church follies – Lee Duigon

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Forever young!

Cottage Grove Church (United Methodist), in Woodbury, Minnesota, has asked its older members–virtually all the congregation–to go somewhere else for a couple of years so the church can attract younger members (https://patch.com/minnesota/woodbury/cottage-grove-church-older-members-take-hike).

The over-60s have been asked to keep maintaining the church, which has been temporarily closed, until it re-opens… without them. Make like a breeze, and blow. But only “to make it more appealing to young people.”

Suspecting that something more than mere foolishness lies behind this move, we have consulted a profoundly unreliable source who has intuited the concealed motive.

“Basically they’re afraid old age is contagious,” said a church official who didn’t want his name revealed, and who spoke to our source after he was paid $20. “Look! You bring a nice 25-year-old couple, with two little kids, into the church–right? And what happens? Being around all them older folks, they, too, get old! Wait just 35 years and those nice 25-year-olds are suddenly sixty! And their kids aren’t kids anymore–which makes it so awkward to keep them in Sunday school!”

Another church official, for $22.50, said the church would “do whatever it takes” to attract young people. “We don’t care what we have to offer them,” he said: “beauty contests, celebrity worship, TV cop shows on the big screen, swinging singles, door prizes, food fights–whatever puts their fannies in the pews!”

A new advertising campaign will be launched in a few days, touting “The church that keeps you young forever!” The cartoon character on the poster looks a lot like Peter Pan.

No one was able to confirm a rumor that the church will be renamed The Fountain of Perpetual Youth, although our source has advised us to bet on it.

(Editor’s note: This post blends news and satire. We expect the reader to be able to tell the difference–even if the actual participants in these events can’t.)

Ancient fresco showing Minoan “bull dancers”–or are these athletes not dancing, but trying to stay alive?

Well, here’s something you don’t see in church every Sunday: the pastor getting gored by an angry bull ( http://todaychristian.net/pastor-nearly-gored-to-death-in-church-sanctuary-by-raging-bull-but-the-end-will-surprise-you/ ).

It really happened, recently, at Solid Rock Church in Ohio. Right there in the church sanctuary, Pastor Lawrence Bishop was gored nearly to death by a bull. It was an unscripted part of a special church program called “Stop the Bull,” meant to address the issues of drug abuse and bullying, felt by the pastor to be particularly pressing in the Solid Rock neighborhood.

If the above link works, here is the actual video of this incident, provided by Solid Rock Church.

Gee, this is even edgier than Christian cage fighting!

Other churches around the country are already scrambling to outdo Solid Rock. “If their pastor can just about get himself killed, trying to ride a bull in church, well, we’ve got that beat!” says Pastor Rabadash Jones of Happening Now Church, Florida. “Alligator wrassling! We have set up a pool in the middle of our church and put some mighty big, mean gators in it. But I think my assistant pastor can tame ’em.”

Squawking Idiot Episcopal Church in Lenin Falls, NY, “steers clear of violence,” said Priestess Happy Octopus Starshine, “but we defy any of those cowboy churches in the Midwest to top our brothel! We’re already convinced we’re going to have to enlarge the church doors, once our knocking-shop opens. And by the way, we will cater to all seven genders. It don’t get more seeker-friendly than this!”

But according to Rev. Tom O’Bedlam, of St. Kerchak’s, in Bismuth, Minnesota, “It’s always best to stick to basics; so we’ll just go with plain old human sacrifice. Our marketing research consistently shows that to be a winner.”