Bathroom Monologue: Come All Ye Faithful, to Tuesday Night Karate

At the turn of the 21st century, a surprising percentage of Americans believed the apocalypse was near. Well, surprising to people who didn't believe the world was ending - to those people who did, I guess it was surprising that the percentage wasn't 100%. But none of the faithful knew exactly what to do about it. If they figured out how the end of the world was coming and interfered, it could go against God's plan. If they increased Church-going and prayer, God would probably figure out that they were patronizing Him. It was quite the conundrum. The Stooksten Cult (as it came to be called by people from out of town) read Revelations very carefully over a booze-free weekend and came up with the only sensible answer. Since the end of times would begin the war between the Seed of Jezebel and the Host of Heaven, the citizens of Stooksten should probably learn how to throw down. The pastor's son had seen a couple of Jean Claude Van Damme movies and insisted karate was the way to go. So the Stooksten Cult congregation took karate lessons every Tuesday (and every other Thursday), to become blackbelts in time for the call of Archangel Gabriel's war horn. Everyone got into it such that even Ms. Brown, the 72-year-old piano teacher, could break a wooden board (if somebody held it for her). Satisfied that unless the demons knew kung fu that they would serve their lord and savior well, the Stooksten Cult returned to business as usual, with the odd Interdenominational Karate Tournament every seventh Saturday, in preparation for Sunday mass. They may be called illogical or blasphemous, but you have to concede that they were really good at coping.