Even those who daily “fight the good fight” need a good laugh. So here’s one for today.
According to yesterday’s Daily Telegraph, a very angry group of people resent Pope Benedict XVI’s invitation to Australia for the World Youth Day celebrations. The Gay Raelian society “staged a demonstration outside Parliament House to protest the Pope's arrival for World Youth Day next week.” (http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,22049,23994345-5006009,00.html)
What are Raelians? Well, Raelians believe that the world was created by an alien civilization 25,000 years ago. “Raelian spokeswoman Eden Bates said it was an insult that the Pope would be welcomed into Australia when ‘our gorgeous, fantastic spiritual leader Rael wasn't even given the respect of a visa’.”
Indeed. That is quite a slap in the face to our extra-terrestrial creators.
Perhaps NASCAR officials could help with the visa issue since Rael is “a Frenchman and former motor sport journalist and race-car driver whose parents, the Vorilhons, called him Claude.”
The group’s website (http://www.raeliangay.org/en/index.html) offers the following welcome to visitors:
ARAMIS is the Raelian Association of the Sexual Minorities that gathers men and women who are homosexual, bisexual, transsexuals or transgender on all five continents and was founded by RAEL, the spiritual leader of an atheist religious movement: The International Raelian Movement.
The members of ARAMIS are thus members of the philosophy of the one who was the first spiritual leader to have said that the sexual orientation is genetic and not a choice of life. . . . ARAMIS also denounces the major traditional religions that spread false beliefs that create prejudices, taboos and violence toward the GBLTT, particularly the homosexuals. In the same token, ARAMIS invites them to apostatize from their religion if the latter has homophobic writings, discourse or attitude.
You would think an alien civilization that went through the trouble of creating a world would insist that its followers focus on more important issues plaguing its creation, such as war, famine, and disease. But apparently not.
Incidentally, what is an atheist religious movement? Is that like an all-you-can-eat buffet at a weight-loss camp?
You can’t make this stuff up.
Donald Tremblay
