Fool (for Christ!) of the Week: The Raving Theist (Part 1)

I used to laugh, but now I understand.
Shake the hand of a brand-new fool.

-- The Drifters

I used to be known (at least to the handful of people who read my site) as "Atheist Gal". In 2003, I changed my mind and became Theist Gal.

Frankly, I didn't think anyone had noticed, or cared - till one fine morning I discovered that a blogger styling himself "The Raving Atheist" had written the following:

This week’s Godidiot, Christine Lehman of A Theist Gal, was selected not for something she wrote but for what she is — an atheist who converted to Catholicism. Or, technically, a Catholic who converted to atheism who re-converted to Catholicism. Her site used to be called “Atheist Gal,” but she added the space between that “A” and the “theist” after Jesus snatched her back about a year ago.

Wow! I didn't know whether to be flattered or hurt. To be honest, I felt both! Hurt, because - come on, calling someone an idiot? Kind of mean. But flattered? Absolutely - because someone was actually paying attention to my little 5-hits-or-less-per-day website!

Anyway, if you read through the comments section, you'll see that I went to great pains to sound very amused, friendly and world-weary about the whole thing. But you know, there's just so many times you can say, "Thank you sir, may I have another?" without losing all respect for yourself.

So finally, I gave up, wished Raving well, and went on my merry way.

So imagine my surprise when, a couple of weeks ago, I was surfing the Net and wound up reading this, at Elizabeth Esther's lovely blog:

In December of 2008, the popular atheist blogger formerly known as "Raving Atheist" announced his stunning conversion to Christianity. He changed his blogging name to "Raving Theist" and dedicated his site "to Jesus Christ, now and forever."



I couldn't believe it! This had to be some sort of joke! Surely this couldn't be the same "Raving Atheist" who'd once written:

As far as I am concerned, people who wear their faith on their sleeve might as well be wearing dunce caps, “kick me” signs, or propeller beanies. They are shallow, self-centered, self-righteous and ignorant twits who should concentrate on educating themselves rather than imposing their half-baked, half-assed theology on everyone else.

So I checked the link in Elizabeth's article and found that - yes indeedy!! - on December 22, 2008, Raving had posted this astonishing statement:

Three years ago, I promoted and appeared in the atheist documentary “The God Who Wasn’t There,” dedicated to the proposition that Jesus never existed.

TODAY I DEDICATE THIS SITE AND MY LIFE TO THE WORSHIP AND SERVICE OF OUR LORD AND SAVIOR, JESUS CHRIST.

Um ... wow! Okay. I think. I was, shall we say, cautiously optimistic. I to believe it. But Raving did have a history of - shall we say - extreme sarcasm - as in this post from June 13, 2003, in which he pretended to apologize to me:

Christine Lehman is not a Godidiot. I will not longer permit that dishonor to stain her reputation. Upon his return, I shall direct my webmaster to delete forever that cruel and unfortunate post.

For I have looked into the mirror. Shouldn’t we all?

Yeah sure. And again, read the comments - I kinda realized it was a joke, but it took a while. Cause he was GOOD.

So before I started the "yay-an-atheist-is-a-Christian" victory dance (which all Christians must learn - it's in the Bible, as you know), I decided to email Raving for the straight dope. And in Part 2 of this story, I'll tell you what I found out!

AND THE WINNERS ARE ...

Hey, good morning, everyone! And thanks so much to the seven wonderful people who commented on my blog last week - thus qualifying for a chance to win one of the 4 extra copies I purchased of Michael Spencer's Mere Churchianity!

The seven contestants are: AG, Brendan, E, IndieRoadie, joederbes, John, and Zach (and please note, I'm linking to your blogs, if you have them - free publicity! yay!).

I've just written their names on little pieces of paper (all the same size!) and put them into an empty vase (since the Tupperware bowl is currently in the fridge, full of leftover pasta).

I'm shaking up the vase (isn't this EXCITING??) and now I'm going to reach in - eyes closed! and pull out the name of the FIRST lucky winner! And that first lucky winner is: (drum roll please)

Zach!

Congratulations, Zach! (Scroll to the bottom of the post for instructions on how to claim your prize.)

OK, time for winner #2, and it is:

IndieRoadie!

Wow, congrats, IR! Let's move on quickly to #3:

AG!

Way to go, AG! Now there's just one copy left - who is it gonna be? (I can't wait!) - let's see:

Brendan!

Yayy! Congrats to all of you! Zach and Brendan, watch your email - I'll be contacting you to ask for your mailing addresses. IndieRoadie and AG, I don't have email addresses for you, so would you please contact me at stoogeswoman@yahoo.com? Thanks!

And ... that's all, folks! I'm really sorry I didn't have more than four copies to give away - frankly, I'm so thrilled to have actually gotten SEVEN people to even READ my blog, much less COMMENT on it, that I would have been happy to give every one of you a free book. Unfortunately, economic circumstances being what they are, four is pretty much my limit.

HOWEVER - now that you've found this blog, I hope you'll stick around. Because later this week, I have a really cool story to tell you, about a popular Internet atheist who, rather quietly, became a Christian less than two years ago.

It's really a wonderful story, and had me smiling happily ever since I found out about it the other day - because as it happens, there's a personal connection between this former atheist and myself! So please, bookmark this page, and I promise to have the new post in place sometime before the weekend!

And to everyone who has managed to plod through this post so far - THANK YOU! Show's over - you may now proceed with the rest of your day!

One obituary Christians hated; and WIN A FREE BOOK!!

Many bloggers knew (if only by his own blog, Internet Monk) and loved the late, great Michael Spencer.

His obituary was one none of us wanted to read.

And his widow Diane's harrowing blog post today tells us a lot of the reason why.

Yes, it is hard to lose someone you love. And it's hard to see a "bright side".

But if there is a bright side to Michael's death, it is Michael's life. I don't know if anyone this side of heaven is keeping track of how many people his words at "Internet Monk" have helped. But I'm betting the stats number into the thousands, at least. And I'm humbly proud (is that a thing?) to count myself in there somewhere.

So on the bright side of this post (and yes, in a blatant attempt to raise my blog's hit count - hey, that's how you get people to read you, right?), I'm starting a contest:

FOUR BRAND-NEW COPIES of Michael Spencer's newly published book, Mere Churchianity!

How It Works:

1. Post a (non-spamming) comment on this blog post. (Be sure to include your email!)

2. One week from today (June 21st) at, oh, let's say 10 a.m. (Los Angeles, CA time), I will put the names of everyone who's commented (only one entry per person, sorry!) into a Tupperware bowl, and draw out four names.

3. I'll then e-mail the lucky winners for their addresses, and send them their books!

And again, yes, this is partly to see if I can get more people to read my blog.

But you know what? It's also because I read Michael's book when it was released on the Kindle a couple of weeks ago. And I really loved it!

And I think you will, too.

So come on ... what are you waiting for? Post already!!!

(and P.S. - thanks!!)

Obituaries Christians Like (and yes, I'm plagiarizing !)

I'll say right up front that I'm plagiarizing Jon Acuff's wonderful blog Stuff Christians Like, but it occurred to me this morning that whenever a famous person dies, the first thing a really serious Christian does is check to see if they ever, at any point in their lives, publicly expressed even a minimal amount of faith in Jesus Christ.

Then they breathe a sigh of relief: "whew, I don't have to worry that he/she might be in Hell!"

For example, in the latest round of celebrity, the late Art Linkletter was a "gimmee" - he has long been known as a professing Christian. So he can be presumed to be "safe".

Art Linkletter, well-known Christian: SAFE!

On the other hand, there's a long and, apparently, semi-serious debate at Yahoo! Answers about the eternal fate of poor Gary Coleman. He may, or may not, at some point in his life, been involved in some way with the Mormons. Whether that helps him or not is debatable (of course!).

Gary Coleman: WHEREABOUTS UNKNOWN(?)

As I get older, I tend to think God (aka Jesus Christ, late of Galilee and Nazareth) is a lot more patient with us than we think. And that there will be a lot of pleasant surprises in Heaven. Including, perhaps, Gary Coleman.

Q: "Whatchoo talkin' bout, Curvy Catholic?"
A: "Grace!"

Need a plumber?

But not necessarily like these guys?

Here's the story: I was doing my Shovelglove routine a little too enthusiastically this morning (also without the "glove"), and, long story short, broke a pipe.

Waaahhh!!


But after a few failed attempts to fix it on my own, I decided to bite the bullet and call a plumber. The Stooges must have been looking down from heaven, because I found these guys: Schuelke Plumbing - and they did a great job!

That's Schuelke Plumbing, 1-800-397-0093 - and they ain't payin' me a penny for this fabulous endorsement, nyuk nyuk!

But seriously, they did WAYYY better work than these guys woulda done:

Let's face the music and ... diet? Nahhh!!

Well, I do have to face the music, come clean, 'fess up, whatever: like 95% of my fellow dieters, I have regained almost all the weight I lost a couple of years ago - I've gone from a low of 180 to - this morning - 213 pounds.

That's 33 pounds.



Sorry, Mr. President!

But I'm not going back to Weight Watchers, because the regain started while I was going there. In fact, if you look back at my posts from last year, I was already well on the way upward and couldn't seem to reconnect with the whole program mentality.

And being unemployed since December (not to mention homebound for two months with acute bronchitis earlier this year) didn't help either.

Despite my best intentions,


there are times when I feel a distinct sisterhood with Peggy Bundy.

But as they say (especially in the Catholic Church, of which I'm a full-fledged Rosary-carrying member!), confession is good for the soul. So now that I've told THE WHOLE WORLD (or at least my husband) about this, I can decide what to do.

Exercise more? Definitely. Especially since the weather's getting warmer. I had been going to 24 Hour Fitness two or three times a week, but now I'm going to start doing some nice, long walks as well. I should be doing SOMETHING - either the gym or the walk - every day of the week.

Diet? Well - maybe not. I may give the "No S Diet" another try. But I do kind of need the "s"'s, especially while watching those damn Scrubs reruns every afternoon.

OK, smart gal, how about this:


No more Scrubs reruns every afternoon!

Aahhh!! Well, we don't have to go that far! But yeah, I definitely need to cut back on my afternoon TV viewing - that seems to be when I get in the most trouble, snack-wise.

Well, I have to cut this post short, as Steve P. is out of the shower and I know he wants to get on the computer. Thanks, sweetie! I'll write more about this later.

Oh, and tomorrow, after church?

Just ONE doughnut for me, 'kay?

When the overly chatty rector starts undressing, it's time to go home

This morning I decided, on a whim, to attend the 10 a.m. "Holy Communion" Service at a nearby Episcopalian church.

Disclaimer: I'm not now, nor have I ever been, an Episcopalian. As the title of the blog should have told you by now, I'm a Catholic. Byzantine Catholic, to be exact.*

But being a C.S. Lewis fan(atic), I have a soft spot for Anglicans. And since there wasn't a Divine Liturgy at our church this morning, and I was in the mood for a good liturgy, and had noticed this particular Episcopalian church's schedule while driving by on the way to and from 24-Hour Fitness, I decided - today was the day!

CLUE #1 that this was the wrong decision: I pulled into the parking lot just behind a sweet, elderly, white-haired lady, who walked in through a locked gate - and pulled it tightly shut behind her, just before I made it through. And kept walking, without so much as a "Sorry, we have to keep it locked if we don't know you." Which I would have understood. But silence? Hmmm.

CLUE #2: I walked around the block and found another entrance into the church, and sat in a pew towards the rear. It was ten minutes before 10:00 a.m.

And no one else was there. EXCEPT a man standing at the altar, noisily thumping books, fiddling with the tabernacle door, and chatting on a cell phone, all at the same time. Admirable! However, I was there to pray, so I did my best.

But alas, it was not to be, because:

CLUE #3: Said chatty gentleman suddenly started walking down the aisle towards me, talking to me while frocking himself in semi-priestly garb. "Sorry, we're only having Morning Prayer today, because Father's still out at the ranch," he shared with me. Embarrassed, I muttered something to the effect that, since I'd never been there before, I wouldn't really know the difference.

"What?" he shouted, over the buzzing sound of a voice inside his cell phone.

"Um, I said, 'That's OK!'" I shouted back.

He nodded and walked out, still struggling with his clothing and yakking to the unseen voice (distinctly female, so probably not God, although on the other hand, this WAS an Episcopalian church so who knows?).

Anyway, at that point I suddenly realized that this service, if it ever got underway, was going to consist solely of myself and Chatty Cathy, and decided this was probably NOT the best place for me to commune silently with the Lord.

So I left, waving halfheartedly to C.C., who was standing outside the door, sucking on a cigarette and still only partially clad.

Then I drove as fast as my little Toyota would carry me to 24-Hour Fitness, where I communed with the Almighty via the rowing machine.

If any Episcopalians are reading this ... um ... was this Rite One or Rite Two?


*Technically speaking, Roman Catholic married to Byzantine Catholic. But it's all good.