"Plastic Jesus" is actually a really old folk song. On the inside of the CD, they credit this song as "song from Cool Hand Luke" (good movie by the way) because Paul Newman plays it in the movie, but the song itself actually predates even that movie by a fair number of years. So anyway, the lyrics are probably quite literal. I can't really picture old folk singers being sarcastic about religion. Wayne doesn't strike me as being terribly religious, however, so he might've chosen to cover this song to make some sort of subtle statement.
"Plastic Jesus" is actually a really old folk song. On the inside of the CD, they credit this song as "song from Cool Hand Luke" (good movie by the way) because Paul Newman plays it in the movie, but the song itself actually predates even that movie by a fair number of years. So anyway, the lyrics are probably quite literal. I can't really picture old folk singers being sarcastic about religion. Wayne doesn't strike me as being terribly religious, however, so he might've chosen to cover this song to make some sort of subtle statement.