Hate-filled pastor should be shunned by the world | Holy Post | National Post

There's a neat email that made the rounds in recent years. I suspect it springs from the pool of urban legends that besot the virtual world, but it carries an appropriate message for idiots like Terry Jones. (I won't dignify him by calling him a 'Pastor'.) He recently burned a Koran in a public event covered by the media in Florida. From there the news spread  across the globe faster, than a rumor of some misdeed by a neighbor fires across a village's old time 'social network' system.


It's set in a university lecture hall and involves a challenge that an atheist professor puts to God to 'knock him off his feet' if he actually exists. He then gives the Almighty 15 minutes to effect his punishment. As the clock ticks by & the lecture continues, he glances at his watch and reminds God that his time is running out to prove that he exists. As the final few moments approach, and the professor prepares to launch into his usual boastful gloating at once again 'proving' God to be a fraud, a man stands up and decks the prof, sending him sprawling to the ground.


"Why did you do that?" sputtered the professor from the floor, preparing in his mind the report he's submit to have the student expelled. "Well," said the student, "God was busy keeping my brother/father/sister/mother (add significant other here) safe in Iraq (or Afghanistan, or...). I promised him I'd watch his back here so that he can take care of business there and keep them safe, so that idiots like you can mouth off back here in freedom."


I certainly don't countenance anyone to presume to 'speak' for God in such a violent manner, but the lesson that our words here can have harmful consequences elsewhere should be experienced 'first hand' by those who'd endanger others through their own recklessness. Such a lesson might hurt them a a bit, but it would be a life lesson they obviously need to learn. Evidently common sense and charity wasn't part of Jone's upbringing and others are now suffering because of that deficit.


Fr. Tim


Read Charles Lewis' opinion piece from today's National Post Religion blog, The Holy Post. Click on the link below.

Charles Lewis: hate-filled pastor should be shunned by the world | Holy Post | National Post