The Last Supper

Happy Easter EVERYBODY!!!! And that goes not only to the Christians, but also the Jews, Muslims, Scientologists, Astrologists and Witch Doctors out there.

As regular readers out there will know, not only am I a practising buddhist, I'm also deeply spiritual in a number of other ways. This all stems back to a time when I ask myself and the blogosphere in general, whether there really is a God.

So I'll say it again, Happy Easter EVERYONE.

Easter hasn't always been about seeing how many chocolate eggs you can stuff down in a day, it's commemorating the day that Jesus Christ was reincarnated, much to the dismay of the Romans. This is almost certainly the root cause of all that Catholic Guilt.

Today is also a great day in the history of Barry Newsdesk. Because, thanks to the additional of my excellent new French friend Mess, I now have a whopping 12 followers. Much like Jesus did.

Following on from yesterday's post about the formation of Newsdesk United. I thought, in honour of it being Easter, I would asign my followers Apostlistical names. I had a pretty good idea who would be Judas Iscariot, but then I thought better of it. It would be what religious people call blasphemous. Which is basically just another way of saying I'd be taking the piss.

Yesterday, I posted a picture of Brian Clough whom many Notts Forest fans believed to be God, and today I've got a picture of Brian Cohen played by Graham Chapman in the classic 1979 film, The Life of Brian. In which he is mistaken for the messiah.

When the film was released it caused uproar among the religious community, who deemed its content blasphemous. There it is again. They were basically saying that John Cleese, Michael Palin and the gang were taking the piss out of religious bigotry and Christian hypocrisy.

And, in many ways, there were. But because those chaps all went to Cambridge University, they were able to argue that actually it was satire.

Satire is what Jewish comedian Sacha Baron Cohen calls his interpretation of that Kazakhstanian character Borat. But really, he's just taking the piss

You see readers, it's a minfield out there.

Anyway, I'm off down the pub to meet Dave, he reckons he's got some news for me!

See you all at tomorrow's paaaaaaaaaaaaarty!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Don't forget, tell a friend and bring a bottle!
peace out.bazz :-)

Six as a parrot

It seems like only yesterday that I gained my first ever follower. On January 25th Jennifer Walker-Shannon tied her colours to the Barry Newsdesk flagpole and I was jubilant. Over time the number of followers grew, from tiny acorns do mighty oaks grow (as my second ever follower and knitting enthusiast Donnac1968 would say ).

Today though, is a grim day in the life of Barry Newsdesk. Because, as with trading on the stock exchange, things can go down as well as up. Where once there were nine, there now stand six. Steve, Vince and Jack Nork have all, quite inexplicably, stopped following yours truly.

What’s wrong guys? Was it something I wrote? My last post was massively upbeat about Christianity, so maybe those guys are just Satanists. Like Jesus though I will turn the other cheek, I’m still going to be following their blogs and I urge you to do likewise. Some of the insight you’ll see will change your world.

I won’t lie to you though. Losing followers is like losing limbs. Well, maybe not limbs, but fingers or toes, something that it’s really nice to have but wouldn’t stop you leading a normal life. Maybe an ear or an eyebrow. Put it this way, it’s like losing a part of yourself that would still mean you didn’t qualify for the Paralympics.

Maybe this is how Jesus felt when Judas Priest snitched on him.

The Christians

It’s Sunday today and traditionally that’s the day Mum goes to church. As I write these words she is almost certainly wishing Rev Smyth well and congratulating him on yet another wonderful service.

You’ve got to take your hat off to the Christians. When it comes to religions, Buddhism aside, Christianity is almost certainly the nicest. The take home message of Christianity is that you should be nice to people and expect others to be nice to you, and even if they aren’t you should (and I quote Jesus Himself) “turn the other cheek”.

Christianity is the most popular religion on the planet. I think that’s probably because it appeals to something deep within us all. Even if you mess up and do nasty things, at the end of the day God will let you off and St Peter will let you into Heaven.

It wasn’t always the case that Christianity was so popular, of course. Before Jesus was born 2009 years ago, in a manger no crib for a bed, no one had even heard of Christianity. Jesus Himself was actually a Jew, although He said a few things back then that upset his fellow Jews and so they persuaded the Romans put to Him to death. Even then, He still found time to let the Jews off, “forgive them father, they don’t know what they’re doing,” He said.

I don’t know about you readers, I would have been absolutely bloody fuming!!!

I’m pretty sure the Old Testament God would have smited the Romans and the Jews, but He didn’t, He just turned the other cheek. I think it’s fair to say that passive resistance was invented by Jesus and not by Gandhi as so many people believe.

Maybe if Gandhi had come up with something new there would be millions of Gandhians roaming the earth wearing loin cloths and what not.

For years after Jesus died, Christians were persecuted by the Romans. Which seems odd. I doubt whether Zeus et al were really that worried about some guys who was basically a hippie.

Another reasons that I think Christianity is so popular is because there’s something for everyone. It’s pretty flexible in terms of rules. For that benefit, we have King Henry VIII to thank. Henry used to be a Roman Catholic.

That’s right readers, Roman Catholic!

After all those years feeding Christians to lions in the name of entertainment, the Romans had a change of heart it seems. Ironically, Roman Catholics make up the largest segment of the Christians.

The Roman Catholics have got some pretty strict rules on how you should be a Christian. But King Henry VIII decided he didn’t fancy playing by the rules. I guess that’s what happens when you’re the King. I mean, you’ve only got to look at what happened to Elvis to see that sometimes a little bit of power is a dangerous thing.

Anyway, Henry wanted to ditch his Spanish wife Catherine of Aragon. But according to the Pope (even to this day this guys basically heads up Catholicism), Henry would not be allowed to do this. Well, this was like a red rag to a bull, it was basically like telling Elvis he couldn’t have any more burgers.

Henry set up the Church of England. This is basically an off-shoot of Catholicism that lets its practitioners pretty much do what they like. Henry even chopped a couple of his wives heads off. Even though Rev Smyth is part of the CofE I doubt he would condone that sort of behaviour.

I like the Christians, they’re friendly, flexible and pretty much keep themselves to themselves. Jesus was famously protective of His Mum, which can only be a good thing. He gave us Christmas, undoubtedly the best of the public holidays, and Easter which not only gets us a Bank Holiday Monday, but also Friday off too. Not to mention the gorgeous chocolate eggs!

I also enjoy the music of The Christians, I’m not talking about all the hymns (although Cat Steven's Morning Has Broken is lovely), I’m talking about the late 1980s Liverpool-based pop band formed by brothers Russell and Garry Christian.

Terry Christian is another famous northerner with the Holy surname.

I’ve not finished my research into religion, but I have to say Christianity is among my favs.

Nice one JC!

Another follower!!!!

It seems the old Newsdesk charm has reeled in yet another follower. Donnac1968* is a fellow blogger. And, if I may say so myself, is nothing short of prolific.

*Apologies Donnac1968 - this pic of you has come out highly pixelated, which gives the impression that I've made the image blurry in order to project your identity, much like they do on TV shows featuring criminals.

Donnac1968 has also been dabbling in Twitterland and Tweets under the name 'electrogirl68'.

Her blog, ‘From Little Acorns’, covers a wide range of topics. Knitting seems to feature prominently, as do photographs of Mighty Boosh star Noel Fielding. She has won a couple of awards and, like Jesus, has 12 followers (at the time of writing).

Do you ever wonder how many followers Jesus would have if he was around today….?

Wonder no more according to Twitter he has 510 followers. This figure comes in well under the number of followers He is estimated to have that follow using the more conventional methods.

Clearly, both Donnac1968 and myself have a long way to go before we can hope to achieve the sort of popularity possible when you’re the Son of God.