or that John was a paranoid schizophrenic with violent hallucinations.      

Crazy like a fox. A rabid fox with mercury poisoning.

It’s still happening today too. I’m sure that the God of Islam (which I think is supposed to be the same God as the God of the bible, just with a different, maybe darker, complexion…?) just wanted to warn the Iranian women of the dangers of skin cancer, but when he told the Iranian clerics, they got it all screwed up and decided to start arresting women for being tan. What a kerfuffle. I’ll bet poor God’s having a LOL.      

I think the whole world will be better off if we all start paying really close attention and try to really hear what God may actually be saying. Otherwise we might come out looking like we are all fucking nuts.