VERSION|0.5.1|SUBJECT|Rev Dr Michael Banner, Dean and Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge  |CONTENT|[b]Rating[/b] 4 out of 5 (Highly platitudinous)

[url=http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap130328.html][img=images/2013/03/pic130328.jpg popup=false float=right][/url]The British Museum is holding an exhibition on [url=http://www.britishmuseum.org/whats_on/exhibitions/pompeii_and_herculaneum.aspx]Pompeii and Herculaneum[/url]. Pompeii and Herculaneum were destroyed by an eruption of Mount Vesuvius. In less than one day, the populations were scalded, suffocated and smothered under the ash.

People lived and died in Pompeii and Herculaneum. Coincidentally, Jesus lived and died, and then lived again before going up into the sky on a cloud. Has anyone mentioned that it's Holy Week this week? Well it is, it's Holy Week this week. Holy Week is when Christians remember what happened in Holy Week.

People say they would like to die suddenly like the people of Pompeii and Herculaneum but people don't really want to die suddenly - scalded, suffocated and smothered under the ash in less than a day. People would really like a long, slow, lingering death like Jesus on the cross. The drawn out nature of crucifixion is just what you need to put all your affairs in order.

Jesus used the opportunity to give his mother a new son. This new son then had a new mother, who had previously been Jesus' mother but was now her new son's new mother. This was because he didn't realise that he was going to rise from the dead, even though he prophesied that he would rise from the dead in three days time, which he did two days later. So his mother would need a new son and her new son would need a new mother.

People in the Middle Ages died too. Unlike foolish modern people, they wisely prayed to be crucified so that they could organise some new sons and new mothers and also to beg the Invisible Magic Friend to give them a happy afterlife, to make up for the miserable one they'd just had, and not to burn them for all eternity.

And that is today's news from a faith perspective.

[url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0174l76]Listen/Read[/url]|CATEGORIES|77|IP-ADDRESS|94.168.119.214|DATE|1364461134|CREATEDBY|admin
