A Cross to Bear

By Pearl Bullivant on May 20, 2021 in Satire

Keeping the faith. Photo: Chris Chen

Pearl received a phone call from God last week. There I was, recumbent on my couch, doped up on Valium and red wine, binge-watching Unit One on SBS when the Big Lady (and I don’t mean Gina Rinehart) calls, directing me to get off my COVID Ambassadorship backside and do something about Australia’s goddamned awful Prime Minister (FYI – God had read my commentary on ScoMo in The Beast, June 2020).
Hell, did God rant, and at a most inconvenient time; Pearl doesn’t like to be bothered when drooling over Mads Mikkelsen. Quoting Matthew 6:1-34 (re the hypocrisy of marketing guru-types), God told me that She is extremely unhappy with Scotty’s recent sermon to the Australian Council of Churches. God feels that the prime minister would be far better placed concerning himself with the slow roll out of the COVID vaccine and the treatment of women in his domain. Not that God is interested in secular affairs, but someone needs to be held accountable for the vile behaviour of men who ‘graffiti’ the desks of their female colleagues, and God would castrate them in good old-fashioned Old Testament style.
God is incensed that a man who is doing his best to facilitate the environmental vandalism of the earth She created claims to be one of Her close personal chums. She denies ever communicating with him through a picture of an eagle and appointing him to the position of prime minister (she has her eye on Penny Wong), nor did she use Scott (and his sidekick Jenny) to “provide relief and comfort” to those in Western Australia affected by Cyclone Seroja (God was far too busy providing alms to those impacted by the same cyclone in Indonesia). And how incredulous that he feels he has curried favour over other religious ‘identities’ such as the former Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, who proudly bears Her mantel as a member of Extinction Rebellion.
God calls on Australians to grasp onto the sanctity of its secularism (she is appalled that the Australian Christian Lobby denies that Australia is secular, just as it denies the existence of global warming and same sex marriage) and warns us all to beware of a man who is using pseudo-theology, cherry picking his favourite parts of the Old Testament to market his neo-conservative political ideology that denies any responsibility for those less fortunate.
And, what is with the buck passing? Scotty’s warped belief that only God and “the community” are capable of remedying man-made problems? God had assumed that, under LNP ideology, problem solving was the responsibility of market forces, not spiritual forces. After all, the Australian Financial Review tells us “we must trust in the market to get five-star quality aged care” and hence, in the market (not God) Australians must trust. Although God does not do trickledown economics, if Scotty fails to desist with his hypocritical bothering then God will be forced to trickle down Her neo-Marxist son, Jesus, for another gig in John Farnham-style. PTL!