WTF, Commercial?

[fenderlove]

There's a carpet retailer in here in Tennessee that has, for years, used little children spouting "Made in the USA" catchphrases and waving cheap plastic flags in their commercials. Well, now they've hit upon a new gimmick- claiming that their carpet was made "by the Heavenly Father." *head-desk* I sorta want to go into their business and demand that their carpet better not only be resistant to wine spills but should turn water into more wine to refill my glass.



There are a lot of businesses around here that use the tactic of claiming to be a "Christian business," but they are the ones most likely to cheat and gouge their customers. I told one fellow who owned such an establishment (that had improperly installed tires to my mother's van and then refused to fix it), "I wouldn't care if you said you were a Satanic business as long as you did the job correctly!" He acted like I had slapped him and then got all holy-roller on me for "daring" to mention the "S-word" (No, Mr. Connery, that's not swords. :D) in his Christianly business.

Of course, I had the lady who owns the local Christian bookstore throw a loaf of bread at my face in Wal-Mart because she said that my Greek Orthodox cross was a "mark of the Beast" and that I was "one of the damned!" I don't know why I didn't just walk away, but I tried to explain to her to calm her down.

Me: No, it's just an Eastern Orthodox cross.
Her: Eastern? *gasps* Terrorist!
Me: It's Eastern Orthodox Catholicism.
Her: *starts wringing her hands and shouting* CATHOLIC DEVIL! DEMON! DEMON!

God, I hate this place so much. One of these days, I'm going to go to the print shop and have a small yard sign made that reads "ZEUS" in big bold san-serif letters to combat the huge amount of "JESUS" signs that people have in their yards. Yes, neighbours, Jesus is going to care more about a useless plastic sign in your yard than the fact that you treat others like garbage.

Comments

[txvoodoo.livejournal.com]

And ya know what? My area isn't unique. The thing that IS unique is that I don't have a Megachurch in my town. THEY'RE EVERYWHERE. They have their own coffee shops and clothing stores and stuff INSIDE the church!

[diebirchen.livejournal.com]

Gotta admit that one of the things I loved best about living in Germany were the bells in very, very old church towers -- "the rhyming and the chiming of the bells -- of the bells, bells, bells, bells, bells, bells, bells -- the rhyming and the chiming of the bells."

[fenderlove.livejournal.com]

Only the oldest church- the Baptists- have bells... Well, they have an actual bell, but they don't ring it anymore. They play a recording of bells at noon everyday, throughout the day on Sundays, and then on religious observances. It's annoying except when it's very quiet on Christmas Eve, and they play more festive tunes instead of a droning clang-clang-clang.

I think I would like to hear the bells in Germany. When I went to Europe many years ago, I regretted that we didn't get to go there.

[diebirchen.livejournal.com]

Recorded bells wouldn't do it for me. Germany is wonderful. I've been blessed with over four years there, a year in England, and 6 months in Austria. It changed my life forever.

[fenderlove.livejournal.com]

The mega-churches scare the shit out of me. The only people near here who have one are the Pentecostals. It looks like a mall with enormous metal letters on the outside of the building spelling out "THE PENTECOSTALS" in case passersby didn't see the equally enormous "THE PENTECOSTALS" sign out by the road. The nearest churches and temples for other faiths are hours away. Mom doesn't have the energy to get up at 3AM on Sunday to drive three hours to the nearest EO church, so she "internet-commutes" and watches the service on the computer most of the time.

I'm also ashamed that Murfreesboro, where I went to college, is the focus of the "Unwelcome in America" CNN documentary about the irrational fears people have about having mosques in their town. I saw some of the clips, and they broke my heart. This crazy lady got up at the town meeting and started saying that, "This is the start! They're starting to infiltrate so they can KILL US!!!" without realizing that the mosque has been in Murfreesboro for almost 30 years without any problems and just wants to build a new facility instead of being next to the frickin' bowling alley. The college campus, which feels like the majority of the town, is very open and accepting to a very diverse population of students, many of whom counter-protested the anti-Muslim vocal townsfolk. The older people in M'boro have the attitude of "Kids are stupid. They let their feelings think for them. They don't know what the "real world" is like."