2008 Woodie Awards
Divine Apparitions
Jarrod Moore
Issue date: 9/27/06 Section: Opinion
Over the past few years, the Virgin Mary's been extra busy with public relations. As a
matter of fact, she's probably only one videotape shy of Paris Hilton's peculiar and ever-present media frenzies.
She has been making appearances in the oddest of places to the oddest of people, the latest being to an elderly Chicago woman on the bottom of her pet turtle, which was promptly named Mary. Either the Holy Mother's acquired a great agent, or there are some seriously disturbed people out there.
My vote is for the latter.
The Virgin Mary isn't on your sandwich. She's not in your melted chocolate bar, and sure as hellfire isn't on the bottom of your pet turtle.
Her son, whose name eludes me at present, isn't watching you through two knots in the wood of your kitchen door. If you disagree, you're probably insane.
Bold statement, I know, but I'm fairly certain it's an accurate one. The otherwise would insinuate that the depiction of the sexy naked lady vying in a match of Uno with a giant penguin that I saw in the clouds last week would also have to be a sign from the "other side." In other words, if you're nuts, I get to be nuts, too.
See, there are literally billions of these things that competent people describe as "shapes" littering the air, ground, and everything in between all over the world at any given moment. Sometimes these shapes coincidentally find their way together and form larger shapes that may or may not happen to vaguely resemble another shape, and if spied upon by a human, they may trigger some mental comparison.
Depending on the religious neurosis of the particular human, apparently any shape can be perceived as the Virgin Mary, as if she doesn't have better places to be than on the unpleasant side of a turtle.
The truth is that people see what they want to see. Sometimes they see a shape that triggers a connection with something they hold so close and dearly, that they can't distinguish between resemblance and actuality.
But they may be disheartened to find out that the Virgin Mary is making millions of appearances at this very moment, ranging anywhere from a collaboration of cracks on a New York City sidewalk to a birthmark on the underside of a baboon's scrotum in Tanzania. They're all just waiting to be discovered.
However, since death is final and the afterlife will always remain a mystery, there is no way to ascertain these trivial apparitions as true or false, no matter how strongly you feel either way. So, I suggest joining in on the fun.
The next time you go out to check the mail and happen upon a coil of puppy excrement exhibiting three shapes that oddly resemble two eyes and a mouth, scoop it up, vacuum seal it, and slap it on eBay. If people are ignorant enough to believe it, you deserve their money.
matter of fact, she's probably only one videotape shy of Paris Hilton's peculiar and ever-present media frenzies.
She has been making appearances in the oddest of places to the oddest of people, the latest being to an elderly Chicago woman on the bottom of her pet turtle, which was promptly named Mary. Either the Holy Mother's acquired a great agent, or there are some seriously disturbed people out there.
My vote is for the latter.
The Virgin Mary isn't on your sandwich. She's not in your melted chocolate bar, and sure as hellfire isn't on the bottom of your pet turtle.
Her son, whose name eludes me at present, isn't watching you through two knots in the wood of your kitchen door. If you disagree, you're probably insane.
Bold statement, I know, but I'm fairly certain it's an accurate one. The otherwise would insinuate that the depiction of the sexy naked lady vying in a match of Uno with a giant penguin that I saw in the clouds last week would also have to be a sign from the "other side." In other words, if you're nuts, I get to be nuts, too.
See, there are literally billions of these things that competent people describe as "shapes" littering the air, ground, and everything in between all over the world at any given moment. Sometimes these shapes coincidentally find their way together and form larger shapes that may or may not happen to vaguely resemble another shape, and if spied upon by a human, they may trigger some mental comparison.
Depending on the religious neurosis of the particular human, apparently any shape can be perceived as the Virgin Mary, as if she doesn't have better places to be than on the unpleasant side of a turtle.
The truth is that people see what they want to see. Sometimes they see a shape that triggers a connection with something they hold so close and dearly, that they can't distinguish between resemblance and actuality.
But they may be disheartened to find out that the Virgin Mary is making millions of appearances at this very moment, ranging anywhere from a collaboration of cracks on a New York City sidewalk to a birthmark on the underside of a baboon's scrotum in Tanzania. They're all just waiting to be discovered.
However, since death is final and the afterlife will always remain a mystery, there is no way to ascertain these trivial apparitions as true or false, no matter how strongly you feel either way. So, I suggest joining in on the fun.
The next time you go out to check the mail and happen upon a coil of puppy excrement exhibiting three shapes that oddly resemble two eyes and a mouth, scoop it up, vacuum seal it, and slap it on eBay. If people are ignorant enough to believe it, you deserve their money.
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