Thoroughly Modern Messiah

“At first I was sure that he must be the Messiah, returned for his second coming. After all, he healed my injuries just by placing his hands on me after the accident,” recalls Amy Drickler, the victim of a serious car accident in Houston, Texas, whose life was saved by a mysterious stranger, who helped pull her from the wreckage, then apparently healed her multiple fractures and internal bleeding. “But before he laid his hands on, he asked me if I had health insurance cover and afterward asked for the details! I mean, that doesn’t very Messiah-like. I always assumed that Jesus healed for altruistic reasons rather than profit. But he did heal me, there’s no doubt of that.” Drickler’s insurance company has since confirmed that they are currently processing a claim for treatment from a practitioner. “The problem is that the individual making the claim doesn’t appear to be associated with any recognised hospital or medical practice and the details of the treatment are vague,” a spokesperson told the Houston Gun Fanciers Gazette. “We’re currently assessing reports from paramedics who attended the accident and medics who examined Miss Drickler subsequent to her alleged healing.”

Drickler’s experience is one of a growing number of reports of a mystery stranger offering healing services across the US. Bill Stripes, a sixty year old unemployed scaffolder from Chicago, for instance, claimed that, as he lay on the street, bleeding after being stabbed in a mugging, he was approached by a stranger offering to heal his wound. “He asked if I had insurance, when I told him I only had Medicaid, he said that he’d need cash up front. At least a thousand dollars!” he told a local TV station. “Obviously I didn’t have that kind of money, so the bastard just walked away and left me bleeding there! I had to wait thirty minutes for an ambulance and nearly bled to death! I knew I couldn’t trust him, with his beard and long hair. Hippie bastard!” In a further development, an individual fitting Stripe’s description has started appearing on various popular podcasts and vlogs, claiming to be the new Messiah. “Yeah sure, I’m the new Messiah. I am the Son of God, back to spread the word again,” he told bald headed idiot Joe Rogan. “But you know, the world’s changed, so the message has to change as well. It was all very well performing miracles free and for gratis back in the old days when I didn’t have an entire religion to bankroll, but nowadays everything is transactional – if I heal someone I have to ask: what’s in it for me? Because, believe me, running a religion doesn’t come cheap – it takes big bucks to maintain all those churches and to pay all those priests.” He further pointed out that paying for health care was an American tradition he wouldn’t want to break. “If you want free healing then Americans are just going to have to start paying their taxes to fund the sort of healthcare systems the rest of the civilised world has,” he joked. “Either that, or make sure your Part Three Medicare cover includes spiritual healing and miracles!”

The new Messiah also used his appearance on Rogan’s show to announce that, this coming, he would be accepting sponsorship, in return for his Holy endorsement. With no shortage of potential sponsors, his beatific face is already to be seen on billboards on online ads, endorsing a new crypto currency: ‘Crypto Christ – Financial Miracle For You!’ Another endorsement has been for controversial Trump supporter Mike Lindell’s ‘My Pillow’ company, with a TV ad featuring the Messiah with his arm around the moustachioed election denier announcing the new My Resurrection Pillow: ‘One night’s sleep with this pillow will bring your tired body back to life’, claims Lindell as the Messiah gives a thumbs up. The endorsement of a product owned by such a prominent Trump supporter, however, has led to criticism of the new Messiah, with many church leaders fearing that he is straying into politics. “What next? Will we be seeing him giving his spiritual seal of approval to political candidates?” asks Adam Fridelsky, Bishop of Springfield. “Will be a case of being condemned to Hell if you don’t give your vote to, for instance, the MAGA candidate?”

Needless to say, Donald Trump himself has tried to jump on the bandwagon, trying to take credit for the US being chosen as the venue for the Second Coming, just as he has tried to take credit for the World Cup and Olympics coming to the US, despite having had nothing to do with securing them for the US. “It’s no surprise that the Messiah has chosen the USA for his second coming – its all thanks to me making this nation great and respected again, providing him with plenty of opportunities to sell his creed,” he declared during a White House press conference. “Believe me, he would never have come here during senile Joe Biden’s administration – the place was an utter shit hole then, overrun with foreign rapists and murderers, poor people, drug addicts, the sick and needy. But we’ve deported them all, or cut their welfare and Medicaid so they died. America’s a great place again – as endorsed by the Son of God himself!” Others remain sceptical as to such claims. “Frankly, I’d think it far more likely that the Messiah has come to the US because right now, under Trump, it is in dire need of saving,” opines Bishop Fridelsky. “Poverty, violence, sickness – they’re all on the rise and our political institutions corrupted.”

But the new Messiah has found himself coming in for criticism after a series of TV and newspaper reports featuring pictures of him ‘chilling out’ at the pools of various high end hotels and millionaire’s mansions, surrounded by a bevy of beautiful, bikini clad, young women. “I’m afraid that it is all part of being a thoroughly modern Messiah,” observes Professor Jim Holkstrom, Chair of Messianic Studies at the Seattle Institute of Fruit Development. “Our Gods tend to reflect the times in which they are invoked, so we shouldn’t be surprised that this current transactional world has brought forth a transactional Messiah who is happy to accept all the perks that go with bestowing blessings on politicians, companies, sports teams and the like – the free cars, designer suits, properties, fast cars and the like. Why shouldn’t a contemporary manifestation of God expect to get something in return for saving us all (apart from our immortal souls, obviously)?” Indeed, according to reports in Variety the TV and streaming rights to the Second Coming were pre sold, although the film rights are still up for grabs?  Rumours that Tom Cruise will play the new Messiah in the movie, an all action epic reimagining, however, have been dismissed, with Variety citing his devotion to Scientology as the main stumbling block to his casting. Vin Diesel is currently the odds on favourite for the role.