Sunday, December 27, 2009

The Age of Credulity



The Feast of Holy Innocents
December 28, 2009


P.T. Barnum
Innocent extraordinaire

"There's a sucker born every minute."
These days...nanosecond.

I was recently surfing channels trying to catch some kind of educational wave. EWTN isn't exactly "education" and I don't personally believe the Mass makes good Reality TV. It's a bit like watching Top Chef when the only thing left in your kitchen is half a bag of pork rinds. And all those deacons with pimples. But those Franciscans have always been kinda "out there". So I decided to really educate myself. Time for the hard stuff. Next stop: History Channel.

Whoaaaaaa, I must say, history has really changed! What was it Yogi Berra once said? "If you don't know where you're going you might end up someplace else." Sage words indeed.

Another Holy Innocent
Yogi Berra
[in Full Lotus]

"The future ain't what it used to be."

Equal time for an Amillenialist response:
"Oh yes it is..."

At any rate, I ended up on the History Channel's new smash hit: Pawn Stars. I can see why it's popular. There's a lot of money changing hands for interesting junk believed to be valuable but selling for only pennies on the dollar. Something like sub-prime mortgages only the mortgage bankers have tattoos and their names are stitched on their shirts out from which their stomachs resolutely tumble. Fine upstanding fellows all. And please give them credit: no one is trying to hide behind respectability or put on the dog. No bespoke suits or french cuffs [though they will sell you a mighty nice pair of cufflinks]. With Pawn Stars, what-you-see-is-what-you-get. Confession: I actually enjoy the show. Penance: two hours of Kenneth Copeland and three hours of Joel Osteen.

Shell game
[in the good old days]

WYSIWYG
Once upon a time Usury was a sin.

I suppose this is "history" because it's a fact so many of us are broke. And so many of our fellow citizens stand ready to take advantage of the fact. Other highly popular offerings on the History Channel are: Gangland: Circle of Death [very popular with Canon Lawyers], The Nostradamus Effect, Decoding the Past: the other Nostradamus [is the plural of Nostradamus Nostradami?] Nostradamus 2012 [Nostradamus is evidently big with historians], Nostradamus Effect: Secret of the Seven Seals [Perhaps Nostradamus and Gangland should merge. Then we could call it La Cosa Nostradamus], Mystery Quest, Strange Rituals: Beyond Sex, Strange Rituals; Forbidden Sex, History of Sex: Ancient Civilizations, History of Sex: The Eastern World, History of Sex: The 20th Century. [I'm beginning to sense a pattern here.] Jobsite: Concrete Countdown [not an attack on Nominalism--boo!], Life After People: The Road to Nowhere [no kidding? Alternate title: PREMILLENIALISTS RAPTURED!], Bible Code[s] I and II, Bible Code II: Apocalypse and Beyond, Modern Marvels: Distilleries [oh boy, finally something for a Whiskey priest!], UFO Hunters, the Illuminati, Knights Templar in the New World, Mary Magdalene, Dan Brown in all his Vatican bashing splendor, and Chariot of the Gods. The latter was not really such a bad show. I have always wondered about Ancient Astronauts and Erik Von Daniken seems to have a real handle on it.

"Klaatu barada nikto"

Take me to your Leader
[or I'll whiz on you]

I think maybe the History channel isn't the best place to learn about, well, history. When I was a kid, about as far out as stuff got was Ripley's Believe it or Not. And at least, Ripley's was real! The guy with three legs or six fingers really had three legs or six fingers. No one was trying to pull your leg--even if you had more than two. That was what made it so quaint.

We moderns have drifted somewhere else. And Toto this ain't Kansas anymore! Of course, if some fool claimed with any kind of authority [oh-my-god, "authority", what an ugly and horrible word!] that Jesus walked on water, fed thousands with a single basket of loaves and fishes or really was God incarnate, well there really should be a place for him on the History Channel. He'd fit right in. It's just so preposterous! Only, there isn't and never will be. And why do you think that is? Maybe because compared to all the other crap on TV it's not really that preposterous after all.

I suppose if  the twentieth century was the Age of Anxiety, then this is the Age of Credulity. An age in which Nostradamus makes perfect sense, the Aztecs [you know, the guys that liked to cut out hearts] have wisdom, and pawnbrokers are the only ones who know what anything's really worth. Gimme a break. I'll stick with the eternal Wisdom of  a Yogi:

 Batter up!

Another splendiferous Yogism:
"If the world was perfect it wouldn't be."

Bonus question and little known historical fact: Who was PTL founder Jim Bakker's cellmate in Federal prison?

Answer: Lyndon Larouche



















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