Kevin's Watch

Jon Paul Kendall Remillard had philosophical difficulties with the concept of Christmas. That the scraggly little evergreen tree his mother was trimming was a midwinter hope symbol was easy enough to understand from the explanations and mental images Teresa offered. But the notion of God creating a body for himself to wear – and even Creation itself – bothered Jack.

“It seems a very strange and unnecessary thing for God to do. To become human so that we’d love him rather than fear him. If he’s truly a Supreme Being then it follows that he has no need of any other entity to ensure his own happiness. Especially entities that are so imperfect by their very nature that they will inevitably befoul an otherwise orderly creation. I can understand God creating the physical universe for fun. But why create other minds when you know they’re going to mess things up?”

“I believe famous human thinkers have debated those point. I seem to remember that the theologians of early times were quite positive that God had no absolute need to create other thinking persons,” Teresa said. “This is perfectly ridiculous, of course, since the theologians were willing to concede that he had done it and must have had a good reason. Now, unless we’re ready to admit that a Supreme Being can be capricious or wishy-washy, it follows that he needed to do it. He did need us.”

“But what prompted God’s need of us?”

“Love,” said Teresa.

“That’s irrational.”

“Exactly. I don’t believe anyone has ever reasoned out a satisfactory answer to God’s need of us. Those religions outside the Judeo-Christian tradition rarely hit upon the notion of a loving God at all. As for natural philosophy, loving-kindness would not be an attribute that one would logically deduce that a Big-Bang-Creator-God would have.”

“Hardly.”

“But love is the only motive that seems to make any sense. Without it, you have the Creator-God as a game player trying to assuage his cosmic boredom, caring about us only as game pieces. That is to say, not caring very much! Now, if God wanted us to know that he created us out of love, he’d have to tell us, since we couldn’t figure it out for ourselves. He’d have to get directly involved with us, rather than let us tick along obliviously the way the evolving non-sapient universe does.”

“I suppose so…”

“There are any number of ways he might have done this. But put yourself in God’s position and try to decide the most elegant way to get involved with your thinking creatures. The way that is at once most difficult and unlikely but has the potentiality to succeed in the most magnificent manner imaginable.”

“Not the easiest way?”

“Hevens, no! What would be the satisfaction in that? I can sing ‘Happy Birthday to You,’ but I get more satisfaction doing the mad scene from Lucia, even if it tires me out terribly.”

“I understand.”

“God’s most elegant way of involving himself with us would have to be a scandal to the stodgy-minded and a delight to minds that have a sense of humor and of adventure. As his mind does.”

“God can laugh?”

“Of course, dear, and feel sorrowful, too. A Supreme Being without those attributes wouldn’t be supreme. Grim and joyless people try to pretend otherwise, but their arguments are unpersuasive.”

“Explain to me how God became directly involved with us.”

“It has happened differently on different worlds in the Galaxy. On ours, I believe that the primary involvement happened through the Jewish people and the Christians. It’s a long story, and you’ll really have to read it in the Bible. That book is a fascinating account of human moral evolution, with historical and deeply mythic truth all mingled in a wonderful mishmash. It’s a literary treasure as well as the word of God, and some parts of it are profound, and some are fascinating and some are poetic, and some are even a bore, and parts of Saint Paul make me want to scream. I’m sorry that I haven’t read the whole thing myself. Different religions interpret the Bible in different ways, but we Catholics believe that when the mentalities of one single key tribe of extremely intelligent people were finally mature enough to grasp the concept of a loving God, God simply spoke to them.” She laughed. “Well – perhaps not simply.”

“And the tribe accepted his messages and passed them on?”

“Some members did. Others kept slipping and sliding back into primitive notions of angry gods that constantly needed to be appeased with blood sacrifices and other rubbish. God had to keep coaxing them and smacking them down the way a loving mother has to do when her children are naughty, and – well, you must read the Bible and discuss it with people who know more about it than I do. Your Mama is a very poorly educated person, especially in religious studies. I’m probably explaining this all wrong.”

“Is love the motivation for all creation, then?”

“I imagine so. Mental lattices within our normal Reality can’t exist without the other five kinds, and vice versa. If God wanted to make minds to love, he had to make the whole cosmos. And it is quite lovely, most of it.”

“But to create for the love of it seems so odd!”

“Of course it does. It really makes no sense – in a rational view of the universe. And yet every artist knows the truth of it. And every healthy adult human knows that people who are in love want the whole world to be as happy as they are. If you are God, loving yourself or even being Love in some mysterious fashion, and there aren’t any other minds to share happiness with – then you make some.”

“So one may conclude that God does need us?”

“Most of our coreligionists today believe it’s true.”

“And the problem of the created minds being imperfect? And sometimes evil?”

“I think that has something to do with advanced chaos theory, which I’ve never been able to make head or tail of. You must ask your big brother Marc to explain it. There’s also some principle to the effect that it is much more glorious to make something wonderful out of imperfect parts. The very imperfection of the individual elements – even when there’s actual evil involved, as there often is in human affairs – challenges God to greater creative heights.”

“What a strange idea.”

“There’s an old proverb that says: ‘God writes straight with crooked lines.’ Human history is just full of crooks and twists and twines. One would think anarchy or barbarism or the lowest common denominator would have triumphed ages ago. But is hasn’t. All the messes and atrocities and disasters have somehow been woven into a construct that looks better and better every year – at the same time that some things look even worse! The world is a wonderland compared to the world that existed only forty years or so in the past. That’s because most people have easier lives in the Galactic Milieu than they did before the Great Intervention. But even so, there are still persons who are discontented or who are villains, and situations that are evil or tragic. Nevertheless we children of God continue to evolve and improve on every level, almost in spite of ourselves. That also has something to do with nonlinearity and chaos. And God’s love, too.”

Julian May is my favorite female writer

Trapper439 wrote:ur-monkey, I'm thinking of starting a new game of Football Manager soon.

If you're not a football fan then, as I said to Avatar recently, please feel free to respond with a heartfelt "FO".

But if you have a soft-spot for either Rovers or City then I will start at that club.

Phantasm wrote:

Trapper439 wrote:ur-monkey, I'm thinking of starting a new game of Football Manager soon.

If you're not a football fan then, as I said to Avatar recently, please feel free to respond with a heartfelt "FO".

But if you have a soft-spot for either Rovers or City then I will start at that club.

If you REALLY want a challenge at Football Manager, start off with Aberdeen.