Yes, I know I always catch up with hot trends two years after the fact. “Oh My Gods: The Pagan Based Comic Strip for the Polytheistic Masses” ran a spoof of Unitarian Universalism back in June, 2004. Unitarian Universalists are portrayed as the Borg from the Star Trek movies, assimilating all other religious traditions into their own bland, tasteless religious mash. In my favorite strip from this “Oh My Gods” series, the dialogue goes like this:
Kay, the leader of the Spiritual Fish cult: “So you guys just go around assimilating other religions and then arguing over proper ways to have spiritual worship?”
UU borg members in unison: “Yes we wouldn’t want to offend anyone. We have to make sure we have at least one person from each social, gender, and sexual class before we can practice equally.”
Kay: “I haven’t seen spirituality this watered down since they tried to say Beltane wasn’t about sex.” Link
What?! Did I hear wincing coming from my Unitarian Universalist readers? Then read the whole series — the UU character is introduced to “Oh My Gods!” here, and the series on UU assimilating other religions starts here.
Why would we start wincing now? I don’t even sigh any more.
Huh. Tad bit nasty. So, hmmm … the fundamentalist Christians see us as the church of Satan and the Pagans see us as bland and innocuous.
We must be doing something right!
Lizard Eater
Not exclusively a Christian, not exclusively a Pagan,
But Definitely, Positively, Exclusively
a Unitarian Universalist
Sad. Funny. Sad. Funny. Mostly boring.
That being said, I wish they had the UU bumpersticker for sale.
It appeals to my not-so-inner geek.
I might still get a Borg/UU shirt or something.
[cue expressionless voice] Scott you do not wince because you are a part of the UUBorg now.
Lizard Eater — The cartoon strikes me as a lot less nasty than Garrison Keillor. But yeah, I think we must be doing something right!
CDS — [cue expressionless voice again] Wear the shirt… become a part of the UUBorg.
OOOOOOH! Coffe jokes.
How droll.
The only reason I giggled even a little is because it reminded me of one my YRUUers several years ago who insisted that adults participating in the responsive readings sounded like the Borg. I still can’t shake that image.
I laughed… and then downloaded the whole lot of strips. It gives us something to think about, and laugh about, ’cause if we can’t laugh at our failings and foibles, then we really are the Borg. If there’s truth that hurts, well, then let’s do something about it. On the other hand, there’s no such thing as bad publicity.