that Lourdes will be saved as the Catholic Church's premier attraction in France.
Miracle Lite cannot be the solution, whereas a massive theme park can. With each ride designed to bring the average visitor closer to God could anywhere be more religious than the apex of a 500 metre high roller coaster just before the dip? Or anything so moving as the scream of pilgrims plunging headlong toward a pool of water that's been blessed?
When I was a child people would return from Lourdes with plastic Virgin Mary shaped bottles whose blue crown was the screw lid. Once I was given a tiny shrine with two lead doors that opened to expose a glow in the dark Sacred Heart. It disappeared around the same time the dog's teeth fell out.
10 comments:
Bad doggie, bad, bad doggie.
I'd pay good money for a plastic Virgin Mary with a screw-top crown.
Theme park? Roller coaster to bring people closer to god? Guess next you'll be wanting to blast them skyhigh in explosive chairs. Come to think about it, you may be on to something there...
G,
That dog was never the same after its teeth went. It was one of our domestic duties as children to chew the dog's food before we left for school in the morning. Man, our dad loved that dog more than he loved us.
Annie,
I used to get a new screw top Madonna every spring after my nana returned from the holy shrine. Even as a small child I thought the lid a marvelous fusion of design and functionality. Though at the same time I always got a kick when unscrewing the top of her head.
D,
Given my views on Catholicism I think I've been quite restrained here. I was going to mention a ride through the Tunnel of a Thousand Cuts (a ride for the really penitent or members of Opus Dei) but didn't for fear of offending sensibilities.
Clearly Lourdes itself is in need of a miracle.
Lourdes! Heal thyself!
We can use it as a test of their efficacy.
Hayden,
You are a genius! Lourdes heal thyself. Of course. Ha, get out of that one Bishop Jacques Perrier, Chief Rep of God in Lourdes and Tarbes. Perhaps the eminent Bishop should visit the shrine a little more often. Might wake God up a bit. Distract him from those gaming tables I understand he's recently had installed. Maybe the good Bishop should open a casino, call it 'Shrines'. And another money spinner floats free of the Flynn brain. Hmmm, I should stop trying to help, especially as I hate the Catholic Church.
ooooh, a casino named Shrines would be a verrry big hit in Vegas. They could put it between the pyramids and the Eiffel Tower so there'd be plenty of foot traffic.
wait wait wait. now I'm thinking. what is wrong here? Las Vegas prides itself on having versions of all of the great sights there. but where is Vatican City? No Shrines Casino, no Vatican City, No Lourdes.
crimeny, the place is surely going to hell. (last loser out, don't forget to pull the lever...)
Hayden,
There was a financial scandal in the Vatical 20 odd years ago around the Banco Ambrosio (or some such name) that was laundering money for the Mafia. The bank was owned by the Vatican, and an Archbishop Marcinkus was involved. He died, of old age, but never again left the vatican because he risked arrest in Italy and elsehwere. I'm afraid they've beaten us satirists to it!
"It disappeared around the same time the dog's teeth fell out."
Is it wierd that I loved this turn of phrase?
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