Toad in the Hole

OK, I’ll have to reiterate: It’s just a frackin’ cracker.

Alas, unlike Twisty, I haven’t spent the last two weeks riding a gorgeous horse. We’re having yet another week of weird red light and painful air, thanks to the wildfires that are still consuming my beloved California. For some reason, that (plus a few other things that have surfaced in my personal swamp) has apparently made me allergic to words. Deadline/work matters, personal correspondence, words of all sorts. Apologies to all I’ve neglected.

The other thing screwing up my deadlines for the last couple of days has been the kerfuffle in Florida over a University of Central Florida student who was assaulted in church and later threatened with death for walking farther with a Communion wafer in his hand than some ecclesiastical martinet thought he ought to.

So you can go over to Pharyngula to witness the mess; I’d advise skimming a few of the relevant threads. Right here, I’m going to pull my Catholic schooling out of my pocket and do some damning of my own.

People are carrying on about “desecration.” Some of them are doing so quite imaginatively. For some reason (Paging Dr. Freud!) a large proportion of their imaginary desecration scenes involve the Koran and/or various human excreta. I’ll give the less-experienced a tip: Holy books tend to be printed on paper that gets sharp edges when it’s crumpled, and is therefore not fit to wipe one’s ass with. Beware.

I have a deep enough background in Catholicism to tell everyone this: The Eucharist was desecrated by Catholics when that kid was assaulted in the Sacred Presence. It was desecrated again when he was threatened by alleged Catholics—threatened in any manner, not just with death. He was threatened with death. He is a human person. His being is sacred. Any who threaten him with harm are threatening God Himself. They are damning themselves.

Any who tell him and/or Dr. Myers that they are going to Hell are committing the sin of presumption, in daring to pretend to speak for God Himself. They are twice damning themselves. (I? I have nothing to fear from the Catholic hierarchy or ideology. I can merrily call these fools out on their own terms and have no thought to the imaginary eternal consequences.)

It’s funny that all those “moderate” Catholics and other Christians are failing to publicly condemn ol’ Bill Donahue for presuming to speak for the Church. He has egregiously misrepresented Catholic theology, human decency, and even such freedom of thought as exists within the confines of Catholic theology. How odd that the consequences of that sin have not descended upon him here on Earth with any degree of severity remotely comparable as what befell, say, the Dutch theologians who got all that Vatican opprobrium for lesser disagreements.