Memo to Amazing Grace Baptist Church: YOU ARE SO DUMB, YOU'RE ALMOST CUTE.
There are all kinds of stupid. There's some stupid that really sticks in my fucking craw, like that asshole in Louisiana that I'll probably be taking issue with on Monday. If you follow the blogs, you know who I mean. And then there's the kind of dumb that's just funny. The kind of dumb that's trying too hard. The kind of dumb that thinks it's breaking a huge cultural taboo, but in reality just makes no sense.
And so it is with the Amazing Grace Baptist Church, nestled away in Canton, North Carolina, and their hilarious decision to hold a Halloween book burning.
A Halloween book burning is a lot like a five-year-old motion-activated ghost. You know, one that was bought for full price at Target, dragged out for a couple of weeks every year, and never had the batteries replaced. It's marketed as being all scaaaaaaary, but we've seen it over and over again, and it's just sounding weak and pathetic at this point.
So, what works of Satan are on the list for the Amazing Grace bonfire? Well, to start, they'll be burning all versions of the Bible that aren't the King James. So if you're a scholar with some old manuscripts or the Dead Sea Scrolls in your satchel, stay the fuck out of Canton, NC on Halloween. I presume they'll also be throwing a netbook loaded up to the Conservative Bible Project on there as well.
They'll also be burning the works of "heretics", which, to Amazing Grace Baptist, means The Pope, Mother Theresa, Billy Graham, and Rick Warren. Purpose-driven S'mores, anyone? That is some serious commitment to fundamentalism, I'll give them that much. But they have to be committed - there's only fourteen of them. Awesome. They're three people away from being Westboro.
They'll also be burning "Satan's music", which again, you would THINK would be the Brutal Legend soundtrack, but Amazing Grace's laser-like focus on right-wing Christianity for not being authentic enough, they're actually going to be burning country CDs, Southern gospel, and contemporary Christian. I tell you, these guys are my new favorite zealots.
Awesome. I need to see about clearing out some of my old religious research books and head on down. We should all go. It's Halloween, for fuck's sake. What could be more fun than a bunch of atheists, agnostics, pagans, assorted other heathen folk, and liberal Christians showing up for the big book burning dressed as frothing fundies, only to reveal our true selves at the end?
Who's bringing the chocolate for the s'mores?
Let's see, there must be something around here I can burn that's the work of the devil ...
ReplyDeleteOh, here we go.