God ‘n’ Son
By Matthew Green
And Jesus walked towards the pearly gates of Heaven and, lo, they were magnificent.
And God did greet him and, behold, he spake in tones as loud and menacing as thunder:
"What in my name are you doing here?"
"Well, it’s funny, nobody seems willing to believe that I’m Jesus. They all think I’m some kind of a nut. Isn’t that funny?"
"No. Of course not. Some unknown guy telling everybody he’s the Son of God. It stands to perfect reason that they’d consider you a loony. How did you die?"
"Old age."
"Old age? You’ll never get any credibility if you aren’t cruelly murdered by the state. How many times have you been back now?"
"Oh, I’d have to say, about once every century... About twenty times. Maybe I should come back to somewhere outside of Israel. Say... America, that seems to be a fairly major country."
"Only to the Americans, and possibly the British. Not to anyone else."
"Maybe I could posses someone."
"Doesn’t that go against everything Jesus stands for?"
"Yes, but if I take over the President of the USA, I’d have a pretty wide field of attention."
"Yes, a wide field of attention of people thinking the President went insane. No, the world has survived for two thousand years without Jesus. I think it can survive well enough without our interference."
"Huh. Just barely. Do you know that they have the power to wipe out all life on Earth if they so desired to?"
"Of course I do. But one nut isn’t going to change that."
"Come on, let me posses someone."
"No."
"Please."
"No I won’t."
"Come on."
"That’s it, I’ve had more than enough lip from you. Go to your room."
And, lo, Jesus did slink off in a huff.
And, regardez vous, the pearly gates did slam shut behind him, with a terrifying crash.