PZ Myers vs The Cracker

Derek turned me onto the Pharyngula blog a month or so ago, and it's a good daily read. PZ Myers is a scientist and ardent critic of religion. I tend to agree with most of his perspectives, and he's pretty funny when he gets going on a rant.

Recently, he tore into the catholic Church and Cracker-gate. Basically, someone snuck a communion cracker out of a mass, and overreaction ensued. One church spokesperson called it a hate crime, the Catholic League suggested the student should be expelled and labeled the cracker a "hostage" - total lack of perspective. Myers rightly exposed the inanity, and then wrote this:

Can anyone out there score me some consecrated communion wafers? There's no way I can personally get them — my local churches have stakes prepared for me, I'm sure — but if any of you would be willing to do what it takes to get me some, or even one, and mail it to me, I'll show you sacrilege, gladly, and with much fanfare. I won't be tempted to hold it hostage (no, not even if I have a choice between returning the Eucharist and watching Bill Donohue kick the pope in the balls, which would apparently be a more humane act than desecrating a goddamned cracker), but will instead treat it with profound disrespect and heinous cracker abuse, all photographed and presented here on the web. I shall do so joyfully and with laughter in my heart.

I found the "kick the pope in the balls" comment unnecessary. I think it would have been funnier had he remained above personal attacks and focused on wafer abuse. But whatever rudeness he might be showing is completely overshadowed by the absurdness of the response.

The Catholic League responded. This part is particularly heinous:

It is hard to think of anything more vile than to intentionally desecrate the Body of Christ.

Remember, "desecrating the body of Christ" is "stealing a cracker". It's pretty insulting to all the people in the world to whom vile things have been committed to say you can't top that.

It has now escalated to the Republican National Convention.

It's sad the Catholic League has gotten any traction out of this. They've apparently gotten the link to Myers' blog removed from his web site and are asking for the school to discipline him, perhaps even fire him. I don't know how much they had to do with changing the title of the original post from "It's a Goddamned Cracker" to "It's a Frackin' Cracker" (note the URL still ends with its_a_goddamned_cracker.php). Richard Dawkins has personally appealed for support of Myers.

And Myers hasn't even done anything to a cracker yet, he only talked about it. I can't wait to see the reaction once we get a youtube video of a consecrated wafer being lit on fire, or dressed like a mini prostitute.