KINGDOM OF HEAVEN, ETERNITY — Larry “God” Schumway, CEO of Holy Trinity, Inc., held a press conference early Friday morning outside the Pearly Gates western entrance to the Kingdom of Heaven, where he apologized profusely and repeatedly for the deaths of rock icon David Bowie and acting legend Alan Rickman within mere days from each other. Both men were 69-years-old and died after their own bouts with cancer.
“I fucked up; there’s no getting around it,” Schumway told the heavenly reporters at the press conference. “I mean,” God said, “I can’t just stop the whole ‘dying’ thing, but I can see now how scheduling to bring in David Bowie and Alan Rickman, at the same age at the same time using cancer for both was just plain mean and fucked-up, and I apologize to the entire universe.” God said that if he had it all over to do again he’d have scheduled Rickman and Bowie to check-in to the Heavenly Hotel, Spa, Costco and Bowling Alley at “much different times.”
God said that while death simply must remain a part of life because of eventual overcrowding issues, he “should have exercised more managerial control” over exactly when he’d take the beloved artists from Earth. “What’s the rush,” God said he would have told himself in hindsight, “they’re all going to get here eventually anyway, so why not let them have just a few more years of each guy’s stuff?”
“Oh, I’m a huge fan of both guys’ work, no doubt,” God said when asked, “but that doesn’t mean this was selfishly motivated, believe me. After all, I’ve already got the best house band in the universe.” God said that between John Lennon, Jimi Hendrix, Kurt Cobain, Freddie Mercury and Janis Joplin he already had a “bevy of world class talent” in Heaven, and that “it was just a clerical error” that took Bowie and Rickman in the same week.
Mr. Schumway mentioned that he can sympathize with those who are mad at him about “that whole cancer thing,” and that “seeing two legendary masters of artistry die because of complications related to their cancers” would make anyone question his leadership. “The thing is, that cancer is like any other obstacle in human development and evolution, and maybe if the people of Earth stopped fighting about marginal tax rates and letting gay people get married or allowing Muslims into your country, you could focus that considerable human energy you have and if not cure cancer, make lessen its grip, but that takes effort on their part. Until then,” God said, “I just take in the castaways that it creates.”
“Sometimes our incoming and outgoing departments get a little mixed-up around the first of the year,” Schumway said as the press conference was ending, “and well, I’m just really sorry about this.” God said that he was “just gutted” by the fact that he had to take “two tremendously gifted artists” and “that was probably too much.”
“I should’ve at least offset this by taking a Duggar or Pat Robertson instead of one of them,” God said, “but paperwork moves slowly around here and I had no idea that this was the week we were scheduled to receive both David and Alan.”
