"They" Just Aren't That Clever
Just last week, some Professor of Blather at the University of Wherever confirmed the old joke that, when Jesus walked on the water, He knew where the rocks were. What the prof said was, "There are ice floes in that lake and, as the apostles were rowing across, Jesus was actually walking from floe to floe."
...uh huh.
The National Geographic Channel's recent two-hour informercial for their books and magazine about the Gospel of Judas did quite a spin on this gentleman. A lot of conclusions based on very little, and rather shaky, evidence.
Not much different than ourselves in our daily lives. Too many conclusions based on very little, and rather shaky, evidence.
I've had enough jobs to hear the grunts talk about the machinations of "them" (the suits) and been in a position to see the suits in action. If there really are plots, they are well-hidden. Mostly, it's people doing their jobs and others spending a lot of time trying to figure out what is really happening.
The result? Anger, at nothing. Useless animosity that ends up causing strife and building walls of distrust. Sometimes destroying friendships.
Most of us aren't smart enough to construct really good plots. What we are doing is more obvious than we think. Someone is bound to get the word back to the people we are planning to screw. (The Judas Gospel thing says that Jesus' dismissal of him at the Last Supper was a pre-planned signal; most likely, someone tipped Jesus off and He let Judas know it.)
Maybe we shouldn't assume someone's plotting. Leave that to the sitcoms and watch how stupid the people act when they get convinced of it. Just go and ask. Life's simpler than we think.
And check snopes.com whenever you get a "send this to all your friends" e-mail about some nefarious plot.
...uh huh.
The National Geographic Channel's recent two-hour informercial for their books and magazine about the Gospel of Judas did quite a spin on this gentleman. A lot of conclusions based on very little, and rather shaky, evidence.
Not much different than ourselves in our daily lives. Too many conclusions based on very little, and rather shaky, evidence.
I've had enough jobs to hear the grunts talk about the machinations of "them" (the suits) and been in a position to see the suits in action. If there really are plots, they are well-hidden. Mostly, it's people doing their jobs and others spending a lot of time trying to figure out what is really happening.
The result? Anger, at nothing. Useless animosity that ends up causing strife and building walls of distrust. Sometimes destroying friendships.
Most of us aren't smart enough to construct really good plots. What we are doing is more obvious than we think. Someone is bound to get the word back to the people we are planning to screw. (The Judas Gospel thing says that Jesus' dismissal of him at the Last Supper was a pre-planned signal; most likely, someone tipped Jesus off and He let Judas know it.)
Maybe we shouldn't assume someone's plotting. Leave that to the sitcoms and watch how stupid the people act when they get convinced of it. Just go and ask. Life's simpler than we think.
And check snopes.com whenever you get a "send this to all your friends" e-mail about some nefarious plot.
posted by Tom Carten at 11:38 AM
2 Comments:
Just a minor aside here. Have you ever heard of the "Judas shuffle"??? I heard about it for the first time during our Parish Mission featuring Father Larry Richards. It's the perfect description for the people who slink out of Mass right after Holy Communion. It's called the Judas shuffle because supposedly Judas was the first one to leave the Last Supper table.
That's a new one on me. The only phrase I've heard is, "The first person to leave Mass early was Judas."
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