The Great God Sarcasmo

It's all my family's fault.

Sister of PeaceBang was here this weekend and we were in the kitchen bustling about getting dinner (leftover Chinese)and talking about the failed suicide bomber woman, and how she will have to go to trial and maybe get the death penalty. S.O.P.B. remarked that the bomber husband was apparently in paradise with a bunch of delectable virgins and then asked, "So what do the Muslim suicide bomber women get in the afterlife if they kill infidels?"

And I said, "I dunno. A date with Menudo."

And we both cackled loudly and wickedly, and people, it's my family's fault if I cannot be a sweet Christian woman. I'm just telling you the cold truth. Sarcasm was mother's milk to us, and it's a hard one to wean off of.

Many years ago when Mother of PeaceBang was fresh and beautiful out of rehab, and we were all very 12-steppy, Mother sat all her chicks around the table at Christmastide and said, most sincerely, that the root word of "sarcasm" means "to rip apart with the teeth," and that she was there to tell us that sarcasm was ugly and she didn't like that it was such a favorite family sport and we were going to try very hard as a family to stop being so sarcastic. Alright?

We all sat around blinking at her like little owls with moist, repentant eyes and in that moment, we knew she was wise and right and that we should -- we really should -- work on this issue.

We were pretty good for awhile, but it didn't last for more than a decade. Soon, we slid back into our old ways. Even Mother of PeaceBang freely let's 'em rip, and she can rip with the best. As I say, I'm not doing any better. You're talking about a minister who has a dog-eared, paperback copy of Woody Allen's Without Feathers on the shelf next to the volumes of Henri Nouwen.

Nouwen writes, in The Inner Voice of Love,

"You have to move gradually from crying outward -- crying out for people who you think can fulfill your needs -- to crying inward to the place where you can let yourself be held and carried by God, who has become incarnate in the humanity of those who love you in community."

Allen writes, in "No Kaddish for Weinstein,"

"Weinstein finished shaving and got into the shower. He lathered himself, while steaming water splashed down his bulky back. He thought, Here I am at some fixed point in time and space, taking a shower. I, Isaac Weinstein. One of God's creatures. And then, stepping on the soap, he slid across the floor and rammed his head into the towel rack."

Which one do you think ministers more to me?

And did you ever notice that Jesus is actually very sarcastic?

Also, am I the only one who laughs so hard that she snorts at the story of Eutychus in the book of Acts? People, he fell out the window from boredom!! I mean, how funny is that?

http://bible.cc/acts/20-9.htm
(I think the BBE version is best)

I always imagine Eutychus waking from his death slumber, taking one look at Paul and asking, "Are you done preaching yet? Because if not, honestly, I'm okay with being dead."

I have a Eutychus rule in preaching. If I can imagine anyone getting so bored they'd fall asleep and fall out the window, I need to zip it up and make edits.

Anyway, sarcasm.
Maybe it's genetic.