Oh foolish politicians.  It’s me, Paul.  I’m glad you averted that whole shutdown thing.  Sheesh.  Get over yourselves.  I have some experience with this sort of thing.  Maybe I can help.

I wrote this letter a while back to some friends of mine in Galatia who were fighting about who is in and who is out – or who is right and who is wrong.  Sound familiar?

This is strictly management advice.  Since we’re on government business here, I’m not going to tell you what to believe.  BTW, if for some crazy reason you think the United States is a Christian nation, feel free to consider this the direct and inerrant word of God.  Otherwise, I’m only acting as an organizational consultant.  Frankly, I don’t even care if the guys are circumcised.

Here’s what I told the Galatians.  You can concentrate on the things that make you different, or you can concentrate on the things that make you the same.  I proposed that the latter was a better strategy.

Dearest politicians.  My Galatian friends were worried about little legalistic differences that caused them to lose site of the big picture.  I think you caught the same train.  Of course, for the Galatians it was more of a camel thing, but I digress.  I guess what I want to say is that, you may see the world in different ways, and even believe there are right ways and wrong ways to do things.  It’s a flaw in the design of the Kingdom.  The programmers were at lunch when the sense of right and wrong as an absolute was accidentally introduced into the system.  The Galatians seemed to be particularly prone to such ways of thinking.  Kind of quaint from an afterlife sort of perspective, really.  Did you know if you play Scrabble here the words “right” and “wrong” are an automatic zero word score.  No kidding.

So, I just want to remind you how much alike you are.  You are more like your colleague across the aisle than you are like any other animal, or any other object, or any idea of life or any alien creature that may exist – yes, I do know, and no, I’m not telling.  Let’s just say don’t turn SETI off just yet.

So think about that alien life, if it has consciousness.  Do you think it’s concept of God would be anywhere near yours.  Much less their ideas about circumcision.  I try not to think about it.

So what I’m saying is…you are so much alike and you don’t know it.  Plus you’re here to make things better for each other.  I wish you could see it.  Not slave or free; Jew or gentile; dude or lady.  I’d like to add no denominations, races, or political parties.  Heck (it’s fine to say that here) we even love Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins.  How’s that for inclusive?  They make some excellent points.  I’ll have to write them a letter to straighten a couple bits of stray illogic.  Or maybe I could just appear to them rattling chains in a diaphanous glow.  What do you think?  Man, at 2,000 years old, my mind just wanders.

So anyway, thanks for averting the shutdown.  I plan to watch the Cherry Blossom Festival on TIVO later as I have a meeting with the other apostles this afternoon.  It’s an Easter decorating committee.  Please just all try to get along.  OK?  For me?

Grace, peace, love etc.  Gotta run.  TTFN.  Paul