"Fair" is Not Enough

A big word at the centre of many peoples belief system is "Fair." I should be treated equally, you need to play by the rules, life should be Fair. A thesaurus puts the word alongside Just, Honest, Trustworthy, Lawful, Legal, and Good.

The average person believes that fairness, or you could say justice, should be enforced in society. In a perfect world, the average person will be treated justly. The problem, however, is that when people think this, they have forgotten that the average person is not perfect. In fact, all of humanity is imperfect, and the familiar phrase "I'm only human" is one piece of evidence that shows we already know this. It's not news, but neither is it a welcome fact.

We are a broken species; we spend as many days behaving badly as we do behaving well, if not more. If you think this excludes you, then I'll add that even if you don't act on bad thoughts, all of your selfish and overly-proud thoughts are as valid for judegment as any actions. Your actions are, after all, only a symptom of the real character within you.

4 Definitions of Church

The word "Church" has had four different meanings to me so far. These definitions have been a mixture of nouns (names) and verbs (actions), and the latest two replace, for me, the earliest two... Sort of...

These different views on one word seem to stem from what you believe about spirituality, people, and what you believe the Bible says.

Noun 1: Church the Building

This is what most non-believers probably think of. A church is a building, a physical construction, a piece of architecture, maybe even just a historic artefact that is badly in need of repair. This view, of course, misses the fact that the christian church existed before buildings to contain it existed. So the shell has been mistaken for the organism. An easy, and understandable, mistake.

Short Story: What Thaniel Can Do

Travel through the stars, and observe the alien planets. There are two, one the size of our Jupiter, and the other bigger by half again, about to collide. In this universe, they are able to fall into each other because they have not intended to, and rock and debris will fly into space as they destroy each other without malice.

Now back up a few stars in this galaxy, and focus in on the only inhabited planet in this sector of space. Zoom into this blue and red planet to an individual called Thaniel Remington. Thaniel was a man not too different from any man you might know in most ways, and right now he is deeply sad. In fact, deeply sad doesn't quite cover it.

Thaniel is lying face down on a large mat of hay, and crying the tears of a man who has given up, and then found that even giving up isn't an option. His mind wanders through the last few weeks of his life.

Free Will

A relaxing and informal subject, no? This sort of area is one of those that is usually thought of as quite deep, but like a few others, is actually quite foundational to everything else we might believe. So; I present to you one of my foundations.

I believe that we have free will. However, from reasoning I have come to the belief that free will cannot exist as a physical or mental attribute, only as a spiritual one. This is because we understand that our physical world is built on physics, and causality, and also that our mental worlds are built on the foundations of the physical world (e.g. nature and nurture).

The reason for my belief that free will is a spiritual element of ourselves goes like this...

Giving: Africa vs. UK

In African church services, giving money is done very differently to how it's done in English church services.

The African churches I have visited have involved everyone getting off their seats, and dancing joyfully in a line to the front, where they drop their donation into the box or bowl. Music sets the pace, and you really get the sense of joyful giving that the Bible says God wants.

Switch over to a sunday morning in England- and I'm even talking about charismatic churches here- and it's a very different scene. The sung worship in some british services may be similar in style, but instead of the time of giving being a focussed and celebrated event, baskets or boxes are passed covertly along the rows of seats, so that people are distracted as little as possible from their singing.

I Believe Science

I trust science, but I don't trust scientists. I believe in all verified findings, but not necesserily the conclusions drawn from them.

If a man holds a rock in your face and says "This rock keeps albino polar bears away, because the rock is here and albino polar bears are not," would you believe him? He has drawn a cause-effect relationship, after all.

Yes, it's a silly and extreme example. But in real life, the possibile conclusions that can be made from a new finding are often very similarly, but subtly, woven into the discovery, as if the fact and opinion are both a single fact.

Passions per Heart

The charities I have regularly given to have included Oxfam, Children in Need and Christians Against Poverty [CAP]. Of those, I've only recently been passionate about Oxfam and CAP. Children in Need was one of those instances of being caught in the high street by someone with a clipboard, and after one year I stopped the money going out from my bank account.

I will buy Fairtrade products if they are available, and I was going to buy one of the items anyway. I don't often drop spare change in the plastic collection containers next to shop tills, and I have almost never given spare change to charity reps or homeless people in the street.

There are definately some conflicting items on this list, but I'm thinking here about what I'm passionate about, because that is what usually fuels my decision to act on the variety of good causes available.

Short Story: The 'Rude' Doctor

A man waited in a waiting room, armed with a wallet. He waited because he had a yellow staple stuck in his finger.

A doctor asked him to come into his office, and to explain what the problem was.

As the man walked in, the man vomitted on the waiting room floor, but the doctor politely ignored this.

The man waved his stapled finger in the medical man's face, and by way of explanation tried to describe his gerbil hunting activities as quite normal.

The doctor did not look very concerned. He reached for some pliers and antiseptic.

A scream that should have belonged to a young girl, and a bit more vomit, fell out from the man's lips as the offending piece of yellow stationary was extracted, and then thrown in the bin, by the educated healer.

Faith and Evidence

Any article or video on the web that mentions anything about religion usually has a predictably long thread of comments by users expressing their own opinions. Apparently, people have plenty of views on the subject (which personally, I hardly find surprising!)

One of the ideas that often makes its way onto these mile-long threads goes something along the lines of "Your belief is based on faith, and faith means ignoring any evidence on the subject, hence you, sir, are an idiot."

I disagree with this. I consider faith to be something that, in my experience, usually complements the known evidence. I have found it distinctly rare for a persons faith to go in the opposite direction of available evidence.

Imagine a scale running from top to bottom. At the top of the scale is "I believe this is true", at the bottom is "I believe this is false", and in the middle is "I don't know". People will be born, for most topics, with nothing on that scale. The default position for believing any topical item will be the neutral- the middle- "I don't know".

The Paranoid Android

I don't want to tell you much about myself, but I already know you'll insist on asking, so I may as well fill your mind with something that won't benefit you in any way.

I suffer from what you would probably prefer to call 'complete awareness', and I already know you'll think it strange that I said 'suffer'. You probably think it would be quite nice to be more aware of everything around you. But you would say that, because that's the typical sort of half-formed opinion that your stunted perception would lead to. You haven't ever given it serious thought, and like most things, you probably never will.

What you sense is a drop in the ocean compared to me. Do I sound like I'm boasting? I'm not. You're intellect really is miniscule compared to my own. So you would probably perceive it as unusual that minds like your own created my capabilities.

Marriage

I am currently blessed with 20 minutes to myself, twice every weekday, as I walk to and from my workplace. You get to a stage where your legs do their own thinking, and your mind is free to roam.

The other day, during this walk, my mind suddenly asked me how I'd reply if someone asked me why I am married. (Not an unusual question for someone who is 23 years old in this culture, I reckon.)

My reaction was surpise, because I realised the answer was not that I am 'In love'. Or at least, that was not the answer to that specific question.

So, a few thoughts on the question and potential answers...

Is a person who asks this question asking "Why did you decide to get married?" or "What made you want to get married?" These two questions have different answers.

All Change

One stereotype of older people is that they complain that "Things aren't what they Used to be." By Things they can mean anything in the world as they know it, and what they Used to be is obviously different to what they Are Now. So change has ocurred.

Change seems to be a sore point for many people, not just those in their old age. It may not be a stereotype for a teenager to complain that their school timetable has changed when they didn't expect it to, or that facebook's new layout isn't as good as the last one, but I have definately heard both of these, and far more trivial causes for upset.

Looking at most people in western civilisation (I cannot speak for any other), the general plan in life seems to be to end with an amount of comfort and security that has been accumulated, and then for life to simply stay that way. When we have done our time in the areas of hard work, fighting to survive, and then scrimping to save, we think that the world deserves to let us take it easy until life ends.

Death and/or Gloom

Many people are scared of death. But doesn't that seem odd?

Death: the 'ultimate statistic', the one thing that every living thing can be certain will occur to it, must surely be analysed as the most natural thing that can happen to us, since it happens with so much more certainty than anything else in life.

But for some reason, something that we could call natural, feels quite unnatural. Most people put great effort into avoiding it for as long as possible. It is currently still considered a taboo subject in England.

Does this unnatural feeling perhaps point towards a built-in part of ourselves that knows it was never meant to die?

They'll Horde Sprayer

Which version do you know?...

Half
Farther
Ooh Art Inn
Hair Fern
Allowed Bee
Yawn Aim
Thing King
Dunk Um
Thigh Well
Bead Anon. Her
Fasten Hair Fern
Gear Fuss the Stay
Hour Dare
Leap Red
Hand Fig if are Since
Has Whiff Fork if Though
Zues Inner Gain Stars
Leader Snot
In Toot
Empty Chain
Buddy Liver Rust
Form Me Fill

If none of that has made sense yet, try reading it aloud. :-)



See a short story about Language...

Image source: http://www.freefoto.com/preview/905-31-4940?ffid=905-31-4940

4 Reactions Model

Shown in the image is a small model. It is about reactions. It obviously isn't meant to be very encompassing, and it also puts things in quite black-and-white categories, which I know life isn't. But when I thought of it one day, I liked the way it challenged me, and it made me think about how balanced some parts of me were.

Two instances, and two reactions.
The instances are events that happen to us in life- good things (+) and bad things (-).
The reactions are our reactions to God- "You are good" (*) and "Why, God?" (?)

The two instances and two reactions form a total of four possible results, as visible on the grid. We'll look at each of them. First let's speed through the obvious two.

Short Story: Sentance in the City

Sentance stepped onto the bus. He walked to the middle and sat down in a very practical way. Sentance had been brought up quite well by his mother. He knew he would be regarded as quite proper in the city, but it would be worth it to see the Quote.

He had sat down next to a piece of grammar who turned to him with curiosity. "Who are you?" Asked the grammar.

"I'm sentance," said sentance, "and I'm going to the city to see the quote."

"Really?" Asked the grammer. "Me too, isn't that funny? My name's Mark by the way, Question Mark, have you heard of me?"

Sentance replied that yes, he had heard of the Question family. He thought to himself that he was glad that he was only meeting one, however- his mother had warned him that the Question family were nice enough, but too many of them together got on your nerves.

Church making mistakes = Good!

I've known a lot of Christians who have become disappointed with the church. That can be the church they go/went to, or the entire church that is the Body of Christ. In fact it seems to be a question of when, not if.

But I put a point to those who then despair, and question the authenticity of what they believe in.

- The church is made of up people. Humans.
- Our faith says that God made humans, but the relationship was then broken.
- Since the break happened, humans were no longer perfect, but flawed.
- So our perfect God sent the perfect solution- Jesus.
- Jesus has restored the relationship between us and our creator, and continues to do so.
- We can now spend more than a lifetime growing closer to our Creator.

But this growing, this learning, this changing, continues for at least all of this life.
We keep making mistakes and often stumble during this journey. We are still not perfect.

So when the Church makes mistakes, this makes my faith stronger.

Christianity is Unique

There are hundreds of religions and faiths available to pick from. If you feel like you want to get in touch with the spiritual world, you're spoiled for choice.

If presented with one option, most critical minds will then ask, "But why is THIS one more true/relevant/important than the others?" (Which is worth asking because religions do tend to require their members to put all their eggs in one basket.)

So applying this question to Christianity is something every follower should probably consider at some point if they want to follow God with their minds as well as their hearts.

There are several common factors that Christianity shares with the other major players in the religious world. So consider then- what's different? If it claims to be uniquely true, what sets Christianity apart from the others?

Short story: Screwj

It is not the night before Christmas. Instead, it is a nicely warm night in the middle of spring. The rich Mr. Evan E. R. Screwj has just settled into bed, when the ghost of his old workmate, Matthew Scrimp, appears in room.

Scrimp warns Evan that he has not given to charity, friends or family in his life enough, especially friends, nudge nudge, and will be visited by three ghosts over the night. Evan mentions in a cautious voice that Scrimp kept on loosing all his money on cards.

But the ghost of Matthew Scrimp has gone now, and is replaced by a fat, jolly ghost who calls himself the Past. He takes Evan through time to see a piece of his own history. They observe a large gathering where his family met for a large meal. He sees his cousin, Phil, stuffing everything he can lay a hand on down his gullet, and remembers that he died of heart failure later that year. His family, who were all quite large, had practically been proud.

Debate vs. Discuss

We usually think that whoever 'wins' a debate or discussion is 'right'. It seems more true to say that whoever 'wins' these is either the better debater, or has the most facts and data to hand, or both.

I do, of course, still believe that we can discern what is 'Right', or true about reality, from debates and discussions. But I'd like to distinguish between my thoughts on two words here, and which one I prefer.

Short Story: Belt Life

Soar through the stars and galaxies, and into one. There is the sun at the centre, it is our sun in fact. And on the other side, a few planets away, is the earth, but it is not our present day earth.

It looks slightly darker than the earth you are sitting on now, but as we keep getting closer, we can see that there is a ring around it. No, not around it, but on it. The ring goes around the entire equator, and looks to be the width of a medium-sized continent. As earth fills our vision, we can see that the ring is a man-made structure, and also, is moving around the earth, constantly rotating around the globe.

On ground level, it must be moving at an amazing pace. We dive down to this level, on part of the moving structure, and meet a little girl, Lindsey.

Future Sketch

Once upon a future, this blog included numerous ideas and short stories.

This was because this blog was brought into existance to record the thoughts and concepts that occurred to Ian- the thoughts often revolving around faith and life; the concepts often being expressed through short stories, sometimes about alternative universes.

So now the introduction has been made, mostly for the sake of taking up space, let the addition of content commence...

Image source- http://wp.clicrbs.com.br/infosfera/2008/05/?topo=77,1,1