Church of Life After Shopping
Religion is a contentious subject; always has been, always will be. There are documented cases where people from the same congregation split from the church they have attended for decades because the preacher doesn't practice the religion as some members of the congregation believe it should be practiced. Then, there's no shortage of historic accounts of holy wars or crusades.
There's also no shortage of parody and criticism when it comes to religion. There's already the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, but there's also a church that opposes consumerism, believing that doing so is environmental friendly.
That's the Reverend Billy and the Church of Life After Shopping.
This church comes complete with its own Stop Shopping Gospel Choir, which has traveled the world, singing anti-consumerist songs such as "Back Away (From Walmart)" and "Shopocalypse."
Sermons are delivered opposing a consumer culture that demands big dams built to supply electricity to factories that produce more consumer goods; they sing gospel to tree-sitters in Northern California who were protecting great old-growth trees from logging, and organize many more events that muster either support from believers or ridicule from critics.
They have even coined a word to describe America's consumption of fossil fuels. The fact that Americans make up only 5 percent of the world's total population but consume more than 25 percent of its energy, they call it "fuel-aholics."
Most environmentally sensitive individuals do what they can to reduce, reuse, and recycle, but joining such a church and cloaking environmentalism with Christianity provokes enthusiasm in some, and down-right hostility and derision in others.
At the end of the day, each of us must follow what we believe to be true and real to ourselves, whether as a Protestant, Catholic, Muslim, Buddhist or even as an atheist, free-thinker, or philosopher; whether a strict vegan or an exclusive carnivore; whether conveniently eco-friendly, can't-be-bothered, or can-only-shower-for-5-minutes-because-I-must-save-water. Regardless of what each of us believe in, our actions will display our values and credo much more honestly than what we profess as our religion or system of belief because our daily actions expose more of our beliefs than attending, or not attending, any organized, institutional religious service.
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