It's almost Easter, send in the clowns

Do you remember when Hollywood hypocrite Mel Gibson released his noteworthy film, "Passion of the Christ" just a few months before Easter in 2004?

(I say Gibson's a hypocrite because anyone professing so vocally to being a Christian who then cheats on his wife of 20-something years and shacks up with a model half his age and fathers a child out of wedlock by her is, well, a tad hypocritical don'tcha think?) But I digress.

Anyway, if memory serves me the fallout from Gibson's film was tremendous with both Jewish and Christian groups decrying everything from sketchy historical accuracy to the portrayal of those who ordered and carried out Christ's crucifixion as being anti-Semitic.

Four years later the whole "Jesus Tomb" story hit the press. Interestingly enough another Hollywood gasbag, film director James Cameron, led the charge to prove that an ossuary (bone box) found by Israeli construction workers in 1980 during the excavation of a site on which to build an apartment building was, in fact, the final repository for the earthly remains of Christ.

Naturally, a symposium at which Cameron and Canadian filmmaker Simcha Jacobovici presented the box and asserted its authenticity took place -- you guessed it -- a couple months before Easter.

After all, if the bones of Jesus were buried that sort of negates the biblical account of his physical body ascending into heaven.

And anyone who knows how athiests think knows that many of them dream of the day when the whole account of Jesus' life and works is debunked once and for all. And what critic of Christianity doesn't know that the resurrection of Christ is the hub around which so much of Christian theology turns?

Disprove the resurrection and you've bagged yourself a big 'un.

Sadly for Cameron and Jacobovici, a cadre of well-respected archaeologists and scholars subsequently denounced their valiant effort to prove all Christians are superstitious idiots.

Noted Jesus scholar Geza Vermes issued a statement that said the arguments for the Talpiot tomb (Talpiot being the city in which it was found) were not "just unconvincing but insignificant" and that most of the 50 or so participants at the symposium concurred.

Sigh.

You'd think that after the firestorm of Gibson's movie and the dedicated efforts of Cameron et al that the whole Easter story could rest in peace. The athiests get to poke fun at us at Christmas, isn't that enough?

Apparently not.

In Davenport, IA last week, the city manager Craig Malin sent a memo to all municipal employees informing them that Good Friday would now be known as "Spring Holiday" and that the city's calendar would immediately reflect this change.

I'll pause for a moment so that those of you who are believers can digest this. . .

Ready to continue?

Yes, you read correctly. Good Friday, the day on which Christians around the world commemorate the crucifixion of Jesus, would now be called "Spring Holiday."

How joyful! How marvelous! How completely asinine and offensive.

As you might imagine, the Davenport City Council caught an earful and has reversed Mr. Malin's order. It's worth noting that Malin acted out of turn since any changes to the city's calendar must be voted upon by the city council.

But the deeper question is this: What prompted Craig Malin to go over the heads of his superiors to change the calendar's wording?

Enter the Davenport Civil Rights Commission.

"We merely made a recommendation that the name be changed to something other than Good Friday," said Tim Hart, the commission's chairman. "Our Constitution calls for separation of church and state. Davenport touts itself as a diverse city and given all the different types of religious and ethnic backgrounds we represent, we suggested the change."

I'll pause again for those of you who have bothered to read the U.S. Constitution so that you can digest THIS. . .

Alrighty. Let's all say it together, shall we? THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA DOES NOT CONTAIN THE PHRASE 'SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE' NOR DOES IT REQUIRE PUBLIC ENTITIES TO REFRAIN FROM DISPLAYING RELIGIOUS SYMBOLS OR REFERRING TO RELIGIOUS MATTERS.

Come on, people. Say it loud! Say it early and often! Write it on your doorposts and on your gates! (Deut. 6:9 for those who don't know)

And when all else fails, remember this:

"He himself bore our sins in his body upon the cross,
so that, free from sin, we might live for righteousness.
By his wounds you have been healed" (l Peter 2:24).

And that's really all you need to know.