Re: Godot: An Introduction
Malcolm Lawrence (malcolm@wolfenet.com)
Sun, 22 Feb 1998 22:51:55 -0800
Brendan McKennedy wrote:
> I think discovering that there is no God, and trying to prove that to
> yourself, is a very large step toward the Divine, whatever you end up
> deciding to call It.
All this talk about a lack of God is really getting boring.
No God? Are you talking about the Western monotheistic male deity who had
no need for conventional sexual intercourse with a female to provide the
world with a prophet who was misinterpreted as a Saviour?
Of course there's a God. But first things first: God is not Santa Claus.
Death may be your Santa Claus (to quote an old Mott the Hoople song) but
God is NOT Santa Claus. And neither is Christ. Those of you who think
that there's no God really need to get out of the house more. Literally.
All of nature IS God. Every living thing IS God. Two people interacting
IS God. Everything that is alive in this universe together IS God. There
is no separation. It is not us vs. Him. We are all one. This is all
Christ was telling us. To deny another person their humanity is to deny
God. To remain socially retarded (like most existentialists are/were) is
to deny God. To think he's Santa Claus or some person who is going to
come sailing down from the skies and come knock on your door and make you
the king of the universe and happy for the rest of your life and make
sure your rent is always paid and there's never any more wars anywhere
and everything is always fair and just everywhere and you never run out
of toilet paper or South Park reruns because they're free and your phone
will always ring every weekend with a total babe willing to sweep you off
your feet because you're such a textbook example of Darwin's wet dream is
to admit to your own childish need to anthropomorphize the nature of the
life force of the universe (i.e. too much TV) and in so doing trivialize
how socially maladjusted you are to what's outside your own front door,
let alone someone in Rangoon or Montevideo.
And speaking of all points hither and yon...Franny's dilemma? The sofa.
That bleeding sofa was her only dilemma. She was/is a couch potato to the
nth degree. Serves her right for getting so ill after she simply read
about the travels and adventures of a pilgrim. When I first read Franny
and Zooey I could always see how she was her own worst enemy and the only
way she was going to be able to cure herself was to get up off the sofa,
sell everything she didn't need for cash, leave everything and go
traveling like the pilgrim did. Which I did. And no matter how much I
love that book and no matter how much of a masterpiece it is, there was
no way I was going to suffocate myself the way I saw Franny's mind
suffocating herself. And after I got done traveling and I thought of that
book I was glad I took my own advice and decided not to let my mind eat
itself like what happened to Franny. I don't care how "spiritual" you
think you are...if you can only be spiritual when you're alone, that
don't cut it, bud. You've gotta be able to go down amongst da people and
be spiritual while you're amongst them. THAT'S the test. Everything else
is just preparation.
Malcolm