c. 2008 Religion News Service

(UNDATED) Comedian Lewis Black may not someday endure the flames of hell, but his new book is sure to inflame many people who’ll want him burned at the stake.

In “Me of Little Faith,” Black speaks on matters of faith and morals, religion and _ needless to say _ God. Given that he is a comic (“The Daily Show”), he’s going to go for yuks no matter what. But Jews will not be the only ones incensed by his statement that “Next to Christmas, Chanukah looks like a retarded crafts fair.”

Black’s wit is supposed to sweeten his sour messages. Still, he sounds deadly serious with such lines as, “If you believe that the pope is infallible and all he says is true, then you are relieved of the responsibility to think.”

The author is an equal opportunity insulter: “One might say Judaism is not merely a religion but a perfect neurosis.” Mormons? “They’re crazy,” he writes. Members of new-wave religions are “grinning that grin that one finds only in the zealously religious.” He also cites “the moronically blissful grins one sees on so many born-again Christians.”

His courage does not, however, extend to criticizing or mocking Islam.

“All I’m saying is that I have nothing to say,” he writes, in the book’s shortest chapter. Actually, he does have something to say, in a different chapter. He muses what might have happened 40 years ago if the Beatles had endorsed Islam instead of the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. “We might have avoided September 11,” he writes.

Black’s erratic use of upper- and lower-case H’s when referring to God _ sometimes it’s “Himself,” but other times “himself” _ will annoy some. But his calling Jesus a name that is seldom heard in polite company and his imagining God saying a profane word will infuriate others.

In “Me of Little Faith,” Black is preaching to the unconverted and unconvinced, and they’re the ones who’ll most enjoy his controversial views. “It’s rather shocking that God only had two books in him,” he says, referring to the Old and New Testament. “You’d think he would have put out at least a pamphlet in response to the Holocaust.” Black then notes that he’s now written just as many books as God has.

Many will hope that score stays tied for all time.

(Peter Filichia writes for The Star-Ledger in Newark, N.J.)

KRE DS END FILICHIAA photo of Lewis Black is available via https://religionnews.com.