Jesus H.

Easter has come and gone almost the same way the individual that is celebrated. Yes, 'So...Yeah' fans I am talking about none other than our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. I do not and most likely will not claim to be a devout follower of Christianity but I figure that I should share my own special 'Easter/Jesus' story.

Just last week I was walking in my neighborhood of Mt. Pleasant. For those of you that are not familiar with the many fine neighborhoods in the District of Columbia, Mt. Pleasant is a quite neighborhood nestled between Adams Morgan, known for its rich nightlife and climbing rents, and Columbia Heights. The 'CH', as one of my friends Grand Ma calls it, is known for the efforts of city officials that are doing their darnedest to revitalize the once strong neighborhood.

Way back when Columbia Heights was a bustling community for some of the wealthiest of DC residents. If you want to read up more about the CH go nuts. Anyhow, somewhere between then and the current revitalization shit done fucked that place up. Now, however, hope is horizon with the construction and completion of a great big retail shopping center. Perhaps in the future I will pontificate about the likelihood that DC's revitalization efforts are likely to fail. The reason I don't wish to do that now is because this story is about Jesus.

Ah, now back to Jesus. So there I was walking down Mt. Pleasant St. and on the sidewalk a small group of people were gathered on the corner ahead. Were these people refuges from the great savings made available at the recently opened Target department store? Were they fleeing the CH to get away from all of the fresh white faces that would have never dared venture so high up 14th St had it not been possible to purchase cheaply made mass produced inventory from the factories of China? As I got closer I could see these were not your garden variety crack heads looking for spare change, in fact, they were not illicit drug users at all. These folks were high only on the love of the lord.

Now I have no problems with religious folks, if Jesus is their drug of choice so be it. Those with the love of the Lord in their hearts are much better than a drooling homeless person with fresh spray paint around their nose and mouth from the last round of huffing a fresh can of Plasti-kote.

When I reached their location one of the fine Christians in the pack handed me a flier and told me about a special offer if I chose to attend their churches Easter Mass. The Church was named the Third Church of Christ. Right off the bat I have to admit that I was not aware that churches had a ranking system because I have heard of the First Church of God several times in my years. Hearing the name made me wonder if there was some sort of ranking system similar to college football out there for the Christian faith and its places of worship. I guess when I think about it, you would have the religious journalist out there with there own ranking system while all of the pastors, reverends and priest involved in their own ranking system. Shoot, I keep getting distracted from sharing my story.

So this faithful follower of the Lord told me that if I was to attend one of their Easter services I would be eligible to win a free Apple ipod. Got that, me! I could win a free ipod just for attending someone babble on and on about how a really long time ago the son of God died on the cross for our sins and then a few days later he arose from the dead and ascended into heaven. Just think of it, a free ipod. I think there must be something going on in the hallowed halls of the Third Church of Christ because it seems as if the elder council has stooped to a fairly low level if they are offering cheaply made mass produced electronics from a factory in China over eternal salvation in the afterlife. Is pack-a-pew day not filling the seats like it used to?

So what did I decide, a shot at an ipod or sleeping in until well after 10 AM Sunday morning? Well when it came down to it and I read the fine print on the flier it said that I would have to indeed be present to win (bummer) and that the drawing for the ipod would be held following fellowship in the rectory. The real let down, it was an ipod 'shuffle' and only a one gig model at that. In the end I told him that I already owned an ipod 'Classic' which is like 100 times better than the puny little 'shuffle.' Had it been a 'Nano' then maybe I would have thought about it but since they didn't even throw in a possible shot at salvation I just had to pass.

Once I told him that I wasn't interested and that my ipod was actually a better model his faced started to lose that 'turn the other cheek' look that Christians are supposed to have and I could see that it was being replaced with the sort of look that said more of a 'I am going to enjoy the afterlife knowing that your soul is doomed to eternal damnation.' Before his face could display his waning patience any further I thought it was a good time to ask a couple of my own questions.

I asked him why Easter is celebrated in the first place. To which he replied, 'We celebrate Easter to recognize the miracle of Christ Resurrection.' With a look of renewed faith in the Christian god I could see his mouth about to start to move in order to spill out some other inspirational words. Before he could get another word out I had yet another question, 'Well that begs the question, why doesn't Isaac get his due? He was resurrected too, right? I don't see little kids biting the heads off of chocolate bunnies looking for hidden eggs. Why can't Isaac get a day? Huh? What's up with that? Is it because he was for sure a Jew? Huh? Oh I get it, only children of virginal mothers can have their resurrection celebrated. I see how it is!'

Blink, Blink, Blink.

Turns out I slept until almost eleven. I would have gotten up sooner but I didn't really see the point. I already have an ipod, better than a shuffle I might repeat, and I think that salvation for me is a little out of reach at this point. I think at best all I can hope for is purgatory, it will only feel like eternity.

Waiting for the Ending,
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