BE: Christmas is A Birthday

As we celebrate the biggest birthday of all time I thought it would be helpful to have our resident experts weigh in on the man himself.
Happy holidays,
POOG

Question: Jesus is always interpreted through the lens of the interpreter and then shaped and reshaped to meet that interpreters own vision of the world. So, I ask, what about the REAL man? What was he like, what did he wear, what lessons can we take from him today as we approach the celebration of his birth?

Samantha Vignette answers: We know nothing about him really. Especially the so called "lost teen years" when it is believed, for absolutely no good reason, that he travelled to India to study polytheism and the Kama Sutra. It is important to know what you don't know and to use that information to inform your day to day decisions and how you treat other people. I would hazard a guess that even though little is known about him, other than he did exist and was crucified as a criminal, he was probably nice sometimes to certain people. The lesson here is that we should also be nice to certain people. I would say everyone, but that's hardly realistic. You should treat people nicely as he might have done when he could however. I call this Niceiticity. Being nice because it's the right thing to do sometimes. That much I know is true. The rest is all uncertainty and from this we grow and move forward.

Samantha Vignette is the director of the Niceiticity Institute in Lausanne, an organization dedicated to the idea that doing good deeds can benefit a person in the here and now and not just in an afterlife.

Thoprac Mishri answers: I like to think of him as a regularly guy. The one that I might meet on a bus if I rode them. Or, since the biblical record mentions carpentry, the man that I would call when I need my kitchen cabinets refaced. People don't like to think that way, but this is a key lesson because I say so. That doesn't really answer your question though. We know that the gospels are incomplete and that heurmenutics are subject to the political and cultural environment of the day, as well as the psychological predispositions of the scholar doing the interpreting. A complete reading would necessarily include the Gnostic Gospels, which shed a relentlessly mocking light on the canon. The entireity of the available literature tells us this: he lived, he spoke, he may or may not have married, he may or may not have died on the cross, he may or may not have had children, he may or may not have gone on to live as an Essene, he may or may not have risen from the dead, he may or may not have been a brunette and possibly he had head lice. Chances are good. We do know that his mother did not have a fine toothed steel comb however but that she probably would have appreciated one since she may or may not have had more children. Based on this information we have a worldwide monotheistic religion that, when merged in a syncretistic fashion with pagan Germanic tribal tradition results in an annual orgy of cutting down trees, bringing them inside and buying way too much wrapping paper. It warms the heart to know that we come together, regardless of religion ultimately, to celebrate his birth even though, given the actual dates of the Roman census of that time, it probably took place in May.

Thoprac Mishri is a leading proponet of the Christmas is More Than Christ's Birthday movement which is dedicated to the belief that anyone, anywhere can celebrate anything at all for any reason but that the support of a major organized religion sometimes helps.

David Yuan-Lee Knowles answers: Everyone likes to think of him as one of their own. In England he is white, in Africa he is black. Our tradition, ancient Confusionism, maintains that he was Asian, but just taller than the average Asian man and with more facial hair. We are pretty certain that when no one was looking he would braid his hair into a long queue and play with his beard so that it tapered on the edges of each tip. These physical attributes clearly explain his apparent rejection of formal religious structures. Random, but possibly true like so much that we know. Along the same lines, his spirituality like all spirituality, was based on acceptance, love and tolerance, especially for those who disagree with you and have power over you. See?

A GOOP Spoof