Wednesday, July 19, 2006

Who's Your Daddy?

It was only a matter of time. Once we knew that Jesus had children with Mary Magdalene, it was only a matter of time until some of his great, great, great ... grandchildren stepped forward to make their presence known.

The first to do so is Kathleen McGowan whose novel, The Expected One, reveals that she is one of Jesus' descendents. This may be news to many, but not to me. Ever since reading The Da Vinci Code I have been searching out the contemporary line of Jesus and the Mary.

The first one I uncovered was a cousin of mine, fifth removed on my material grandfather's paternal uncle's maternal aunt's side of the family. Like Ms. McGowan, I too have incontrovertible evidence proving this to be so, but, again like her, I am not at liberty to reveal this to the public.

Since finding this cousin, I have stumbled on dozens of Jesus descendents all of whom are related to me. Now I know that this means that I too am related to Jesus and Mary. Ordinarily this would not really mean much to me. After all it is such a tenuous connection. Yet, I found out that not only am I a descendent of Jesus, my next door neighbor, with whom I have never gotten along, is descended from the High Priest who plotted Jesus' death. And not only that, but the guy around the corner is in fact related to Pontius Pilate, the Roman Procurator who actually had Jesus killed. Neither my neighbor nor I get along with him.

And there is more. Knowing my lineage explains so much about my life. Now I know why I feel so persecuted. Now I know why I used to get the hives in high school wood shop. Now I know why thorns frighten me, and why I loved subtraction in elementary school but broke out in a cold sweat every time I had to write the plus sign in addition problems.

Lots of readers will deny Ms. McGowan's claim, seeing it as a crass marketing ploy by her and her publisher. But I haven't written a novel about my ancestors, so I have nothing to gain by disclosing my heritage. Well, maybe not nothing. I am writing to Aunt Kathleen to ask her to help out a starving relative when the millions she will reap from this disclosure start poring in. I am sure she will be delighted to send me a substantial percentage. After all, it is the Christian thing to do.

1 comment:

Peter Schogol said...

I've decided that leaving the country would mean leaving the country in the hands of a bush-league Taliban who won't rest until they nuke our secular Bamiyans and fill the niches with Ten Commandments.

I take my cue from Leo Baeck who stayed in Germany to be a rabbi to his people even as the Nazis were closing in on him. He was sent to Theresienstadt, true; but he emerged from the concentration camp experience very much the man of faith and conviction he was when he first arrived.

Someone has to stay and fight.