April 19, 2019To the Insurance Agent Who …
During the Christianity wars in Paris 1572,
three Huguenots were skewered on a spit
and roasted. They happened to be children
and siblings, two brothers and a sister.
And it was the Will or Holy Plan of God
that they would die this way. For the girl,
if she were allowed to come into womanhood
one day, would take seed and give birth
to the Antichrist who would destroy Christianity
for evermore. That was the thought. The Catholic
shoe mender who lured the children into his home,
the man who would save the world,
cranked the spit and had no further
context of the extravagant display of his crime
—for which the angels in the echelons
would take up their terrible horn and siren voices
to equally praise and condemn for eternity.
He could feel God moving through
his hands, he would later describe to others
who simply saw him as a psychopath
before the word for that condition was invented.
And as with another thing their brains
were not equipped to identify: it was loneliness
that motivated his actions and not God at all,
unless God was loneliness, as he must be.
And if you find yourself confused
by this little narrative, remember
that to have faith is to believe
as the shoe mender did in his innocence,
or to come closer to the same fire
and take some comfort there.
from #62 - Winter 2018