Thu 1 Mar 2007
(The characters, places, blogs, churches etc in this story are entirely fictional, any resemblance to real people, blogs, churches or characters is entirely coincidental. HONEST.)
It was the best of times; it was the worst of times (well, it really was). Not since the French Revolution had anything so radical as the Internet brought all that was good and bad into the lives of the people.
Roger Vinny, not his real name anymore, had spent the last two years collecting facts. He had fallen into it quite innocently but now the facts just rolled in. His blog, Armageddon had become the place to share these facts. If you had a gripe, Roger Vinny, not his real name anymore, would give you a forum. Over the last year, many bloggers had removed Roger’s blog from their blogrolls but his hit count and anonymous comments were larger than ever.
The picture posted on Roger’s blog showed a handsome man in a button down with silver sideburns amidst auburn hair. Auburn hair is generally only found on heroines in romance novels or at football games, but there it was on Roger’s blog. The picture loudly proclaimed that here is a dignified man of wisdom. Roger had paid a lot of money for that picture. He got it from a photography service. The real owner of that physique had never read Roger’s blog. Roger was quite a bit plumper than the picture. He had packed on 40lbs since his blog took off. He had a flat nose and the pasty skin of the northman but he was not an ugly man. Roger’s family did not know that his blog had taken on new proportions; they thought, perhaps, he had a problem with pornography as he spent more and more time locked away with his laptop.
It all began when Roger’s own pastor had been caught in adultery and the elders had decided to put a lid on it, sweep it under the carpet, hush it up. Roger’s pastor had agreed to go into therapy, although some people thought nouthetic counseling was preferred. Pastor Bob stood humbly at the press conference announcing a sabbatical flanked by his supportive, meek and surprisingly attractive wife Debbie. Returning to the pulpit 6 weeks later Pastor Bob began his first sermon with a hearty, “the man is back and boomin’.” This naturally had not set well with Roger who was a scrupulous man. He tried to speak to the elders but they were adamant that Roger needed to forgive and forget. After all, Debbie had. After all of his efforts to rouse support failed he decided to go public. But how? It was at this precise moment that he learned about blogging.
He got 13 hits his first day but as word got around his mega-church, his hit count increased. Many, many people were upset about the cover-up, good people. His blog drew them like white on rice. The head elder showed up to put out the fire and debate with the parishioners but the conflagration was unstoppable. Finally the elders openly rebuked Roger calling him to repent. Faithful Pastor Bob began preaching about scurrilous bloggers and the damage they caused to the body of Christ. From all over the Internet men and women flocked to read Roger’s blog and support him. When he was finally excommunicated the uproar was intense. Roger was the first man ever excommunicated by a mega-church.
Others who had been sorely mistreated by hegemonic presbyteries began telling their stories. Where there are no shepherds, comments abound.
In the last 2 years of scurrilous blogging, Roger had uncovered 3 cases of ministries misusing funds, one missionary making over $300,000 a year in donations while living on a sugar plantation in Barbados using white slave labor, 5 cases of pastors consorting with prostitutes, not all female, 1 case of bank robbery, 2 cases of child abuse at Christian schools, 1 case of schizophrenia, 1 poorly run Christian publisher, 2 pompous curriculum sellers, 201 cases of Narcissistic Personality Disorder and 562 cases of hurt feelings.
He was hated by many; read by all. There was an irresistible draw to read his rants. He had not been invited to the God Is Not Mad At You Conference for bloggers but he had every intention of attending. Someone had recently given him the sweepings from underneath a well-loved carpet. He planned to do his own vacuuming at the conference. He would be attending incognito using his real name.
Pulling out his laptop with advanced spell-check Roger began tonight’s blog post. He wanted the whole cinnamon mocha latte crowd at the conference. He was going to knock their fuzzy slippers off.
. 