Many
moons ago, when I was in college, I had a rather interesting
day. I was resting my brain from writing a long paper for my
English 112 class, and skimming a few newsgroups and I came
across a rather interesting post in alt.brother-jed. It mentioned
a website where anyone could become an ordained
minister. Not believing it I went to the website at
http://www.ulc.org/.
Much to my surprise it was true and quite serious.
"The
United Life Church Web Page: To Become Ordained Click
here."
Well,
I wasn't quiet that eager to become a minister. So I decided
to check out what this church believes in first. I
clicked on "About ULC". According the website here's
what the
ULC believes in:
"We
believe everyone is already a member of the church and is
just not aware of it as yet. The Universal Life Church will
ordain anyone that asks without question of faith, for life,
without a fee. Just select 'Become Ordained' to complete the
process right here on our World Wide Web site. The church has
two tenets: the absolute right of freedom of religion and to
do
that, which is right. Anything else within the law is allowed."
Hmmm . . .
"As
an ordained minister of the church, you too may ordain new
ministers. The Universal Life Church will not stand between you
and your God and recognizes that each person must choose his
own
path. Each person in the ULC is free to follow any path as long
as it does not infringe on the rights of others. "
Basically
what it boils down to is a non-denominational religion, and
one which you don't have to believe anything in
particular. Sounds like a plan to me. I followed the "Become
Ordained" link and filled out my name, email address and
my
mailing address and presto chango I'm an ordained minister.
Even got a nifty online certificate to print out.
As
a minister in the ULC I not only have the power to forgive
people's sins, but also with minimal paper work to fill out
can
legally marry people. How sweet is that? I decided I had no
time to lose and set about my ministerly duties.
I
believe a person's first action as a minister could set the
tone for his entire ministership. So I felt like I had to do
something meaningful and that would tell everyone exactly what
I
was all about, what my ministership would mean. After 2.5
seconds of thought I excommunicated Hanson and the Spice Girls.
I then declared Ricky Martin to be a tool of the devil. (This
was 1997 after all.)
I
already felt the world becoming a better place, but I decided
that I needed more people in my cult parish.
And what better way than Brain Washing? That's right regular
washing! I hurried down the hall to the dorm's bathroom and
blessed all the showerheads so that I could be baptized every
time I got zestfully clean. This also made every other guy on
my floor a member of my cult parish. Well, every guy except
for that smelly one at the end of
the hallway.
My
next mission was to practice marrying people. I thought this
would be rather difficult. But the solution to all life's
problems can be found in an internet chat room, so it was off
I
went. After about 2.5 seconds of searching I found my
friend, Pteri and explained the situation to her and asked her
if she wanted to marry anyone. While the idea seemed to appeal
to her, she had no one to marry but a lawn chair we had found
by the side of the road the night before. While this seemed like
a
good idea to me, Pteri wasn't as enthusiastic.
Before
long another friend, Crow logged on followed by a female friend
of his, Tori. I again explained the situation; they
agreed and performed what probably was the first marriage over
this particular
chat line. For all you romantics, the transcript reads as
follows . . .
Crut: Do you, Tori take this MoFo to be yer man?
Tori: Sure, Why not?
Crut:
And Crow, do you wanna bang her on a regular
basis?
Crow: Hell Yeah!
Crut:
I now pronounce ya'lls hitched, you may now perform oral sex
on the bride.
Tori: I think I'm going to like this.
Crow: My girlfriend's gonna kill me.
Tori: Wait you mean this is real? We're really married?
Crut: Well kinda
Tori: I don't want to be married to him. I've never even met him
in real life.
Crow: There goes the honeymoon.
Crut: I guess I could annull the marriage.
Tori: Yes
Crut: Bippity boppity boo, I now annull you.
So
my first marriage was short lived, but I've had some successful
ones. My stuffed frog, froggie, is still happily
married to my girlfriend's teddy bear P.E. They're expecting
a
Freddy in a few short months. Or would it be a Trog? Ah
whatever.
The
next day I go into the computer lab in my dorm and see my roommate
from the year before. He asks me what's new and I tell
him I'm now Minister Crut. "Oh the ULC?" "Yeah,
how'd you
know?"
"I've
been Minister JBear for like 2 years, I think Scott's a Cardinal." "How'd
he get to be a Cardinal?" "I
think you just sign up so many other people as ministers." And
you thought the cult thing was a joke.
As
the months passed, I had pretty much forgotten the whole thing
about until my radio show a few days before Halloween. I got
a call on the request line, which went something like this:
"WFAL. "
" What are you guys going to do about the bomb?!?"
"
What bomb? You mean Mambo Number 5?" (Again this
was 1997 and that sort of cheap put down was in fashion.)
" No!
The Bomb! There was a psychic on Oprah today, he predicted
that on Halloween weekend a school in the Midwest with 'H'
Shaped dorms was going to be bombed by a guy in a Little
Bo Peep
Costume! What are you going to do about it?"
Now
I knew this wasn't true, it was simply an urban legend, and
the 4th different version I'd heard that day, unless there were
also psychics on Montel, Rikki and Sally Jesse Raphael Donatello
Michellangelo Leonardo Ninja Turtle. Also this competely ignores
the fact that we're a college radio station and what the hell
could we do anyway?
"Um
. . . we're going to give away Free Judas Priest tickets,
so that you can be in Columbus on Halloween and won't die."
" Judas Priest? I'd rather be killed by little Bo
Peep."
*Click*
Then
while while using R.E.M.'s "It's
the End of the World as
We Know It" as a sound bed, My co-host and I then proceeded
to
discuss the likely hood of Little Bo Peep bombing us. Some of
our listeners were seriously moving out of the dorm back home
for the weekend, out of fear of Bo Peep. In retrospect this
was very inapropriate as "You Dropped The Bomb On Me" would
have
made
a much better
sound bed.
I
told my loyal listeners they had nothing to fear, except fear
it's self, and that clown at the car wash. And if they did
stay and
died,
everything would be all right in the after-life because all my
listeners were right now being blessed and forgiven by Minister
Crut, of their sins, unless Bo Peep was listening, he was the
exception. In case you're wondering, the dorm didn't blow up.
Also for the record, we couldn't give away Judas Priest tickets.
We
tried for 3 weeks, even claimed they were opening a Pearl Jam/Radiohead
Show. For you older folks that'd be like them opening up for
like Elvis and the Beatles, if they like only
did one concert a year a piece and weren't dead.
It
wasn't until a few weeks later at a party that a girl whose
drunk party trick was to rest her eyeballs on spoons complained
to me that I couldn't be a minister because I am half Jewish.
This
was a major downer cause I kinda liked being zestfully
baptized daily. So I again journeyed to the ULC WebPage.
I
shouldn't have been worried because to quote the ULC website:
" If
you wish to have a special title bestowed by the church and
it is not named in the list below, you may make a special
request for that title. If it is a religious title the church
will consider your request. The ULC does not bestow titles
that
are belief system specific like Pope or Jedi Knight etc.
Our
mission is based upon sincerity and faith and the meaning
of
titles is respect. The ULC and Monastery live and act upon
that
faith."
Goddamn
it, Pope Crut would have been kick ass.
So I browsed the list for the title I wanted.
-
A
bishop would be
cool . . . I'd know how to play chess then.
-
I
could be Channel Crut . . . all Crut all the time and now
for the
Crut
O'clock news . . maybe not.
-
Flying
Missionary? Is that like the flying nun?
-
I
can rule out Lay Sister, Goddess, and Christian Mother
Superior right off the bat.
-
Brother
Crut, that's not bad.
-
Martyr
Crut sounds cool but I'd have to die wouldn't I?
-
Angel
Crut sounds like a burnt dessert.
-
Father
Crut, no wait, I'm too young for that.
-
Canon
Crut . . . Cantor Crut ugh!
-
Colonel
Crut, not bad
. . . if I was on Hogan's Hero's.
-
Monk
Crut, Hrmmmmm Hey
Hey we're the Monks,
People
say we monkey
around
but we're
to
busy .
. . No.
Bad idea.
Well
then should I be an Abbe, Abbess, Abbot, Ananda, Apostle of
Humility, Apostolic Scribe, Arch Deacon, Arch Priest, Archbishop,
Ascetic Gnostic, Baron, Baroness, Bible Historian, Brahman,
Chaplain, Cure', Deacon, Dervish, Directress, Disciple, Druid,
Elder, Emissary, Evangelist, Faith Healer, Field Missionary,
Free Thinker, Friar, Guru, Hadji, Healing Minister, High Priest,
Imam, Lama, Magus, Messenger, Matriarch, Metropolitan, Minister
of Music, Minister of Peace, Missionary, Missionary Doctor,
Missionary Healer, Missionary of Music, Missionary Priest,
Monk, Monsignor, Most Reverend, Mystical Philosopher, Orthodox
Monk, Parochial Educator, Pastor General, Pastoral Counselor,
Patriarch, Peace Counselor, Preacher,
Preceptor, Priest, Priestess, Prophet, Psychic Healer, Rector,
Religious Preacher, Revelator, Reverend, Reverend Mother, Right
Reverend, Saintly Healer, Scribe, Seer, Shaman, Sister, Soul
Therapist, Spiritual Counselor, Spiritual Healer, Spiritual
Warrior, Starets, Swami, Teller, Thanatologist, The Very Esteemed,
Universal Philosopher of Absolute Reality, Universal Religious
Philosopher, Vicar or Wizard?
After
much consideration I had eliminated all but one choice. Thus
Rabbi Crut was born, and it was good, and the peasants rejoiced.
If
anyone wants to get married let me know. I'll be happy to do
it. And if anyone else wants to be a Rabbi, Minister or a Swami,
go ahead and sign up. Just remember to tell them that Rabbi
Crut sent you, if enough of you sign up, maybe I could be
a Cardinal, like that Mark McGuire guy.
