Christianity

Ireland's sons turn their backs on the priesthood

Some Harlem Churches in Fight for Survival

Kirk’s College of Divinity has so few students it is ‘scarcely viable’

This has nothing to do with religion, either for or against. I just like this picture of Rocket Jesus lifting off, to symbolize the soaring Brazilian economy. (That's the 40 meter-tall Christ the Redeemer statue in Rio de Janeiro, in case anyone should not recognize it.)

"This is my solid rocket booster stage which is for you. Launch this in remembrance of me."

J minus 10 and counting!

Priest Stole $1.3 Million to Spend on Male Escorts, Designer Clothes, Other Stereotypically Gay Things

Christian right leader George Rekers takes vacation with "rent boy"

The next Catholic abuse scandal: Crimes against women

So the other day I'm walking through a Tokyo-area shopping center, and in a drug store I see stacked boxes of Jesus Body! (exclamation mark theirs).

What's this? Communion crackers? No, those would make for grisly boxes of actual Jesus flesh (or so the priests insist). The tomato-red Jesus Body! boxes I saw are a diet product – 180 tablets of slimming ingredients. 

Putting aside the skeptic's natural suspicion of diet tablets, why the name "Jesus Body"? Well, the association of Jesus with miracles must be part of it. But I assume the product is mainly seeking to attract lady shoppers with a well-known popular image: the lean, slim-bodied Jesus that artists have been hanging on the cross for near 2000 years now.

(I mean, Buddha was a miraculous guy too, but would Buddha Body! sell?)

So, there's no mystery behind the appeal of a savor who always looks so fit (well, fit apart from the blood and the dying and all that). But on the other hand, there may be more to a "Jesus body" than just slimness. A church in Oklahoma has a painted Jesus whose... interesting anatomy has some faithful up in arms. (And maybe has a few swooning as well.) 

My, Christ certainly does appear to be pointing the way to heaven, doesn't he. Or as quicker wags have already quipped: I knew Jesus was crucified, but I didn't know he was hung! 

AP EXCLUSIVE: Future pope stalled pedophile case

Exorcism?

Here in the second decade of the 21st century, you might think that the only exorcism still to be found in the Church involves casting altar boys out of their robes. But while that may the mainstream of Catholic practices, good old-fashioned hellspawn expulsion remains on the Vatican's menu of imaginary services.

A lot of folks lately have been talking up the story of "Father" Gabriele Amorth, cross-slinging demon-buster of the Holy See, who claims a Vatican-roaming Satan himself is behind Church improprieties ("the Devil made them diddle", I guess). Reading words about – and by – the 85-year-old priest is a trip into utter lunacy, of course, but I gotta say it's awfully entertaining wackiness. Here are some things I've learned about the Church and the exorcist biz in particular: Readeth thou more