Photo Courtesy: Peter E. Zekiel
The James E. Marks Intercultural Center, largely known as the central hub of religious worship at Drexel University, met its demise this year at the hands of Drexel University’s officials. They convened at the top of the Papadakis Integrated Sciences Building each dressed as a different Greek god, cackling around an artificial lightning-bolt machine called the Smite-Simulator2000. With one bolt after another, the all powerful administrators reaped the wrath of the heavens crumbling the building to bits.
After being moved to the Pauly Peckers Problem Solving building, on-campus religious groups have taken to the streets the past few weeks, claiming that officials have incurred the wrath of the gods with this tactic move.
The rally was announced shortly after officials released their plan to commemorate the Intercultural Center in the hotel that will replace it, with a small inscribed granite tile placed in the floor of the entryway, reading in curly script, “Where is your God now?”
Warren Carter, from the Office of the President, further incited student outrage when he was televised at a “town hall” meeting telling students who complained about the building’s demolition that Drexel was the new religion. To compensate for the religious center’s demolition, they would be giving out free copies of the Drexel Master Plan. “We’ve even hired what we like to call ‘JuanFria’s Witnesses’ to go dorm to dorm on campus and hand them out,” he said.
Students from religious groups around campus were found the next day, accumulated in the giant pit where the Intercultural Center once stood. Representatives from the University’s branches of the Children of Atom, the Church of God the Utterly Indifferent, the Joy of Sect, Potatoism, the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster and Praysbyterian, were among others showed up with their bullhorns and Bibles (which have 100 percent accuracy when thrown at close range) for public safety’s inevitable visit. Around 4 p.m. the crowd began screaming and hurling the building’s debris over the barriers onto Chestnut Street, creating a debris-dam to keep traffic from progressing and to obtain a crowd of spectators.
A life-like hologram of a giant potato (courtesy of the Drexel Potatoism branch) loomed overhead ominously as students marched back and forth on the rubble, chanting with signs reading, “The shaft stops here” and “NOtel.”
“The Flying Spaghetti Monster puts up with a lot of shit here at Drexel, but there’s no way he’s letting the destruction of his place of worship slide,” Duleep Khusan, an enraged member of the group, said that he had covered himself head-to-toe in Allegro tomato sauce, or as he called it, “the war-paint of his people.”
“The University’s officials have officially declared a war on noods and noods lovers.” He continued, before rushing off to hurl meatballs at a public safety officer attempting to break up the dispatch.
Outside the riot, Cornelius Jimenez, a member of the Church of the God of the Utterly Indifferent, was staggering along Chestnut Street trying to get a signal on what he referred to as his “God phone.”
“The service has typically been really lousy here but now that they’ve wrecked down the Intercultural Center, I can’t even get a bar,” he said. “But before it happened I texted the big man to let him know, just as a courtesy. Well, instead of the usual way he responds to my prayers like “lol” or “omfg” he responded with this.” Jimenez whipped out his God phone and showed the reporter a text message with a single ellipsis.
The students’ riots were shut down by about 6 p.m., when the crowd dispersed after public safety officials flew overhead in a chopper threatening to dump an ungodly amount of boiling holy water from above.
In an exclusive interview, God declared war on Drexel University officials, saying he would use members of on-campus religious groups as his minions to fight this battle. “Fry thinks he can just displace my people and tell me it’s ‘all business.’ I’m not going to take that lying down. After I got that tip from what’s-his-name down there, I was a little peeved off. I help Fry out in all his squash matches and this is the thanks I get in return? Got me off my god chair and making some personal calls. What he doesn’t know is that I’ve got more contacts than him. Crazy people look up to me, you know.”
The Rectangle contacted Drexel’s officials, who defended their decision to evict and relocate the religious groups, issuing a statement from Fran Bobbis, director of University Facilities, that read, “I don’t see why we should entertain the idea that their spiritual beliefs are worth more than our monetary revenue. Here at Drexel we worship none other than the dollar.”
Attached to the statement was a picture of Drexel’s board of trustees. All of the members were pointing to the office mantel, on which was a glass of wine, a $100 bill and a picture of the Virgin Mary whose face was pasted onto the body of a stripper covered in trillion dollar bills.