ST. LOUIS (EAP) -- Thousands of people in the St. Louis area who
purchased a "Jesus 2000" doll from a local religious retailer during
the 1999 Christmas season found themselves amazed last week when all
of the dolls started bleeding at the same time.

"Our doll started bleeding from His hands and feet at exactly 9:00 on
Friday night," said Tom Tinglemyer, who admitted that he's been
refreshing the batteries in his daughter's Jesus 2000 doll for the
past five years without her knowledge.

When the batteries get low, the doll beeps for a few hours, and after
that keeps saying "Why Hast Thou Forsaken Me," over and over, once
every half hour until the batteries are replaced or until Jesus dies
from lack of power.

"I didn't want my daughter hearing Jesus cry out about being forsaken,
so I made sure to keep fresh batteries in the doll," Tinglemyer said.

"It's the same with me," said Louise Franklinson, who says that she
ended up buying Nicad batteries with a recharger for her daughter's
Jesus doll, because the recharger also beeps at her when the batteries
are fully charged.

"Jesus beeps for the first few hours before saying He's actually being
forsaken, and the first time He did it, my daughter was at school, so
when He started whining about being forsaken, I quickly drove up to
the corner store to get some fresh batteries."

"I replaced the batteries and my daughter never knew the difference,
just like when I used to eat the milk and cookies she left out for
Santa on Christmas Eve," she said.

David Ingsommers, another St. Louis resident who purchased a Jesus
2000 doll, says that he bought an extra set of rechargeable batteries
to use while he's recharging the first set.

"I didn't wanna risk Jesus being out of power for the 4 hours it takes
to recharge the batteries, so I bought a spare set and it was like a
great burden was lifted from my heart or off of my shoulders," he
said.

All those people who purchased the doll and kept fresh batteries in it
for the last five years witnessed the doll bleeding at exactly 9:00 on
Friday the 13th of May, 2005.

"It's a miracle," said the owners of the dolls.

"I found it strange that I had to code in whether I was on daylight
savings time when I bought the Jesus 2000 doll and was programming it
at first," said Robert Weringer, who gave one of the dolls to his son
for his fifth birthday during the 1999 Christmas season.

"When Jesus started beeping and whining about being forsaken, my son
says that he put the doll in a shoe box in his closet, to shut it up,
or bury it, and that was the last I heard of it," said Marcus Ebingly,
who also says that he feels like he might have actually forsaken
Jesus, and fears for his everlasting soul.

"I hope Jesus doesn't take it personally that I didn't keep fresh
batteries in my son's doll. I really would've liked to have seen Him
bleeding on Friday night, but it apparently wasn't meant to be. I
also thought my son was too old to be playing with dolls when he
turned nine, so I didn't really worry about the batteries after that.

--
Elroy Willis
www.elroysemporium.com