Epsicopalians and Christmas

From Earth and Altar-

Christmas is a time to have fun (note: Christmas is a time to have fun; I’ll be gravely disappointed if you’re having any fun before December 24th)! And luckily the folks over at Christianity Today have given us some suggestions for how to have that fun. Unfortunately, some of these suggestions just don’t quite work with the culture and lived realities of a lot of Episcopal Churches. But never fear! We’re here to tell you how, with just a little creativity, they can be modified to allow for a fun Christmastide, even for Episcopalians!

Get your friends together to string popcorn and cranberries while watching animated kids' classics like A Charlie Brown Christmas and How the Grinch Stole Christmas.

For Episcopalians: Classic Christmas movies are fine I guess, but wouldn’t it be much more fun to get together and listen to recordings of NPR’s coverage of A Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols from King’s College, especially during the years when Rowan was still our Archbishop?

More here-

https://earthandaltarmag.com/posts/celebrating-christmas-with-earth-and-altar?fbclid=IwAR0tFXYdQhkxMpnjXKNSLpgOuIhwm1til1QnzdcTE-o1-miaq0gcfzvdFOg

Satan Claims Responsibility For Kale

From Babylon-

Amid claims that the ungodly, disgusting substance could not have possibly been conceived of by a benevolent creator, the great adversary, Satan, published a video claiming he alone was responsible for the violent attack upon humanity known as “kale.”

 

Authorities had long surmised that whoever invented the bitter, repulsive leaf cabbage did so with malevolent intent, and the dark lord’s statement confirms that kale was in fact designed to be an act of terrorism against mankind.

 

“Yes, you fools! It was me all along,” Satan said on the video posted to social media Tuesday. “Who else do you think could have deceived people into paying tons of money for horrible, overpriced organic kale chips and salads?”

More here-

https://babylonbee.com/news/satan-claims-responsibility-kale?fbclid=IwAR0Ph1Kt7bhxcM8PlOWDNz4c8AOlxWll5xf3stqZAwu1vllF7yC8y-6xTa8

White Sox Attendance Now Lower Than Average Episcopal Church Service

A Little Humor-

Attendance records for the beginning of the Chicago White Sox’s season obtained Monday revealed that the majority of Sox games are now being attended by fewer people than even the average Sunday service at an Episcopal Church.

“Where Episcopalians usually are able to wrangle up a dozen people or so for morning worship, the White Sox are averaging about three people a game,” a journalist wrote at Bleacher Report. “The ball club would do well to study Episcopalian outreach methods and try to figure out what they can do better to maybe get 10 or 15 people to come watch them play at Guaranteed Rate Field.”

“Maybe throw a hot dish social or two to garner up some interest,” he concluded.

It's here -

http://babylonbee.com/news/white-sox-attendance-now-lower-than-average-episcopal-church-service/

Misspelled Acomb sign proclaims 'Chris is Risen'

From The BBC

A church was presented with signs reading "Chris is risen" after a mix up at the printers.

Acomb Parish Church, in York, had ordered four banners saying 'Christ is Risen' but the 'T' was missed off the finished article.

However, assistant Curate Ned Lunn said the error was discovered before the signs were delivered.
A BBC Radio York Facebook post has been shared more than 3,000 times, prompting one person to reply 'More T vicar?'

Mr Lunn said: "I'm so glad the customer spotted the mistake. It'll save a bit of embarrassment and a lot of confusion.

"I had to check the four banners when I distributed them though, just to make sure.

"The pastor at the Baptist Church is actually called Chris and he's got to get up for a sunrise service at 6.30am on Easter Sunday.

"His predecessor didn't manage to get up for the service last year."

See it here-

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-york-north-yorkshire-35899023

Church Introduces New Soundproof Section For Terrible Singers

A Little Humor To Start The Day-

Christ Church of the Hills introduced an innovative new feature at its central campus Sunday: a completely soundproofed section of pews reserved exclusively for loud, off-key singers in the congregation, sources confirmed.

The section of several pews is encompassed by state-of-the-art anechoic technology, preventing any screeches, bellows, or other distracting noises from leaving the isolated chamber and disturbing the rest of the congregation. Those seated in the section can listen to the service through a set of speakers wired into the quarantined area.

According to head usher Monty Bennett, the program is working out great so far.


More here-

http://babylonbee.com/news/church-introduces-new-soundproof-section-bad-singers/

New Martin Luther-Shaped Amazon Echo Will Rudely Answer All Your Theology Questions

A little humor to start the day-

Specifically targeting the lucrative Christian market for the first time in celebration of the 500th anniversary of the Protestant Reformation, Amazon just released a new version of its Amazon Echo device that is shaped like Reformer Martin Luther.

Dubbed the “Amazon Luther,” the new device is programmed to answer all your theology questions in the Reformer’s trademark aggressive tone and style.

An Amazon rep gave a demo at the press conference announcing the device, showing off some of its dynamic responses:

“Luther, can you tell me about the Pope?”

The Pope is a mere tormentor of conscience. The assembly of his greased and religious crew in praying is altogether like the croaking of frogs, which edifies nothing at all.

More here-

http://babylonbee.com/news/new-martin-luther-shaped-amazon-echo-will-rudely-answer-theology-questions/

How to Be a Perfect Christian: Your Comprehensive Guide to Flawless Spiritual Living.

From Babylon Bee-

It is our great honor to announce The Babylon Bee‘s first book: How to Be a Perfect Christian: Your Comprehensive Guide to Flawless Spiritual Living. It releases May 1st and is available for pre-order right now.

What’s it all about?

How to Be a Perfect Christian is 208 pages of brand-new Bee material which will transform the sad excuse for a believer that you currently are into an absolutely Perfect Christian. The experts at The Babylon Bee will take you by the hand and lead you on this journey, helping you achieve perfection in all aspects of the Christian life. This book truly is Your Comprehensive Guide to Flawless Spiritual Living, and you will not be the same after you have read it.

Is this a joke?

This is not a joke. We really did sign a deal with Multnomah and we really did write a book and it really is coming out May 1st and you really can pre-order it right now. And it really will change your life.

More here-

http://babylonbee.com/book/

The TL;DR Edition Of All 66 Books Of The Bible

A little humor to start the day-

Luckily for you, we at The Babylon Bee have studied our official company Scofield Reference Bible for the past 80 years in order to distill each of the 66 books down to a bite-sized snippet even you can understand. We reduced every book to a single, memorable line, so you don’t have to read a word of it for yourself. Nice!

Forget about reading through the Bible in a year—now you can read through the Bible in about five minutes!

Genesis – God makes everything and it’s really good for about 3.2 seconds.

Exodus – YAHWEH VS. RA FIGHT NIGHT ONLY ON PAY-PER-VIEW SUNDAY SUNDAY SUNDAY!

Leviticus – STOP DOING GROSS STUFF.

More here-

http://babylonbee.com/news/tldr-edition-66-books-bible/

37 Episcopalians Remaining On Planet Vote To Stop Using Male Pronouns For God

A Little Humor To Start The Day-

The last surviving members of the Episcopalian religion voted last week to stop using male pronouns for God, sources at a meeting of the Diocese of Washington, D.C. confirmed.

The 37 remaining Episcopalians on Planet Earth conducted the vote in an effort to make the last three or four Episcopal churches in the country be more inclusive, in the rare case anyone actually showed up to any of their services.

“We don’t want to offend or trigger the six or seven people left in our pews,” said the writers of the resolution. “And we get literally dozens of visitors every decade—what if we scare one of them off by reading the Book of Common Prayer and forcing them to hear the words ‘He’ or ‘Him’? That’s a chance we just can’t take.”


More here-


http://babylonbee.com/news/37-episcopalians-remaining-planet-vote-stop-using-male-pronouns-god/

Santa Claus Converts To Calvinism, Moves Everybody To Naughty List

A little humor to start the day-

NORTH POLE—After a transformative moment reading R.C. Sproul’s What Is Reformed Theology? for the first time earlier this week, legendary Christmas icon Santa Claus reportedly converted to a full-on, five-point Calvinist, and almost immediately moved every single person on the planet to the naughty list, sources confirmed Friday.

“How can I put anyone on the nice list, when every human being is totally depraved from birth?” St. Nick was overheard saying to Mrs. Claus in his office. “No matter what filthy rags of righteousness they bring before the Lord, they are condemned already based on their sin nature.”

More here-

http://babylonbee.com/news/santa-claus-converts-calvinism-moves-everybody-naughty-list/

Multi-Campus Church Debuts New 3D Experience To Make It Feel Like Pastor Is Actually There

A little humor to start the day-

Experiences Church finally debuted its long-awaited 3D experience at each of its 12 campuses Sunday morning, with state-of-the-art VR goggles making it feel like the pastor of the church is actually there each and every week, churchgoers confirmed.

Each of the church’s 1,000 seats was equipped with a VR headset, with footage of Pastor Ryan rendered in real-time by a powerful PC.

“The effect is really convincing—very lifelike,” one church member said afterward. “You really feel like the man who is called to shepherd your soul is really there in the room with you—like you could actually reach out and touch him.”

More here-

http://babylonbee.com/news/multi-campus-church-debuts-new-3d-experience-make-feel-like-pastor-actually/

Pope Francis Canonizes Single Turkey In Annual Vatican Tradition

A little humor to begin the day-

Declaring the 10-pound bird worthy of the church’s veneration to a crowd of thousands in St. Peter’s Square, Pope Francis celebrated a hallowed tradition on Thursday by canonizing a turkey from a local farm, a Thanksgiving ritual dating back more than three centuries to the pontificate of Innocent XII. “Dear brothers and sisters, it is my deepest joy today to present the life and witness of this humble bird to the Church and welcome him to cluck and cackle among the saints in God’s Kingdom of Heaven,” Pope Francis recited in accordance with the teaching of the Second Vatican Council, invoking the name of God three times before inscribing the newly beatified bird, named St. Gobbler, in the catalogue of saints. 

More here-

https://www.theonion.com/pope-francis-canonizes-single-turkey-in-annual-vatican-1819575901

Humor in the Bible

From Church Life-

We rightly approach Scripture with reverence and a certain solemn spiritual hunger. Therefore, we do not often think of these inspired texts as having any sort of humor or laughter in them. This is especially true if we are Fundamentalists, or, take every word of the Bible literally.

Nonetheless, there are a number of Scripture passages that make me pause every time I hear or read them. These are in the Bible itself. They are not just the result of insufficient preparation on the part of the lector in regard to a particular text. One passage in particular comes to mind as an example of the latter: Luke 2:16.  The text may say, “The shepherds went in haste to Bethlehem and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby lying in the manger,” but the lector almost always proclaims instead that they “found Mary and Joseph and the baby, lying in the manger.” I will leave to your imagination how the “flaming brazier” of Genesis 15:17 comes across from some lectors.

What I am considering is something rather different. The Bible has a special status as the Word of God, but it is also quite simply literature and needs to be considered, at least at times, in that light if we wish to properly understand the manner in which each author wrote. Reflect on the fact that Shakespeare himself would include humor even in tragedies like Hamlet or Macbeth, and you will not be surprised to raise an eyebrow (or the corners of your lips) when you encounter certain biblical passages.

More here-

http://churchlife.nd.edu/2017/11/10/humor-in-the-bible/

Back Pew Voted Best Spot In Church Fifty-Eighth Year Running

A little humor to start the day-

The back pew at church was voted the best seat in the house among churchgoers for the 58th year running, sources at LifeWay Research confirmed Tuesday.

Regular church attendees were polled on their preferences for a place to sit during a service, with options ranging from the various pews in the sanctuary and the overflow room to the comfort of one’s own home while watching an online broadcast.

Over 92% of those polled stated that sitting in the very back pew is the perfect spot: far enough away that the pastor can’t effectively gaze into your soul, but close enough that you feel good about yourself for showing up unlike those heathens who are playing hooky.

More here-

http://babylonbee.com/news/back-pew-voted-best-spot-church-fifty-eighth-year-running/

Study: Women Find Men Carrying Leather-Bound ESV More Attractive

A little humor to start the day-

A new study performed by LifeWay Research found that Christian women find men who are carrying a high-quality, leather-bound ESV Bible significantly more attractive than men who carry other versions of the Scriptures, or no Bible at all.

When asked to describe a picture of a man carrying a large, expensive English Standard Version, 91% of female respondents used terms like “attractive,” “manly,” and “come to mama,” while the same man without an ESV was described using phrases like “boring,” “total dork,” “completely unattractive,” and “hard pass.”

More here-

http://babylonbee.com/news/study-women-find-men-carrying-leather-bound-esv-attractive/

What Should You Wear To Church? A Handy Guide For Each Denomination

A little humor to start the day-

Whether you’re visiting your parents’ stuffy old Baptist church or piling into the family minivan because the kids are begging to ride the roller coaster at the sleek new megachurch down the street, the age-old question persists: what should you wear?

Wonder no longer, good and faithful servant. We sent a team of Babylon Bee agents to over two thousand churches, big and small, new and old, all across the land to research customs, dress codes, fashion do’s and fashion don’ts. This exhaustively researched article is the result, and it’s absolutely packed with helpful fashion tips.

Bookmark this page and check it any time you’re unsure what it is you ought to be wearing to church!

More here-

http://babylonbee.com/news/wear-church-handy-guide-denomination/

Food Consumed At Church Functions Does Not Count Toward Daily Caloric Intake, Nutritionists Confirm

A little humor to begin the day-

Confirming an age-old rumor among churchgoers, world-class nutritionists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Food Research Institute announced Thursday that any and all food consumed on church grounds or at a church function is exempt from counting toward one’s caloric intake for the day.

“We’ve done numerous exhaustive studies on this and can now say without a doubt that calories consumed at church simply are not absorbed by the body,” UW Food Research Institute Lead Nutritionist Philip Reed said at a press event announcing the findings. “We have no scientific explanation for this at the moment—it seems to be some sort of miraculous event that takes place inside the body of a believer when he or she is consuming delicious baked goods in the house of God.”

More here-

http://babylonbee.com/news/food-consumed-church-functions-not-count-toward-daily-caloric-intake-nutritionists-confirm/

Hipster Priest Consecrates Fresh Batch Of Seasonal Pumpkin Spice Eucharist

A little humor to start the day-

Just in time for the start of Fall, local hipster priest Fr. Kale Adams announced this morning that he has consecrated his first batch of Pumpkin Spice Eucharist.

Although the seasonal pumpkin flavor of Jesus’ body has been condemned by the Vatican, Fr. Adams has told his parishioners that they’re not sheep, but rather, “free souls that can’t be contained by the man or the Vatican.”

“Pumpkin Spice Eucharist allows me to express myself and my love for JC in ways you wouldn’t believe,” Adams told EOTT as he sat down to finish knitting a cover for his iPad. “And listen, to all those establishment bishops in Rome,  I was consecrating before it was cool. And that’s why my parishioners dig me and why so many of them have returned to the Church in the first place. You gotta give them what they want. And what they want is Jesus…Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity, with a flawless blend of cinnamon, clove, nutmeg, and ginger.”

At press time, Fr. Kale Adams is trying on his brand new hemp vestments.

More here-

http://www.eyeofthetiber.com/2016/09/19/hipster-priest-consecrates-fresh-batch-of-seasonal-pumpkin-spice-eucharist/

Lakewood Church Issues Eclipse Glasses For Gazing At Joel Osteen’s Teeth

A little humor to start the day-

The rumors are confirmed: local authorities have instructed Lakewood Church to issue eclipse glasses to any churchgoer who might catch a glimpse of Joel Osteen’s brilliant teeth.

“It’s just no longer worth the risk,” public health official Riley Carnicella told reporters. “Every weekend in this great city, 52,000 people are exposed. Who knows how much irreversible eye damage has already occurred.”

Reporters caught up with one Lakewood staff member for comment. “Eclipse glasses are now required at all times inside the arena,” assistant financial director Brandon LoPresti explained. “When Victoria is up there, the knock-off ones will work. But when Joel ascends the stage, only certified ISO 12312-2:2015 pairs are safe. That bestselling smile can be hazardous for the uninitiated.”

More here-

http://babylonbee.com/news/lakewood-church-issues-eclipse-glasses-gazing-joel-osteens-teeth/

Angry Arminian Mob Pulls Down Statue Of John Calvin

From Babylon Bee-

PITTSBURGH, PA—A rowdy gang of angry, riled-up Arminian believers gathered to pull down a statue of Reformer John Calvin standing in front of Calvin Reformed Bible College & Seminary, authorities confirmed Friday.

The band of Wesleyan troublemakers brought a rope, lassoed it around the neck of the stone likeness of Calvin, and yanked it down while yelling rallying cries like “Down with limited atonement!” “You’ll never take our free will!” and “For Servetus!”

Mob members then stomped on the statue and spray-painted crude Arminian slogans on the downed Reformer, according to police reports.

More here-

http://babylonbee.com/news/mob-angry-arminians-pulls-statue-john-calvin/