Thread: Religious Humor
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Old 10-24-2007, 04:16 PM   #10 (permalink)
Matthew Shea
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Join Date: Nov 2006
Location: Detroit
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I know for a fact that it's not just my church. I've known many priests with sense of humor. When I was going to grade school in the '80s, my parents actually went out to dinner with the pastor, Fr. O'Neill and the assistant priest, Fr. Ron Cyprus (rest his soul). Fr. Ron was saying that in his family's native country, his name is pronounced "Ship-rishh". Fr. O'Neill starting calling him "♥♥♥♥♥-rich" (only privately, though).

The priest that married my wife and I was well known for his humor. In fact, he was friends with a Baptist pastor (which admittedly IS a bit unusual). This pastor asked him to preach to his congregation one Sunday. He had already prepared a homily about the Virgin Mary for that Sunday, so he decided to give it. If you know anything about Baptists and Catholics, Catholics hold the Virgin Mary in MUCH higher regard than Baptists. So not only did that take some serious guts, but he had the congregation at my parents' church nearly in tears laughing when he was telling the story of what happened (it went surprisingly well, for the record). This is the same guy who once incorporated an empty 40 oz. beer bottle into a sermon.

The pastor of my church almost always opens with a joke or a funny story. Before coming to my church, he was the rector of Detroit's cathedral, so he's pretty close to the archbishop.

The current pastor of my parents' church as well as the current assistant pastor are both constantly making quips and jokes in their sermons.

I should add that, while these men all have a good sense of humor, they're all very respectful where they should be and are very careful to maintain propriety during the mass, so there's never any disrespect.

So this isn't just my experience I'm talking about. Not by a long shot.
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