Excerpt from "Sex with Clergy and Veggie Burgers" INTRO

Organized Religion is like Organized Crime.

We’re thick as thieves until someone screws up.

Then we have to whack ‘em.

-a. v. roach

Intro

You reject all “isms” once you realize God ain’t got nothin’ to do with Religion.

You decide it is time to finally stop calling yourself a Seventh-day Adventist when you watch your favorite talk show host interview your favorite gospel artist who is publicly repenting of the unpardonable sin of viewing pornography. You ask yourself why, instead of sitting on the talk show couch with tear-stained eyes, didn’t he and his wife just sit at home on their own couch and enjoy the films together? Instead of agonizing over his shame, why didn’t this young, virile, sexy married couple take an open minded approach to his “addiction” and try out a few new poses, keeping what works for them and discarding what didn’t, privately? You also wonder if his porn collection is larger than yours. Speaking of porn, you later watch said talk show host interview Jenna Jameson, the highest paid adult film star on earth. As you view these powerful women eye each other, you wonder which one envies the other more.

You are driven to write a book about the sexual, emotional and psychological abuse you’ve suffered at the hands of religious leaders when you realize God is not the jerk off most church folk, atheist intellectuals and comedians make Him out to be. You are forced to write a book when you realize that you are over 40 and you have never had a “healthy” long term relationship and you have never had a long term permanent job or prepared for your future with any 401K, investments or even a savings account because you totally bought into the idea that Jesus is coming back “soon” so you invested more than 10% of your income and 100% of your time into the church all your life and yet He still hasn’t come. You write a book because you are tired of all the bible toters and bible bashers who claim to have all the answers.

You are inspired to write a book about the hypocrisy of the religious denomination you were born into when circumstances force you to tell your mother she was right. She was right when she told you that your transfer of membership from your Queens Seventh-day Adventist church would probably not be accepted by the Florida Seventh-day Adventist church you want to join because the pastor knows. The pastor knows that you live with your boyfriend and although, the pastor himself claims he doesn’t have a problem with it, he knows the conservative members of the church will make a big stink about it. He knows they must have a board meeting to discuss why you are a 40-something unmarried woman living in sin with a 28 year old non-Adventist man. The pastor offers you the option of bringing your strong, beautiful non-Adventist dreadlock and denim wearing boyfriend into the church by water emersion baptism, like they did to juicy John Corbett in “My Big Fat Greek Wedding.” The pastor also offers to throw in an affordable wedding package. You politely decline. You inform the pastor that you and your boyfriend have a secure, loving relationship and are committed to each other and probably have a better relationship than most of the married couples in his congregation. You inform the pastor that you have been an Adventist all your life and you know how these church board members operate and that you don’t want to put the pastor in a position of having to defend you or your lifestyle to hypocrites, many of whom are probably having sex outside of marriage and/or only got married because their carelessness or ignorance of birth control led to their own forced marches down the aisle. The pastor assures you that he would stand up for you as he has become an admirer of the talents you’ve thus far voluntarily exhibited. He thanks you for the work you’ve done with the children at the church school for Education Day and the musical selections you have provided for church services and the enthusiasm you bring to Sabbath School and Prayer Meetings in the few short months that you have been attending. The pastor again questions what you have against marriage. You inform the pastor that you have no problem with marriage; you just have no interest in marriage without money. You ignore the “money isn’t everything” sigh the pastor emits because you know full well that he asks every couple who comes in for marriage counseling how they intend to provide for a family. You inform the pastor that you and your domestic partner have not yet acquired the financial means to have the type of wedding or married life that will meet your dreams and expectations. You inform the pastor that, “No offense”, but you don’t want to get married in the pastor’s study, the way your mother and father did. You think about, but chose not to share, the fact that your father left Catholicism and only joined the Adventist church because he married your pregnant mom when she was 22 years old and he was 43 years old and newly divorced from his second wife. You think about the fact that your father went on to divorce your mom and married wife number four, “Mama” Kirk, divorced her, joined the Nation of Islam and was “assigned” wife number five. He joined the Nation after being diagnosed with cancer and changed his name to something you couldn’t remember or pronounce. In an effort to forgive his absence from your life during your teenage and college years, you visited him at his Brooklyn Mosque only to be informed that you couldn’t walk beside him as women have to walk behind Muslim men. You politely walked. Away.

You inform the sincere Pastor that although you know none of the following ensures a happy marriage, you still deserve and have just as much right to: a gorgeous wedding gown, a gorgeous wedding cake, gorgeous wedding video and photos with smiling friends and family, a gorgeous catering hall filled with dancing guests (Yes, Dancing, Darnnit! Seventh day Adventist aren’t supposed to dance…or swear for that matter). You deserve scrumptious, Leviticus 11 approved food and Martinelli’s non-alcoholic sparkling cider (as the taste and smell of alcohol engenders connotations of your molestors) and a gorgeous stretch limousine. You deserve as fabulous a honeymoon as anyone else and should not have to settle for less. The pastor informs you that you can still attend the church anytime you want and you can still submit your tithe (shocker) to the church. You inform the well meaning pastor that he needn’t worry about you or your soul, that you and God have discussed your living situation and He’s cool with it. So you walk out of the Pastor’s study and for the first time in your life, you are not a member of any church, in any denomination, any where…

SEX with Clergy and VEGGIE

BURGERS