Post by williemeikle on Jan 18, 2010 3:53:07 GMT
No Bounds By William Meikle
I had a strict Scottish Protestant upbringing. Church every Sunday, with Sunday School afterwards, Religious Education classes at High School, and prayers every morning at assembly.
It didn't take.
I grew up, not atheist, but agnostic. To me, organized religion was an oxymoron… the two were incompatible. I had no belief in an overarching figure sitting on high meting out punishment or pleasure based on rules he gets to change when he feels like it.
That all changed last year.
One wet night in Spring I prayed, for the first time in over thirty-five years. I prayed, not to my god, but to my parent's god.
They needed him. They were both in their seventies and dying. Not quickly, but slowly, agonizingly, from a range of ailments too painful to list.
And I could do nothing but watch. After one particularly harrowing hospital visit I found myself kneeling on the floor by my bed with little idea as to why I was there. Part of me remembered though.
I was there for two hours. I prayed and I cried in equal measure. There was no catharsis. I crawled into bed feeling just as shitty as before and more than slightly disgusted with myself.
I didn’t expect an answer. Then again, maybe that’s the best time to get one.
It was waiting for me in my RSS news feed the very next morning.
“HEALING POWER OF PRAYER REVEALED.”
A massive study has found that patients admitted to hospital with heart trouble fare better if someone is praying for them. None of those involved were told that people were engaging in what is known as "intercessory prayer" on their behalf.
It was like a light switching on over my head.
Did I mention that I work in advertising?
--o0o--
We’ve known about the power of subliminal messaging for a long time, using it to sell everything from soft drinks to political power. Now I had an idea for taking it in a new direction. I was just high enough up the chain that I could get away with it, and smart enough to make sure no one would notice.
I started small.
An animated web advert for car insurance was due to run over the whole of the Eastern Seaboard demographic for two weeks. I slipped a single frame into it, a picture of my mother with the words PRAY FOR HER overlaid.
Two weeks later her cancer was in remission, she was sitting up in bed, and thirty thousand new members had joined various churches in the Eastern States of the USA. After that I ramped it up a notch or two, slipping frames into national campaigns across the net and on network television.
Within three months both my parents were up and walking. Church attendances all across North America were up by over a hundred per cent.
Somebody noticed.
--o0o--
He was waiting for me in my office one Monday morning, sitting relaxed behind my desk as if he owned it. I recognized him straight away… Jim Reader ran one of the biggest Ministries on TV. Friend of presidents, kings and pop stars, his smile and charm headed a multi-billion pound empire that stretched all across the States.
He wanted more. When he mentioned the amount of money he could put in my pocket, so did I.
That very day we started placing frames in ads across the media, both domestic and international. They all showed his grinning face and the same PRAY FOR ME text as before. Within a week his ministry had doubled and there were reports of new converts to Christianity, via his Ministry of course, all across the third world.
Towards the end of that week my mother called to say that she wasn’t feeling too well. I placed a couple of frames of her picture in ads and went back to subverting the campaigns of automobile companies.
The money rolled in. So did the converts. We used the cash to get into more ad campaigns, in more countries, for more time.
By the end of that first month tensions in the Middle East were running high due to the numbers of new Christian converts. Jim Reader went on TV to calm the troubled waters. His face appeared in TV, newspapers and magazines across the world. We used the opportunity to place more frames in more ads.
Mum got worse. Dad started to feel ill again. I hired the best doctors that Jim Reader’s money could buy and went back to working on his campaign.
Two months later Jim Reader announced his intention to run for President. His war-chest filled that same day. More screen time followed, with more of our introduced frames embedded. The next day showed that he had an unprecedented ninety per cent approval rating in the polls. A clamor arose in the country for his immediate elevation to the White House.
Mum and Dad went back into hospital the same day that Jim Reader changed water into wine at a wedding for one of his flock. Mum died the day he entered Washington on an open topped bus to a ticker-tape welcome. Dad died as Reader was being sworn in.
--o0o--
I refused to work for him any more. I cited my parent’s deaths as a reason for a need to pull back on my involvement. His people were very understanding. I never got to know what Reader himself thought as he was by now in an elevated world surround by twelve disciples who filtered any access to him.
Just this morning the UN handed him supreme power.
Which is why I slipped an extra frame into his acceptance speech. It was only a single picture, of Reader nailed to a cross, and a simple message.
HE IS THE ANTICHRIST.
A lot of people will see it.
I had a strict Scottish Protestant upbringing. Church every Sunday, with Sunday School afterwards, Religious Education classes at High School, and prayers every morning at assembly.
It didn't take.
I grew up, not atheist, but agnostic. To me, organized religion was an oxymoron… the two were incompatible. I had no belief in an overarching figure sitting on high meting out punishment or pleasure based on rules he gets to change when he feels like it.
That all changed last year.
One wet night in Spring I prayed, for the first time in over thirty-five years. I prayed, not to my god, but to my parent's god.
They needed him. They were both in their seventies and dying. Not quickly, but slowly, agonizingly, from a range of ailments too painful to list.
And I could do nothing but watch. After one particularly harrowing hospital visit I found myself kneeling on the floor by my bed with little idea as to why I was there. Part of me remembered though.
I was there for two hours. I prayed and I cried in equal measure. There was no catharsis. I crawled into bed feeling just as shitty as before and more than slightly disgusted with myself.
I didn’t expect an answer. Then again, maybe that’s the best time to get one.
It was waiting for me in my RSS news feed the very next morning.
“HEALING POWER OF PRAYER REVEALED.”
A massive study has found that patients admitted to hospital with heart trouble fare better if someone is praying for them. None of those involved were told that people were engaging in what is known as "intercessory prayer" on their behalf.
It was like a light switching on over my head.
Did I mention that I work in advertising?
--o0o--
We’ve known about the power of subliminal messaging for a long time, using it to sell everything from soft drinks to political power. Now I had an idea for taking it in a new direction. I was just high enough up the chain that I could get away with it, and smart enough to make sure no one would notice.
I started small.
An animated web advert for car insurance was due to run over the whole of the Eastern Seaboard demographic for two weeks. I slipped a single frame into it, a picture of my mother with the words PRAY FOR HER overlaid.
Two weeks later her cancer was in remission, she was sitting up in bed, and thirty thousand new members had joined various churches in the Eastern States of the USA. After that I ramped it up a notch or two, slipping frames into national campaigns across the net and on network television.
Within three months both my parents were up and walking. Church attendances all across North America were up by over a hundred per cent.
Somebody noticed.
--o0o--
He was waiting for me in my office one Monday morning, sitting relaxed behind my desk as if he owned it. I recognized him straight away… Jim Reader ran one of the biggest Ministries on TV. Friend of presidents, kings and pop stars, his smile and charm headed a multi-billion pound empire that stretched all across the States.
He wanted more. When he mentioned the amount of money he could put in my pocket, so did I.
That very day we started placing frames in ads across the media, both domestic and international. They all showed his grinning face and the same PRAY FOR ME text as before. Within a week his ministry had doubled and there were reports of new converts to Christianity, via his Ministry of course, all across the third world.
Towards the end of that week my mother called to say that she wasn’t feeling too well. I placed a couple of frames of her picture in ads and went back to subverting the campaigns of automobile companies.
The money rolled in. So did the converts. We used the cash to get into more ad campaigns, in more countries, for more time.
By the end of that first month tensions in the Middle East were running high due to the numbers of new Christian converts. Jim Reader went on TV to calm the troubled waters. His face appeared in TV, newspapers and magazines across the world. We used the opportunity to place more frames in more ads.
Mum got worse. Dad started to feel ill again. I hired the best doctors that Jim Reader’s money could buy and went back to working on his campaign.
Two months later Jim Reader announced his intention to run for President. His war-chest filled that same day. More screen time followed, with more of our introduced frames embedded. The next day showed that he had an unprecedented ninety per cent approval rating in the polls. A clamor arose in the country for his immediate elevation to the White House.
Mum and Dad went back into hospital the same day that Jim Reader changed water into wine at a wedding for one of his flock. Mum died the day he entered Washington on an open topped bus to a ticker-tape welcome. Dad died as Reader was being sworn in.
--o0o--
I refused to work for him any more. I cited my parent’s deaths as a reason for a need to pull back on my involvement. His people were very understanding. I never got to know what Reader himself thought as he was by now in an elevated world surround by twelve disciples who filtered any access to him.
Just this morning the UN handed him supreme power.
Which is why I slipped an extra frame into his acceptance speech. It was only a single picture, of Reader nailed to a cross, and a simple message.
HE IS THE ANTICHRIST.
A lot of people will see it.