Bizarro World

Some of the stories in the news are difficult to believe. Do you ever read an online newspaper & wonder for a moment if you accidentally went to The Onion instead?

Here are some of the better ones that I've read recently:

Urine big trouble, mister
Children today have enough to deal with what with child predators, school shootings, bullies & the horrifying wave of "healthy" foods in schools nationwide. As if they don't have enough on their minds, why not bother your young relatives at school when you need a cup of urine?

A Kentucky man was recently arrested in an elementary school, soliciting clean urine for a drug test. When his poor little nephew couldn't produce, he started asking other children & they alerted a teacher.

But don't we all have one of these uncles? If he's anything like me, it'll be years before little Timmy makes a connection between this incident & the "horns" that smell like a skunk at Uncle Bob's but he will make the connection.

Later on in high school or college, Uncle Bob will be briefly popular with Timmy & his friends until they realize that he's the only one of the group that never springs for the pizza.


When Your Little Buddy Lets You Down
In unrelated criminal urine activity a Florida man is in big trouble for not being able to produce. For unknown reasons, the convenience store clerk peed into a bottle of Mountain Dew & then sold it to a customer who got ill.

As part of his sentencing, the man has to undergo regular drug tests but now finds he suffers from a shy bladder & is unable to produce. According to an MSN News article, peeing got him into this mess & now peeing is the only thing that can get him out of it.

Talk about scared straight.


Donate to Pension for Child Molesters
A group of Roman-Catholic priests are raising ire by soliciting donations for defrocked priests. In some cases, this wouldn't be such a bad thing. Some very good priests have been defrocked & excommunicated for asking the Church to be more progressive.

Some have ordained women, gotten married, supported same-sex marriage or merely spoken out against Church positions on bioethical issues.

Not all defrocked priests are potential martyrs & some totally deserve to be excommunicated. Like the pedophiles.

These men have ruined the lives of countless victims & families. They went to great lengths to hide their crimes at the expense of others. The average pedophile is said to have victimized approximately 117 children.

Unfortunately, it's primarily pedophiles that are being helped by this organization, although the group will give the money to a fund for the ill if they run out of needy child molesters.

The Manchester Union Leader reports that The Organization of Concerned Priests is a registered non-profit group that requests a minimum $1000 donation from all priests.

Most disturbingly, the group's president was quoted as saying, "We could not imagine how we would have coped if we were in their shoes."

Well for starters could I suggest not molesting children, not abusing your power, not manipulating everyone around you, not tarnishing an entire religion, not leading a life of crime . . .

I could go on & on but the basic idea here is that, forgiveness is a basic tenet of the Catholic faith & very few people are completely cut off from the Church entirely. Even those who've been disciplined & removed from service - including pedophiles - are usually eligible for various benefits.

The absolute heinousness of the extent of the crimes of which these men are guilty must be astonishing if they are completely cut off from the Church. The fact that these peers would solicit on their behalf when the world has an endless supply of worthy & needy people is horrifying.