Personal favorites: “The Death Cookie”, “Titanic” (mostly because I have a friend who is a Titanic fanatic (and was before the diCaprio movie was a glimmer in Cameron’s eye) who has annoted his copy with every factual error Chick makes about the Titanic), “Where’s Rabbi Waxman”, and “Reverend Wonderful”.
(As a side note- I’m sorely disappointed that they don’t have the text of “Dark Dungeons” (also known as “How Dungeons & Dragons promote Suicide, Witchcraft, and Satanism”) tract there; it’s always been one of my favorites.)
Second: Tell us your feelings about these things! Seen any in real life? Had someone force one upon you? Felt immensely persecuted because you’re a Catholic and happened to pick up one of the “The Pope is the Devil’s Tool” tracts?
Third: Keep it to the tracts, folks. No general Christian-bashing or general fundie-bashing. Focus on the innaccuracies and inconsistencies and general attitude of the Tracts themselves. dlv, this means you.
JMCJ
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God, those are strange! I’d never actually seen one before. They take complex theological issues and boil them down so far that there’s nothing left. I don’t think I’ll be reading them again.
Oops, sorry, it’s hard to get out of Burma-Shave mode.
I think these things are hilarious; they are too goofy and insane for me to get upset over. Have you ever gotten the Jews for Jesus fliers? They’re pretty funny too; and a few years back a Korean group was handing out booklets telling in grisly detail what would happen to you in each circle of hell.
Sometimes I take these things, just to have something to giggle at on the subway.
Oh man, these things tick me off, but just for one specific reason. I used to work in a video store in Ithaca, NY. About three days a week, I would open the store, go to the drop box, and scattered amongst the copies of Judge Dredd and Barney Goes to Camp would be these little comic books urging me to save my soul. I admit, many of our employees were in dire need of some sort of help, but I’m not sure why I.M. Jesusfriend would drop these things off all the time. We get the point, bucko! We’re all going to hell. We didn’t even have a porn section at these stores. Perhaps they felt we were contributing the the community’s downfall by offering The Last Temptation of Christ or something. Regardless, I would take the little booklets and read them, have a good laugh and throw them away. “I’ll save my soul when you remember to rewind your god-damned tapes!”
I haven’t seen any, but they reminded me of a children’s book that I saw occasionally when I was little. Every story ended with some angelic child dying of a wasting disease and angels coming down to get him on his death bed. The kicker was that the only place I ever saw these books was in doctors’ waiting rooms. How comforting.
Actually, my friend and I had copies of The Death Cookie pressed on us by some earnest soul a while ago. We, of course, laughed our asses off and threw them away, but it has led to speculation as to which of the numerous cookies we consume will be – The Death Cookie! So at least I got one on-going in-joke out of it.
I saw one that featured a little boy’s best friend dyeing in a car crash. When the little boy’s mom went to talk about it she said “You know Tommy, your friend died in a crash and now he is burning in HELL!” Talk about messing with people’s heads…
“Bad Bob” had me on the edge of my seat. I almost busted out bawlin’ when they put him in jail for selling crack.
It just wasn’t fair, because it clearly shows, on page 3, that the reason he turned out so evil was because his parents didn’t beat him with a rod when he was a child. Why should poor Bob have to suffer because he wasn’t properly abused by his stupid parents?
Maybe a little dip in the lake of fire would show those ignorant heathens the light.
… I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.
The thought of kids being force-fed a steady diet of this bullshit sorta’ takes the fun out of it.
I agree that the Chick tracts try to twist everything to promote their own viewpoint, but how much of it is really true? I have heard that HIV might possibly be able to get through condoms (although the statement that condoms are useless is ridiculous). And the Catholic Church is rather sensitive about anyone saying that the Eucharist is only symbolic. I don’t whether the quotes about anyone objecting to it being killed is true, but I wouldn’t be surprised.
Tom~ could answer this with more authority, and the proper terminology, but The Ryan said:
That is true, and one of the major doctrinal differences between Catholic and heretic^H^H^H^H^H^H^H Protestant beliefs. The Church holds that at the time of transubstantiation, the Host becomes in its essence the actual Body of Christ. Its material appearance, of course, does not alter. Protestant denominations feel it just represents the Body.
Seems petty to anyone not into it, but that’s how it stands. Of course, anything Chick says is a combination of misinformation, distortions, and lies.
Actually, I believe the High Church followers of the Church of England and a few of the Evangelische/Lutheran groups may also believe in the physical reality of Jesus in the Eucharist. (Polycarp?) We wrangle over (Aristotelian/Thomistic) Transubstantiation versus (Platonic/Augustinian/Lutheran) Consubstantiation, but those are discussions based on philosophical approaches (good reasons to hate and kill each other, of course) rather than actual beliefs regarding the Presence of Jesus. As DrF said, the Catholic teaching is that Jesus is physically present in the Eucharist. BTW. What in the world does a string of carats and capital H’s represent? It always looks like it should represent the sound that a cat makes while ejecting a hairball, but I have never seen it explained.)
^H is what delete was in the olden days. Correct me if I’m wrong, but Al Gore came up with it in a science fair.
As for Chick, I’ll quote a doomed soldier from Holy Joe: I couldn’t care less – let’s get out of here!
Although from a comic book readin’ standpoint, they work. I have to finish reading 'em, even if I’m not going to be irreversibly swayed by 'em.
Here’s the kicker: people are so malleable in these stories that one game of D&D or a sip of beer will damn 'em forever, but reading a tract will turn their life around. Never met anyone like that in the real world. (Let alone in the message board…)
“Jill, you have an unseen enemy. His name is Satan. He’s been planning your destruction for years.” from Party Girl
Oddly enough, I’ve seen one of these things or something frighteningly similar… there is a rest stop between SLC and Moab and I always stop there to let the dog pee. Usually, I have to go too. In the bathroom there is usually a stack of such… uh… dubious reading material.
My favorite thing is to read them and then wipe myself with the sanctimonious spewings. Guess they didn’t realize that that restroom is infamous for running out of TP!
