A Letter to the God-Botherer From Arizona Who Recently Bothered Me With A Letter That Somehow Reached Me In California

Dear Neighbour,
I live in the area. I haven’t been able to speak with you personally, but I have some important information to share. A sample of it is contained in the enclosed tract.

Dear God-Botherer,
Thanks for the leaflet about the end of the world, and the coming of the end of the world, and the way that I personally can be in the running to be part of the VIP set who will survive the end of the world. And will have a VIP party. In heaven. Which, based on the drawing on your leaflet, is a dairy farm in Switzerland.



So I’m looking at the drawing of the dairy farm in Switzerland. Correct me if I am wrong, but isn’t that Captain James T. Kirk plucking an apple from a perpetually full and autumnal tree in Swiss dairy farm heaven? Why, so it is. And there’s an Avon Lady in a twin-set offering apples to a woman wearing a sari. Or something ethnic. Anyway, she’s sort of brown. Ethnicky. You’re inclusive, right? That’s what that means. You don’t care who joins. You’ll take anyone. Everyone is smiling and scoffing apples. But where is Mr. Spock? Where is the Vulcan? Come to think of it, where are the Aliens? Are you saying Aliens can’t go to Heaven?

I am privileged to work along with a group of volunteers in upwards of 200 lands. In all these lands people are being invited to benefit from a program that gives the Bible’s answers to questions such as: why do we grow old and die? What is the purpose of life? How to [sic] find real happiness?

You must be very busy then, flying all over the world, constantly between upwards of 200 lands. In fact, you’re probably on a plane right now writing letters and enclosing pictures of Swiss dairy farms that discriminate against Aliens. Nice.

I happen to be an Alien myself: I have an official Alien Number from the U.S. Government, a number which comes with my Green Card, (which isn’t green, it’s more sort of olive), a number which grants me the same rights and privileges as any Humanoid in the US. Except of course, I cannot yet have my vote suspiciously ignored in a national election, but I do have a right to know by what authority your god excludes aliens like me, and Mr. Spock, from this Swiss Dairy Farm.

We are engaged in work because we are genuinely concerned with our neighbors. It is my hope that someday soon I will be able to speak to you personally.

I couldn’t advise it.

Anyway, thanks for the note. It was very kind of you to stop bothering God and start bothering me. I don’t know what I have done to deserve bothering, particularly not by a racist and persecutory sect of Swiss dairy-herders, but that’s the wonderful thing about you God-botherers: you always find time to bother someone with your shiny faces and your remorseless optimism about death.

But you know, if I wanted to be bothered by something with a shiny face and remorseless optimism, I’d buy a puppy.

AK-