Deliver Us from Monotheism: Necromancer, Burned

Welcome to "The Gods Are Bored," where we run from One! "Mono" isn't even a pretty-sounding prefix. Whereas "Poly" just rolls off the tongue. Example: mononucleosis .... polypeptide .... monotonous .... polly wanna cracker?

Oh. Sorry about that.

News just in my email box, from regular posts I receive through Charisma magazine. About once a week I get a little pep talk from a Christian preacher named J. Lee Grady whose column is called Fire in My Bones.

Remember that dude I told you about down in Lakeland, Florida, who was doing all those faith healings, even unto bringing dead people back to life? (An impolite Pagan would call that "Necromancy" and denounce it.) His name is Todd Bentley. Well, the 100-plus day heal-fest down in Lakeland has come to an untimely end, with Mr. Bentley separating from his wife and three young children.

I will grant you that there were Christians who already distrusted Mr. Bentley, his odd speaking-in-tongues, his tattoos, his whacking disabled people to the floor, all of that. But now that Mr. Bentley is having marital problems (unspecified), the entire corpus of Christian pastors has lined up to denounce him.

Here's a bit from J. Lee Grady's email:

"A prominent Pentecostal evangelist called me this week after Bentley’s news hit the fan. He said to me: “I’m now convinced that a large segment of the charismatic church will follow the anti-Christ when he shows up because they have no discernment.” Ouch. Hopefully we’ll learn our lesson this time and apply the necessary caution when an imposter shows up."

I'm not sure I follow you, J. Lee. If Todd Bentley was an imposter, what happens to the people who were healed by him? Do they seek to be sick again because what happened to them was the work of an imposter?

Quick. Somebody tell the zombies! "It's okay, you can go back to bed now. Just a false alarm. An imposter."

I'm not one to throw stones, but I think this is a picture-perfect case of an overworked god not paying enough attention to detail. When a third of the population of an overcrowded planet is some sort of Judeo-Christian follower, you're bound to stress the reigning deity to the max.

You gotta see it from God's point of view. He gets a memo that some young fella in tattoos is doing healings down Florida way, he sprinkles down a few healings like you quickly toss oregano into your pasta salad, and alas. Insufficient background check on the healer.

Now, some of you are saying, "Okay, Anne Johnson, it's easy for you to belittle necromancers from other religions. What exactly do Druids do if they want healing?"

1. Herbs and homeopathy, reiki and acupuncture. And if those aren't enough, then ...

2. Modern medicine, with all the accumulated knowledge of humankind at its disposal.

As for bringing dead people back to life, well, that depends on how long they've been dead. If modern medicine can't do the job, we at "The Gods Are Bored" say it's time to call in the Sacred Thunderbirds to dispose of the meat, and the faeries to beckon the soul.

Our operators are standing by to take your call.