Wednesday 2 January 2013

IRONY

When I downloaded, this lovely picture it was captioned "Angry Jesus." Well, "grumpy" might be nearer the mark. "Miffed," possibly?
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http://catholicismpure.wordpress.com/2013/01/01/more-parables-for-our-time/

CP&S have reprinted this piece from "America: The National Catholic Review," a web magazine from, as one might reasonably expect, the U.S.

It is worth a read. And I have re-reprinted it, the link at least.
Spreading The Good Word!
The author - a Jesuit, may well I suspect, rue the day he wrote it.

It is, as you see, heavily ironic.
And several centuries in journalism have persuaded me that irony will  inevitably be taken literally by the vast majority of readers.
And the Jesuit will get a lot of frothing letters expressing horror at the willful misreading of Christ's message.
Personally I'm in favour of irony. Let the chips from the whiners' shoulders fall where they may.
But then, I'm not a Jesuit.

The illustration above also amused me; Jesus as what I've described before as "The Surbiton Hippy," though, as this is from America, let's call him "The San Francisco Hippy."
One thing he is clearly not is a Jew from Palestine. Not a swarthy product of the troubled and detestable  Middle East.

Wearing, it appears, a dressing gown over his spotless T-shirt, and with shoulder-length hair. And a goddam beard, already! Like Karl Marx! Probably a Commie!

It's the hair that gets me, though.
I enjoy imagining this "dude" showing up on the doorstep of some devout Irish-American Catholic, in Boston asking for a "...bit of bread, please, man.." only to be crisply advised to, "... go forth and multiply! " ..or words roughly to that effect,  "...And get a proper job, while you're about it. Long-haired bum."

But of course this scenario is not possible, as, thankfully, he'd never have got through immigration control anyway. Not looking like that.
So, that's all right.

Of course, there's always the chance that the Jesuit's offering will be treated, not with either approval or horror, but with utter indifference.
Could happen.
These matters interest me, but not, it seems, too many others these days. Which may be all to the good.

1 comment:

Laura said...

Thanks for the link to that wonderful piece...I may need to post it to my Facebook. I am considering calling him "Tea Party Jesus" though.