Chapter 32: Evidence
"Come on! Keep up!" Demi whined, sprinting ahead before stopping suddenly, waving at us to hurry.
Dawn pulled on my arm as if her force would get me to move at a faster pace. I continued at my walk, trying to appear as if the strain on my arm wasn't painful.
"I'm a bit tired of Salamence not ever leaving the company of his new sibling." I stated.
Dawn's pull lessened, "Well, they're brothers. You can't expect them not to spend time together. Besides, we won't be here forever."
My mouth thinned. It had been a week since reuniting with Electivire. Each day had been full of socializing, though fortunately I had gotten out of going into the church for longer than a few minutes at a time or spending any quality time with Robert, who still was a complete stranger that I hadn't warmed up to yet.
"You and Roric spend hours together so I don't know why you're complaining." Dawn teased.
"Roric and I have civilized conversation." I argued.
"The last time I interrupted you were both talking about your hair."
"He brought up that subject. And he talked about his for the majority of that topic."
Dawn gave me a disbelieving look.
I guffawed, "Dawn, since when do I talk about hair?"
"He must be influencing you. Wow, peer pressure."
She laughed as I pulled my hand out of hers to smack her shoulder gently, but ran to catch up to Demi. I still refused to run, opting to smile as she turned to face me as she continued going backwards, winking at me.
Where are you heading, kiddo?
I looked behind me to find my uncle's Electivire jogging tiredly to catch up.
"I'm not sure. Demi says she has a surprise for us."
I see. Do you think the surprise involves my look-alike? He asked.
"No. I don't think my partner would go through Demi to speak to me."
He sure is taking his sweet time to talk to you about his choice. Electivire grunted.
"We're both very full of pride." I said, slowing in my walk, "Or else the two of us would have spent much longer together."
He sighed, I hope you're not beating yourself up about leaving me.
Shrugging, I didn't look at him.
You have to leave it in the past. He cautioned gently, Guilt eats away at people. The best thing to do is let yourself get picked up and keep going.
"That seems logical."
You and your logic. Electivire scoffed, How about some spiritual healing? It's spiritual advice.
"Of course when I can hear your words you're beating the Bible as well." I said, trying not to smile.
He noticed and grinned, I was Ben's Pokemon and have spent years with Robert. Do you really think their faith wouldn't rub off on me?
"Faith isn't something that can rub off on someone. Beliefs don't instantly form or change just because someone else says their beliefs are true."
He snorted, I see you've been talking to Roric.
"Can you say I'm wrong?"
I'm not saying you're wrong. You're absolutely right. You don't have to be a know-it-all about it, kiddo.
He pushed my shoulder with his giant hand, catching me before I could lose my balance.
"At least I'm humble enough not to go picking fights when I'm wrong." I smirked.
You push with your words. He rolled his eyes, I'll let you talk about that stuff with Roric since he seems so much wiser than the elder.
"Fine." I smiled.
"Hurry up!" Demi demanded, "I've had to mentally be all connected to you guys so you could talk, but you're going to be late for the surprise."
Electivire and I glanced at each other before picking up our pace, finding ourselves at the beginning of the tree line. A larger space between trees revealed a circle of plushy pillows, which Demi jumped onto, sitting with her legs crossed as she grabbed a book from the ground in front of her. I noticed Luxray taking up three pillows next to his Trainer, who was reading his own book. Roric didn't look up for a moment as he finished, "I see now why Demi insisted on bringing so many pillows."
His eyes met mine and I couldn't help but smile again. Really, Roric was the easiest person to talk to that I had ever met. The previous day we had had an enormous conversation about how science supports the existence of God. Well, he argued for God while I argued against. I was surprisingly impressed by the probabilities of a life supporting planet being the perfect distance from the Sun.
Apparently, the universe was the perfect size to support this one planet's life. There were over eighty factors that, if they had changed in the slightest, such as a dash more of carbon or oxygen, life on earth wouldn't even be possible. As much as I disliked being wrong, the idea of a god being the creator of the universe made far more sense than it creating itself, or nothing creating it, or some other thing making it. Because really, as far as I knew, nothing could make itself.
Despite saying that I believed that the Christian God existed, I continued to try to find a loophole in things that Roric said, or in what reality was and how God must be wrong in some way, shape, or form. After a lot of debate with Roric, he had asked me why I was so closed to the idea of God and, when I couldn't answer, had stated, "I don't think God is the one you really have problems with. I think you have problems with yourself. Believing in God changes everything and you're not ready for that change, so instead of focusing on what's important, you're just busy being nitpicky."
It was a bitter statement to swallow, one that I tried not to think about because I knew he was right.
"Earth to Paul!" Demi waved her hand in front of my face, obviously impatient, "I've been waiting all day for this so can you please focus and sit down? Luxray would love to sit next to you."
"I'd love to sit next to Paul too." Dawn said quietly, bumping me.
Ignoring Electivire's chuckles and Roric and Luxray's smirks, I chose to sit by Dawn, who rested her head against my shoulder. I took her hand and looked attentively at Demi, ready to begin whatever we were here for.
"You sit too, Electivire. Ok, good. We're all here." Demi picked up her book, "We were going to read the Bible together."
Dawn let out an excited noise while I frowned, "Why?"
"Why?" Demi blinked and leaned back, "Because don't you think that if you believe in God you should learn stuff about Him?"
"I'm still figuring out my beliefs."
Demi crossed her arms, "That's fine, but don't you think reading would maybe possibly help with that? Kids read these stories."
"I've read the stories several times." I said slowly.
"Yeah, and so have I. But let's read them again."
"You do learn something every time you read through them." Dawn reassured me.
I crossed my arms, "Fine."
I noticed Roric studying me from across the circle and realized I was being very closed off. Amazing how a look could convey so much.
"We were going to read from the gospels. All of John." Demi flipped to it.
"All of John?" I repeated, "That's a very long book."
"It's not that bad. What would you be doing besides this anyway? You promised you'd come."
"You tricked me." I argued.
"I'm sure Paul knows absolutely everything about the book of John if he doesn't want to read it." Roric said smoothly.
I sighed quietly, "Do you know what problem I have with the Bible?"
"I'm sure I will momentarily."
"Let's just go with the gospels then. They say Jesus was born from a virgin, did all these miracles, and then died on the cross and rose from the grave. Now, how am I supposed to believe that something that was written to have happened practically two centuries ago actually happened? Because some men wrote a made up story down?"
"Well, why do you say you believe in God now?" Roric asked.
I hesitated, "Because all evidence points towards the universe being made by a divine being."
"But you believed in God as a child, correct?"
"That was naivety."
"You believed in God before having the facts that I told you. What made you believe?"
"Peer pressure." I raised my eyebrows at Demi, who shook her head.
A rumbling voice penetrated my thoughts, I suggest you take this matter seriously. You are among friends. It is not wise to chase one's tail.
"Luxray is right." Demi agreed.
I sighed, "Fine. I started believing in God lately because, after all of that stuff that happened, I couldn't believe that it was just coincidence."
"And before?"
I didn't particularly feel like sharing, but continued, "...When I was with my uncle, I was happiest living the way that he did. Putting others first. Trying not to be angry even when I felt like I deserved to be. Having that desire to be a part of some unknown plan that was better than I could imagine. That has disappeared since he died."
My chest ached and the silence was uncomfortable before Luxray spoke, Have you not experienced the joy you've spoken of since arriving in this town?
I thought back on it. There was a thrill of learning when I was around Roric, talking about subjects that were taboo in seemingly every other place to every other person. He didn't mind me arguing with him and seemed to enjoy thinking things through with me. I had grown fond of Demi's company, though at times she could be a bit much. Like her brother, she was pushy, but in a much more energetic way that was hard for me to handle. Yet she would cradle herself against me and stay with me despite my retorts, despite how I would push her away.
All the pain I had been through had actually seemed to benefit me, or at least partially. There were still holes that needed to be patched up. But at the same time, as I thought about the potential of the future, of how much I could change, of what it would mean to live the way my uncle did...
"I could actually change a lot." I murmured, more to myself.
"So you're open to learning now?"
I didn't really want to do it for God. I didn't know God. I didn't really care about God- but I did care about my uncle. And I knew he was right about everything he said. I trusted him, which meant I would give this a shot. I owed him that, "I am."
"Good." Demi cheered.
"But I still want you to explain why you all believe in these stories when they're going on eyewitness accounts that could be lies or mistranslated."
"I'm sure we can explain all of that to you." Roric leaned back on his hands, "As long as you remember we're human and eyewitnesses are the best evidence for anything we ever had. Even videos can be edited to show things that didn't happen. The Bible is more impressive because of how many eyewitnesses there are. Have there been mistranslations? Certainly, though just think of how many translations there are to give the reader as accurate an experience as possible. No one ever questions the reliability of literature from the ancient Greeks, like Plato, despite only having one incomplete transcript, yet everyone questions the gospels despite hundreds and even thousands of people sometimes being present to hear Jesus speak. So why would someone believe these specific eyewitnesses about Jesus?
"For me, personally, I believe them because they were risking their lives every day to tell the story of Jesus. They listened to his teachings and travelled with him for three years. They made mistakes in their faith, but they truly believed that Jesus was the Son of God. Most of them were killed because of their beliefs. Throughout their lives, they continued to be rejected, threatened, and tortured because they continued to preach. Now, do those sound like liars to you? Would an entire group of people risk their lives day in and day out if there was even a small possibility that what they believed wasn't true?"
I studied the ground in front of me.
"You know, that's a lot to think about." Dawn said, "I mean, it really takes courage to go tell people what you believe sometimes since it sounds crazy. And that's without people getting violent if they don't believe you. It's still really hard."
I realized she meant she was always scared to tell me about her faith. I gave her hand a squeeze, knowing later I would apologize for being so cold to her when God had come up as the subject in the past.
"I'm still not sure." I replied.
"Fine." Roric leaned forward, "Let's say I came up to you and said something absolutely ridiculous. Let's say that I claimed for the first five years of my life, I lived in a girl's head."
"In a girl's head?" I repeated blankly.
"In a girl's head. And let's say that I had wings and special levitation powers. But I was agnostic and didn't particularly care about God until I started talking to Him and was told I would someday live in my own physical body."
"Without wings." Demi interrupted.
"Without wings." Roric nodded, "And then I 'magically' showed up and started telling everyone what God had done, that I used to be inside a girl's head as if imaginary, but God had made me and wanted people to know Him through that."
"Wouldn't you be able to show people your wings and powers to get them to believe you?"
"God took them in this scenario."
"...How did you come up with this scenario?" I asked.
"Not important. The important part is if you would believe me if I continued to say this was true despite death threats." His eyes were serious.
"I would think you were crazy."
"What if I wasn't the only one in this girl's head?"
"I'm starting to wonder how he came up with this too." Dawn whispered to me.
"Not important." Roric waved his hand carelessly, "The important part is to realize that of course that sounds ridiculous, but actions speak louder than words. Faith without action is dead. Now, of course, you would have to think 'Would God really do something like that?' and go back through the Bible to see what other crazy things He's done.
"You'd also have to see what kind of man I was, if I was true to my word and loving as God calls people to be, or if I was truly crazy or a liar. But really, what could I gain from lying about that? A bad reputation. So really, I would either be telling the truth or insane. Those are the only two options for believing if Jesus was the Son of God or not. He can't be a good teacher if he's a liar."
I heard Dawn say, "Wow", but was too busy thinking, "I suppose that is something for me to think more about."
Demi raised her hand.
"Yes?" Roric raised an eyebrow.
"In this scenario, what color wings do you have?" Demi questioned happily.
He grinned, "Black, of course."
She giggled and I looked between the two, missing out on some sort of sibling inside joke.
"Now, are we ready to begin reading?" Roric asked.
"Yes."
"Finally. Thought we'd be here all night." Dawn teased.
I'll just nap if that's the case. Electivire gave a grunt.
"You go ahead and read, Dawn." Demi said.
"Sure." Dawn said as Demi handed her the Bible. She flipped it open and began reading. I looked over Dawn's shoulder to read the text, soothed by her voice as a story unraveled.
"One of the most cowardly things ordinary people do is to shut their eyes to facts." - C.S. Lewis, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader
Hey Trainers!
Thanks, as always, for reading. I know a lot of these chapters are full of a lot of talking and questioning and discussion about hard questions. No matter what you believe, I think it's important to think over these questions and always analyze what we believe, why, if it makes sense, etc. I love doing that and learning more, not only about what I believe, but what other people believe. My friend told me this superstition they have in China about this old lady in the underworld who gives people soup to forget their lives and it really reflected the same Ancient Greek idea discussed by Socrates (actually, written by Plato) of the underworld and how people get to forget their lives and somehow come back here all reincarnate. It's fascinating. Not what I believe at all, but most cultures do believe in some sort of underworld and have ideas of what happens after death, reincarnation being one of those ideas. Isn't that amazing?
By the way, that quote up there isn't me saying people are idiots, or cowards. But I do agree that not thinking about the hard topics isn't smart even if it's scary. Which is why I gave the speech above. Just wanted to let you know that so you don't think I'm trying to be mean. :o Also, if you don't have anyone to talk to about hard questions and want my opinions or just someone to run ideas by, PM me!
Pokemon Question of the Day: What kind of cultural explanations for things do you think the Pokemon world would have?
I hope you have peace today :)
-Flips