c 2002 James Bauhaus

                                              THE NEW COVENANT

     "Bless me Father for I have sinned."

     "When was your last confession, my son?" “About 98 years ago, when I was 12."

     "We welcome you back to the fold. What sins do you have to confess?"

     "So many! My memory fails me."     

     "Generalities will help you remember."

     "Prodigious gluttony: my lusts and adulteries extend far into the past,My wealth

and power provide me with carnal exploits beyond my body's ability to enjoy them fully, and I continue them anyway.  My libido ceased to respond despite heroic medical interventions.   Now I only lust,"

     "I understand, my son. Are there other sins?"'

     "Lord yes! Er, ...excuse me Father. I lie a lot. I employ people and organizations to lie for me*"

     "Lying can be forgiven."

     "Maybe not the way I've done it. I've lied to millions of people, vigorously,,

throughout my life. My lies have caused colossal misfortune to others. Horrendous

global consequences have came of my lies,"

     "Are there other sins?"

     "Thefts. Usually my assistants do my stealing for me, but I may be considered

responsible for their acts too; same as collecting my bribes. Also I owe my long life

to organs made from cell-lines stolen from unwitting donors, Thousands of embryos

died for me. Worse, before we outlawed cloning for everyone else, we had to harvest

our replacement organs from living people we duped or condemned. If the tissue match

was good enough, even famous persons were not safe. If phony trials were too risky,

we would simply abduct them or engineer "accidents". No one could withstand our need;

for the greater good, that is:"

     "Theft, bribery, greed and murder require penance."

     "My esteemed colleagues and I also enslaved a lot of people. We had to torture

some too, and kill them to maintain secrecy, but mostly it was for the security of gov-

ernment. We employed persons to torture and. kill for us, truly evil persons, and we

concealed them and their crimes. We exported shiploads of weapons and started many

wars. Millions of people suffered, thousands of innocents were killed or starved

because part of war is keeping food out."

     "I don't know if this is a sin, but, we were temporarily out of power and had to import tons of drugs to finance our plans to get back in. Once we succeeded, we couldn't

stop even though we had regained both houses, the courts and the presidency. Drug

money is so addictive! We created millions of addicts and built hundreds of prisons

with which to exploit them. Using creative accounting and legislation, we got paid far

them twice; once from forcing their labor and once through taxing the citizens for them.

We bought hundreds of foreign governments and thousands of their politicians, causing

millions of their citizens to flee. Part of this decades-long migration north we used

to keep wages so low that they had to work 70 hours per week just to afford food,

housing and transportation. Our tax-scientists keep these rivers of loot flooding over

us: Remember slave history, Father? The triangle of shipping between Europe, Africa

and the New World? Slaves to America to produce molasses for rum for Europe for ships

for slaves back to the Americas? Well, we're much more sophisticated now: Faster, and

so complex that none of us can grasp the whole picture. We thought Stalin was so clever,

starving 70 million political opponents by selling their agricultural output to us for

weapons and heavy industries. We're far beyond that now! We have our taxherds telling

us to take their money to fight drugs:   Our public relations machines are so efficient

and our citizens so gullible and scared that they let us take 60% of the gross national

product for the very thing they're so terrified of; weapons of mass destruction:   We've

siphoned off trillions: Some of it we call "foreign aid", but it is really a money

laundering scheme. We "give" it away, but force them to buy our weapons with it. We

have our knives to everybody's throat: They swallowed that "Patriot" crap and

"Preventive Detention" fraud without a microsecond of thought or protest. How can they be

so thoroughly stupid and trusting after all we've done to them? We've got you to

thank for that, Father, We made school bogus. Only our own kids can get real educations: the sheep only get religion. We've stolen this world by selling the next! And

it doesn't even exist: They work themselves to death to make us rich and think that

they will get paid after they die: How can you get a sweeter deal than this? We've

cornered six billion people: This is the absolute best time to be alive:"

     "My son, why are you here?”

     "Huh? Because I'm dying, of course. There's nothing more the doctors can do for

me.  If I could last just ten more years our doctors could transplant my brain into some

youngster's head.But I'm not going to make it. God damn it! Life is so unfair!"

     “No, I meant that since you don't believe in God., why would you want your sins

forgiven?"

     “0h, that, Well, Father, we public figures spend our lives using other people's

weakness for religion to pry out wealth and power for us. After a lifetime of posing

and posturing, it's only natural that we would get unsure as death approaches. After

all, we didn't invent religion, or, if we did, the fact that it's a hoax has been lost

to us. We can't be sure, so, like my brokers, I'm here to hedge my bet; a victim of my

own propaganda."

     "That is the one good thing I've heard you say, my son. It is fortunate that you

came back, even after so long. You've missed many changes. Evil is so rampant that we

can't keep up. We now enlist help from among the pious such as yourself. You will be

shocked to learn your penance. We’ve had to change procedures. We no longer waste much

time saving individual souls, It's more efficient to attack evil directly. Your part

in this requires that you accept certain facts. One is that Satan is no longer with us,

He left shortly after the first great war. There was no need for him and his minions.

Other demons had risen up and took his work as their own. Those demons who made Satan

superfluous are your colleagues, friends and descendants."

     "You can't be serious!"

     "Deadly serious, my son."

     "My descendants are all in law and government and politics."

     "Just so."

     "What?"

     "You put them in jeopardy getting them parasitic careers like yours, They are

not in Church," 

     "Well, I’11 fix that; I'll go get them right no-. Father, this door is stuck.

Get Mr. Murphy to bring his tools,"

     "There is nothing, wrong with the door, my son."

     "By God there is!It will not open. Now get-."

“     We also practice Preventive Detention."

     "You what? That's kidnaping,' Mr. Murphy! Murphy!"

     "No one can hear your shouts. You can't break the door. Calm yourself, please."

     "You're a lunatic! You can't hold an elected official hostage: You open this door! There'll be hell to pay!"

     "Kneel, my son, and receive your penance."

     "Then you'll let me go?"

     "Then you can go."

     "Give it to me!"

     "Your penance is to call a meeting, inviting all the officers of your various in

interlocking directorships, lobbiests and legal advisors. Halfway through the meeting

you will kill everyone who attends and then yourself."

     "You are a lunatic if you think that will get me to heaven!"

     "That's one of the changes: Heaven is closed. The best we can hope for is an

eternity of suffering in purgatory."

     "The hell you say! Now open this door!"

     “Additionally, your penance is to say the first words of the Holy Mother's prayer. Then you may leave."

     "Hail Mary, Moth-. Yeow! my tongue caught fire:"

     "You will not be permitted to pray for your soul until your task is completed

and you reach Purgatory. Then you will have a thousand years plus one additional

year for each person in your knot of evil that you manage to take with you."

     "Then I go to Heaven?"

     "Heaven is closed. Then you will go to Satan's new Hell, constructed specifically for persons who made their Heaven on Earth by so fiendishly exploiting your

fellow man,"

     "Dear God. Yeow!My throat!"