I don’t know what it is, but there is just something between priests and sermons. I’m not referring to the fact that these priests are trained to give sermons, I’m referring to the other fact that I can find no sign whatsoever telling me that these guys know a single blasted thing about giving sermons. Mass after mass, month after month, Easter after Easter, Christmas after Christmas…it’s all the same. Actually it’s not the same. Each successive year pushes the bar as to how bad, meaningless and ridiculous a sermon can get. If this trend continues, it won’t be long before we start finding the sermons telecast on MiracleNet extremely riveting. That’s one way of know you have truly reached rock bottom, and that there is no hope in hell for you, when you get hooked on MiracleNet.
To get back on the topic I had in mind, this year’s Christmas sermon only reassured me that this really was a hopeless situation. The priest was from somewhere else, and was determined to shake things up around here. Now his idea of ’shaking things up’ was nothing but giving us a sermon so bad, that it almost made us long for the days of the Bishop. His sermon revolved around two words: wonder and ponder. Now the deal with this guy was that he had this bloated, commanding way of speaking; and he employed theatrics while doing so too, which lead us to believe that he had something unbelievably profound to say. As profound as, say, telling us repeatedly that Mary Magdalene was a prostitute. But the Truth was quite different. He had absolutely nothing to say. His words were like dew drops on the tip of your nose: irritating and ticklish. As I was about to say before I was interrupted, he seemed to believe that humans had only two states of mind: one of being in wonder, and the other of pondering. And that was it. While his niece’s son threw a tantrum, he wondered with his mouth open, while the niece pondered. On the day of Jesus’ birth, the shepherds wondered, while Mary pondered. And every time he said ‘pondered’, he’d accompany it with this pretentious, expressive gesture. Just what the hell was there for his niece to ponder no one knew. I mean, instead of giving the darn boy a good thrashing, what the hell was she pondering so hard about? And I also find it hard to stomach that so soon after painfully giving birth of the Son of God without the aid of Modern Medicine, Mary was already pondering so intensely. After a while, the priest himself seemed to have entirely lost track of what he was trying and failing to say. As is usually the case, that’s the moment the priest ends the sermon, after saying something like, ” Bethlehem is burning!”, just to give the impression that the sermon was in fact about something.
While still on the topic, I should also tell you about Easter sermons. Yes, Easter, the forgotten festival, like the distant relative of Christmas. The priest there was the definition of a Human bulldog - rotund, porky and puffy-faced. With his eyes raised to the heavens and his voice going up the road of loudness, he’d begin by saying, “Mary Magdalene….was a prostitute woman! She was a PROSTITUTE!” This was enough to liven up the church a bit. I mean, who isn’t interested in prostitutes? And that too, prostitute women? So while everyone would be looking suspiciously at their neighbour, the priest would suddenly cast an accusing finger at as many people as his fat finger could accommodate, and say, “Now you wouldn’t invite a prostitute to your birthday party, would you?”
“That’s what you think!”, I felt like shouting back at him, but good sense prevailed. So on he went, “You wouldn’t invite a prostitute to your wedding, would you?” Unless, of course, your spouse-to-be is the prostitute - but that’s a whole new story. Let’s go on. “But Jesus, he was with Mary Magdalene for so long.” Then he’d end the sermon at this cliff-hanger moment, and take a hike. And that would be it, bizarre prostitute fixations and all.