Where peace is not a pie ...Rick's Cafe Americain

Last year, standing-room-only crowds attended Easter Mass at the Cathedral of St. Augustine in this comfortable suburb of West Palm Beach.  This year, father John O’Toole is concerned that his Easter homily will be heard by only a few.  “Easter Mass is always very well attended.  This year we have more parishioners than ever, but I know many of my flock will not be in Church this Easter,” said O’Toole.

Here, as in many small and large towns throughout the country, Catholics inspired by Mel Gibson’s blockbuster hit “The Passion” are planning to attend screenings of that film in lieu of mass.  “Church is boring,” admits Sean Liston, 15, a freshman at St. Andrew’s Preparatory School.  “I’d much rather go see ["The Passion"], which shows how all that biblical stuff really happened.  I never knew it was so awesome back then.  I wish I had been a Roman—I wouldn’t have let the Jews kill Christ!”

But “The Passion” is not just for young or newly-minted Catholics.  Gertie Karasznek, who has faithfully attended Easter Mass at St. Augustine’s for the last 37 years, says she will probably go with her friends to see a special Easter screening of The Passion at the Golden Glades Mall Optiplex this Sunday.  “I’ve heard everything Father O’Leary has to say.  In fact, I’m pretty sure he’s used the same sermon more than once in the last few decades.  This year, I’m going to reconnect with my faith by experiencing the passion of our Lord as it was meant to be: in THX surround sound with stadium seating.”

Gibson’s graphic portrayal of the final moments of Jesus Christ has also captivated a generation of Catholics who have become disillusioned with the Church in recent years.  Many who felt alienated or discouraged by the massive pedophilia scandal that has come to a head over the past two years say they have found comfort and faith again in Gibson’s bloody filmic depiction of the crucifiction.

Tony Bartolino, a refrigerator salesman in Boca Raton, says he trusts Gibson more than he trusts the Church.  “The Church has lost a lot of credibility with a lot of people lately.  I mean, with the Church hiding and protecting those sick child-abusing priests, and you look at the Pope, I mean, the guy is so old and out of touch—he couldn’t even keep his story straight about whether he saw the Passion.” Early promotional materials for “The Passion” claimed that the Pope had endorsed the film.  The Vatican later issued a statement saying that the Pope had no comment on the film.

“Gibson’s message is more timely, more honest than the Church’s message,” opined Dr. John Farfenhauser, professor of Religion and Film Studies at Florida Atlantic University.  “People are tired of hearing boring, hypocritical sermons about tolerance and peace and love.  In the post-9/11 world, these “postmodern” concepts have little relevance.  Catholics, like most Americans, are recognizing the need to return to fundamentals: to see things in terms of good and evil, black and white.” Farfenhauser added, “as for that last, I think the casting of Jim Caviezel—a white man, conclusively ends that debate.”

Officials at the Catholic Church admit that there is a problem.  “Attendance is down.  Even as “The Passion” stands poised to become the biggest box-office success ever, the Catholic Church faces a potentially huge loss of income.  Easter is, let’s face it, one of our biggest revenue generators since tithing,” said a cardinal who asked not to be mentioned by name.  But the Church has also been quick to respond.  Although most churches are not equipped to screen films, many are not content to wait for the DVD release. 

Father Egan O’Regan of the Most Holy Feminine Church of St. Paulie is one of many church leaders who has enlisted the help of local talent to put on live performances of “The Passion” at his church, starting on Good Friday.  “It’s kind of like Rocky Horror, but without the gay stuff, and its about Jesus,” said O’Regan, referring to “the Rocky Horror Picture Show”, a cult film whose screenings are often acompanied by performances from live actors.  “We’ve gotten tons of volunteers to play the Romans,” added O’Regan, “but nobody wants to play the Jews.  We’ve been talking about asking Rabbi Solomon from Temple Beth-El to help us out, but I don’t think those people can work on Friday, so we’ll probably have to convince some of our Italian parishioners to do it.”

Other pastors are adjusting their message to match the “Gospel according to Gibson”.  72% of priests surveyed by the Pew foundation said their Easter homilies would focus on the responsibility of the Jews for the death of Christ, and 98% said they would mention it.  Several churches in the South Florida region have also begun providing parishioners with leather-bound volumes of official screenplay of The Passion, in addition to the more traditional bibles and hymnals. 

These screenplays, available from the The Passion Gift Shop at http://www.sharethepassionofthechrist.com, contain both translations and transliterations from the Aramaic, Hebrew and Latin texts.  Professor Farfenhauser, a leading Passion scholar, says FAU is planning to offer a year-long course on that text and the scholarly interpretations thereof.  “Film makers are the history teachers of our culture—and Mel Gibson’s movie, “The Passion of the Christ,” teaches us about history’s most important event. The impact of this movie will be immeasurable,” said Mark Mittelberg, author of “Building a Contagious Church”.

Perhaps the clearest sign of change in the Catholic Church can be found on the bulletin board of Our Lady of the Perpetual Nausea, one of the oldest Catholic churches in Florida, which has for the past 45 years contained the same message in stick-on letters above the Church schedule: “Love your Neighbor”.  This week, that message was replaced with the following text: “See the Passion”.

Fuck that. Going out and clubbing an infant creature to death in order to make nice clothes is simply not something civilized people should be doing (insert Canada joke here).  If you agree, go to this site and maybe you can help do something about it.

Fuck that. Going out and clubbing an infant creature to death in order to make nice clothes is simply not something civilized people should be doing (insert Canada joke here).  If you agree, go to this site and maybe you can help do something about it.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t hip to the fact that on Planet you have to request your hand history 25 hands at a time, in real time, or they are lost.  I’ve sent an e-mail in the hopes that someone at planet can pull up my hand history, because honestly the whole thing is a blur.  I remember that I played tight—as tight as I’ve ever played consistently for two hours.  I remember that this was made easier by craptastic hands most of the night.  And I remember that Pauly made it to the final table with me.  I remember that I spent a good portion of my time toward the end with $6,666, which ended up being not so lucky for me.  In the end, my A3o got “cracked” by Roy’s K5o.

Other highlights of the game:  Felicia’s QQ got cracked again, this time later in the game, but by JJ!  Also, Roy was trailing for a long time, maybe most of the tourney, but came back from $700 to take second after losing a commanding chip lead to stinkypants.  I haven’t got Ugarte’s flair for these things, and I’m still a bit stunned that I made it to third, so I hope he can make it to the next PJK (He had to help his mom do chores tonight).

It’s a great, very funny group of people to play poker with, and I can’t wait until next week.

(if I can get a hand history, I will update with more details)

I can only take so much credit for my success, though.  I played tight enough that I didn’t get myself in trouble, but I got paid off on hands all night - even when I sooooo didn’t deserve to.

I won Omaha when A♠2♠xx became the nut flush and nut low.  I won Omaha when T♥T♣ was joined by T♦ on the flop and T♠ on the turn.  I didn’t even have to call Omaha, since Helmut was calling it every time it came around to him.  Even when I missed the flop I was reading the table, and was able to get people to dump when I bet from late position.  Maybe I have fewer tells than I think.

Oddly enough, all of the crazy hands came in the typically low-risk, low reward game of 5 card draw.  Churchwarden had bullied the table to minimal results by betting the max ($5) predraw on two hands in a row.  Both times, the rest of the table (Helmut, Rick, Leo Bloom and me) all folded.  With .25 antes, Churchwarden wasn’t making much by jamming the pot, but he reports that he had trips both times and was hoping that he would get callers the second time because it seemed like such a bluff.  No luck for Churchy, and he had to settle for $2.

The next time 5 card draw came around, nobody bet predraw.  I had 4-5-7-8-x and took a shot at the inside straight.  When I asked for one card, Churchwarden played a little keep away: “Is this the card you want? Are you sure? Maybe you want the second card...” - but I wanted the top card - a 6.  After the draw, Helmut, who had taken three cards, bet the max.  Well, god damn!  Not looking to be greedy, I just called. And waited to slap my cards on the table.  No dice.  Helmut turned JK into quad Jacks and my straight looked positively puny.  Still thanked Churchwarden for dealing me the card I wanted.  One must be curteous, you know.

A few orbits later, Rick decided to throw a little wild card action into the mix.  Probably inspired by Helmut’s quads, he called 5 card draw with Jacks wild.  Leo bet the max preflop.  Helmut called. I looked down at A♥2♥4♥5♥x.  Believing (as Leo wanted me to) that all of this predraw betting was just so much bullying (and looking at a nut flush draw), I called. And much to my surprise, Rick raised another $5.  Calls all around.  Pre flop there was already $41.25 in the pot on a game that usually has one player steal the blinds with a $1 bet. Yikes. I imagine Churchwarden was comfortable with his fold.

Leo stands pat.  Helmut takes three.  I take one and get ... 3♥! I stifled the urge to yell “Holy shit!” and just waited for Leo to bet.  $5 from Leo it is.  Helmut threw down his cards after an ill-advised $10 investment. I, of course, raised. Rick, wary now, called as did an equally suspicious Leo.  When I turned over the wheel straight flush, a chorus of “No fucking way” and “What the fuck” filled the room.  The cursing wasn’t as sublime as Marie’s c-bomb, but what it lacked in majesty, it more than made up for in sincerity.  Leo couldn’t believe that his natural AQ flush (no draw) lost.  Rick was even more surprised that when his two wild jacks became an AKQ flush it wasn’t enough.  I even had the nerve to be upset that neither of them reraised me.  At the time it made no sense to me.  But if I were to guess now, Rick and Leo must have both figured that when I drew one card, two pair became a full house. No more looking into the mouth of this gift horse. I’ll take my big pot and move on.

Final tally:

Ugarte + $107.50 USD
Churchwarden + $25.75 USD
Leo Bloom - $13.25 USD
Helmut - $50.00 USD
Rick - $70.00 USD
PTBNL (not present)

Ferrari has called a game for Monday, but that’s because he has accepted a false god.  I’ll be at a seder with my family.

Problem is, the guy in second position (who limped in, remember) calls all-in.  I take back about $3,000, and the cards are turned:

ME: K♠ K♦

Number 2: A♣ J♠ (!)

Number 3: Q♣ Q♥

I’m feeling pretty good since I was expecting 2 to have AA.  The flop comes, and a J hits, but so what?  I’m still a huge favorite to win (huger, in fact, now that there are only two cards to come).

So what is the A♠ on the turn, is what. 

Now, at this point I’m resigned to losing, but there are three spades on the board, so with the K♠ in my hand and the J♠ in Number 2’s hand, I’ve still got 9 outs.  Right?

Obviously, I didn’t improve and got knocked out on the next hand by 88 when I went all-in with A5s against A8o.

Now, Two Dimes says that my chances of winning that second hand were less than 30%, whereas my chances of winning the KK hand were 58.17%.  I’d be inclined to believe them, except they also claim that I had 10 outs going into the river:

pokenum -h kd ks - ac js - qc qh —2s jc 9s as
Holdem Hi: 42 enumerated boards containing As 9s 2s Jc
cards win %win lose %lose tie %tie EV
Ks Kd 10 23.81 32 76.19 0 0.00 0.238
Js Ac 31 73.81 11 26.19 0 0.00 0.738
Qc Qh 1 2.38 41 97.62 0 0.00 0.024

I thought this might be because it was missing the J♠ in my opponent’s hand, except it correctly limits Queenie’s outs to one, since Q♠ would give me the winning flush.  Any thoughts?