Ever wonder about stuff that’s related to other stuff?  Like those little organ grinder monkeys and global terrorism, you know there’s some kind of connection there, but you just can’t quite pin it down.  Or how Dick Cheney’s career didn’t really take off until hammerpants had passed from fashionability.  And of course, the greatest question of them all; what’s the connection between Star Wars, The Presbyterian Church, and Communist China.  I know you probably never thought anyone would finally find the answer to this timeless and imponderable question, neither did I, until I discovered something online so horrifyingly self-evident that’s its terrible veracity cannot for a moment be doubted.  You need not doubt the truth of what is to follow, it has been vetted by the greatest independent fact checkers in the business, and it is, without a doubt, completely legit.  What you are about to see came from a copy of Star Wars: Episode Three, Revenge of the Sith found on the mean streets of Beijing, and it puts forever to rest the question which haunts us all.  Now, some of you will be completely shocked and freaked out by what you are about to see, and others of you will probably just snarf in your beverage, so you’ll want to make sure you don’t do it over your keyboard.  With these words of warning, I give you this:                                                                                                               

            Now, being a Presbyterian myself, I had always suspected that Star Wars was really all about me, not only because Yoda bears such an uncanny resemblance to John Calvin (who, after defeating Pope Babyface XIV in a steel cage match, decided to just go and start his own denomination).  It is also no secret that the Chinese government has always been unusually harsh in it’s oppression of Presbyterian groups.  I’d always kind of wondered why this was, but clearly it has a lot to do with the fact that for some time now, the Chinese government has known the truth about the Presbyterian Church: it’s full of Jedi.

            I’d always kind of suspected that this might be true, since our church was always sending missionaries to China, and then when they came back, they’d be all like, “We have dealt a serious blow to the forces of the Evil Galactic Empire this day!  Um, I mean, uh, we built an orphanage in a poor mountain village, yeah, that’s what we did, my bad y’all.”  And then there were all the times that I’d go to see our minister about something, and right when I walked in he’d be practicing his lightsaber forms, and then he’d put it away really quick and tell me these weren’t the droids I was looking for.  And of course, there was the time that Christopher Lee kidnapped the Moderator of the General Assembly, and we had to send a couple of guys to blow up his battleship and chase off General Grievous (who, in case you were wondering, is actually a Unitarian).

            But now, it’s all so clear I can’t imagine how I ever missed it in the first place, and I’m all psyched about going to live on a swamp planet with a gnarly old muppet and learn how to make stuff fly around with the power of my mind.  Unfortunately, I have recently received a new report from the Wookies that the Red Chinese are even now working on construction of a Death Star somewhere in China, which is a totally wack thing for them to be working on (though I might have suspected earlier when the fortune cookie I got last week at General Tsao’s Sacred Wind of the Seven Spirits of Righteous Vengeance Fried Chicken Palace said “We are building a Death Star, come and stop us if you can, Sucka! Sincerely Yours, The People’s Republic of China).

            Clearly, the time has come to leave the shelter of the metaphorical moisture farm this is Virginia, and do that thing where my minivan transforms into an X-Wing so I can fly to China and destroy their Death Star before they can use it against anyone cool and/or anyone who owes me money.  And of course, once I get that done, I might as well have an epic battle with Chairman Mao, the evil emperor of China, high above one of China’s many scenic and deadly fiery magma pits.  Of course, I’ll eventually cut off 75% of his limbs, let him roll down a gentle slope and catch on fire, tell him he was the chosen one, and then just go home and assume that he’s dead and nobody is going to rescue him and rebuild him into a half man, half machine lord of darkness, cause hey, that magma is really hot, and I’m gonna have a long trip ahead of me before I’m back in Richmond where I can get a decent Slurpee.  Cause yeah, even if I’m a Presbyterian Jedi, I still love me some Slurpees.