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| Joel Osteen by m. ball |
Dateline. The First Tuesday after Epiphany —
And
they came bearing gifts, gold . . . .
Why the gospel of success succeeds while
the gospel of Jesus of Nazareth that preaches poverty and powerlessness cannot
but fail. (I mean by succeeds gains
followers, by fails loses them.) Who
with any sense (any hope, any ambition) would choose that itinerant, murmuring,
nonsensical rabbi over Joel Osteen with his big house, his expensive clothes;
his blonde wife and straight teeth - with his amplified voice preaching surely,
sensibly, and incontrovertibly that
more is more? How can it not be? — It is the nature of tautologies that they
must be true. So it is the nature of oxymorons, equations that cannot balance: they
must be false. “Less is more” can not
be so.
When I find myself wandering, hoping by
odd chance that I will stumble into a store that is giving away what must make
me feel better, I have to remind myself, “Wait. Stores don’t give away, do
they?”
01.17.20
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