Lightning and "Touchdown Jesus," AKA the Wrath of Gawdy

[Orrex]

My fellow Americans in this group have likely already heard about the lightning strike that burned the 62-foot statue of Jesus to the ground near Dayton, Ohio. Good riddance, I say, because such a tacky and overwrought icon can't possibly be anything but a crime against good taste and sensibility.

To his credit, the spokespriest for the church (I believe that his name, in fact, is Father Bishop) is reluctant to read anything into it. Several of the churchgoers interviewed by NPR, however, see something more supernatural at work.

The first was a woman who described a conversation with her boyfriend in which she expressed her awe at God's ability to wield lightning, etc. And when she woke up this morning, the statue had been destroyed.

The second was a guy who saw this as proof that Jesus is "still sacrificing himself to protect the church," by which he means that The Son acted as a divine lightning rod, channeling his Father's power right into the ground. Of course, the statue itself cost about a $250K to build in the first place, and total damages (including fire damage to a neighboring building) will top $1.5M, but I guess that's okay, because Jesus protected something. Or something.

So the destruction of the statue is a two-fold proof of God's power, since it shows that He can throw lightning bolts as well as any Olympian and He'll throw His divine self in the path of the strike to protect His church.


I wonder what that guy would have said if an atheist monument (whatever that might be) had been struck instead...