The Lord sure does work in mysterious ways!
Yesterday afternoon, I opened up the TLO Tip Line to find an email from the almighty and powerful Christian God – Eternal Ruler of the Heavens, Lord of Light, and Stuffer of All Crust – instructing me to sell The Lost Ogle to Gene Bicknell for only $20,000,000.
In case you’re not aware, Gene’s the 92-year-old retired Pizza Hut franchise mogul who financed the American Heartland Amusement Park scheme, and apparently follows all the Lord’s digital commands.
Fortunately, God made sure to :cc him on the correspondence:
That’s awesome. Although I once believed we live in a holographic simulation created by an eternal artificial intelligence that’s beyond our understanding, the email is obvious proof that the Christian God is real and vengeful.
Plus, I'm going to be rich!
As a result, I will follow HIS will and turn over the keys to the website once the cashier’s check arrives in the mail!
“Whatever, Patrick. I see what you’re doing here. You’re mocking Mr. Bicknell, who claimed in a recent lawsuit that a pair of Branson holy men duped him into sinking $60 million into the American Heartland amusement park by sending fake emails posing as God.”
Whatever. That’s not true at all. As the newest subscriber to God’s Substack, I would never commit such a blasphemous act that would condemn me to eternal hell.
That being said...
You do have to admit the details of that deception are kind of funny.
According to a Steve Lackmeyer article in The Oklahoman (and other news reports), Bicknell is suing those Branson holy men – Richard Silanskas Jr. and Larry Wilhite – for fraud, specifically accusing them of posing as God to get his money.
“Silanskas and Wilhite executed a predatory conspiracy of psychological manipulation—convincing Gene, through fraud and impersonation, that God himself was commanding him both to finance the park’s construction and to grant Silanskas and Wilhite two-thirds ownership over the completed venture, which was to be worth $2 billion,” lawyers wrote…
To keep Bicknell on board with the project, attorneys wrote, Wilhite and Silanskas “tricked” Bicknell by impersonating God and religious figures purportedly communicating God’s directives in hundreds of electronic messages.
“For years, those electronic messages preyed upon Gene’s devout Christian faith and admonished Gene to obey God’s will without doubts or second-guessing,” attorneys wrote. “Silanskas and Wilhite used the word of God to convince Gene he must equally share ownership of the completed Project with them.”
In one of the “Today’s Word” emails, Bicknell was cautioned against using his business expertise, attorneys wrote: “God” all but shouted: “Do not fall back upon your old business practices trying to push forward what is not ready! Do not exhibit impatience or set deadlines with your own worldly wisdom from your past business ways.”
Before I write anything else, I want to be clear – impersonating the Christian God to dupe and defraud someone out of the grand fortune he made selling personal pan pizzas is evil and wrong.
But I’m not sure Bicknell has much of a case here.
First of all, if impersonating God to convince someone to hand over millions of dollars is considered fraud, then every preacher, pastor, and youth group leader who’s ever asked for money on behalf of the Almighty — which, let’s be honest, is all of them — could be opening themselves up to lawsuits and liability.
Second, how do we know God didn’t tell Wilhite and Silanskas to send Bicknell the emails? Maybe they were also just following His divine plan, and by filing a lawsuit, Bicknell is defying it? It's something to consider.
Anyway, all this writing about God and pizza has made me hungry. When Gene’s check arrives in the mail, and the deed to the website is handed over to him, I’ll let you know.
In the meantime, stay with The Lost Ogle. We’ll keep you advised.
