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me! simply shirls mad about dark choc & ice cream building global youth ministry! to build strong and biblical youth to plant strong and biblical communities in every school in singapore and all over the world blogroll of yhope mob! central joanne ang winnie cheng xanthe ang zach young east chenglee poh jacquelyn tan yiqin teng north david hoe joyce tan northeast chantel teo freedy prajitna gideon ng marcus loke west alexis lim charis ng jr college debbie chong jasmine loh xiangyu say minops charis lu jiayi lee nathaniel tan shuzhen wang friends from all over! ps jeff chong eelee tan jasmine poon mike raditya chris bee eleanor tan stephanie soh other fave sites! yhope bulletin hope international apologetics bible gateway politico the beautiful game all-knowing wiki
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Friday, January 19, 2007
excerpt from life of pi shirls' note: this is how Pi, son of a zookeper in india, first met Father Martin, a Christian priest He was very kind. He served me tea and biscuits in a tea set that tinkled and rattled at every touch; he treated me like a grown-up; and he told me a story. Or rather, since Christians are so fond of capital letters, a Story. And what a story. The first thing that drew me in was disbelief. What? Humanity sins but it's God's Son who pays the price? I tried to imagine my Father saying to me, "Piscine, a lion slipped into the llama pen today and killed two llamas. Yesterday another one killed a black buck. Last week two of them ate the camel. The week before it was painted storks and grey herons. And who's to say for sure who snacked on our golden agouti? The situation has become intolerable. Something must be done. I have decided that the only way the lions can atone for their sins is if I feed you to them." "Yes, Father, that would be the right and logical thing to do. Give me a moment to wash up." "Hallelujah, my son." "Hallelujah, Father." What a downright weird story. What peculiar psychology. I asked for another story, one that I might find more satisfying. Surely this religion had more than one story in its bag - religions abound with stories. But Father Martin made me understand that the stories that came before it - and there were many - were simply prologue to the Christians. Their religion had one Story, and to it they came back again and again, over and over. It was story enough for them. I was quiet that evening at the hotel. That a god should put up with adversity, I could understand. The gods of hinduism face their fair share of thieves, bullies, kidnappers and usurpers. What is the Ramayana but the account of one long, bad day for Rama? Adversity, yes. Reversals of fortune, yes. Treachery, yes. But humiliation? Death? I couldn't imagine Lord Krishna consenting to be stripped naked, whipped, mocked, dragged through the streets and, to top it off, crucified - and at the hands of mere human, to boot. I'd never heard of a hindu god dying. Brahman Revealed did not go for death. Devils and monsters did, as did mortals, by the thousands and millions - that's what they were there for. Matter, too, fell away. But divinity should not be blighted by death. It's wrong. The world soul cannot die, even in one contained part of it. It was wrong of this Christian God to let His avatar die. That is tantamount to letting a part of Himself die. For if the Son is to die, it cannot be a fake. If God on the cross is God shamming a human tragedy, it turns the Passion of the Christ into the Farce of the Christ. The death of the Son must be real. Father Martin assured me that it was. The horror must be real. Why would God wish that upon Himself? Why not leave death to the mortals? Why make dirty what is beautiful, spoil what is perfect? Love. That was Father Martin's answer. This Son goes hungry, suffers from thirst, gets tired, sad, anxious, heckled and harassed, has to put up with followers who don't get it and opponents who don't respect Him - what kind of a god is that? It's a god on too human a scale, that's what. This Son is a god who spent most of his time telling stories, talking. This Son is a god who walked, a pedestrian god - and in a hot place, at that - with a stride like any human stride, the sandal just reaching above the rocks along the way; and when He splurged on transportation, it was a regular donkey. This Son is a god who died in three hours, with moans, gasps and laments. What kind of a god is that? What is there to inspire in this Son? Love, said Father Martin. I had tea with Father Martin three days in a row. Each time, as teacup rattled against saucer, as spoon tinkled against edge of cup, I asked questions. The answer was always the same. He bothered me, this Son. Every day I burned with greater indignation against Him, found more flaws to Him. I couldn't get Him out of my head. Still can't. I spent three solid days thinking about Him. The more He bothered me, the less I could forget Him. And the more I learned about Him, the less I wanted to leave Him. listenin -- small enough by nichole nordeman
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