Today's Sermon: The Book of Handbasket, 7. xvii.

Yea, my bretheren and sisteren, today I wish to speak to thee of the proverbial handbasket, and of our journey in it -- our journey STRAIGHT TO HELL. And yea, ye might asketh, "To what does this handbasket pertaineth? Must we listeneth to thy confusing and garbled metaphor?" To which I say yea, my bretheren and sisteren, YE MUST.

For lo, seeth the heathenish depiction above and its most base yet true caption, steeped in sarcasm and UNENDING INTERPERSONAL ANTAGONISM, and know: he who partaketh in the ritual of UNHOLY MATRIMONY, he shalt go STRAIGHT TO HELL, and not in any comfortable manner, nay, not in the Full-Wetbar Limousine of Satan, not in the Cablecar of Salacious Expectation, not in the Volkswagon Bug of Illicit Desires, nay: he shalt go in the Handbasket to Hell, the most expedient and most righteous way to dispatch his soul to the Netherworld, to the world of unending torment and everlasting torture, to that Wasteland of the Human Soul, to marriage, the hell of the Befuddled and Confused Bourgeois Follower of Outdated and Oppressive Rituals.

For lo, my bretheren and sisteren, listen unto my words: marriage is a trap, a snare, a most unholy and unnatural state of being, a VERY HELL OF UNDISCUSSED AND UNFULFILLED EXPECTATIONS and MOST UNPLEASANT SURPRISES that can do naught but leave its sufferers unsatisfied and wallowing in the most cruel and painful of earthly torments. Yea, my bretheren and sisteren, this be MARRIAGE!

For lo, it is truly written in many sources, of which I quoteth here but a choice few:

"Take my wife, please." (Hen. Young. 1.1)

"For it is written, let he who entereth unto the state of matrimony, let him learn to toucheth his wife not, nor she he, and let them seetheth in unending futile frustration, until they can taketh no more, and he searcheth out other comforts, and she taketh of many prescription medicines, until they do turn themselves into ashes in the very conflagration of ceaseless incriminations, incriminations the more pointed and cruel as they are based upon truth, and let them not toucheth of each others' flesh forever and ever, until they die a dusty death, unfulfilled and full of hate, forever and ever, drawn down into the realm of Satan, to be eternally in the other's company, always to argue over the most menial of things, a torture to last unto the end of days, Amen." (Bk. Hol. Mat. I.iv.)

"And lo, there came a day, a day unlike any other day, when the husband did look upon the wife, and the wife unto the husband, and they did recognize the MUTUAL INFERIORITY of the other, exacerbated by the unholy OPPRESSIONS OF CHURCH AND STATE, which be separatedeth not, and they didst lament until their tears didst turn the very earth to salt, and they could harvest naught, and their progeny didst wither and fail like unto the crops of the salted field, and they were barren, and after that day they had naught, and heedeth naught, and turneth their faces from the Lord, and didst not recognize the HOLY RELEASE OF DIVORCE, that most beneficial of institutions, handed down from generation unto generation by the Lord Himself (until He wast ignored and heeded not by the unrighteous and indignant and MOST IGNORANT of his FUNDAMENTALIST AND FEARFUL followers, they who dost reject and fear the very PLEASURES OF THE FLESH, pleasures they FEAR to enjoy yet seeketh out still in the steamy heat of their rancid desires, under cover of night, in back alleys and bus station restrooms, in glory holes and other unsavory places, and denieth unto mankind these very same pleasures, for they wanteth them to suffer like unto their own suffering, like children who doth accept a toy and breaketh it and wanteth not the other children to enjoyeth of the same), yea, handed down to save mankind from that which must surely destroy it -- SEXUAL DISSATISFACTION DUE TO HASTY AND UNWISE DECISIONS THAT LEADETH TO INCOMPATIBLE COUPLINGS, Amen." (Plain Truth, I.ii.)

Yea, my bretheren and sisteren, heedeth my words! Hasten not into marriage, and avoideth it like unto the very PLAGUE itself, for it is the quickest road to Hell, it is a handbasket, and taketh instead the road of MUTUAL SATISFACTION unencumbered by LAWS OF CHURCH AND STATE, intrusions, yea, intrusions into the VERY SOUL ITSELF by those most greedy and grasping of Satan's minions, the politicians, the money-changers, and the clergy. Amen.