The greatest thing about having a personal god is that he always tells you exactly what you want to hear, and will always be there to help you justify doing whatever you want – even if it contradicts the teachings of your religion.
Thus we have the video for Ghost’s cover of “Jesus He Knows Me” by Genesis, which depicts a clergyman1 selling Jesus by day and then spending his night in drugged debauchery before returning to church in the morning as if he hadn’t spent the night snorting his congregation’s donations, banging hookers, and (in one scene) apparently getting facials2 from the members of a hockey team.
As you might expect, this video is not safe for work or appropriate for children. It’s age-restricted, so YouTube will insist on you signing in. Unfortunately, it’s the children who need to see this most. They need to learn that adults in positions of authority – whether they’re clergy, teachers, police, politicians, or their own parents – are rarely worthy of the trust children are expected to place in them.
Don’t mistake me: I grew up Catholic and I got the message that we’re all sinners and we all need to be forgiven, because we’re human and thus flawed3. Nevertheless, it’s galling to be judged by parasites who hurl fire and brimstone from the pulpit to frighten people into donating money they worked hard to earn and can’t afford to give away lightly in the hope that they might earn the forgiveness that Jesus freely offered according to the Gospels.
I don’t have a lot of patience for the self-righteous. This is especially so when it comes to self-righteous fundies who ignore the gospels in favor of Leviticus and Paul as entirely too many religious leaders in the US do, while speaking in cliches.
To go with the cover video, here’s a parody podcast starring the preacher from the first video, “Father Jim DeFroque”. Ghost impresario Tobias Forge is having an unholy good time here, and it’s plain to see, but he nails the cliches and accents in which shady evangelical preachers4 trade. The satire is real and it’s sharp enough to make God bleed.
There are reasons my wife Catherine says she believes in God but not the Church, and one of them is the continued tendency of organized religion and hypocritical clergymen to line their pockets by selling indulgences, even if they don’t call it that any longer.
The whole sordid mess reminds me of lyrics from “Spreading the Disease” by Queensrÿche:
Religion and sex are power plays Manipulate the people for the money they pay Selling skin, selling God The numbers look the same on their credit cards
Offended yet? Take it to the Lord in private prayer. While you’re praying, remember that I can say all of this because Jesus knows me, too, and he knows I’m right.
He’s my god, too, when I find it convenient. Not that he talks back to me when I talk to him, but there’s the old principle: Qui tacet consentire videtur, ubi loqui debuit ac potuit5.
If your god has a problem with me, he can get his almighty ass down here and tell me so. But I’m not taking your word for it. Nor will I misplace my faith in that pile of fan fiction you keep thumping without reading it too closely lest you find themselves condemned by your religion’s own teachings.
You see, Jesus knows you, too. I doubt he’s as impressed with you as you are with yourself6.
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Apparently this guy is named Father Jim DeFroque, pronounced like “defrock”, which suggests that Forge has his tongue thoroughly wedged in his cheek.↩︎
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I don’t mean the kind of facial you can typically get at a day spa.↩︎
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We’re supposed to be created in God’s image, right? So if God isn’t happy with his creation, what does that suggest about him? If we’re assholes, what the fuck is God then? What kind of incompetent potter blames his clay if it doesn’t take the shape he hoped it would, anyway?↩︎
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Especially televangelists active in the 1980s like Jim Bakker, Jimmy Swaggart, Jack Van Impe, Peter Popoff, Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson, and Billy Graham — though one could argue that Graham wasn’t as sleazy as the rest. Not my problem, though. Damn them all; the Lord will know His own.↩︎
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from the Latin: “He who is silent, when he ought to have spoken and was able to, is taken to agree.”↩︎
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I doubt he’s particularly impressed with me, either, but I don’t claim to be Christian so his opinion means no more to me than the lives of the poor and working class do to the richest among us.↩︎