(Originally published April 21st, 2008)

Church of the Holy Trinity

Caucasian male, 60, with grey hair and mustache, wearing black pants, black T-shirt, and blue silk shirt, surrounded by a semi-circle of audience members.

The Jesus Sayings: The Quest For His Authentic Message, Rex Weyler (House of Anansi Press)

Page 110:

The image satirizes religious pretension with a counterculture sense of humour. For Jesus, spiritual awareness is not something to boast about. It starts with the smallest seed, invades highly structured society like a weed, and provides protection for innocent creatures. As we assemble Jesus’ most likely original oral teachings, we can start here, with the lowly mustard seed.

Once a week, yellow school buses lined up outside the elementary school. She watched from the tarmac, clutching her hopscotch puck, as the buses filled front to back, the neighborhood’s children dangling their heads and hands out the open windows. She waved as they pulled away, her best friend bouncing and clapping, en route to the promise of free bibles and doughnuts, and a 25¢ treasure taped under the seats of 100 lucky souls.

30 in 30: Jeramy Dodds reading from Crabwise to the Hounds. Buy it here.