What is the similarity between the Starship Enterprise and a piece of toilet paper? Answer: they both circle Uranus looking for Klingons.

 

What’s the difference between a lawyer and a catfish? Answer: One’s a scum sucking bottom feeder and the other’s a fish.

 

A priest, a physician and a lawyer went to the beach. While they were sunbathing, the tide came in and cut them off from the mainland. They were separated from the mainland by a channel teeming with sharks.

 

The priest said “I have to give a 3:00 o’clock mass” and he proceeded to wade into the channel. Needless to say, the sharks were in a feeding frenzy and the poor priest disappeared from view.

 

The physician said: “What are we going to do, I have an open heart surgery scheduled for 3:30. The lawyer turned to the physician and winked. The lawyer then whistled and all of the sharks lined up so that the lawyer was able to walk on their backs to the mainland.

 

The physician yelled across at the lawyer “Why did they do that?”

 

The lawyer said “Professional Courtesy.”

 

Religion in middle adulthood – pp. 494-497

Religion in late adulthood – pp. 569-571

 

Marcus Aurelius: “Our life is what our thoughts make it.

 

“God don’t make no junk.”

 

“Dr. Schwimmer

(Office Upstairs)

 

Lamarck – Can inherit acquired skills.

Vighotsky – Knowledge and skills come from interaction with the group.

 

Goldstein in Orwell’s 1984. Big Brother is God – “I love Big Brother.”

 

Chocolate House in Brave New World.

 

“Ford’s in his flivver,

All’s right with the world.”

 

From Romans: “If God is with me, who can be against me?”

 

German belt buckles all said “Gott mit uns”.

 

 

How to tell if you are getting old?

 

      1.    You notice a three foot hair growing out of your ear. It wasn’t there yesterday.

 

      2.    Instead of thinking it’s 10 p.m. – where are the kids, you think: It’s 10 p.m., where am I?

 

      3.    You have to be reminded to put on your socks before you put on your shoes.

 

      4.    You see your picture on a milk carton at the supermarket.

 

Without religion, you can get cynical. Consider the case of Jess Lair, a college professor from Montana, who wrote “I’m Okay, You’re Okay”.

 

His next book was “I’m Okay, But I’m Worried About You”.

 

His next book (still in manuscript) is “I’m Okay, You’re Crap”.

 

Without religion, this can happen.

 

There are irreligious jokes too. Consider the following:

 

The fraternity could be I Felta Thy, I Laida Theta or I Tappa Keg. It doesn’t really matter. After a big rush party, one fraternity brother turned to another and said:

 

“I don’t care if he does wear sandals, any guy who can change water into wine oughta be pledged.”

 

The Polish Pope performed his first miracle: he made a lame man blind.

 

A priest and a nun were playing golf. Each time the priest made a bad putt, he would exclaim “Goddamnit, missed again!”.

 

      The sky started to darken and a bolt of lightning came from the clouds and struck the nun dead. A booming voice was heard from the sky saying “Medamnit, missed again!”.

 

And, of course, what are the most fearsome words that a suburban householder can hear? “The Mormons are at the door!”

 

What is religion? Understanding that something you don’t understand is in control of things you don’t understand.

 

Marx: “Religion is the opiate of the masses.”

 

Our textbook says that one concern about religion is that it deflects people from facing real life issues. Could the book be referring to Mother Theresa, Martin Luther King, Jr., Desmond Tutu, St. Paul, Mohatma Ghandi and Reinhold Niebur?

 

I am a Unitarian, if I attend church at all. A Unitarian is defined as “a person with no invisible means of support.”

 

 

A high school football player’s father was blind and in ill health, but he attended all of his son’s games. The father died. In the next football game, the son played halfback and gained over 200 yards. In fact, he was the game’s star.

 

After the game, the coach said to him: “What happened, Bob? You were terrific tonight.”

 

Bob said: “It’s the first time my father ever saw me play.”

 

 

An unusually high tide left thousands of starfish stranded high and dry. A little boy was going along the beach picking up starfish and carrying them to the water.

 

A man came along and said to the boy: “Why are you doing that? There are 1000’s of them - it doesn’t matter.”

 

The boy picked up a starfish and carried it to the water. Holding the starfish in his hand, he turned to the man and said: “It matters to this one.

 

A young man grew up on Park Avenue in New York City. After graduating from Harvard Medical School, his family expected him to set up a medical practice on Park Avenue to serve wealthy clients.

 

Instead he moved to a small town in New Jersey and set up an office over a pharmacy in the poor part of town. He practiced medicine there providing free medical care to families that could not otherwise afford to see a doctor.

 

Tragically, he died at a young age and his family, from whom he was estranged, did not hear about his death until some time after. They found out what cemetery he was buried in and set out to visit his grave.

 

On the way to the cemetery in their big Mercedes Benz, his mother said: “I bet that they did not even give him a proper headstone”

 

Sure enough, when they got to the gravesite, there was no headstone, only a simple pole on which was affixed a plaque which said: “Dr. Schwimmer – Office Upstairs”.

 

A college student came home from college. She noticed that her elderly grandfather would retire to the attic every day to read the Bible, so she asked her mother: “What is grandpa doing in the attic?”

 

Her mother replied: “He’s cramming for his finals.”

 

God is dead.

 

      -Nietsche

 

Nietsche is dead.

 

      -God

 

Found on a restroom wall at the Yale Theological Institute:

 

      “Reality is a crutch.”

 

Why did Nixon see Deep Throat four times?

 

A:    He wanted to make sure he got it down Pat.

 

Nixon was the only president to win a Grammy. He won in 1973 in the category “Best Editing of a Sound Recording.”

 

Why do lawyers wear red power ties?

 

A:    It keeps the foreskin from covering the face.

Before I ever knew him, a friend of mine joined the Hare Krishnas and stayed at their temple in Los Angeles. Although he was an insulin-dependent diabetic, they persuaded him to stop his insulin injections.

 

As a result, he developed kidney problems which required dialysis treatments. Because of multiple health problems which developed, he chose to stop the dialysis treatments and end his life.

 

Two days before he died at his mother’s home in Seattle, he told me this joke and made me promise that I would pass it on whenever I could:

 

Scientists in Florida were trying to extend the life span of porpoises in their research facility. They found out that feeding the porpoises baby sea gulls from the nearby beach seemed to allow the porpoises to live without aging.

 

One morning a scientist went to the beach to check the traps and found two baby sea gulls trapped inside.

 

He took the baby gulls and went back to the research facility. Just outside the facility, two African lions were lounging and the scientist gingerly stepped over them. He was immediately arrested by the FBI. What was the charge:

 

The Indictment read: “[Violation of the Mann Act] Transporting young gulls across staid lions for immortal porpoises.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

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