For all the godification in our culture, you'd think there'd be more examples of folks in high places leading peace-loving, selfless, humble, pious lives; that those who so loudly profess to be god-fearing, decent, moral Americans, wear Old Glory lapel pins, who bow their heads and close their eyes in supplication during televised National Prayer Breakfasts, who cite Jesus Christ as their favorite philosopher and decry "atheism" and "socialism" as scourges upon an already embattled Judeo-Christian landscape would, you know, practice what they screech.
And maybe they kinda are. Take the environmentally conscious BP.
Fishermen (you know -- like those guys from Galilee) who live and work in the region, which has been severely impacted by the hemorrhaging of millions of gallons of oil, killing fish, ruining habitats, spoiling coastline, destroying livelihoods and lives, are being offered money to clean up the spill and sign wavers to absolve BP from any potential liability should any of said fisherman become ill or incapacitated from exposure to the toxic chemicals permeating their once pristine environs.
BP. Doing God's work.
Or take that diva of the devout, Sarah Palin.
When she's not attending churches which perform exorcisms or wagging her French manicured index finger at all the heathens who don't practice abstinence, she rushes around shoveling speaking fees into her Fendi, covering still mysterious tracks within her own less-than-abstinent charges, basically siding with the kinds of folks Jesus took to task that day he turned their tables over. Talk about a market crash.
And then there are those crusty crusaders, those puncturers of political perfidy, the Tea Baggers.
Coming together in the face of the apparent dismantling of the sacred American principles they hold so dearly, namely that white guys should be president, big companies should make the rules for the rest of us, no one should have to pay taxes for things like roads, police and fire protection, libraries, health care, care for our elderly, education, the military and other commie/socialist, fascist stuff like that, they have made it their mission to set the infidels straight, to reclaim their rightful, snug places as citizen/consumers, trusting the banks and insurers to do the right thing with their diminished earnings and dampened aspirations.
Examples abound in all parts of the world of pious people parading their faith while betraying banal brutality, from "healing" the desperately devoted to tithing congregations to starvation, to evicting the poor from "holy" land to embracing death in exchange for eternal life.
As they thump their Bibles and Korans and rail against immorality, they sin like sinning, rather than redemption, is their business.
Because the truth is that the depths of their compassion is far outstripped by the depths of their pockets. Every dollar they amass is a graven image of the all-powerful, immutable creator of their world, a novena passed from the hands of the reverent, terrorized masses straight into their church elders' coffers. God hears their prayers, alright.
Every time a cash register ka-chings.