Theos-Talk Archives (September 1997 Message tl00387)

Here's something I got from another list.  Maybe there is justice in the
universe after all.

Chuck the Heretic

Message: 40

>Date: Mon, 22 Sep 1997 11:16:07 -0600
>From: Ben Liberman <ben@bl.com>
>Subject: Mother Teresa Sent to Hell in Wacky Afterlife Mix-Up
>
>[http://www.theonion.com/onion3206/motherteresa.html]
>
>CALCUTTA--In what is widely believed to be the result of clerical error
>on the part of Heaven's massive soul-evaluation and
>punishment-allocation bureaucracy, The Calcutta Daily-Telegram reported
>Monday that beloved missionary caregiver Mother Teresa was condemned to
>agonizing, eternal torment in Hell following her death last Friday at
>the age of 87.
>
>Widely expected to ascend into Paradise and take her rightful place
>among the saints to the glorious fanfare of horns and choruses upon her
>passing, she was instead hurled from the firmament into the bowels of
>the Lake of Fire.
>
>"We can only assume that some sort of mix-up occurred in the processing
>phase," said St. Peter, the heavenly official in charge of the Book of
>Life, in which the names of those chosen to ascend to the Gates of
>Heaven are written.  "Unfortunately, when you deal with over 70 million
>souls a day, these kinds of mistakes happen. What can I say? I don't
>know what else to tell you."
>
>Mother Teresa, who for decades inspired the world with her selfless
>devotion to the starving, disease-ridden masses of Calcutta, was
>unavailable for comment, as she was being lowered upside-down into a vat
>of boiling human excrement by a trio of pitchfork-wielding
>demons. Similar punishment reportedly awaits her for the rest of
>eternity.
>
>Ever since Monday, heavenly angels, cherubim, seraphim, and other
>secondary celestial entities have been working around the clock to keep
>up with the enormous volume of intercessionary prayers arriving daily on
>Mother Teresa's behalf. Despite the tremendous number of pleas, however,
>Heaven essentially has its hands tied.
>
>"It's sad that this happened," the archangel Gabriel, a spokesperson for
>Heaven, told reporters. "But we really can't do anything about it. The
>whole point of eternal damnation is that it is inescapable, absolute,
>and irrevocable. If the Lord were to turn around and pull her out of
>Hell now, he'd be turning his back on millennia of Catholic doctrine, on
>everything Mother Teresa stood for."
>
>Her arthritic limbs snapping like twigs as her frail, 4'11" frame was
>rent asunder by the claws of grotesque, multi-limbed demons, Mother
>Teresa reportedly screamed in indescribable agony as the superheated
>gases of Hell's unholy furnace blackened and charred her hair and
>face. According to a New York Times report, her skull has already been
>used as a drinking goblet by Satan, the Great Deceiver himself, and the
>esteemed nun's rape at the hands of insatiable, barbed-penis-wielding
>hellhounds in the near-future is considered "highly likely."
>
>"I can't believe this happened," said stunned Catholic Cristina
>Fontanez, 38, of Petaluma, CA. "She must have been so shocked when,
>after a lifetime of good works, she found herself face-to-face with
>Satan. Instead of being thrust into the living and redemptive light of
>Jesus' love for all time upon her death, she instead found herself being
>slit from crotch to sternum and suffering the pain of red-hot
>instruments of torture repeatedly being plunged deep into her writhing
>entrails."
>
>Speculation varies as to what could have caused such a miscarriage of
>heavenly justice. While some contend that Mother Teresa's policy of not
>administering medication to the sick and dying in her clinics may have
>caused some in Heaven to doubt her true compassion, others believe that
>her constant speeches against birth control--a contributing factor to
>mass overpopulation, poverty and starvation throughout the Third
>World--may be to blame.
>
>Still others posit that Teresa may have sinned in her heart at some
>point during her long life, qualifying her for eternal damnation despite
>a history of good works.
>
>"According to Catholic doctrine, even one moment of lust would be enough
>to justify Mother Teresa's banishment to the flame," said Archbishop
>Janiusz Wolsczya of Krakow. "It is possible that after years of celibacy
>and self-denial, her natural desires for sexual release may have built
>to a breaking point. I imagine that sleeping alone on that hard cot all
>those years and donating every ounce of her strength to the care of the
>poor, she must have been very lonely. The compulsion to masturbate must
>have been enormous."
>
>Most observers, however, reject these explanations, firm in the belief
>that the eternal punishment is undeserved, the result of simple
>bureaucratic error on the part of heavenly officials.
>
>"I promise a full investigation into this matter," the Apostle John,
>seated at the right hand of Christ Almighty, told reporters. "If any
>evidence of incompetence or error on the part of the officials who
>conducted Mother Teresa's afterlife evaluation is found, I assure you
>there will be serious repercussions."
>
>Despite such strongly worded statements from Heaven, a majority of
>followers on Earth are calling the promise of a full investigation a
>case of "too little, too late."
>
>"I feel like this has forever weakened the foundation of my faith," said
>73-year-old Giancarlo Rossetti of Milan, one of over 300,000 protesters
>who crowded Vatican Square Tuesday to call for an immediate reversal of
>the Mother Teresa Hell condemnation. "She was a good woman, and she does
>not deserve to have her eyes torn out of their sockets by flaming packs
>of ravenous demon-dogs."
>
>Satan, speaking from deep within his fortress in the Hell city of Dis,
>described the late Mother Teresa's soul as "succulent and tasty."
>