GK: We've been having an argument at church this fall about ministry and outreach and specifically about our ministry, or lack of ministry, to zombies. We've been very accepting of werewolves, have a werewolf couple in the choir actually----
J&J&GK (SING):
Twas grace that taught my heart to fear
And grace my fears relieved
(ADD TR & SS HOWLS)
How precious did that grace appear
The hour I first believed.
GK: And we did have a vampire who came to the Sunday evening service, back when there was a Sunday evening service, but it was cancelled because attendance was so poor, in part because the vampire was there, and he was acting out, the way vampires so often do.
TR (VAMPIRE): I want to sing "There is a fountain filled with blood, drawn from Emmanuel's veins, and sinners washed beneath that flood lose all their guilty stains." Number 234-----"There is a fountain filled with blood"-----
GK: But recently a lot of zombies have appeared in the neighborhood, and at the meeting of our Outreach Commission, Sandy, a woman who gives me the creeps, spoke up about it.
SS: Okay, so maybe they are undead ----- whatever that means, I don't know ----- so maybe they have voices that don't conform to what we assume a human voice should sound like ------ maybe we have a strong negative reaction to them physically based on our own cultural stereotypes of what is human and what is not ---- but I don't think that we in the church can simply ignore the entire undead community.
GK: Community?? Zombies??
SS: Yes----
GK: They're a community now?
SS: For your information, "zombies" is such a judgemental term ---- they prefer the term "alternative life forms" ----- anyway, we need to start accepting them as they are----- they are broken people-----
GK: Literally. Their faces are falling off.
SS: Broken people. Why are they so different from the lepers in scripture??
GK: Sandy, you're talking about the living dead, okay? People whose brains are leaking out. The custodians have enough work without having to clean up big chunks of rotting flesh.
SS: They need the gospel as much as anybody else. How are they different from lepers? Tell me that.
GK: Sandy, they have a virus and they want to eat the brains out of your head and what zombies need is to be shot. I mean it.
SS: I can't believe you're saying that.
GK: They need to be shot in the head so they can die and go into the afterlife and then ----- if you want to donate flowers for the altar in their memory, fine-----
TR (MURMURY PASTOR): I think Sandy has a very real concern and I think that in the spirit of diversity and accepting differences, I think we need to reach out and embrace all different life forms regardless of our biases about------
GK: Pastor?
TR: Yes?
GK: Zombies are dead. They're not alive.
SS: That's your opinion.
GK: Zombies are mindless corpses who have an insatiable hunger for human brains. Their bodies are rotten, their flesh is falling off.....
SS: And the church is about healing! It's about solving those problems!
TK: ZOMBIE (OFF, SLOW SLIDING FOOTSTEPS)
GK: Who invited this zombie?
TR: I did. I thought we needed to hear from an undead person and get their point of view.
GK: Pastor?
TR: The gospel is for everyone.
GK: It's for the living, Pastor.
TR: We are a welcoming church.
GK: Pastor?
TR: We are a welcoming church.
GK: Not entirely. Pastor, look at me.
TR: We are a welcoming church. (FOOTSTEPS)
GK: Look at Pastor Johnson. The way he's walking. Slowly and stiffly.
SS: He's always walked that way.
TK: ZOMBIE
GK: Get back. Get away.
SS: He's reaching out to you. He wants you to embrace his otherness.
GK: Hand me that cake mixer ----- it's right there in the kitchen. Jack-----
SS: What for?
GK: Just get it. And hurry. (FOOTSTEPS OFF) Pastor------(ZOMBIES OFF) ---- Pastor, don't come any closer ----
TR: We are all one. We need to come together.
GK: Pastor-----
SS: Don't hit him!!! (GK SWINGS, KNOCKS LOOSE FLESH OFF) You just knocked his head off.
GK: It's the only way. Give me the cake mixer, Sandy. (FOOTSTEPS)
GK: (START MIXER) Close your eyes, Sandy. This isn't going to be pretty. (MIXER, ZOMBIES GETTING WHACKED, SPLORT, CRACK, WHUMP) (SFX SLOWLY FADE UNDER MUSIC) I used to be more liberal, more accepting of differences, and then the living dead came to church, and I decided that some differences are too different. Some of the zombies are still there, I think. At vespers the other evening, there were some people sitting in a dark corner and they were singing in a monotone-----
ALL, SINGING, SLIGHTLY MONOTONE:
We have been here ten-thousand years
We will not go away
And we will teach your heart to fear
You may be us someday.
GK: Keep your eyes open, that's all I can say. Be alert. Because they're out there. And they want to come in here. (MUSIC PLAYOFF)