A Damsel in Distress

[I planned to be in Little Rock for Easter, but God had other plans. A sudden invitation to Myrtle Beach. One invitation led to another, but I’m finally back in The Rock.]

Easter’s passed over. I spent mine, unexpectedly, in Myrtle Beach. Pretty much what you’d expect from a beach named Myrtle. Down Home, a little loose and sleazy, with a seductive southern twang.

Our Sunrise Service began on the beach-house veranda overlooking the Atlantic surf. Sipping Mimosas.

Speaking of “overlooking,” behind us in the living room Il Papa’s Vatican global address replayed on the plasma.

HE conveniently “overlooked” his recent assertion that condoms actually HELP to spread AIDS in Africa / the underdeveloped world (rather than preventing HIV transmission, as shown by decades of science and research) by claiming that Africa and the underdeveloped world in particular need nothing so much as “Hope” this Easter Morn.

Whoa. Let’s parse the Pope, “Hey, third-world ignorant Darkies! No condoms! If you fuck, you’re fucked! Dominos vobiscum.”

Really, who WOULDN’T want to belong to the Catholic Church after THAT heart-rending humanitarian commitment from a former Nazi Youth member who’s upholstered like a brocaded five-piece living-room-group at Hank’s Fine Furniture?

Wearing matching Prada lifts.

(Oh, STOP, Razorbabies. GOOGLE this shiz!)

The Pope SAYS “Hope” is what he most wants for the world this Easter 2009 and “Hope” is fabulous and all but actions speak louder than words. So . . .

What’s the Pope actually DO? Withhold condom-distribution to AIDS-ravaged Africa, ensuring the deaths of 20-60 million, according to the President of the Royal Society of Britain (world’s oldest continuing scientific body).

Preach Hope . . . Perform Genocide. Thank Your Holiness, You Representative of God on Earth, You.

When words and actions contradict, Vatican, it’s your first clue something’s pathologically skewed.

When words and actions contradict, Razorbabies, the words are always lies and the actions always the truth.

I mean, we’re sipping Mimosas on the Myrtle Beach veranda listening to the Pontiff spout “Hope” whilst promoting genocide among ill-educated African countries.

How “loving.”

“My GOD!” somebody inside the house shrieks at the Pontiff on the plasma. ”Bob Mackie looks like a RACOON with rabies!”

“Oh, stop, honey. It’s the Pope.”

Gotta love the Myrtle Beach gays this Easter morn.

But look. It’s Easter sunrise and I’m gonna commune with The Infinite if it’s the last thing I do.

I find the pitcher in the kitchen, pour remaining Mimosas into thermos, trek to beach with thermos and aluminum lawn chair – sprawl happily to contemplate ancient reason for season – Sunrise at Vernal Equinox – enjoying nectar of Gods.

Strange, wonderful, to reconnect with hearts and minds 5,600 years old and older. To re-experience the origin of ALL 30,000+ human religions at once, in the present . . . relishing a slow Easter sunrise across the Atlantic from a lawn chair on Myrtle Beach with a thermos of Mimosas.

Of course, the Pope on the plasma and I on the beach are late for the Vernal Equinox if not for Easter.

The Vernal Equinox this holy day originally celebrated before Christianity absorbed pre-existing “pagan” holidays already occurred back in March.

But look: it’s the Pope: cut him some slack.

The mythical German Goddess Estre or Estra for whom this Spring celebration is named in our part of the world (though it dates back to pre-Dynastic Egypt), is as forgotten as Joey Heatherton.

The Vernal Equinox myths 5,600 years ago already contained the collective symbols of the Cross (the four annual Solstices / Equinoxes), Rabbit (Fecundity) and the Egg (Fertility) . . . (“estre” is the root of the scientific term, “estrogen.”

Yes, once, science and religion were one.

HERE, for instance, is just one link debunking the notion that ancient Egyptians were “primitive.” They were anything but. The layout and construction of the Sphinx and Pyramids at Gizeh have been shown, with today’s astronomical computer models, to be astonishingly precise. Take your time, but READ this stuff. It's where we all came from, religiously.

I'm in a Time Tunnel here on Myrtle Beach this Easter Morn, embracing 5,600+ years old minds and hearts! With mimosas!

God, I wish I had a little we- . . . wait a second – that kid last night, bless his heart, determined to nail a cougar – what was his name? – Artie! – looked like Seth Rogen before his recent weight loss – I STILL have a roach from him in this beach bag!

There IS a God.

Egyptians’ “solar religion” with its various symbolic “deities” was based entirely on minute astronomical observations and calculations.

It is the oldest “religion” of which humanity can be sure. It was based entirely on observed physical science and mathematics. Astronomy, to be accurate, and that science’s relation to earth’s seasons of planting, growth, harvest and mulch.

The oldest religion on earth – pre-dynastic Egyptian – though popularized and personified with the names and myths of the planets and constellations . . . and finally anthropomorphized into “real” human gods on earth (Virgo, the Virgin Mary, from the ancient Egyptian virgin Mari who bore Iassu, Jesus, “The Light of the World,” in a cave / manger on December 25^th at the Winter Solstice, for instance, 3600 years before the Jesus story) – that original “science worship” or “astronomical worship” by humanity is probably most closely tied to today’s Deists, who see observational evidence of “God” throughout Nature and Science.

You remember the Deists? The founders of our Country. Like Thomas Paine.

Paine’s thoughts in a nutshell, for those too hurried to read the link in Part II to “The Age of Reason”) . . . THEY’RE HERE.

Sunrise, moon, tides, planting, harvesting . . . Easter . . . Equinoxes, Solstices . . . the origins of the “Cross” . . . it used to take YEARS to find these ancient origins of religions that are now just a click away, if you’re curious.

One of the most beautiful and detailed, if lengthy, treatments of the ancient astronomical religion of Egypt is THIS 23-Chapter site that bridges computer astronomy, ancient cartography, the Pyramids and the Sphinx.

What’s a Myth? What’s a Lie? What does it matter?

Why is same-sex marriage such a BIG DEAL?

That’s next.