by God
18 This may be because with a half-millennium of hindsight, it is now clear that while some of the theses are fantastic, about half of them are filler.
19 (In fairness, 95 is a lot of individual chunks of theses for anyone to squeeze out.)
20 But the ones that are good, are very good; so as a public service I am herewith including what a record company would call The Very Best of The 95 Theses; that is, if record companies put out albums anymore.
21 Hard-core fans, feel free to cut the following pages out and post them on a church door; but only after purchase.
CHAPTER 9
(THE VERY BEST OF THE 95 THESES)
1 Hi! I’m legendary theologian Martin Luther, and if you’re reading this, my first thesis is that you’re standing outside All Saints’ Church here in beautiful downtown Wittenberg.
2 Friends, I’m not the kind of writer who needs to nail his work to the front doors of public buildings to get attention.
3 As I’m sure you remember, my last book, Explanation of the Seven Penitential Psalms, was a publishing phenomenon, selling over 13 copies.
4 But my message is urgent, because I’m angry: angry at a Vatican that has become a case study in what happens when hoarding goes untreated for twelve hundred years.
5 You know, there’s only so much gold you can forge into a crown of thorns and put atop a Carreran marble likeness of Jesus on the cross inlaid with ruby stigmata, before the irony becomes uncomfortable.
6 And as for the Pope’s claim that he has the authority to pardon sinners, well, he doesn’t; in fact, if you bump into him in the basilica and you say “Pardon me,” technically he’s not even allowed to do that.
7 And while I’m on the subject of the Pope . . .
[There followeth 10 theses dedicated to the corruption of the Pope; and the cruelty of his temperament; and the foulness of his breath; and the mating habits of his mother.]
18 And so I have written this document in protest: For I am a protestor, and I am starting a new branch of Christianity that reflects that spirit of protest: Protestantationalism®.
19 Protestantationalism® is a revolutionary new system of worship that will forever change the way you think about slavish adherence to dogma.
20 It does away with elaborate religious bureaucracy to let ordinary folks like you get to experience for yourselves the boundless terror of the LORD’S wrath.
21 It eliminates the middlepope between worshipper and God, and in so doing frees the LORD to literally pass his savings onto you.
22 Now let me be clear: our new religion is not Islam—just like you, we believe Muslims are godless animals fit for the lance and the pyre.
23 And our new religion is not Judaism—just like you, we believe Jews should be persecuted, ghettoized, and even occasionally out-and-out slaughtered.
24 Why, I myself am so anti-Semitic that in 1543 I will publish a tract called The Jews and Their Lies advocating that all Torahs and synagogues be burned to the ground, and that Jews have pig dung thrown on them in the streets!
25 And while I’m on the subject of the Jews . . .
[There followeth 10 theses dedicated to the corruption of the Jews; and the vileness of their temperament; and their control of the Gregorian-chant industry; and the staleness of their bagels; though in the Jews’ defense, it was well-nigh impossible to get a good bagel in Wittenberg in those days.]
35 What this new religion is, is all the features of Christianity you’ve come to know and love: God, Jesus, crucifixes, sing-alongs, and of course, plenty of days off.
36 But here’s the difference: In Protestantationalism®, you’re the boss.
37 You make your own hours; hold your own services; write your own sermons; and, if you get in on the ground floor, even create your own sect!
38 By now you’re probably thinking, “OK, Marty, this all sounds well and good, but it’s going to cost me an arm and a leg, right?”
39 No: you can join our new faith at the unbelievably low price . . . of simply accepting the divinity of Jesus.
40 Let me repeat that thesis: You can join our new faith at the unbelievably low price of simply accepting the divinity of Jesus!
41 That’s a belief you probably already have lying around in your head anyway!
[There followeth 12 promotional theses for local businesses.]
54 At some point in its history, the Catholic Church got the ridiculous, morally outrageous idea that good works could somehow help you get into heaven.
55 This has led generations of Christians to engage in all manner of wasteful activities, like behaving nicely and helping people.
56 But the truth is, all men are born stained by a common original sin, even if most of our subsequent sins are plagiarized.
57 This means we are all equally deserving of eternal damnation, condemned regardless of our deeds: Rape a nun, don’t rape a nun, it’s all the same to God.
58 No, we cannot attain salvation through our actions, but only through God’s grace, as manifested in the birth, life, suffering, death, resurrection, and 1,500-year working vacation of Jesus Christ.
59 The only catch is you must take Jesus as your personal LORD and Savior; to the point where you can imagine Him on the cross in agony, thinking, “It is my pleasure to suffer an excruciating death on behalf of [Insert Your Name Here] from [Insert Your Hometown Here], to redeem his sins of [Insert Every Sin You’ve Ever Committed Here].”
60 But once you accept that, then as long as you keep committing sins, he’ll keep having died for them.
61 That’s right: once you accept you’re a total moral failure, you’re free to go out and be that failure!
62It’s just . . . that . . . easy!
[The next five theses introduce a subplot about a lovable but mischievous puppy who diggeth up the neighbor’s prize gardenias; it nearly jumpeth the shark.]
68 Unlike those other guys, we don’t come with a built-in hierarchy; so since no one starts out “holier than thou,” everyone has the chance to become that way.
69 That’s why when it comes to confessing, we don’t turn to the so-called “experts” with their magical booths; instead, we rely on our own congregation’s built-in sense of scorn.
70 And we express that scorn using the most advanced system of social ostracism ever devised: A finely calibrated spectrum of disdain containing no less than 143 distinct shame-shades, from furtive looks and hushed whispers all the way to burning at the stake!
[There followeth four well-placed insert ads for local stake manufacturers.]
79 Still not convinced? Listen to these testimonials I’ve miraculously culled from decades and centuries into the future!
80“I used to be an ordinary Catholic in Zurich. Then I joined your movement. Now I play a crucial role in shaping Swiss theology—the most boring aspect of the boringest nation on earth. Thanks, Protestantationalism®!” —Ullrich Zwingli, Zurich, Switzerland
81“I was so insufferably pompous I needed an entire ocean’s worth of space between myself and the continent I was holier than. Thanks to Protestantationalism®, I got it, and today I’m running my own witch trials!”—Cotton Mather, Plymouth, Massachusetts
82 “Zagnutab utta butta zhoot, yorma mitder pfffffffellen zordyx! Klee! Klee klee klee! Kleeeeeee! There! Be gone, lymphoma!”—Tom Brown, Tom Brown Ministries
[There followeth a long public-service thesis on behalf of the Hanseatic League: “The Hanseatic League: We’ve Got a ‘Guild-y’ Conscience!”]
84 My friends, I know that some of you still have doubts about all this; that you may find it hard to even envision a world where Christianity has undergone such a radical transformation.
85 But I, Martin Luther, have a dream.
86 I have a dream that one day there will be a sect of Christianity specifically associated with oats.
87 I have a dream that one day priests will no longer be forced to live in a state of unnatural celibacy, but will be free to marry and have celibacy slowly
descend upon them in the natural way.
88 I have a dream that one day, the love of Jesus will be expressible through honking.
89 I have a dream that one day, people will walk around with WWJD? bracelets, to remind themselves of what Jesus would do, and what Jesus would not do; such as wear a bracelet.
90 And I have a dream that one day people will be judged not by the content of their character, but by their outward adherence to a core set of talking points.
91Libera me! Libera me! Deo gratia omnipotens, libera me!
92Some restrictions apply.
93Predestination does not constitute legally binding guarantee of acceptance to heaven.
94Theses not applicable to freethinkers and savages.
95Copyright 1517, Refor-Madness Productions Limited. All rites reserved.
CHAPTER 10
1Protestantism’s user-friendly tenets sold themselves, and quickly spread through Europe like unto a wildfire of hot-cakes.
2 Jesus was delighted to see Christianity thus reinvigorated; he had begun to question the integrity of the very religion that bore his name, but seeing his faith restored restored his faith.
3 Even the church benefited in the long run, for the new competition forced it to become leaner and more responsive.
4 One can see the improvement in its handling of the Galileo affair; for after finding him guilty of heresy it took them less than 400 years to correct their mistake; in the old days it would have taken over 1,000.
5 (Raphael likes to mirth that Protestantism and Catholicism should be called Pepsism and Cokism: for they are both essentially the same sugar water with different packaging; yet each side’s partisans are fiercely loyal, and contemptuous of the other; and the more of their product they consume the more high-strung they become;
6 Until inevitably they exchange words; the words become blows; the blows escalate into an all-out Cola War; the parties exchange an eye for an eye until everyone goes blind; at which point they are suitably prepared for the taste-test.
7 Yea; the streets of Belfast are caked with blood that may as well be corn syrup.)
8 But as for me, I had no strong reaction to the Reformation one way or the other; for my mind, while everywhere, was elsewhere; and by the early 16th century I was devoting less and less of my time to the affairs of man.
9 Now, this was partly because over half the human race was by then securely in the thrall of either Christianity or Islam; and with two such pure and incorruptible faiths holding sway I knew little harm could come to the world.
10 Also, while the details of the afterlife remain classified, it reveals little to tell thee that the population of heaven has grown considerably over time; and that as it has, I have been forced to allocate a greater proportion of my resources to its upkeep.
11 It is a success problem to be sure, but a problem nonetheless; for heaven is the kind of place one wants to keep nice.
12 But I had also begun struggling with certain divine issues.
13 For I was now over 5,500 years old; and I was starting to experience some of the natural symptoms of aging.
14 I was not as omnipresent as I once had been; tasks that once took a quintillionth of a second now took a quadrillionth; I had a harder time flushing away heresy with regularity; and worst of all, I started noticing a deterioration of my short-term memory.
15 By this I most emphatically do not mean I was or am no longer omniscient; all knowledge in the universe is still contained within me; my mind, as always, is like unto an immeasurably vast library.
16 It is merely that some of the books are overdue; and the reference desk is not as well staffed as it used to be; and the computer system has broken down, so I am back to relying on the card catalogue;
17 Which is poorly alphabetized, and written in all the languages of the world;
18 And the library is closed.
19 The low point came in the 13th century, when I referred to the “Golden Age of Monasticism” as the “Bronze Age” to its face.
20 I tried coasting along; I told myself it was nothing serious; nothing I could not handle with a little help from me.
21 But as thou knowest, the end of any Middle Ages can betimes trigger a spiritual calamity in a sentient being; and alas, I proved no exception.
22 I looked back on what I had accomplished on earth; I reflected on where I was; I looked ahead to the time I had left before Armageddon; and I came unglued.
23 Humanity, here beginneth a dark time.
CHAPTER 11
1For I have spent the last 500 years going through a midternity crisis.
2 I have been wanton; I have been irresponsible; I have done and failed to do things of which I am so ashamed that I choose to remain ignorant of them.
3 (For I have the ability to keep myself in denial; I simply set my all-powerfulness to work on my all-knowingness.)
4 But now I shall delve deeply into my deeply delvable self, and briefly chronicle the dissolution of my last few centuries, spilling many more of my heretofore sacrosanct beans;
5 In the interests of candor and commercial prurience, yes, but also in the hopes that it may steer thee away from making some of the same bad choices I have made; particularly the young believers out there, many of whom see me as some kind of role model.
6 I will begin by reminding thee of my earlier confession—that after the death of Jacob I began overseeing another universe.
7 Reader, I must now admit that that was only a partial truth.
8 I have been overseeing more than one other universe.
9 I have been overseeing 29 other universes.
10 Let me explain.
11 As the Renaissance dawned, and man for the first time since ancient Greece began developing strong interests outside our relationship, I found myself feeling somewhat superfluous.
12 I watched as great artists and writers and thinkers began to live their lives, neither in adoration nor defiance of me, but in indifference.
13 This made me angry, and as thou knowest I have wrath-management issues; but I could no longer simply manifest that wrath in the violent way I had before; not with Jesus, and H. G., and Moses, and Muhammad, and the entire heavenly bureaucracy urging restraint and watching my every move.
14 So rather than act out, I sought to relive my past glories by cavorting with many other cosmoses:
15 All younger than thee, some even less than half thy age; and most of them none too bright, having but a few stars apiece.
16 I even customized one universe cherry red!
17 Yea; as pathetic as it sounds, I redshifted that entire universe; then I got into it and drove it forward as fast as possible, just to feel the vacuum rush by.
18 Moreover, I began placing an unseemly focus on my physical appearance.
19 For example, when I visited Phreculea, and wished to impress the Nivian Brandallaxes, I would emerge before the altar of the Balrythioid Quorngrankers in the guise of a beautiful worby; yea, even in the middle of their zabwynx.
20 I know, I know; ridiculous.
21 I am the LORD thy God, King of the Universe; yet I followed the path taken by every 50-year-old CPA with a pre-owned Porsche, male pattern baldness, and a pseudonym at ashleymadison.com.
CHAPTER 12
1All this renewed Creationary activity reenergized me for a little while; in earth time, roughly from the reign of the Medicis to Plymouth Rock–ish.
2 But then the problems grew worse: for juggling a multiversal harem of this scale became increasingly stressful; the stress led to bouts of anxiety; and these in turn led to the most troubling symptom yet:
3 A certain lessening of my . . . omnipotency.
4 Mirth not at me!
5 I assure thee: nothing like this had ever happened before.
6I am all God.
7 Yet it grew ever more difficult for me to summon the will required to perform the creative act; and this affliction soon impacted my relationship with each of the other universes,
until they all grew dissatisfied and angry.
8 Yea; by 1700 just getting the sun to rise in the morning felt like a miracle.
9 As for thee, my new habit of keeping a disdainful distance from thy affairs grew steadily worse.
10 I limited myself to only the most essential intercessions, such as the Spanish Armada, the Salem Witch Trials, and, in response to an emergency, the midnight ride of Paul Revere.