PZ Myers, evolutionary biologist, outspoken atheist and astonishingly prolific blogger, has done what he recently promised to do in the wake of a kerfuffle about some kid who took communion but didn’t swallow (thereby smuggling out a piece of the flesh of Jesus himself according to Catholic doctrine).

PZ couldn’t believe the fuss (well ok he probably wasn’t so surprised) and promised to do the same himself, prompting a hysterical flurry of pleadings and condemnations for it. Being an atheist (and therefore fashioned of pure evil) he was unmoved by such appeals, and went ahead and did it anyway. Read his report here, along with some interesting references to the slaughter of Jews perpetrated by the Catholic church over the centuries as punishment for the crime of host desecration.

Also fun (although sometimes alarming) to read is the hate mail PZ gets; this is one of the more civilized ones:

You must be the devil himself as even he knows the power in the Holy Eucharist (don’t you dare disparage the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ by calling Him Who died for you a cracker!). You must be a freemason, or just a very sick man who needs healing and believe me, I will pray for your conversion. Pray you live to see that day so you can ask Him to forgive you and your uncircumcised heart. Just the mere thought of desecrating the Holy Eucharist is enough to get one into hell, but, maybe that is, for now, the horrible place you are aiming for. I dare you to read about Our Lady of Fatima and the accounts of hell as the three children saw, then, maybe you will change you sick mind. God forgive you. However, it was great that you got many people praying for your conversion since you showed the world how sick you are, and maybe God will convert your hard heart. Pity you. From a lay evangelist who prays for you and the rest of this sick world of secular humanists.

Some level-header Catholic named Mark Shea thinks PZ defiling a wafer is tantamount to breaking into someone’s house and stealing their child’s drawing:

And if you send one of your blog readers into my house to take it, I would be quite justified in calling you a thief who has stolen something precious. I would also be quite justified in defending it and my house from your naked act of aggression.

He also refuses to mince his words:

I won’t mince words. Myers is an evil man. And as evil men, particularly evil intellectuals, tend to be, he is also a mad man as are most of his acolytes and followers. One need only read Pharyngula to know this. Not all atheists are driven mad by their atheism. Many are quite respectable human beings. But those who make it their raison d’etre tend to be made crazy by it. That’s the tragedy of sins of the intellect. They don’t just make you stupid. If you persist in them, and particularly if you persist in them to this degree, they make you crazy.

In Mark Shea’s mind (and those of his perfectly sane acolytes) PZ Myers is an evil mad man because— although he wouldn’t hurt a fly — he would symbolically disrespect a cracker to make a point.

I honestly don’t get it. I can understand someone calling the demonstration obnoxious perhaps, but evil…?

Nothing is sacred. That’s not a lament of our modern times. It’s simply true, and it’s good that it’s true. Nothing is above question or even ridicule. We have ethics, morals and taste; we have no need of the sacred for to live well as humans.