Moderate-time readers will recall a certain visit that was paid to my abode this winter by a random church member who wanted to ask me all kinds of questions about my belief in God and the upcoming doomsday. I knew there was a chance I’d get another knock on my door, but I didn’t think about my mailbox and honestly, the incident I’m about to reference may have nothing whatsoever to do with my previous conversation. There are more than enough folks around here concerned for my soul to go around. Not that my soul in particular is of any interest; I’m quite sure that there are people in Walla Walla who are gravely worried about humanity in general. This is not to say that I couldn’t interest them in my specific soul, but I won’t go there. I wouldn’t want to frighten anyone with my misdeeds.
The mail comes early to our house, usually before 11:30 has rolled around. It’s just a short clanging of the box that is bolted to the front of our home, and as it sits next to our front picture window, I can sometimes catch a glimpse of the carrier, who is a young woman prone to listening to some music or other on her iPod. I had no idea before moving to Walla Walla that letter carriers were allowed to listen to music as they delivered letters, avoided nippy dogs, or whatever. And now I’m curious as to what the carriers listen to, and what a music mix from US Postal Service employees would include.
I digress. Mostly out of a need to avoid stabbing out my eyes, Oedipus-style, when I recall the postcard that found its way to my mailbox yesterday. Here it is:
Where do I even begin?
First, I don’t recall anything in Revelations about unsafe streets, unless they’re referring to rivers of blood or something. There’s a passage in Ephesians about not drinking so much that one runs around the streets being debaucherous, but I suspect that’s not what the reference is here.
Lest I get ahead of myself, let’s examine the picture. The leader of Iran, or well, the person Americans think is the leader of Iran, Ahmadinijad, the Pope, President Obama, and Moammar Gadhafi. Are two of them agents of peace and two of Satan? Nope. Survey says, they’re all evil! Good thing we have Windswept Jesus and his ball of white power (I’m really not kidding anymore) to bring goodness and light to the corrupt figures of our world!
Who is it leading this exploration of fate, humanity and the divine, anyway? Reverend Graham? A world-famous theologian? Nope. It’s some guy named Mark Moore. Who is Mark Moore, I wondered. According to the back of the postcard, Mark Moore is a Biblical scholar who is also a sports coach, though which sport, I’m not certain. Those tennis pros are known for their crappy Bible decoding, after all. I want me a football coach to get the most comprehensive interpretations out there.
I went to my handy dandy window to the Internet, a.k.a. my iPad, and looked up Mark Moore. Here I found a Ph.D. at the College of the Ozarks who has written a ton of papers on different kinds of criticism and the limitations of all of them—read, they’re not Christ-focused. Nothing like saying literary criticism, anthropologic critique, and deconstruction are all the same in their Christlessness. No need to really understand how any of them function. Thanks, Dr. Moore.
I have no idea if these are the same person, but I admit I’m curious. I won’t be going to the lecture on Friday because *cough cough* I’ve got a friend’s gay wedding to attend in another city. What’s that about saving my soul?
Trans/plant/portation 
I almost went to school at college of the ozarks. Well, I took a tour in my junior year. Where I found out I’d have to go to church 9 times a semester (read: basically the whole time) as part of my on-campus activities. It’s an interesting school aside from that: all the students there attend for “free” in exchange for working on campus. There are fields with cows and crops, a mill where they grind flour, etc.’
Of course, If you aren’t SupahChristian, it is definitely not the place for you. An old internet friend of mine went to UofO and almost jumped off the roof of his dorm because it made him so miserable.
I got one of these mailed to me at my parents house a long time ago.
Awesome prayer rug, Tony!
I’ve visited the College of the Ozarks. It’s really pretty and I like that students attend for free and that every student works their way through school, and I’m not even against a religious affiliation per se…it’s the hard-line “interpret things this way or else” that really bother me. Anyone who says they absolutely know what some deity means is someone who has no clue, as far as I’m concerned.
That said, I bet that prayer rug would go very nicely with some Catholic candles lit around it.