more religious nuttery in Texas

[ArmsMerchant]

For some reason, there seems to be a huge incidence of religious mania in the Lower Rio Grande Valley in Texas. Back in 1983, there was the woman frying a gordita for lunch, and saw the image of the Virgin Mary on a tortilla. It was kept in a plexiglas box in a shrine at her home.

In 1990, a stain in a shower stall--in the restroom of an auto-parts store in Progresso--resembled (you guessed it!)--the Virgin Mary.. The resulting crowds caused the store to go out of business. (This was, presumably, not exactly what God had in mind.)


In 1993, there were two such manifestations--the image of a glowing figure with outstretched arms seen in the bark of a cottenwood tree in downtown Brownsville, and crowds formed block-long lines to smooch the holy bark. Then someone saw the image of the Virgin Mary in rust spots on a maroon 1981 Camaro--someone cobbled together a tin-roofed chapel to house it, complete with plastic chairs and rough wooden pews for visitors.

In 1995, neighbors noticed the image of the Virgin Mary on a curtain in a private home. The residents got sick of the crowds, so they simply removed the offending holy curtain.

Well, here we go again. An acacia tree started spouting this foam-like stuff some twenty feet up in the branches--following the death of a local 92-year old matriarch, who is said to have loved the tree. Despite the fact that the froth is yellowish (hence more urine-ish than teary)--people insist the tree is weeping.

Scientists who examined pictures of the phenomena said the wad of foam was a spittlebug nest. Obviously secular humanists.

BTW--I swear I am not making this up--I saw it in a syndicated news story originally appearing in the Dallas Morning News.


(NOTE--I was going to put this in SotD, but since the phenomena seemed confined to members of the wide-spread cult known as the Roman Catholic Church, thought it was more apropriate here.)