[ExI] miltonian hymnal

[spike]

> > Keynes schmeynes.  Friedman is the way.  spike

You wrote:

> Spike, I grow so weary of the Friedman worship...

Not to worry me lad!  I have a strategy.  Perhaps you know of the folky
groups of the 60s swapping intellectual property and recording each other's
songs.  The Weavers, Peter Paul and Mary, the Kingston Trio, the
Lamplighters, Chad Mitchell Trio, and I don't know how many others stuffed
their albums with their own versions of Blowin in the Wind and Greenback
Dollar for instance.  This gives me an idea.

Friedman's parents were insightful enough to give him a two syllable name,
so that we, the Church of Milton Friedman Latter Day Capitalists, can co-opt
all those songs in the hymnal, and simply substitute the name Milton for
Jesus.  How convenient is this!  In return, we can write the followers of
Jesus a bunch of new hymns.  Everyone wins in this case, for if you thumb
thru their hymnal, you will be struck by the fact that NONE of their songs
ever mention anything recent.  Every one of those songs could have been
written back in the days when humans lived in those stone Eichlers as seen
in the town of Bedrock on the Flintstones, or yurts.  The hymns of praise
never mention anything that is recent or relevant to modern church goers:
cars, planes, internet, and so forth.  The hymns never mention those very
real feelings that we have today, the very real challenges of living as a
true believer, the actual sights and sounds of a modern church.  The other
thing you notice is that substituting Milton is easy because the musical
poetry never uses the name of Jesus as the rhyming element.  Perhaps it is
because that particular name is difficult to rhyme.  But not impossible.   

I have written a collection of hymns to address that shortcoming.  For
instance, consider this one, in the key of G, in the style of a traditional
English sacred melody, with these words:

We come to this sacred temple to worship holy Jesus,
But the hottie in the next pew just wants to tease us,
With the sermon her cleavage is vying,
She should cover up, for out loud crying
Anthropologists call her Homo Erectus Sleazus.

The song goes on to complain about the pastor, in which one of the lines
ends in "...he is trying to BS us..." which I realize doesn't exactly rhyme,
but such is often allowed in song, as described with the term "poetic
licentious."  Or something like that, but in any case, I haven't yet heard
back from the Sacred Music Publishing Association.  I expect to any time
now.  I call that last one "Hooters in the Next Pew."  

Perhaps Jeff or Damien or some of the other wordmeisters here would like to
write some modern church hymns, to exchange for some of their traditional
hymns for our favorite worthies.

spike

(Come now, friends, it is the middle of the summer, high time for a bit of
silliness.)