Holy Crap: When I-Told-You-So Becomes Moot Edition
We folks in the south know all about tent revivals, foot washing, speaking in tongues, and snaking handling.
The theory is this: you can handle dangerous snakes if you trust in the Lord and ask God to protect you.
The problem with that theory is that snakes rarely have religion and they aren’t a damn bit ashamed about that.
Jamie Coots’ death appears to be the first from a snakebite in a Kentucky church service since November 2006, when a woman died after being bitten while worshipping at a Laurel County church.
Coots, a third-generation snake handler, was the pastor of a small church in Middlesboro, Full Gospel Tabernacle in Jesus Name.
The Steeple People who snake handle says they are commanded by the book of Mark to do so. That book, however, also says to drink poison but you don’t see them doing that. Not near the glamour.
Coot’s family refused to take him to the hospital after he passed out so I guess they were a bit tired of him being a damfool, too.
Just a heads up: you should never handle a Republican for the same reason. They will bite you.
Thanks to everybody for the heads up.
Wish more Repugs would take up snake handling.
1It will be a slow, long process and one snake bite at a time, but we can weed out the imbeciles this way. I would request that a Snake-in-a-Box gift be sent to Mitch McTurtle and Pubic Hair Paul … oh, what a surprise is in store for them when they open that box!
Quick and reasonably painless, I suppose … and don’t let anyone call in the EMTs.
2Thank heaven, I missed the part of the Bible that says you have to mess with snakes.
I know people who do this….. have their reasons…..
I just can’t for the life of me….. figure out what they are.
3It doesn’t matter what you believe. What counts is what the snake believes, and the snake believes “I’m gonna bite this sucker messing with me.”
4The part I got was “you will strike at their heads as they strike at your heels” thing, and there is definitely enmity between most people and snakes.
Republicans are both scaly and venomous, and they speak with forked tongues, too. They must be a subterranean variety though, because they are frequently described as being “lower than a snake’s belly.”
5Looks like a head pastor job has opened up for Teddy’s dad!
6The rattlesnakes we used to see around the ranch where we lived for seven years really didn’t want us around. The time when snakes are most dangerous is when they are shedding their skins at the end of summer and they are blind. Otherwise, don’t have stuff planted near your house, wear boots, watch where you step, give them a chance to get away because honey, they don’t like you either. I’m amazed that more folks didn’t die that way. Just believing something don’t necessarily make it so.
7Yeahhh. Snakes do what snakes do awright. Whether they be snakes in some reptile group or tea baggers sitting around assuring each other that they made it on their own and that the law of the land should be natural selection.
8Pinkard & Bowden did a song about the snake people.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7iqVfrGY7w
9Snakes don’t kill people; people kill people. Sometimes themselves if they’re ignorant enough.
10Since the Bible says that God will protect those who believe and handle snakes, I guess this jackwagon just didn’t believe enough, or else God got tired of him tempting fate all the time.
I wish the Bible said that God would protect believers who juggle running chainsaws. We’d get rid of a few more of these fools with less hassle to the snakes.
11Is the snake OK?
12I believe God protects us, but don’t push your luck.
Condolences to the family
13@Rhea … I said the same thing … I think God just got tired of putting up with this jerk’s nonsense! Time to go … bye-bye!!
Uncle Dave … the snake probably had to get a tetanus shot after biting that jerk!!
14I read somewhere that if you list all the poisonous snakes in the world in order of their deadliness, the top nine or ten are in Australia. I’m guessing they don’t have many snake handling churches there.
My husband was a herpetologist and he handled rattlers, cottonmouths, copperheads, etc. very, very, carefully (certainly not picked up by the middle.) Never was bit. He counted on good sense and didn’t put it off on the Almighty.
15I think the passage in Mark about this is talking about things like the time Paul (Acts 28) accidentally got bit by a snake and survived. (Well it was accidental for Paul who was shipwrecked and picking up firewood. I suppose it was on purpose for the snake.) I think God gives us brains to avoid doing dumb things, though we don’t always use them.
16Thank you Uncle Dave, While Jamie Coots demonstrated his interpretation of New Testament theology, the snake showed us the Old Testament, Genesis, when God created snakes and their attributes, including fangs and poison.
The snake was the one being tempted this time around.
17Not so fast Charlie. According to CNN “Coots was a third-generation “serpent handler” and aspired to one day pass the practice and his church, Full Gospel Tabernacle in Jesus Name, on to his adult son, Little Cody.”
Advice to Little Cody: find another occupation.
18A snake in the hand leads to a tooth in the tush.
19@uncle dave
20Saw the answer to your question on the dvd we watched last night, Expendables Dos, another unappreciated classic BTW
Stallone: I’ve heard … that you were bitten by a king cobra?
Chuck Norris: Yeah, I was. But after five days of agonizing pain, the cobra died.
Varmint on varmint violence. The good one with fangs won.
21I think the snake spent the rest of the day spitting up.
22A fool and his fancy!
23Is the snake OK?
24I don’t mind non-venomous snakes one bit (there was the amusing time I hitchhiked to Tuxedo Park to meet a friend at the Renaissance Faire, and while walking on a path had some kids shouting, “Lady!! Lady, watch out!!!” because a garter snake was about to cross my foot), but I stay well away from pit vipers and other venomous types. Whenever I hike in NY or NJ, if I smell that rotten-crushed-cucumbers smell, I avoid stone walls, where copperheads like to hang out. I guess that makes me smarter than ol’ Coot.
25You gotta have the faith to deal with snakes. Which is why all the thumpers vote Republican.
26Does anyone know if the snake has a lawyer? He is entitled to competent council,except in Texas. If he/she so desires,but cannot afford a lawyer.one will be provided for him/her at no cost,unless wingnuts cut funding for the program and then his/her goose is cooked. I heard the snake is pleading stand your ground and then Texas wingnuts and RW bloviators accused Wendy Davis and the snake of making fun of Gregg A-But of Texas because A-but uses a wheelchair to run over snakes and is hardly an unbiased witness. Case dismissed,A-But pays the snake’s attorney fees.
27That part about letting snakes bite you and drinking poison is a much later addition to Scripture…it’s not in the original (oldest we have) manuscripts.
28The only thing that can stop a bad snake in the grass is a good snake. It finally makes sense!
29Jokes aside, I’m sorry for his family. They’ve not only lost someone they loved, but likely had their faith badly shaken. I hope this prompts them to different religious beliefs, but it probably won’t. My aunt and grandmother were Holiness folks—although they never handled snakes themselves, which might explain how they lived to a very old age.
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