What's it all about?

How's this for a change? A theological discussion has led to a political discussion has led to my novel. And not the other way around.

Andy's wonderful blog post of yesterday sparked an interesting debate about the use of alcohol. I admit to being just a bit bored yesterday when I read the post and ignored it the first time. But Andy felt like stirring the pot a bit and so, I went to the discussion section and posted some thoughts. These thoughts were not well thought out, but the sort of common place thoughts that reside in your head as a place marker - a thought that you keep until real life forces you to contemplate the reasons behind the thought. We carry these kind of place marker thoughts in our brains all the time so that we can have opinions about anything and everything and thus appear to be educated. Most of our wisdom is actually a few well considered thoughts and tons of place marker thoughts.

As I expected, the discussion became intense. Theological concepts were being thrown around left and right. One of these concepts was a verse that I knew had been abused in the past to cover up all sorts of political malfeasance. I explained that I didn't agree with the verse and was told, rightly I believe, by Pastor Peter that I was a fool for questioning the scripture. Many people came to my defense - thus seemingly justifying my words. What had started as a simple stirring of the pot was quickly devolving into a debate between man and God.

When the situation in Zimbabwe was thrown into the mix, my first thought was, "Bravo! Thank you for proving my point!" And that was almost instantly followed with the thought, "Wait a second... maybe this is going a bit too far."

And that was when I thought about my Novel and I knew that I had gone too far. I think I recognized this fact because I see a lot of my own shortcomings in the Novel, and I know that this is one shortcoming I am constantly trying to overcome.

The main character of my Novel is a kid whose youthful head is filled with tons of these place marker thoughts. But he is not quite wise enough to realize that these thoughts are not a substitute for real tried and true and tested thinking. He tends to "offer" this advice to everyone, whether they want it or not, and whether it helps things or not. In fact, in the first chapter, this kid's big mouth gets him into a lot of trouble - trouble that follows him throughout the rest of the book.

As the story evolves, this kid never learns from his mistakes. He continues to make statements and act on his "convictions" without stopping to think about what he is saying or what he is doing, even to the point of co-opting religion to make his point. In the end, he leads a great many people to a tragic ending and only after a lot of death and hardship does he come to realize the errors of his ways.

Too often we are more interested in being right than in being good. Only true wisdom can cure us of this habit. Sometimes wisdom tells us that we have to be obedient, even unto death, in order to truly solve the world's problems. I can assure you that this is not right. But it is good.

And thus we come full circle. Religion to Politics to Novel, and back to religion again.