The Agnostic Christian

This is a poem that I will be reading for Intersections of Art and Faith-An Open-Mic Reading and Discussion Series. It will be read on the final night in August.

http://i16.photobucket.com/albums/b47/dream_me_real/flyerforjaci5.jpg

The Agnostic Christian

Will I believe it when I see it?

or will i see it when I choose to believe it?

Does one have a choice in these games,

or are we all subjected to the dictations of the cosmos?

"God does not care for you" you claim

However, my neighbor, my heart

puts up the claim of a different narrative

(am I to privilege that which I do not see{believe}?)

the pumping of blood bids me closer to the source;

the ravings of insanity lurk behind these eyes

Who is it that lies behind these eyes?

where does the surge of plasma come from

that compels me towards the center of what I do not believe?

Lurk around the corner, dear stranger,

I will not hear the taunts until I am too late

We are all to late to understand what may draw us away...

away from a journey so grand and beautiful

Not behind these eyes,

the taunting voice does not cry from

But from the well spring of life

does the great travesty's voice arise

(do the dictations of the cosmos

come from our own two eyes?)

lust, power, greed

the cry for more compels me away

from that which I do not believe

away from the essence of all we can know

(beauty)

What more could I wish for

then what i believe?

What lies in front of these eyes...

the 'beauty'(deficient)

only cries for comfort and security

separation from what lies behind your eyes:

within the well spring of your life

if only I can become but a child again

even travel back beyond the womb,

to experience that which I do not believe

to feel again the source of this life

that can only belong to the one in whom I fail to perceive

(in whom I can only believe)

Do I bid farewell?

Shall I remain subject to the workings of the cosmos?

Destiny will, and will forever be yours and mine

This wellspring I offer up

{Restore us to yourself, O Lord, that we

may be restored;

renew our days as of old-

unless you have utterly rejected us,

and are angry with us beyond

measure}

The Evolution of Love

I feel the need to give a bit of a disclaimer before preceding. This is not a biological/sociological exploration into how our current concept of our deepest emotion is expressed. As fascinating as that subject is, a blog is not the appropriate outlet. Rather this is an exploration into the evolution of how we love. I fear that this could potentially turn into some form of relationship self-help and be a far cry from the sort of pseudo-revolutionary writings I wish to convey. Or maybe it will tie in. For love is what makes or breaks the revolutions at hand. We shall see.

Moving right along.

I remember my first (and arguably only) serious relationship. It was sort of unofficial and lasted roughly a year. During the beginning the thought that most raced through my head was "This is person is mine!!!" It was not that I had a complete control over her, or that she was a possession of some sort; the thought was that of an immature love. Typically this is known as 'lust', however I disagree. Lust, as we shall love later on, is what happens when one fails to move beyond the initial immature love.

This immature love is, seemingly contrary to what I said earlier, a sort of possessive love. Again, it is not because I believe she actually belonged to me, it was because I felt that I had earned some sort of sacred right to affect someone's life and this in person in turn showed me love back. Which made me feel all gooey and giggly on the inside. No matter how you look at it, this is a selfish love that can't be dwelled at for very long. The longer you dwell on the feeling of this immature love, it quickly disintegrates into possession (lust) and has a total disregard for the well being of the other. At times there can be an attempt to grow beyond and 'share' this person; however once possessiveness has taken root the only way to remove it is to burn the entire relationship down.

However, if you follow the age old saying of 'If you love someone, let them go. If they come back, they're yours' then this is when the relationship begins to bloom.

The thought is that once you truly realize that they have a stake in your life now, that a part of them is yours. It is no longer about you, however it is about the both of you. Now you see that not only does this person in a sense 'belong' to you, you belong to them. Really this is simply an intermediate stage between the seed and the flower. You can tell what it is becoming, but it's beauty is not yet in fully revealed. 

The flower of love is the beauty that I can simply call 'mutual submission'. It is that the only thought on your mind is giving yourself to this person. You belong to them and they have no other desire but you. The beauty of this is that it is mutual (hence the 'mutual submission' part). It is not an end, but a great adventure. Not filled with perfect romance or perfect people, but people willing to sift through all the bad in life and work things out together. This is how a unit is built: basing decisions off of the needs of the other rather then your own. 

I am well aware of the risk involved. What if the other person doesn't reciprocate? Well then, that person never moved passed square one. Not your fault. However, the real test is whether or not you realize this before or after you reach the blooming of love. I've witnessed many times the tragic mixture of selfish love and submissive love. It's unholy and degrading. I feel I have to end this on a warning. Treat love as you would a precious treasure. Don't waste it. The person may not be able to reciprocate it. However, this would not be a blog truly written by me if I didn't throw in a bit of optimism. Don't keep the treasure locked away forever. Share it when you are ready.

I've been on a Nietzsche binge this week. I apologize, but this is too humorous to ignore. Read and then watch.

"Two people with equally great vanity retain a bad impression of one another after they meet, because each one was so busy with the impression he wanted to elicit in the other that the other made no impression on him; finally, both notice that their efforts have failed and blame the other for it."-Taken from 'Human, All Too Human'

Loosely Philosophizing...a first blog...

"There is not enough love and kindness in the world to give it away to imaginary beings."

-Nietzsche 

I could not agree more with this observation. We live in a world ransacked by a lust for power and security; so much so that we are willing to sacrifice the well being of the whole for our own simple pleasures. If but one person has the audacity to love another, why would they ever want to waste it on someone that they can't prove to exist? One might call them crazy.

"Hi, my name is Ralph. This is my best friend Todd."

"Where is Todd?"

"Todd is all around you."

"..."

"I love Todd and would do anything for him. I spend my every waking moment with him and I give my money to the people who first told me about Todd."

"..."

Now I have but one confession to make. 

I am, and I am not a Christian. 

I am not a Christian because I do not sacrifice my time, energy, and recourses to preserve an institution which claims to stand in for god within society.

I am a Christian because I choose to sacrifice my time, energy, and recourses on my neighbor.

The spirit of Christianity is not to worship an old man up in the sky with the hopes that one day we will have outrageous blessings, if not in this life then in the next. The spirit which exemplifies Christianity is that you choose to become a part of an already blessed people and you must now extend that blessing on to others. Again, it is not based on the merit that if you shower this invisible being with love and affection then that person might decide to shower you with love and affection (always in monetary form of course) back. It is based upon loving your neighbor.

Yet how is this a revolutionary idea to the modern post-religious mind? Well in the simplest way to answer... it's not. To love your neighbor is not a revolutionary idea anymore. It is in fact looked down upon to not think about children starving in Africa. Yet let me share a parable that might begin to answer the question of what the point of my faith is.

There is a man. And we’re sitting on his back.

Not directly on his back; but the couch we’re on does sit on his back. And since we’re on the couch, we’re sitting on his back.

I’m not sure how he got to where he is. Maybe I put him underneath, maybe you did, maybe someone long ago did. Whoever it was that first made him carry this couch doesn’t matter; we’re still on his back.

Who needs to argue history here?

Maybe there is more then one person carrying the couch we sit on. It could just be this guy though.

However, I’m sure comfortable up here. I really appreciate what that he carries us from here to there. But mostly I forget that he’s down on the ground,

with a couch on his back.

One day someone was missing from the couch. I couldn’t figure out where he went. Then I saw another set of feet by the man who carries our couch. So I decided to jump off and figure out what was going on.

“Why are you down here?” I asked my fellow couch potato.

“Well, while everyone was sleeping I saw this man crying. I couldn’t sleep with this noise, so I decided to find out what was the matter. He told me that every now and then his back really hurt from carrying this couch. Some days he can ignore it pretty well, others not so well. I figured since I haven’t stretched my legs in a while it might be a good to get some exercise, so I decided to help carry the couch. Then I realized that it was a lot of work to carry it and this man’s back must hurt quite a bit. So I stayed here.”

“Does it really hurt that bad?” I asked the man who carries the couch.

“Some days the pain is unbearable. Other days I can ignore it. But most days just fly by like a blur.”

So I decided to stay and help him carry the couch as well. It makes me sad when people cry.

After a few days of carrying the couch I decided that I needed a break. My friend had already gotten back up on the couch to rest a few times.

Why can’t I?

While I was resting upon the couch I told all of my friends of the adventures I had carrying this couch. I told them of the mans plight. And we all came to the conclusion that we must do something.

“Why does there need to be a couch?” A couchling asked. “We shouldn’t burden the man simply by providing an object for our own comfort. We can do away with it and simply sit on him. When we do this, then we will be able to better see the path he walks.”

I found this to be a great idea. We can all be enlightened as to the hardships others go through for our own comfort.

But soon the boniness of the man’s back began to make us all uncomfortable.

“Must I sit here, watching this man toil, it makes me uncomfortable. His back is awfully hard and when we consider it, we really haven’t helped him all that much. Maybe we should build a better couch, a couch that will not harm him so much. Maybe even one that will help him eat better!”

So we did. And we reflected upon the times when we helped carry the load, when we sacrificed our comforts for this man’s journey. We felt proud of ourselves, but soon forgot about the man.

I think of him from time to time. Some of us go down, a few at a time to help him carry the load. Give him new clothes. Even some new shoes from time to time. And we felt good about ourselves.

But all the while, the man continued to stumble on, with a couch upon his back.

Could Christianity be the spark that sets fire to the couch upon which we all sit?

***********************************************************************

Next Question: If God is an all loving being, and love is best exemplified in self sacrifice, can God make a decision to benefit god's self at the expense of the other?

More to come...