Team Tominthebox, of the satirical blog Tominthebox News Network (TBNN) held a competition for an honorary doctorate for readers who commented with a short satire of their own. I entered, but didn't win - yet. Here was my entry:

Joel Osteen Repents In a new book by Joel Osteen, entitled Still Living an Average Life, Osteen reveals that a study by the Barna Research Group discovered that the people who followed his teaching were no wealthier than people who didn't. In the book Osteen wrote, "I repent that I have not spoken clearly enough in the past. The fact that I have the largest church in the United States is evidence that the message of prosperity works. However, my followers must not be applying this truth effectively." Osteen says he plans to restore the use of his church as an arena for sports and concerts during the week and give the money to the people who attend his church so they can show financial gains. "God will bless this effort and prove that He wants us to have all that we desire," said Osteen in a press release following the release of his book in stores.

Congratulations to the winner, Lance King. You can find Lance's site at http://nhoriginal.blogspot.com/. This was his entry:

Since 1987, the United Church of Christ (UCC) has been following its mandate to be an open and affirming fellowship. In recent years the UCC – whose roots include various Reformed traditions – has generated considerable media buzz with its ad campaign depicting church patrons being ejected from their pews. The UCC has prided itself in its open and affirming posture towards people of all sexual orientations. So it came as no surprise this week when UCC spokesperson Rev. Jenda Ambigus announced the UCC's latest strategy to add conservative Christians to the list of affirmed people.

“We realized we couldn't continue to call ourselves open and affirming if we didn't include all theological options. Beginning next month, we'll be welcoming our first token conservative into our fellowship. We're not sure why he wanted to join us, but we welcome diversity as long as he joins us for our gay pride parade.”

Reaction to the news has been mixed. Exuberant conservatives from other churches hope for great reforms in this mainline denomination. Longtime UCC members, however, are skeptical.

“We're open and affirming,” said Houston church member, Mauri Bund. “But I'm not sure so sure about these conservatives. The way they insist on getting in your face with their Bibles just makes me feel sick. If they want to read Paul or Peter behind closed doors, that's fine. Just don't subject me and my partner to that kind of stuff. We don't want to see that sort of thing out in the open.”

Rev. Ambigus sympathizes with such concerns, noting that the UCC is currently designing a mandatory sensitivity training course which will aid conservative pastors in creatively “reinterpreting” key biblical passages that might otherwise create disunity.

You can read all of the entries here.
http://tominthebox.blogspot.com/