Thursday, September 27, 2012

UnFriending Jesus: A Facebook Fable

  Jesus-on-Facebook

It was a classic Facebook story.
I hadn’t heard from Jesus for a long time, I kind of left the Church in a huff over male pattern balding, hang-nails and Justin Bieber. He was all “It’s my Dad’s fault” but you have to take some responsibility for something  sometime! Plus it’s a drag when you’re trying to get across  the lake and your too-cool-for-school friend just strolls over while you’re trying to rent a canoe from some creepy local you can’t even trash talk without all that holier than thou “Don’t throw the first stone” stuff. So, okay, he is holier than me! Fine! He better be. But does that mean he has to rub it in all the time?
And he was cheap. Sorry, but he was! When they say ‘loaves and fishes’ you don’t automatically think “wonder bread canned tuna.” At least I don’t. I think fresh baguettes and pan seared swordfish. But not Jesus, no way.  And don’t even ask about the wine.  But let me just say -- I prefer water to Manischewitz!  Then, like, you ask him what to do, just some friendly advice from the Son of God and he’s like “What would I do?” That’s what I’m asking you, preachy pants! Heaven forbid  you ever  get a straight answer.  He won’t even explain the long hair and the beard.” It’s not 1968 any more!” I yelled at him one time. Like he cared.
So we just drifted apart. Then years later, I get a Friend request on Facebook. Totally out of the blue. Of course he has like millions of friends already, and we have at least three in common so I accepted the request and now it’s just constant status updates. He healed somebody here, he blessed somebody there.  Got into a bar fight and turned the other cheek, the guy broke his jaw. So he forgave the guy! There was some instagram picture attached, the two of them hugging.  And how many bodies of water do I have to watch him strolling across?  He stepped on somebody’s head, some other Facebook friend of mine, the guy was doing the Ironman and almost drowned.  He goes on-line in the hospital and sees
“You were tagged in Jesus’s photo.”  That’s nice to hear. He was like, “If someone offered me thirty pieces of silver, forget about it. I’d betray that jerk for a discount coupon at Red Lobster.”
Then Jesus went to Israel. You can imagine – twenty updates a day. “Hanging out at the money lenders temple. It’s looking kind of shabby! They should take out a renovation loan!”  “Checked out the Calvary escarpment.  Bummer.” “Walking the stations of the cross Total Déjà vu.” “Had to check out the garden tomb. That’s one huge rock!”  And on and on.
The worst thing is the name dropping. Everyone cool winds up in Heaven I guess. And they just hang out, I guess, drinking Passover wine and eating tunafish sandwiches on white bread. “Reminds me of something John Lennon said to Freud last week,” he’ll comment on some post of mine.  I’m glad Jesus ‘likes’ it, but I don’t need to know that Camus, Goethe Elvis and Johnny Carson disagree. I’m supposed to take his word for that! No Facebook in Heaven – yet. Supposedly he’s talking to Zuckerberg about it. He’s big buds with all the guys who invented the computer in the first place. George Boole, Kurt Godel , Liebnitz, Lebedev, you name it. Or don’t bother, just let him do it.  He won’t quit.
Talk about endless? Check out his time line.
Finally I had to unfriend the guy. It was just too much.
I love him and I know he loves me, but from now on he can use e-mail.  And good luck getting past my spam filter.

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