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Monday, May 12, 2008

The Crazy for this Sunday: Mortals and Immortals

The sign outside the Church of Christ, Scientist is back. It has been back for a couple weeks now, I just haven't gotten around to posting anything about it. It disappeared for a while in what appeared to most likely be an act of vandalism with someone stealing the "Subject for this Sunday" portion of the sign. Really, as acts of vandalism go, I think I can actually understand this one the most. Unlike stealing a stop sign, where you risk seriously injuring someone, this does not really run the risk of any serious ramifications, plus whoever does the stealing gets an incredibly crazy sign to put on his wall. Of course, it is still stealing, so I do frown upon it. Also, an absent sign means I miss my weekly dose of crazy.

In case you are not familiar with the Church of Christ, Scientist, it is an odd cult that manages to somehow convince its followers that modern medicine is bad, and prayer is better. I've never actually gone to one of the sermons, but I often think it might be fun. The reason for that is they often have really ridiculous titles for the week's subject. When I first moved in and started noticing them, they had a whole string of slightly normal (even science-like) sounding ones. After several weeks of seeing subjects such as "Matter", "Energy", and "The Universe" advertised, I actually briefly thought that maybe it was an educational institute masquerading as a church (you know, kind of like Intelligent Design masquerading as science, only the other way around and actually helping people by giving them a nice physics lecture every Sunday). Unfortunately, on closer inspection of their sign I noticed "Wednesdays: Testimonials of Healing". That was my first inkling that something might be a little off. Then the subjects changed, and I knew there was an institution peddling craziness located within easy walking distance. I think my favourite to date has been something about modern necromancy (I forget the full title, but it was quite long and completely full of ignorance). Of course, in order to get full enjoyment out of this sign, I need to detach myself from the knowledge that people actually go to this institution and believe what it teaches. If I can perform that little mental dance, then I can just chuckle on my way to class at what an absolutely insane subject is being advertised, and wonder just what could possibly be said about it for two hours without anyone realising the speaker was completely off. Then, the sign disappeared, and I spent several weeks wondering just what the crazy for this Sunday might be. Now, however, it is back, and I can have my weekly dose of crazy again.

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