God then went on to send his only begotten son to one of those conversion camps. “It’s for your own good,” he said with a stern look on his face.
I often hesitate to post strips like the one above out of concern that someone that does not deserve it might be offended, but the idea of God as disappointed (and disinterested UNTIL disappointed) Father was just too funny to pass up. I worry that someone might take the strip as a literal position that I personally hold, as silly as that would be. To be absolutely clear, it’s simply satire based on a particular version of god contained within the collective consciousness of a particular subset of Biblical literalists and bigots, and I hope everyone recognizes that.
Readers have often asked me why God appears to have different personalities from strip to strip, a question I would answer with my own question: “Why does God appear to have different personalities throughout the Bible or from person to person?” and there you’d find your answer. Many people speak about the G-man as if they know the mind of a being that, by their own accounts, is and was and will be the creator of all things. The Bible itself is a confusing mess of stories that show several different kinds of God. There’s your Jealous God, your Disappointed God, your Angry and/or Wrathful God, your Loving God, etc, and it’s all very confusing to the average reader. There is a surprising amount of literature devoted to trying to make sense of all of this, to explaining these differences, these shifts in tone. The reasons, like the God they try to make sense of, vary from person to person, from faith to faith, and from moment to moment.
It seems like an awful lot of mental gymnastics to explain something that is supposedly inexplicable.
I’ve personally found that each version of God is humorous in one way or another and so that’s what I focus on. I’m sure the Wrathful God might find that pretty annoying, but maybe there’s a Hilarious God that would get a laugh out of these jokes. That’s one I’m pretty sure I haven’t seen in the Bible. Imagine trying to rationalize a God that, in early portions of the Bible is sending plagues to destroy entire nations and then, a few pages later, is asking Moses to pull his finger. Good luck with that!
Anyway, I’ve always found the concept of God as father (both to humans and Jesus) to be pretty funny and the idea that he would be disappointed with us over something as intrinsic as our sexuality even funnier. You’ve got this all powerful God that creates us in his own image and gives us our basic functionality, then he spends all this time getting mad that we actually use our sex organs or throwing a fit about some of us liking the same sex or both sexes. It’s like, man, you did this! You made us this way! You can’t get mad!
It’s even funnier to me when you consider how little there is in the Bible that pertains to these particular things, but that’s nothing new. People pick and choose their beliefs all the time and it’s people that really push their interpretations of God.
Fortunately, the tide is definitely turning against that particular version of God, though it does not seem to be going quietly.
At least if God the Father really is disappointed or angry, we can turn to each other, to our brothers and sisters here on earth to find some compassion and acceptance. We’re a pretty big family and sure some of us are pretty awful but a lot of us aren’t so bad and that’s some small comfort.
Sometimes it can mean everything in the world.
“Why does God appear to have different personalities throughout the Bible or from person to person?”
The Marcion heresy has an interesting take on that question…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcionism
And there goes the last appearance of monotheism!
I say appearance because there hasn’t been much left of it. Since people direct prayers to Jesus, he is clearly another God. Add the virgin Mary (and if youre that kind of Christian, a few hundred saints) and the idea of a monotheism has clearly been dead and buried since Biblical times.
Sure, if you have a mind completely incapable of paradox. By the way, circles can’t be real, because how can something as silly as “irrational numbers” exist, amiright?
If you had gone with God in cat form, Jesus could have been a kitten!
It’s clear that god has no problem with gays, but rather he really hates rainbows.
But he was OK with Joseph and his rainbow coat, wasn’t he?
Have you ever done a striip concerning Psalm 137 verse 9 ?
“Happy shall be he who dashes thy little ones against the stones.”
If there aren’t enough surplus children to go around (because of abortions), how are these right wing Christianists going to get Yahweh’s blessings through this verse?
So… Jesus isn’t allowed to borrow clothes from Joseph?
Great, interesting one. Is it just me, or are the comics loading very long?
Up to a half minute for one comic, when i like to go back to older comics.
It has nothing to do with “explanation” or with “understanding,” it’s all about indoctrination into an ideology.
It is like we are all siblings helping each other get over a narcissistic, abusive, yet at the same time absent parent.
https://video-lga1-1.xx.fbcdn.net/hvideo-xat1/v/t42.1790-2/11291294_833624520062444_1391894605_n.mp4?efg=eyJybHIiOjUyNywicmxhIjo1MTJ9&rl=527&vabr=293&oh=e801d1e9beffdeda211f9343272acb58&oe=55B5296C
that is how scott draws happletea
For the hilarious God, you might consider Esther. At least as it starts, it is a farce – the king is drunk on day 7 of a half-year debauch and calls his trusted Eunuchs (Mehuman, Biztha, Harbona, Bigtha, Abagtha, Zethar and Karkas). You can just imagine them going up to knock on the door of the hostess. “He wants you to drop everything and come.” “Yes, he might be a little tipsy.” “What should you wear?” “He just said your crown.” … “No, he didn’t mention anything else.” “No your majesty, we don’t think it would be wise to tell him where he can stuff it.”
Then they shuffle up to the king. “She won’t come”
Then probably still drunk, he calls the best lawyers of his court (not Dewey Cheatham and Howe, Karshena, Shethar, Admatha, Tarshish, Meres, Marsena and Memukan)
… and it only gets sillier from there.
(By the way, the above is not my original observation. I read it in a book in a library somewhere. I’ve done a basic search, but can’t find it on the Internet.)
There was that scene with a talking donkey, that was pretty goofy. The hight of Divine humor, however, was the humiliating prank God pulled on the Philistines for stealing the Ark of The Covenant. After cursing them with a variety of plagues, they finally returned it, but had to also preform several elaborate penances, including making golden representations of the plagues. They hit a cunundrum when it came to the hemroids. How do you make a “golden hemroid”?!
Great comic. I’m just wondering why everyone’s noses look red. Does everyone have a cold in this universe? >.>
AWESOME comic! Awesomer commentary! Such a great a beautiful sentiment, I absolutely love it, despite being a straight white dude. It really is incredible that people deign to say that they know and understand the mind and intentions of a being that is so powerful that its nearly impossible for us to even contemplate.
Thank you so much!
I suppose the argument could be made that since we’re created in God’s image, God Himself is as full of petty emotions and mood swings as we are… He’s just on a cosmic timeline, that for some reason passes slower than an Earthly one, thus the hundreds/thousands of years between behavior.
I’m not a theist, but for those that are, it may have something misogynistic to do with Eve eating that apple and giving humanity freewill to incur the mood swings.
So is hp gone again for the foreseeable future? ;(
I always kinda worry that people who are tangentially important to us, like the coffee shop person you see every day, the web comic writer, the bus driver, will have something dire happen to them and because they’re not someone you know well or how to contact, it’s a massive shock if they just disappear. How do we know that they’re not dead? Or in a drug induced coma? Or just changed jobs?
PUpdaaaaate pllllzzzzz!
Noes don’t leave us alone 🙁
If you need inspiration, I advise comparing Budhist mythology with Irish mythology, especially their completely opposite attitude towards sexy snake people. It’s pretty hilarious.
‘Please, sir, I want some more.’
…
‘What!’ said the Happle Tea master at length, in a faint voice.
‘Please, sir,’ replied Oliver, ‘I want some more.’
R.I.P Happletea 🙁
Just let us know you’re ok please… miss you!
Ugh, Daaad, it’s a Technicolor Dreamcoat! If that little brat Joseph can have one, why can’t I?
*tries to find like button* *pokes screen aimlessly*
He was warned.
“If a man lies with a man as with a woman, they have both committed an abomination. They must surely be put to death; their blood is upon them.” Leviticus 20:13
The rainbow guy, wasn’t that Moses?