Twisted Fate

here is the preamble: i really hate to see anyone self-deprecating. i think it's a sad sign of someone who doesn't realize how amazing they are. having said that, i will say that i am, myself, a recovering self-deprecator (is that a word?). and, somewhat hypocritically - sort of like a smoker stabbing the air with her lit cigarette admonishing you not to smoke - i am about to just, well, talk down to myself a little bit. you see, i think that i'm sort of like a pre-schooler about all things theological and lofty. i'm new to this arena and so i feel like my "big questions" are the kinds of questions that scholarly individuals would swat away like mosquitos annoying in the summer heat. so i have some insecurity to iron out - but at least i'm aware of it. so i am starting by saying that i imagine [more] educated minds furrowing their bushy brows and laughing down their long, biblical noses at me, then stroking their wiry gray beards as they shoo me away.

okay, enough of that. (really, even though i do feel all those things, i was trying to strectch my literary muscles just a bit and stylize my thoughts.)

let's get to the point. my latest so-called (sorry!) "big question":

is it at all possible for free will and destiny/fate to dwell together in peace or are they actually polar opposites?

we were talking the other night, nathan, deborah and i, about the possibility that God doesn't actually intervene. a theory, that as it was discussed seemed to make the most sense to me at the moment. what about all the people in the shit? the haitians, the africans, the whole god-damned bloody world, it seems. what about children who are being abused and FUBAR by their own parents? it's up to us, we concluded, to come together in community and do something for each other and for everyone else. i mean, OBVIOUSLY, god isn't going to appear as a burning stove and provide food for 10 million. OBVIOUSLY. and if it hasn't happened yet - my brother and my sister - it ain't gonna happen. god has not miraculously whisked people away from their shitty lives in recent memory. god hasn't spoken in a loud booming voice (or even the wind-like whisper) to the clergy of this great nation "how about not treating haitians and jamaicans like something foul and wretched? how about recognizing that they are people, just. like. YOU?" He hasn't appeared to the governments-gone-wild and told them to straighten up and fly right. In the places where it really counts, i cannot say that i have seen any evidence of a mystical intervention.

so how could i possibly believe that this god who chooses not to save the most desperate of souls with magic, would make a small whim of a wish come true for me? how can some christians believe (i'm thinking of some specific individuals) that god would give them a discount at the damn store and not answer to the plight of someone screaming or suffering silently in the dark? that's kind of math that will get you audited, my friend. so, if god doesn't intervene, and we are responsible for our brothers and sisters - it's up to us - then what?

mother teresa. UNICEF. WHO. the UN. bono. doctors without borders. oprah. the hunger site. the one campaign. live aid. bob geldoff. these organizations/people and many more like them are, in my opinion, the only manifestation of anything god like that shows any ray of hope and images of love. so then, we have free will. we can do what we want, but a lot of the times it's without love and therefore inconsequential.

another question: was jesus really "born to die"

if god doesn't shift things around on a checker board and we all actually have free will, god would have KNOWN ahead of time about jesus' death, but it doesn't mean that She planned it. so jesus was killed. and then he turned into something exra special by coming back.

could the christian church have missed it? spewing on about how jesus died for us when, in reality what jesus did was LIVE for us? if the church would quit talking about sin and jesus dying for our sin and talk more about love and the LIFE of jesus they might actually sound a little less dusty and a little more shiny.

i'll close by saying that all i can say is what the hell do i know? yes, i believe in a Creator. yes, i believe that jesus' life was more than significant. yes i believe that jesus recognized his divinity. yes, i believe in love. yes, i believe in here and now. no guarantees.

as usual - everything else is just questions.