The Cannibal Dreams of the Puppet Minister

Ronald William Brown had a dream .  He wasn’t content with just doing a Christian children’s TV puppet show, and warning about the evils of porn. 

He wasn’t satisfied by working with the puppet ministry of Gulf Coast Church of Largo, Florida for 15 years.  He wanted more than just picking kids up for church in a van.  He longed for something more fulfilling than living in a trailer park, and running his Puppets Plus business.  To fulfill his dream, Ronald Brown wanted to kidnap, sexually abuse, murder, and cannibalize a child - a boy from his church!  

The 57-year-old aspiring cannibal discussed his fantasies with another like-minded friend, in an online chat room.  His friend filled him in on cooking tips, and how they affected the flavor of various human body parts. 

Fortunately for the intended victim, police investigators arrested the creepy puppet guy before he could carry out his sick plan. 

The curious thing in all of this?  That the members of the Trinity – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – all seemed to have been too busy to alert the pastor (or any other staff member) of Gulf Cost Church that one of their children’s ministry personnel was planning to murder and eat the child of one of their church members.

To be fair, maybe these divine persons were busy with other things – granting convenient parking spots, blessing money-grubbing televangelists, and sending tornadoes to tornado-prone regions as punishment for gay marriages happening elsewhere.  Perhaps it was a small oversight on God’s part.

Or, maybe the Christian god doesn’t have a problem with cannibalism, seeing as how it is sometimes part of his modus operandi, according the Bible:

And I will make them eat the flesh of their sons and their daughters, and everyone shall eat the flesh of his neighbor in the siege and in the distress, with which their enemies and those who seek their life afflict them.  Jeremiah 19:9 (ESV)

Perhaps God had some grievance with the boy’s parents and Ronald William Brown, puppet master was his chosen vessel to carry out divine vengeance against their son?   In that case, our sympathy should lie with Ronald, instead of his intended victim.  Now of course, this is crazy talk, but it is exactly the sort of crazy talk that only a masterful apologist such as William Lane Craig would dare to utter.  Consider his spin on the biblical account ofGod ordering the Jews to kill Caananite children:

“Moreover, if we believe, as I do, that God’s grace is extended to those who die in infancy or as small children, the death of these children was actually their salvation.  We are so wedded to an earthly, naturalistic perspective that we forget that those who die are happy to quit this earth for heaven’s incomparable joy.  Therefore, God does these children no wrong in taking their lives.So whom does God wrong in commanding the destruction of the Canaanites?  Not the Canaanite adults, for they were corrupt and deserving of judgement. Not the children, for they inherit eternal life.  So who is wronged? Ironically, I think the most difficult part of this whole debate is the apparent wrong done to the Israeli soldiers themselves.  Can you imagine what it would be like to have to break into some house and kill a terrified woman and her children?  The brutalizing effect on these Israeli soldiers is disturbing.”

To be fair, Craig’s spin is entirely consistent with the common Christian practice of not empathizing with the true victims in the biblical stories, but, I digress.    

Wouldn’t a loving god have intervened to prevent the aspiring cannibal puppeteer from carrying out his horrific plans?  Indeed, wouldn’t a holy and just god have long ago struck dead a man who worked in his church’s children’s ministry while collecting child porn and pictures of tortured and dead children?  Ah yes, watch his anti-porn video again to be truly creeped out.

Wouldn’t pastors and church staff who were indwelt by the Holy Spirit – a spirit supposedly grieved by sin – have sensed, or had even the faintest inkling that an unholy predator was lurking in their midst?  Yet nobody had a clue. 

Thankfully, law-enforcement was doing their job and nailed this guy, although I’m sure that some Christians will try to credit their action to God. 

This case plainly points to a god who is most probably absent.  Better I suppose, than a god who is evil or incompetent.  Despite their god’s inaction and lack of concern, don’t expect Gold Coast Church to be shuttering their doors any time soon.  While Puppet Guy is spending his next 20 years behind bars, the God virus infecting the church members will continue unfazed, fed by a steady diet of rationalization and self-deception.

"Is there any point to which you would wish to draw my attention?"
   "To the curious incident of the dog in the night-time."
     "The dog did nothing in the night-time."
     "That was the curious incident," remarked Sherlock Holmes.
     Inspector Gregory and Sherlock Holmes in "Silver Blaze

Written by J. M. Green