Be Like Ike

Long before I joined the heathen ranks of the Evil Atheist Conspiracy (or, as we affectionately call it, the EAC), there were things about churches that puzzled me to no end. Despite spending considerable time in church as a kid, I never understood wacky shit like the whole alpha and omega concept surrounding god, never quite got how he (she? it?) was supposed to be infinite and without origin. I remember more than once asking Moms how this god was supposed to have come to exist with no beginning. "Did god have a mother and father?" I'd go. "If god created everything, then who/what created god?"

She used to try to explain to me that god was never ending and had always been. I tried to grasp that, but all that ever really came to mind was a picture of a giant spiral winding continuously into itself until its tail seemed to vanish, sort of like that crappy effect on the opening of "The Twilight Zone."

These were the kinds of questions that I had that ultimately led me into the thrice-damned fold of the EAC, yes, but these weren't deep philosophical machinations I was conjuring back then. I was 8, 10, 12 years old. These were the sorts of simple-minded queries any child in his or her right mind would ask when something they were told didn't add up.

Swear to Thor, I felt like that the other day as I read about how mega-church big tymer Creflo Dollar (holla!) was refusing to cooperate with a US Senate investigation into the financial dealings of prosperity cults run by Dollar and other big-money preachers. The appropriately named Rev. Dollar lives like Hugh Hefner sans the bathrobe, having been lavished with jets, luxury cars and mansions through the donations and retail purchases of his sheeples. When Sen. Charles Grassley announced last year that he would be looking into dealings by Dollar and his ilk, Dollar said then that he'd be willing to comply with a "valid request." 

I guess he figures a Senate request ain't valid.

Now, if this Negro were doing something actually principled — were doing almost anything other than standing around lying to people about how his magic genie in the sky is going to make them all rich, if they kneel at just the right angle and break Creflo off the right amount of paper — I might commend his defiance. But he's a charlatan getting rich off a belief system that, at its core, is supposed to be centered around a guy purported to be selfless, charitable and downright contemptuous of the mega-rich. He sells god to people as a financial plan (one that includes Dollar's "brokerage" fees, I'm sure) and is among the fetid ranks of conservative-jocking black ministers prone to mimicking the sort of bigoted Bush-ian rhetoric that equates poverty (especially that of the black, urban variety) with moral failing.

Dollar's about as big a Christian as I am. Only difference is, I won't lie to you. And on the real: Even if you believe in god, why in the name of Shango should you have to make a clown like this rich just to get to know him (her/it)??

But to me, the even larger question is, why are people like the Wrong Reverend Dollar (holla!) allowed fleece their kindhearted (if desperate and delusional) members out of 10 percent of their take-home every Sunday and not be subjected to more scrutiny? I thought snake oil salesmen were no longer permitted to pump any old Python Tonic they decided to bottle?

I'm not talking about people offering a room and a hot meal to the traveling evangelist, either. Cref and his folks have private jets! Jed Clampett-style cribs! Rolls Royces! (Well, in Dollar's case, as he felt the need to tell CBS, it's only one Rolls, not two. Guess it's hard out here for a pimp.) 

For Zeus' sake, can't we start taxing these niggas? They aren't the spiritual descendants of Christ; they're the offspring of Rev. Ike.

They have no business being exempt. Seems to me they're just stealing money. Hell, I've known drug dealers who paid their taxes. (No lie; they claimed to be pro gamblers on their returns.) Why should Creflo and these other preachers, hucksters out here slangin' that spiritual sticky-icky, be allowed to skate with their bank intact??

And what's so special about religious groups that they can't be taxed? They claim all kinds of wacky shit that can't be proven. They don't even agree among themselves about what god they want to worship. And having listened to Creflo for myself, I know that this Negro is spouting sheer lunacy. (And even if you don't, why should that mean your church doesn't have to pay up? You're damn sure making income. Render unto Caesar, baby.)

So I say don't just investigate them. Start taxing them...hard.

Think of what we could do with the money. The mega-churches alone would bring in billions, money that President Obama and future politicians could use to rebuild our infrastructure and properly educate our children.

Sure, some theists might claim that the churches should be exempt because some of them perform services for the public. Bump that. Let the government -- which is to say, the people, irrespective of religion -- do it for themselves. Let the churches pitch in just like almost every other institution in this country.

I know it likely won't happen in my lifetime. Same as I know Ponzi schemers like Dollar, Kenny Copeland and others will continue to get fat off of the naive, the desperate, the narrow-minded and the primitive.

But one day, just like Grassley's doing, we're going to start looking much harder at the Creflo Dollars of the world. We're going to start asking those same sort of simple -- but infinitely powerful -- questions that even a kid would think to raise.

And when that day comes, Amen-Ra willing, those pious, fat cat assholes won't have the luxury of refusing to answer.