Orthodox Medicine

Not even the factions of Christianity are so riven by mutual hatred as to lack a few features in common; and among the most consistent and universal points of agreement is the heretical and blasphemous nature of the Saviour's pronouncements in the first eight verses of the sixth chapter of Matthew's gospel. Far from encouraging modest silence and unprofitable solitude, the churches have traditionally imposed collective worship, ostentatious piety and noise, the better to police their adherents and maintain a cash flow commensurate with the Deity's moral welfare. Accordingly, the Greek Orthodox church has decreed that the feast of Epiphany will be celebrated in defiance of the materialistic requirements of earthly powers and the fleshly demands of mere physical health. Unlike western Christianity, wherein the feast celebrates the arrival of the Magi and their wealth, the Orthodox faction uses the day to commemorate the Saviour's cleansing from His presumably non-existent sins and His formal adoption by His Father in heaven, who proclaimed Himself well pleased at the empty ritual even though comparatively few people seem to have died as a result.