We accompanied our son and his fiancée when they met with her priest to sign some pre-wedding ceremony papers. While filling out the form, our son read aloud a few questions. When he got to the last one, which read "Are you entering this marriage at your own will?" he looked over at his fiancée.

"Put down ‘yes,’ " she said.

Prior to our wedding, David and I met with the minister to discuss our marriage ceremony and various traditions, such as lighting the unity candle from two individual candles. Couples usually blow out the two candles as a sign of becoming one. Our minister said that many people were now leaving their individual candles lit to signify independence and personal freedom.

He asked if we wanted to extinguish our candles or leave them burning.

After thinking about it, David replied, "How about if we leave mine lit and blow out hers?"

Jake, Johnny, and Billy died and went to heaven. "Welcome," St. Peter said. "You’ll be very happy here if you just obey our rule: Never step on a duck. If you step on a duck, the duck quacks, they all start quacking and it makes a terrible racket."

That sounded simple enough until they passed through the Pearly Gates and found thousands of ducks everywhere. Jake stepped on one right away. The ducks quacked, making an unholy racket, and St. Peter came up to Jake bringing with him a ferocious-looking Amazon woman.

"I warned you if you broke the rule you’d be punished," St. Peter said. Then he chained the Amazon woman to Jake for eternity.

Several hours later, Johnny stepped on a duck. The duck quacked, they all quacked, and St. Peter stepped up to Johnny with an angry-looking, shrewish woman. "As your punishment," St. Peter told Johnny, "you’ll be chained to this woman for eternity."

Billy was extremely careful not to step on a duck. Several months went by. Then St. Peter came up to him with a gorgeous blonde and chained her to Billy, uniting them for all time. "Wow!" exclaimed Billy. "I wonder what I did to deserve this?"

"I don’t know about you," said the beautiful woman, "but I stepped on a duck."

One Sunday morning my sister Liz was surprised to receive a phone call from her minister. He reported that he’d just been in a minor car accident and asked if she could inform the congregation he’d be unable to conduct services that day.

Liz was flattered that out of the entire congregation, she was the one he had called—until the minister went on to say that since Liz was always the last to arrive at church, he knew she would be the only person he could still reach at home.

Doug was leaving church after Christmas services when Father McCarthy took him aside. "Douglas, my son," he said, "it’s time you joined the Army of the Lord. We need to see you every Sunday."

"I’m already in the Army of the Lord, Father," Doug replied.

"Then why do we only see you on Christmas and Easter?"

Doug looked to the right and to the left, and then leaned over to whisper in Father McCarthy’s ear. "I’m in the Secret Service."

As the golfer approached the first tee, a hazardous hole with a green surrounded by water, he debated if he should use his new golf ball. Deciding that the hole was too treacherous, he pulled an old ball out and placed it on the tee. Just then he heard a voice from above say loudly, "Use the new ball!"

Frightened, he replaced the old ball with the new and approached the tee. Now the voice from above shouted, "Take a practice swing!"

With this, the golfer stepped backward and took a swing.

Feeling more confident, he approached the tee when the voice again rang out, "Use the old ball!"

One Sunday I asked our pastor to announce that the church softball team had won its league championship. As he did, he asked team members to stand up.

Although there were usually ten to twelve of us at Sunday service, I was embarrassed to see only four of us standing.

Not missing a beat, the pastor continued, "And what is most amazing is that they won with such a small team."

Moses was walking down the street when he bumped into George W. Bush. "Hello," Bush said. "Nice weather we’re having, huh?" Moses took one look at the President, turned, and ran in the other direction.

The next day Moses was walking down the same street and there was Bush. Again he tried to initiate a conversation. Again Moses turned and ran away.

Bush was tired of this bizarre treatment, so the next time Moses ran away from him, Bush followed. When he caught up, he asked Moses what was wrong.

Moses said, "The last time I talked to a bush I spent 40 years in the desert."

Desperate for a child, a couple asked their priest to pray for them. "I’m going on sabbatical to Rome," he replied. "I’ll light a candle in St. Peter’s for you."

When the priest returned three years later, he found the wife pregnant, tending two sets of twins. Elated, the priest asked to speak to her husband and congratulate him.

"He’s gone to Rome," came the harried reply, "to blow out that candle."

The pastor of my church hates to plead for money. But when the coffers were running low, he had no choice. "There’s good news and there’s bad news," he told the congregation. "The good news is that we have more than enough money for all the current and future needs of the parish. The bad news is, it’s still in your pockets."

Walking through the forest, an atheist hears a rustling in the bushes. Turning, he sees a massive grizzly charging towards him! He runs as fast as he can but trips over a stump and falls. As the bear raises a huge paw to strike, the atheist screams: "God! Help me!"

Time freezes. The bear becomes immobile, the forest is silent, and the river stops running. Then the atheist hears a powerful voice: "You have denied my existence for years, taught others I don’t exist and credited my creation to a cosmic accident. Why should I help you?"

"It would be hypocritical to ask you to show mercy on me," the atheist agrees. "But perhaps you could make the bear a Christian?"

At that, the noise of the forest resumes, the river runs, and the bear drops to its knees, brings its paws together, and says, "Lord, for this food which I am about to receive, I am truly thankful."

My boyfriend was working in the souvenir shop at Canterbury Cathedral in Kent, England. One afternoon he was talking with an attendant who worked in the cathedral when they were approached by two tourists. "Are you a monk?" one of the women asked.

"No," the attendant explained, "I wear this robe as part of my job, but I’m not a member of any religious order."

"Then where are the monks?" asked the woman.

The man replied, "Oh, there haven’t been any monks here since 1415."

Hearing this, the woman looked at her watch and announced to her friend, "Betty, we missed the monks."

Kevin was not an ideal child. He managed to get into mischief frequently, and was always trailed by his younger brother, Ken. Finally, at her wits’ end, his long-suffering mother took him to see their parish priest. The father decided to focus Kevin’s mind on higher levels.

"Kevin," he asked with great seriousness, "where is God?"

Kevin gave no reply.

"Kevin, where is God?"

Again there was silence.

For a third time the priest asked the question, and this time Kevin bolted out of the office and ran all the way home. He burst into his brother’s room.

"Ken," he panted breathlessly, "Father can’t find God and he thinks we had something to do with it!"

The ten-year-old boy was failing math. His parents tried everything to get him to do well in school, but nothing worked. Finally they enrolled him in a Catholic school. From his first day, the boy spent every night poring over books. When his first report card came, he had received an A in math.

"Son," his father asked, "what made the difference in math class? The nuns? The textbooks?"

"Dad, I had never taken math seriously before," the boy admitted. "But when I walked in and saw that guy nailed to the plus sign, I knew this place meant business!"

During an ice storm I went to check the mailbox, carefully shuffling down the driveway. When I reached for the mail, my feet went straight up in the air, and I landed on my back. More embarrassed than hurt, I looked to see if anyone witnessed my fall and spied a fire truck passing by. The crew had seen the whole thing.

Firefighters climbed out of the truck to assist me. "It’s the preacher," one said. "Are you okay?"

"I just got the wind knocked out of me," I replied.

"Wow," said another firefighter. "It takes a lot to knock the wind out of a preacher!"