A blog inspired by Beth's theme of late and as I said there sometimes I have to rejigger theology in my own head from time to time due to events. The late playwright Arthur Miller who as I recall was not known for being a religious person had this to say in his autobiography TimeBends: "Fuck you Death!" Probably for many of us we've come to accept death as natural and normal if not really a great thing, it's not and I think Miller tapped into something here basic to Christian thought without even knowing it and that is there is something fundamentally flawed with the Universe, in the original Christian understanding death did not enter the world until Man sinned and I covered alot of this ground already in my blog about why emotionally I can never be pro-choice (http://not-the-left.blogspot.com/2009/01/spiritual-view-on-pro-life-im-entitled.html) .
It's not an either/or situation, you can hold that God exists and yet Life is absurd and without meaning at the same time (although this is largely subjective since the happy and the unhappy cannot seem to relate to each other). The atheist "solution" besides ignoring Intelligent Design is too easy and doesn't address this central existential problem head on. Now whenever I've drifted towards this view people call you depressing, negative, pessimistic...relax, I'm merely stating a hard philosophical truth and do counsel people to get as much out of Life as you possibly can, you can and should enjoy Life to the max anyway but the answers religious folk give in such situations are too pat. So why do those of a spiritual bent continue to fool themselves insisting that God has plans for all of us which are too inscrutable for us to even figure out, always on some unknowing mystical plane? What about the 8 dead in the Taconic tragedy? I'd have thought a divine plan would not be so easy to foil.
The thought occured during my walk in Piermont this morning that maybe we're not meant to be here that long anyway and yet we cling to this life with all its absurdity and tragedy and yet maybe the good angels are whispering to us to just let it go. As soon as we're born we start to die, life's a bitch and then you die so why do we try to reconfigure a reality that isn't? Man sinned, we muffed it and can't seem to get back on track. Why are we here? Why were we born? I have no answer to that just know that it's not our true destination so if it's merely a sojourn does the duration really matter? IMO the real problem is secularism which teaches us to become too attached to this one life and meaning then becomes derived through materialistic means: career, house, money, sex etc. Final Thought - Your life here on Earth is very short, even the average lifespan of say 75 years is short when you stop to think about it so how the tragic affects us emotionally and spiritually is finite too and when the time comes when everyone looks back on this dot called Life, well as I said it really didn't make a whole lot of sense and we're in Heaven now so seen against the backdrop of Eternity its relevance is only temporary.
If God gave us Life then it must be a gift that we should appreciate. But my mother-in-law, in trying to console me, said she heard a speaker say that if our loved ones in Heaven were given the chance to come back to Earth, that though they love us, they would never leave the beauty of Heaven. So perhaps showing our appreciation for this gift of Life on Earth is just a step towards the gift of Eternal Life.
ReplyDeleteBut here's the rub Beth, it all boils down to How's Your Life? You honestly think though when you're on your deathbed you're gonna miss all this crap? Did you have a choice in being given this gift? What if the gift turns out to not be what you or God planned or expected? I've said it before and Lista agreed with me that while many of us don't hate the happy we can't relate to them. True love, largely a myth although I used to believe it exists and now see to the extent that it does it's rare. So yes make the most of the gift is the way I would put it even if the gift doesn't turn out to be that 10-speed Schwinn you always dreamed of but a 5-speeder instead.
ReplyDeleteAs a broad philosophical statement if you asked me "are you happy?" I'd go with a NO. This is one of the really honest blogs out there and I don't give required or proper responses. OK so God isn't doling out the miracles lately, well we've come to expect this but on some other matters I recently gave my blog a makeover and went all the way back and did some much needed trimming, deleted a few blogs here and there that for whatever reason I felt were delete-worthy and so I had posted a Happy Valentine's Day blog once and had no problem deleting it. It's either your favorite special day or it isn't, it ain't mine and with our 50% divorce rate I'm surprised it's still a day at all. Pessimism if you will at least doesn't set up false expectations, whatever it be, stuff about soulmates and it's almost grating this constant social requirement to be happy even if in your bones you know you're not and for good reason. Peggy Noonan once wrote an insightful piece that we as a society feel we have a right to be happy and she offers a more realistic approach but that's food for another blog.
ReplyDeleteAs your good friend it makes me very sad to read what you wrote when you said you are not happy, because although I know it is not realistic to think that people are happy 24/7, having a friend rate an all-out NO just makes me feel bad.
ReplyDeleteBut I'll bet if you posed this question to alot of people if they answered honestly you'd get the same result. I could pose the very same question here, philosophically where do you come down on this? I'm not at the point in Life where I want to be, it's not a counsel of despair to not enjoy life just giving some broad conclusions. Let's pose the question: the good doc gives you 6 months to live, as someone once told me you'd be very sad of course but you might also get a tingle in the stomach that the bad dream is almost over. But you really have to read that part of the subtitle of my blog to get the full gist: "Life may be a tough road to hoe but enjoy the trip anyway." That's pretty much my philosophy and outlook, it ain't contradictory any of the things I've said here.
ReplyDeleteI think we all have ups and downs so it depends on when you would pose the question and where that person is on the roller coaster of Life that determines their answer.
ReplyDeleteDuring Emily's funeral, the pastor mentioned a story that Emily once told a friend, "I'm pretty healthy, except for this cancer thing." Now that was early in her diagnosis of course, but talk about making lemonade out of lemons, know what I mean?
Overall, though, I have had those down periods when I wish I could be dead, but as I said our lives are a gift, and I also think our friends and family are a gift to us, and so the down times are often made better by the love of those who know us.
It's a dark world, we're living in dark times. As for my thoughts about Life in general I've a right to my opinion, to my conclusions. I can't make conclusions for others, it's all subjective anyway. I'm not a preacher of false optimism, of pat answers which is why I find so many speeches today so lacking in inspiration. I've never been a conformist so some things they're telling you you know is a big lie. I've blogged about this elsewhere but why is Life so painful and fraught with suffering for so many? Lista hit upon it once and I've said it too and that's because largely it's because others make it so (barring natural calamities and diseases of course) so the real tragedy here is that we as a species have the power to make this world a better place and we choose not to, we prefer the option of causing hurt and pain to others. There is something about the poetry of suffering though, that romantic element and I know I speak for many through my blogging. Maybe 'tis a midlife crisis, the feeling of Life ebbing away. You're not wearing a hairshirt and walking around grinding and gnashing your teeth all day, just that you've reached some conclusions on this deal called Life and so people become horrified that you can be so socially incorrect that you can give what is in your view an honest assessment at least for now.
ReplyDeleteAs always you ask some good questions, and I suppose people do not always chose doing good because it isn't easy and as humans we aren't perfect, but if there is any wy I can add some brightness to your dark world, please let me know how I can, because I would very much like to if I am able.
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