Humor

With the commercial success of Mel Gibson’s “The Passion of the Christ”, Hollywood is looking closely and there are now some new projects based on biblical themes. Here is a list of some previous films never released and some possible new screenplays.

Bruce WIllis’ Die Hard and Resurrect
Peter Jackson’s Return of the King: The Second Coming
Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Able
Sylvester Stalone’s Rambo IV: The Canaanites
Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Conan the Samaritan
Mario Puzos’ The God, The Father
Pixar’s FInding Nebakanezer
Steven Spielbergs’ Menorah Report: The legend of the Maccabees
William Powell – My Man-God Free
Paul Newman’s Cool Hand Gospel of Luke
Robert Di Niro’s Chariot Driver
Spike Jonze’s Being John, Apostle
Francis Coppola’s Apocalypse Later
Orson Well’s Citizen Cain and Able
The Day the Earth Stood Still: Joshua’s Battle
Whale Rider 2: Jonah

And even Apple computers is getting into the mix with the release of the new iMaccabees, which is guaranteed to work off battery power for twelve days..

I kept hearing about Mary’s Fiat, but I never could find a picture of it until now.

For Lent I will continue blogging as a penance for others. I will try to provide you with plenty of punance during this punitential season.

I was thinking of giving up fasting for lent, but it just wouldn’t work out with the mandatory fast days and all.

Here is some Lent trivia I posted last year.

The capybara kap-i-‘bar-uh,
hydrochoerus hydrochaeris, is a semi-aquatic rodent of South and Central America.
It is the only species in its genus, which belongs to the family Hydrochoeridae,
order Rodentia.

When the Spanish missionaries
found the capybara in Brazil during the 16th century, they wrote to the Pope
to ask – there’s an animal here that’s scaly but also hairy, spends most of
its time in the water but occasionally comes on land; can we classify it as
a fish (and thus, the indigenous people could continue to eat it during Lent)?.
Not having a clear description of the animal (and not wanting the petitioners
to starve), the Pope agreed and declared it to be a fish.

The pretzel has a deep spiritual meaning
for Lent. In fact, it was the ancient Christian Lenten bread as far back as
the fourth century. In the old Roman Empire, the faithful kept a very strict
fast all through Lent: no milk, no butter, no cheese, no eggs, no cream and
no meat. They made small breads of water, flour and salt, to remind themselves
that Lent was a time of prayer. They shaped these breads in the form of crossed
arms for in those days they crossed their arms over the breast while praying.
Therefore they called the breads “little arms” (bracellae). From this Latin
word, the Germanic people later coined the term “pretzel.”
[Full Article]

The Teutonic word Lent, which we employ to denote the forty days’
fast preceding Easter, originally meant no more than the spring season. Still
it has been used from the Anglo-Saxon period to translate the more significant
Latin term quadragesima (Fr. car�me, It. quaresima, Span. cuaresma), meaning
the “forty days”, or more literally the “fortieth day”. This in turn imitated
the Greek name for Lent, tessarakoste (fortieth), a word formed on the analogy
of Pentecost (pentekoste), which last was in use for the Jewish festival before
New Testament times.

Carnival means "farewell to meat.”

It was thought that misfortune would come to those who married
during lent – “Marry in Lent, live to repent” – because lent was a time for
abstinence.

I have also changed one of my top graphics to this.

Normally I am happy face phobic, but I thought this was appropriate.

We all have a fallen nature due to original sin and man’s fall from Eden. We also know from Proverbs 24:16 that “a righteous man falls seven times” so what about the rest of us who fall even more frequently? The answer is simple, we are to “pray for one another” to help us to get back up. But what if you are a shut-in, house-bound, or just don’t have access to request prayer from others? This situation can be eliminated by a new service from Jester Enterprises. Jester Eternal Security Systems can now help out by providing the new Fallen Nature Monitor (Original Sin 2000). This amazing monitor can provide you with emergency prayer support 24/7. Simply by selecting the class of sin and pressing the red button your prayer request will be answered withing five minutes by our professional and prayerful staff. If you are unsure of the sin simply select Unknown and we will get some general prayer intercessions to your location immediately.

Our trained staff will evaluate each situation as it comes in and will immediately determine the level of prayer support needed.

Out staff of prayer warriors is supervised at all times by Carmelite nuns professionally certified in the Teresian system at Mansion Seven. All of our employees have been state certified as “righteous” so that their prayers will avail much. Over sixty percent of our staff have completed advanced training and are currently at Mansion five or higher.

Don’t go with those other cheap monitoring systems since they cut corners by hiring atheists and apostates. Go with Jester Eternal Security Systems where the prayers are timely and piously done. We go strait to Jesus and through his network of tried and true saints as our subcontracted intercessors.

The price of monthly monitoring is only $9.95 and if you act now and sign an annual contract we will throw in the OS-2000 for free.

So don’t delay, just pay and we will pray.

Victor Lams has dug up some rare books from C.S. Lewis which you must see. Since imitation is the sincerest sign of flattery I decided to also peruse some of the rare book shops and come up with some of my own finds of lesser known works from C.S. Lewis.

As surprising as these title were this newly discovered manuscript by the Tolkien estate is amazing.

This takes place before Bilbo, Frodo, Gandalf arrived on the scene in Middle Earth in a time even more elder than the Elder Days when Elves and Men first started cooking food. A race of creatures tainted from uncooked food and the resulting food poisoning became the Salmonellion and wreaked havoc on the races in Middle Earth.

Victor Lams posted a different picture of the same monk.

I laughed when I saw this yesterday. I think this picture could be used as a RAD TRAD detector. If placed in front of a someone and they start shivering and muttering something about Vatican II and then go into shock, you know there a RAD TRAD. This picture used in conjunction with the picture of the Pope watching Break Dancers perform could probably stun a RAD TRAD at 100 feet. As for me I like the idea of skate punk monk, as long as it isn’t during the liturgy.

Jesterware now presents the latest in interactive liturgical gaming. Missal Defense allows you to take out your frustrations on vapid modern songs (none dare call them hymns) such as those published by Oregon Catholic Press and GIA. The object is simply to destroy as many missals as you can before they can find their way to a pew.

Game Play
Simply press play and the cross cursor will then appear. As missals come on the screen place the cross over them and press your mouse button to blow these missals out of the skies.

Credits:
The blogger at Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam suggested a game along these lines in my comment box. Some of the underlying coding is based on a Macromedia Flash sample by Sascha Wolter. Any lameness of this game is totally attributed to myself.

(Roto Reuters) The age old bitter question about who was responsible for killing Christ has raised it’s ugly head again with the upcoming Ash Wednesday release of Mel Gibson’s the Passion of Christ. Details released about the movie is that in a close up of a Crucifixion scene where a pair a hands are shown nailing Jesus to the cross, are actually those of Mel Gibson’s. Some have attributed the symbolism of this is that Mel is saying that he as others are the cause of Christs’ death. A new group HAND (Hands Against Nail Defamation) have another take. Their spokeshand had this to sign “This close up is obviously a blatant attempt to blame hands for the death of Christ. That if it wasn’t due to the hands capabilities and capable opposable thumb, that the Crucification could never have happened. Mel Gibson did not get permission from other hands before he did this and we think possibly his own hands were forced to act this out under orders from his nervous system.”

We also believe that much of the New Testament is anti-hand in it’s portrayal of hands. For example the verse “The Son of man will be delivered into the hands of men, and they will kill him” blatantly tries to blame hands for Jesus’ death. Another example is “Rise, let us be going; see, my betrayer is at hand.” There is even a conspiracy to keep hands from knowing about what other hands have done. For example “But when you give alms, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, ” But one of the worse anti-hand verses is reported to be in the movie:

..he took water and washed his hands before the crowd, saying, “I am innocent of this man’s blood; see to it yourselves.” And all the people answered, “His blood be on us and on our children!”

“Why did Pilate’s hands have to be washed? This is just more anti-hand sentiment equating Jesus’ blood with hands. And what about “Palm Sunday”, what did the palm of a hand have to do with this event. Palm Sunday is illustrated to show the hypocrisy of those who praised Christ on one Sunday and then asked for him to be crucified on the next. Hands have nothing to do with this hypocrisy and it should be given another name. There is often also blatant right hand-left hand discrimination. Much talk about the right hand being preferential over the left. Aren’t all Jews, Greeks, Right Hands, and Left Hands equal under Christ? Now I don’t want to be accused of ignoring the verses that contained positive hand messages such as “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand”, “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord”, “Give me also this power, that any one on whom I lay my hands may receive the Holy Spirit.” There is also an overall positive message about body part equality in the verses starting “If the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. We are in total solidarity with our brother the foot, yet these verses are few and far between and we are asking that all hands refuse to purchase or hold tickets in their phalanges and to boycott this movie and it’s anti-hand hyperbole.”

Patrick Madrid has a pretty funny list titled Pat’s Top Ten: Orthodox Catholic Pickup Lines

[Via Discernment Group]

To which I add my own:

• My Guardian Angel thinks your cute

• Your Pilgrimage or mine

• May I sit down? I was admiring your Chest – erton. Have you also read Orthodoxy?

• I have a vocation to the married life. Will you help me out?

• My Sacred Heart statue started beating faster when I saw you

• Ah, so your what happened to my missing rib
• Didn’t I see your face on a Holy Card somewhere?
• I would like to study the theology of your body