Goodbye to Gelius, kudos to Kvarme

No, I'm not really that interested in this very public termination process, but that headline was just too good not to use. ;-)

So, Einar Gelius supposedly resigned today. Yeah, well, sometimes that's how it goes down - you get the choice between quitting on your own or being fired. I would soo not be surprised if that's what's happened here. In any case, they were both on the Daily Review tonight and I have to say, kudos to bishop Kvarme. I am not a fan of his - far from it - but that is mostly because of the ideology he represents, not because of him as a person. I know very little of him as a person. I oppose what he stands for, but that's all. However, I did think he came off much better than Gelius on the news tonight. Gelius seemed to be falling apart a bit ... and his arguments were just BS IMO. All he wanted was to make the Church a more open and accepting place, blah blah. Sheesh.

First of all, as I've said, there's nothing to be argued here, it's an open and shut case. When you're hired, you sign a contract; live up to the contract or you're out. Unlike what he seems to think, it's the employer who determines whether the employee fulfils the demands of the job. That's part of what you agree to when you accept a job ... even if you are a wizard.

But more than that, and this is something that a lot of people ought to think about ... Gelius, his various supporters, Kvarme's detractors. Everyone who's got the idea that the Church needs more people like the former and that the latter is a relic from the dark ages who needs to realize that we're living in 2010, man. Here's the thing. You may not like what Kvarme stands for - I know I sure don't - and you may feel that Gelius' warm and fuzzy Buddy Christ take on things is more appealing to you. But please realize that there are limits - and rather specific and narrow limits too - to what you can actually do with Christianity to make it appealing in a modern secularized society where people can read and have electricity and healthcare.

You can't use Christianity to make people feel good about themselves, because it's been specifically developed over the course of two thousand years to make people feel bad. That's the whole point of it. You can't make it make sense, because it doesn't. You can't make it sound good, because it's oppressive and cruel and hateful. Genocide and human sacrifice just aren't good and nice things, there's just no changing that. It is what it is, as Ivana Trump might say. If you change these things, it'll no longer be Christianity. IMO of course that'd be a good thing, but who's asking me. Sheesh.

I'm sure poor Gelius will be missed by a great many idiots, but for my money it's good riddance to bad rubbish. Here's hoping he won't be clogging up the media even more now that he's freed from the burden of making a weekly sermon or performing baptisms and marriages ... unless of course there's an important game happening, in which case you should have picked some other day to get married.

In other news, have you ever heard someone say that a person ought to be protected from themselves? In Norwegian that's kind of a set expression. You ever hear that? Ever wonder what it means? This.