Meditation on Christian Living: Curmudgeons

It's amazing how quickly weeks disappear into the past.

To God and to my readers, I ask for forgiveness that I have not posted in so long. I have plenty of excuses—but no good ones. I have plenty of reasons—but none that do not crumble under God's scrutinous gaze. In essence, I allowed other tasks, and other facets of life here, priority. Thankfully, God chose to utilize me in other ways, to deepen my faith in other ways, during my prolonged hiatus from blogging. I'd like to share a part of that with you.

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My Curmudgeons class—which covers the literature of Ambrose Bierce, Kurt Vonnegut, Mark Twain, and H.L. Mencken—truly challenges me at times. As one might imagine, the majority of these men write of God with a sword for a pen, and bile for ink. They structure their harangues like dunking booths, doing their best to place God on the ledge as they hurl indictments and libels, like baseballs at a high school principal.

I often wonder why they bother railing so loudly against Someone whom they believe does not exist. Who are the fools—those who believe in a Higher Power and attempt to converse with Him, or those  who claim that they do not and yet shout obscenities at Him all the same? If we are God's children, then these are the teenagers: screaming and slamming doors, demanding freedom while shirking responsibility, spouting faulty arguments about fairness and reason—all in all, the reckless, rebellious, rancorous basket-cases that parents dread.

Mark Twain, for one, quite notoriously fell into this category. For example, note the following climactic passage from his posthumously published work, The Mysterious Stranger, a veritable temper tantrum:

"God who could make good children as easily as bad, yet preferred to make bad ones; who could have made every one of them happy, yet never made a single happy one; who made them prize their bitter life, yet stingily cut it short; who gave his angels eternal happiness unearned, yet required his other children to earn it; who gave his angels painless lives, yet cursed his other children with biting miseries and maladies of mind and body; who mouths justice and invented hell—mouths mercy and invented hell—mouths Golden Rules, and forgiveness multiplied by seventy times seven, and invented hell; who mouths morals to other people and has none himself; who frowns upon crimes, yet commits them all; who created man without invitation, then tries to shuffle the responsibility for man's acts upon man, instead of honorably placing it where it belongs, upon himself; and finally, with altogether divine obtuseness, invites this poor abused slave to worship him!..."

In my latest paper for the class, I challenged the theology of this selection, and the work as a whole. The following lines come from my rebuttal:

"Praise be to a God who could make good children as easily as bad, yet prefers to let them form their own character; who could have made every one of them generically happy, yet instead allows them the opportunity to find happiness for themselves; who made them prize their earthly lives, and willingly grants them life eternal; who gave his angels eternal happiness unearned, on the same conditions that we may have it; who gave his angels painless lives; and gave us a beautiful universe; who mouths justice and hopes that none shall perish; who mouths mercy and offers us redemption; mouths Golden Rules, and forgiveness multiplied by seventy times seven, and forgives us for breaking those very Rules many more times than that; who mouths morals to other people and personally withstood temptation; who frowns upon crimes and tolerates those who duck personal responsibility and blame Him; who created man without invitation, and loves him in spite of him; and finally, with altogether divine wisdom, invites all who are weary to find rest in Him."

"The wise will be put to shame; they will be dismayed and trapped. Since they have rejected the word of the Lord, what kind of wisdom do they have?" (Jeremiah 8:9)