In Jesus' Name: Taking Up Serpents

I love this shot. The one armed man; deep faith resides there.

Mark 16:18: "And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name . . .they shall take up serpents."

I find the fervour and enthusiasm of Crowds, Congregations and the Preachers leading religiously themed performances deeply fascinating. 

The quality of the recordings in the clip below, its candid and autodidact feeling makes it all the more intriguing. It is like you have stumbled upon a tiny church deep in some hidden away holler. You are drawn in by the honesty and heartfelt interpretation of religious bluegrass and walking up you peek through the cobwebbed windows. 

There are interviews with some of the participants, but for the main part we just get to experience the no frills, all emotion and commitment of the little congregation.

There is great power in the shadow lands between performance and religious ecstasy. Real emotional healing and transcendent experiences has been created in settings like this for aeons. Here we get a rare unpolished and raw glimpse of it.

a New World

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1

First there was language.

We expressed truth.

As we saw it.

As it was.

Who was there?

What happened?

- When.

Then there were stories

We expressed other truths.

As we saw it.

As it was -

Imagined in our minds,

Shaped by us,

Not just the world.

More exciting.

More meaningful.

Greater explanations.

Old stories improved by telling.

Reshaped by Crowd reactions.

The teller’s thoughts coloured it.

The hero emerged

No longer just a man

Something more,

So much more.

Without stories

Diverging from the true,

Without the first fictions

There was no religion.

2

A cave.

A fire.

A Shaman stands.

The others look up.

He waits for attention

Eyes meets eyes,

the flickering light

Attention

changes the space.

Quiet.

Nothing

His mouth opens

The beginning: The word.

A Circus Priest - and what followed

The beauty of the Internet -

I found this picture on may all your days be circus days.

"Father Ed Sullivan was THE circus priest when I joined out. Loved my times with him; he knew everybody, great stories -- he liked an occasional Brandy Alexander, too. In January, 1970, Father Ed passed away while blessing the Ringling 100th Anniversary train as it left Venice. So sad. Or was it? Good night, my friends. (Showfolks of Sarasota Photo Archive.)"

I really like the idea of a Circus or Carnival Priest. A hint of Showmen with their own religion.
In my mind the Carnival world is such a fertile ground for imagery to understand the world. The religious metaphore would blend in with the smell of freshly baked bread from a wood-fire stove on the back of a truck half filled with broken carousel horses. For such is the way of my mind.

A friend, Samora Squid, then commented on the picture and added this to the mix. Another Showman Priest.

This is a truly awesome Act. I have laughed so much and quoted lines from this skit for what feels like my whole life.
Now some of you folks out there might not get the reference to the Paul Daniel punchline in the end. I grew up on Paul Daniels Magic Show on TV. We got reruns in Norway from the BBC and Paul Daniels was on TV for what feels like every Saturday until I went to University. What added to this fact was that the Great Santini, my father, had a VCR recorder and we taped every magic show that came on our 1 channel (NRK). We also borrowed another video player so that we could copy the tapes of other fellow magicians, which might have been lucky enough to capture the first episode of Penn and Teller's Birth of a Baby dove in the Ghetto. So for those of you who don't know him here is Paul Daniels. The Great Wizard of the North.

Paul Daniels, born Newton Edward Daniels on 6 April 1938, is a British magician and television performer.^[1] He achieved international fame through his television series The Paul Daniels Magic Show, which ran on the BBC from 1979 to 1994.

Here is a link to his current blog. Enjoy the further exploration of this magicians illustrious career.