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robininthelabyrinth · 4 years

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All this trans!Nie Mingjue really makes me want some trans!Jiang Cheng, and if you want too, maybe him ending out pregnant instead of his core being melted, because if I remember correctly Wen Zhuli was honorable, so if Jiāng Cheng did get raped by one of his subordinates, I feel he’d try too limit Jiang Cheng’s suffering.

“It’s not that I’m especially opposed to an alliance by marriage, but who were you planning on having marry in?” Nie Mingjue asked Jiang Fengmian and Madame Yu politely.

They blinked at him.

“I think,” Madame Yu said dryly, after a few minutes, “that we were planning on A-Cheng marrying in. Women usually do.”

“But your son isn’t a woman,” Nie Mingjue said, which he thought was quite reasonable.

“I don’t have a son,” Jiang Fengmian said. “Only two daughters.”

Nie Mingjue frowned. “You have an older daughter and a younger son. Hasn’t he told you?”

“Ah, you mean – by Qinghe standards,” Jiang Fengmian said. He sounded uncomfortable with the idea, which made Nie Mingjue’s eyes narrow and Jiang Fengmian immediately drop the notion of saying something more along those lines. After all, Nie Mingjue himself was a man ‘by Qinghe standards’, as the other sect leader put it, and starting trouble with Qinghe wasn’t on the agenda for today. “Sect Leader Nie, I appreciate your concern, but my daughter –”

“Son.”

“My daughter is a woman. We don’t practice Qinghe ways here.”

“It doesn’t really matter what you practice in the Lotus Pier,” Nie Mingjue said. He was wearing his best pleasant smile, which most people said looked like he was about to start chopping people into pieces. It was, at the moment, a fair description. “From my perspective, with my Qinghe ways, you have a son, who is a man. However you wish to treat him or raise him is up to you, of course, and I’m still willing to arrange a marriage between him and Huaisang, to be maintained or cancelled at their will when they’re older, including a marriage in which Jiang Cheng marries into the Unclean Realm. But what I will not tolerate is Huaisang getting confused by being told on one hand that he has a wife and the other a husband. He’s very fragile after our father’s death; I’m sure you understand.”

Jiang Fengmian, who’d been about to protest, shut his mouth, his desire for Nie Mingjue not to bring up, yet again, the fact of his father’s murder at the hands of Wen Ruohan – a murder that would need to be answered for, one day – outweighing his desire to argue back.

It was a petty move, but Nie Mingjue was aware that he had very few cards to play against the older and more influential man, and that meant he had to use them all no matter how petty to get what he wanted.

Mostly, in this case, for Jiang Cheng to be treated the way he so obviously identified. The damage that could be done by people who didn’t understand this sort of thing was incalculable – it was worth sticking his nose into another family’s business, no matter how rude, to try to make a difference if he could.

There were long few minutes of silence, in which Nie Mingjue stood his (tenuous) ground and Jiang Fengmian considered possible responses that would result in even more awkwardness.

Just at the point that it was getting intolerable, Madame Yu snorted, a surprisingly inelegant sound for such a refined woman.

“Let him be a son and a husband, then,” she said, her voice a little waspish. “If he changes his mind later, he can resume being a daughter, and there will be no loss.”

It wasn’t exactly how Nie Mingjue had intended on settling Nie Huaisang’s marriage, but it seemed a worthwhile conclusion, even if Jiang Fengmian was clearly not entirely on board.

“Very well,” he said. “Are we agreed?”

The marriage was unofficially dissolved when the boys were twelve, if by ‘dissolved’ one meant that the entire Jiang sect had entirely forgotten that their young master had ever been a young mistress, even Jiang Fengmian. A casual comment to Madame Yu that she ought to consider finding someone to marry in to their sect so that the heir could be officially confirmed, rather than wasting him on a cutsleeve marriage out, was more than enough for the entire concept to be permanently misplaced.

(Not that he thought they would make a bad pair, but if that was the case they could always figure it out for themselves later on.)

As far as Nie Mingjue was concerned, that was the end of it.

And yet, years later, it was at Nie Mingjue’s tent in Heijan that Jiang Cheng came, a twisted expression on his face.

“I have a problem,” he said, and touched his stomach lightly in a place a little too far down to suggest a stomachache. “I don’t know what to do about it, and – when I was younger, Huaisang said – well. I thought you might have some insight.”

Nie Mingjue let Jiang Cheng into the tent and put up a silencing array behind him, the sort used to protect news delivered by the most important spies.

“I’m not sure what you want me to tell you,” he said honestly. “It’s not a problem I’ve encountered on a personal basis, if you understand my meaning. Do you want to keep it or not?”

Jiang Cheng settled down where Nie Mingjue led him, still grimacing. “I don’t know,” he said. “The idea of bearing a child for any one of them disgusts me beyond telling. But on the other hand, what did the child have to do with it? It seems unfair not to give it a chance to live.”

“It’s not a child yet,” Nie Mingjue pointed out. He could do math, and the fall of the Lotus Pier wasn’t that long ago. “There’s no way that it’s quickened this soon after. Right now, it’s a problem that can be eliminated with a bowl of medicine, if that’s what you want.”

“I know,” Jiang Cheng said. “I’m considering it. It’s only…on one hand, even if it’s not a child yet, it could be a child, if I let it. A Jiang child, with me as its father, and obviously my Jiang sect could use as many new members as possible, no matter what the other half of their biological origin. But on the other hand – wouldn’t it be irresponsible to carry a child now? I’m leading the Jiang sect’s efforts against the Wens, trying to avenge what they did to me, to my parents, to my sect, and a child would be a distraction from that…and Wei Wuxian, who might have helped me out, is still missing.”

Nie Mingjue didn’t comment on Wei Wuxian, even though he itched, as he often did, to remind Jiang Cheng that no matter how atrociously Jiang Fengmian had behaved – and no matter what the condition of his birth had been, legitimate and incorrectly categorized – he was the son and heir of the Jiang clan.

Not the child Jiang Fengmian had brought in and treated as if he’d been the son he’d never had.

(Really, Nie Mingjue didn’t understand places like Yunmeng. What was the point of not recognizing misaligned reincarnations like theirs? It wouldn’t make it any less true.)

“Depending on the way it affects you, you could be out in the fields for months still,” he said reasonably. “Certainly plenty of mothers in Qinghe don’t go into isolation until there’s only a few weeks left. And even if you aren’t, I can take charge on the battlefield while you consult on strategy from the backend, the same way you would if you’d been taken out of the field because of an injury – Lan Xichen is doing much the same thing, when he’s not acting as courier, and he’s doing it because he’s a terrible general rather than any logistical reason.”

“But it’s not an injury.”

Nie Mingjue frowned at him. “You’re making it very difficult to resist making some sort of pun about the Wen sect’s swords, Sect Leader Jiang, and I don’t even like that sort of crude humor.”

Jiang Cheng took a second to get it, then snorted. “I supposed you could say I got ‘stabbed’ a few times, yes.”

“Only a few times? They really are worthless dogs.”

And now Jiang Cheng was laughing, even though he was trying to stop himself. “That’s terrible, stop it…you know, I suppose, if you look at it from a certain perspective, I really am just suffering from – from post-stabbing complications.”

“Seems reasonable enough to me.” Nie Mingjue poured Jiang Cheng a cup of the tea that had already been cooling on his desk – a little rude, but better than wasting time making a new pot. “If you do decide to keep it, you can leave the child with Nie Huaisang once it’s born, if you like. He’s always liked children, and it’s not as if I’m going to let him get anywhere near a battlefield, now or ever.”

“Are you sure he’s not a woman?” Jiang Cheng asked. He sounded almost wistful, which suggested that the arranged marriage they’d set up so many years ago might even have a chance of resurrecting; Nie Mingjue would have to slip Nie Huaisang a hint. “With the fans and the birds and the pretty things –”

“He says he isn’t, and so he isn’t,” Nie Mingjue said with a sigh. “I admit it’d make it easier if he was. No one outside of Qinghe would question his below-average talent or his love of frivolities if he was a woman, however unfair that might be, and it’d make things easier for him.”

“You’d still yell at him to practice his saber.”

“Of course. What does saber have to do with gender?”

Jiang Cheng smiled and shook his head. “Thank you,” he said. “I still haven’t decided one way or another, but…it’s good to know there’s a way to do it, if I want, that doesn’t mean that – I’m not as brave as you. I don’t want people to know.”

“It’s not a matter of bravery,” Nie Mingjue said. “It’s common etiquette. Anyone who spends time thinking about another person’s genitals that isn’t planning on courting them is wasting their time.”

Jiang Cheng snickered. “No, I mean – people know about you, that you’re misaligned. You’ve never been shy about it.”

Nie Mingjue was pretty sure Jiang Cheng was thinking about the incident during a discussion conference some years back when he’d been shouting at Jin Guangshan over something or another – loud enough to be audible across half the city, it seemed, based on the number of people who talked about it afterwards – and ended the rant by telling the other sect leader to suck his non-existent dick.

“I’m not really a shy person,” he said dryly, and Jiang Cheng pressed his lips together in an evident attempt to avoid descending into giggles – he’s definitely thinking about the suck-my-dick comment. “Also, Qinghe is a bit more open about these things; it makes it easier, not having to explain exactly what it means or doesn’t mean. Don’t be too hard yourself.”

Jiang Cheng didn’t seem convinced, but nodded anyway.

“It’s not just that,” he said, though obviously it was, in some large part, that. Jiang Cheng’s complicated relationship with Wei Wuxian was proof of it, if nothing else. “It’s also – people can do math. I don’t want people thinking I’m weak, or a pushover.”

“No one who has seen you wield Zidian is likely to make that mistake,” Nie Mingjue said, but he could tell from the set of Jiang Cheng’s shoulders that that wasn’t enough. “It isn’t weakness, you know. Anyone can be captured, anyone can be tortured – some people will have to live without a leg or an arm, after what they suffered, and that’s the lucky ones that didn’t die. That’s all it ever is in war – just luck, good or bad. If I walked into a Wen ambush next week, I’d be as liable to complications from a Wen ‘stab’ as you, but it wouldn’t be because my strength wasn’t enough.”

“I guess,” Jiang Cheng said. “It’s just – if I kept the child, people would have to know, wouldn’t they?”

“Says who? If you retire from the battlefield due to complications from an injury for a few months, then the assumption will be that you found out that you got some poor girl pregnant and took on the child once you knew. If you do want people to know that you carried it, well, children come and go at their own speed.” Nie Mingjue shrugged. “Let some gossip overhear you talking about how you were already carrying the Lotus Pier’s next heir before any Wen set a foot on Yunmeng soil, and everyone will put together the rest. You know how it goes.”

“I suppose I do, at that.”

“Huaisang could probably put together a convincing story,” Nie Mingjue said. “He’s really very good at identifying every possible point in time and place where someone could be having sex, even if the actual personalities involved make it highly unlikely. And then he illustrates it, usually.”

Jiang Cheng was smiling, and his shoulders were straight again – his burdens lifted, however temporarily.

Good.

“Let me know what you decide,” Nie Mingjue said. “I know just enough about medicine to be able to mix you up what you need using just the medicine I already keep in my general collection, so no one would need to know, if that’s what you choose. And if you choose the other way, well, I have the medicines to help support that, too.”

“You keep that much medicine?”

“I’m not sure if you’ve heard about the tendency of the Qinghe Nie towards qi deviations –” Of course he had. Everyone had. “– but we have a habit of keeping an awful lot of medicine on hand.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Jiang Cheng said, and he was frowning a little, thoughtful, but not as stressed as he’d been earlier. “Thank you.”

“Don’t mention it,” Nie Mingjue said. “Really, don’t. If I let it get out that I give advice, every misaligned sonofabitch that wants to get a promotion will start showing up at my door with problems that are really just an excuse to get a chat in with the sect leader, and then where will my troubles end?”

Jiang Cheng, who was dealing with similar problems, smirked. “That doesn’t seem like my problem. At least people know better than to ask anything of me.”

“That can change,” Nie Mingjue said threateningly. “I’ll get Huaisang on it; see what happens to your reputation then.”

Jiang Cheng held up his hands in surrender as he retreated.

Nie Mingjue wondered for a moment which way he’d pick, but then remembered that it wasn’t his business and also that there was a war on that needed his attention a bit more.

Personal problems could wait.

#mdzs #nie mingjue #jiang cheng #my fic #my fics #I'm thinking of continuing this one #could be fun #trans JC #trans NMJ #pregnancy #discussion of abortion #Anonymous

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sk1fanfiction · 3 years

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the many faces of tom riddle, part 5

- more myth than man... or not? the mortality of tom riddle and the anatomy of a villain-

That leaves us with Ralph Fiennes’ portrayal of adult Tom Riddle/Lord Voldemort in movies 4-8.

I generally find adult Tom Riddle disappointing, even in the books, in terms of character depth. Instead of delving into his motivations and the inner psychology of a villain, we get... slight body horror? And in the movies, it’s even more egregious.

If a story is as good as its villain, adult Tom Riddle is a bit of a let-down, especially on-screen.

“I was ripped from my body, I was less than spirit, less than the meanest ghost . . . but still, I was alive.”

Perhaps the very first time I watched it, I found this scary, but I must confess that nowadays, Voldemort’s resurrection is more funny to me than anything else. The forked tongue and the nose slits, yes, are supposed to allude to Tom Riddle’s loss of humanity, but I don’t think it...worked out that way in practice.

I know that’s how it is in the books, but ugly equals evil (and vice versa) is a tired trope. not only that, but under the CGI, Lord Voldemort is so difficult to relate to, so inhuman, that it’s hard to (1) see his true depravity (2) connect with him emotionally (3) at least for me, not laugh at him flapping around the graveyard in GOF like an oversized crow.

Now, the reason I’m going on about this is not (just) me being petty. Lord Voldemort is the Boggart for most of the characters in the HP universe, meaning their greatest fear is Lord Voldemort. He represents Fear; as such, he should be utterly terrifying. Now, I don’t mean horrifying in that sense, but Voldemort’s grand entrance should at least feel somewhat unsettling, have some sort of a Gothic atmosphere...

"But then, through the mist in front of him, he saw, with an icy surge of terror, the dark outline of a man, tall and skeletally thin, rising slowly from inside the cauldron."

Visually, this looks great. But it’s not scary. And I’m not a purist by any means, but the words are scarier than the book. Darkness induces fear.

“The lack of any kind of visual stimuli increases anxiety, uncertainty, and tension.”

So, having Voldemort’s pale body materialize isn’t as scary as it could be.

Furthermore, I think Fiennes’ overexaggerated expressions would actually come across as properly horrifying/threatening rather than funny if they just left his face alone. Yes, Fiennes does manage to emote the fear and the anger through the CGI, but it’s like he’s too alien to be scary, at least to me. The amount of memes with Voldemort suggest I’m not the only one this way inclined.

I think there’s probably a problem going on with the uncanny valley. (Images from the Mori essay linked).

[When things are still]

[Creepy things are creepier when moving]

Now, I assume Voldemort is meant to be zombie-creepy, or at least that how Harry describes him in the books.

"The thin man stepped out of the cauldron, staring at Harry...and Harry stared back into the face that had haunted his nightmares for three years. Whiter than a skull, with wide, livid scarlet eyes and a nose that was flat as a snake's but with slits for nostrils...."

Now, we can’t get Harry’s experience of being haunted by Voldemort in his dreams, because what I think makes Voldemort’s countenance so truly frightening to the other characters isn’t his snake-like nose or his red eyes, but the potential. Voldemort is, in essence, the Grim Reaper. You are at his mercy, and you’re probably going to be dead.

“This time, I shall enter the fray myself, Harry Potter, and I shall find you, and I shall punish every last man, woman, and child who has tried to conceal you from me. One hour.“

And yes, Voldemort can be quite funny and witty, but..

“I will allow you to perform an essential task for me, one that many of my followers will give their right hands to perform.” (To Peter Pettigrew)

...it’s still incredibly dark, sadistic humour. Whereas the teenage Tom Riddle we’ve been discussing has just barely dipped his toes into evil, Voldemort is, well... swimming in it. At this point, he think he undeniably enjoys causing pain.

And much of what makes Voldemort scary is subtle.

For example, what I personally consider haunting is the fact that he’s got a cave full of Inferi. A cave full of reanimated dead bodies.

Either he dug them up, which is unlikely... or perhaps, a twenty-seven-or-so-year-old Tom Riddle would lie in wait like a bird of prey, very quietly and patiently, perhaps reading a book, waiting for an unsuspecting Muggle to wander past. Maybe killing is a game to him at this point, when it’s not so personal as killing Harry Potter. Maybe it’s a whispered Avada Kedavra, and then he carries the dead body away to his cave. Maybe he Imperiuses them to walk off the cliff. Maybe he tortures them first.

Shudder.

And I don’t think you can show that kind of horror through any CGI or make-up, so...

You know what is terrifying? Revolting? True crime; real-life people who do unspeakably horrible things. And I think a lot was missed out on, in stripping Tom Riddle physically of his humanity. Yes, Riddle is a monster...

But, as we’ve seen, he’s a human monster, not some eldritch horror from the seventh level of hell or something.

I just think it would be interesting to have this perfectly normal-looking human do all the horrific things Voldemort does. I want to see that sick joy in a human face and feel disgusted. I want to see fear make his bottom lip tremble, and feel a misplaced sense of empathy. (Think President Snow from the Hunger Games -- now, that’s a sick, twisted villain who we can relate to as a human being, but still love to hate -- or what about The Joker?).

And out of everything they chose to CGI, why on earth did they not make his eyes scarlet? That might have made him look at least somewhat menacing, rather than a failed lab experiment.

(Don’t even get me started on his and Bellatrix’s death scenes in the movies-)

Here’s President Snow. He’s got a cute little granddaughter, he sends kiddies to kill each other Battle Royale-style every year, and he poisons all his political opponents. He’s also a master manipulator and has a penchant for white roses. They cover up the smell of the sores in his mouth from eating the poison too, to conceal his treachery.

Heath Ledger as the Joker in Dark Knight (2008), who is, according to NYT (which I totally agree with), the best Joker. Now this is a villain done right, with many Voldemort-like traits. On a scale of one-to-ten, he’s absolutely terrifying. Why? He’s (unlike Voldemort in the movies) incredibly intelligent, shows young-Tom-Riddle-like skills for charm and manipulation, plays with humans like they’re his own personal psychology experiment (and to hell with the Institutional Review Board), and has one, single, very clear goal -- chaos. Like Voldemort, he wears an inhuman mask that’s not horrifying in its own right; but unlike Voldemort, the human is all there -- terrifying, real, and with a bottomless, obsessive desire to destroy. His disordered thinking is all out there for the audience to see. The Joker’s motivation is to enjoy himself; whereas Voldemort seems to lack drive. Why does he want to take over the world -- who knows, with Voldemort? The Joker wants to see it burn.

Let’s try to do the same with Lord Voldemort:

[SLIGHT FLASH WARNING]

I had to go with this because Voldemort isn’t legitimately terrifying in many scenes. And yes, this unrefined anger somewhat speaks to Tom’s immaturity

By this point, seventy-one year old Tom Riddle is a hollowed-out shell of a human being. After decades of building his power, he was defeated by a one-year-old, and ended up slumming it as a spirit for a decade, got defeated again, was a shrivelled-up baby for a year, then finally got his body back.

He’s angry, okay! And Fiennes does a great job of portraying the sheer, destructive, unbridled rage of this character.

The body language. again, since his face is inhuman, this is super important. and Fiennes’ body language is great. Voldemort/Riddle commits to his actions. He is very emotionally-driven.

But yet, he doesn’t feel capable, in the way that the Joker or President Snow do. Yeah, we know anecdotally that he’s incredibly evil, sadistic, and second only to Dumbledore in terms of power, but he loses to a baby, and then that same baby as a teenager. So, we really could have done with seeing Voldemort’s power, cruelty, and evil firsthand a lot more often.

Voldemort is not well-characterized. I don’t understand his motives, and the ones that I do understand are not compelling.

Not to die? Well, he’s already made several Horcruxes. Why not sit back and relax? Why start a war and risk himself?

JKR said that Voldemort’s great desire was to become all-powerful and eternal. But that’s... boring! It does little to tell us about Voldemort, other than that he’s a villain and a wannabe dictator.

Furthermore, the charm, manipulation, and cunning that are hallmarks of younger Tom Riddle’s personality are gone.

Is Voldemort (to return to Jungian terms) all shadow? An empty creature of simple creation and destruction, perhaps? We’ll discuss this further down...

And this isn’t a problem of having a fantastical world with magic and the like. Grindelwald’s quiet, self-possessed, almost coy “So you think you can hold me?” was infinitely scarier than anything that has ever come out of Voldemort’s mouth. It was chilling.

OOTP is my favorite book, and the Ministry sequence is one of my favourite in the films.

This scene where he psyches out Harry, talking so quietly that he could just be a little voice inside his head (and again, during the possession scene)? Absolute perfection.

Why? Because this showcases what’s truly scary about him. Voldemort can get into your head. He can make you do things. And perhaps, if we had seen that more often, we’d understand how scary he is.

I wish this had been his grand entrance, and not whatever that scene in GOF was. Somehow, him screeching “I WANT TO SEE THE LIGHT LEAVE YOUR EYES!” is not menacing. At all.

But, I can’t help but think how much greater the emotional affect would be if he had more human features (think the burned-and-blurred, waxy features from Dumbledore’s memory).

Just imagine these scenes if Voldemort looked human, and spoke as quietly as he did in this one.

Because of the reason that I have little to go on in terms of characterization that I haven’t already covered, we’ll discuss the myth and legend of Lord Voldemort.

I can’t decide if the statue in the films is supposed to be the Angel of Death or the Grim Reaper. He has a skeleton and carries a scythe, but he also has wings. There are so many different interpretations, attitudes towards, and personifications of Death across the world that I don’t want to draw any one conclusion. But I must wonder if Lord Voldemort, with his yew-and-phoenix wand (which carries heavy symbolism of immortality and rebirth) and almost deified figure is meant to be a personification of Death himself? His name, Lord Voldemort, is a shade close to Lord Death.

For years, it has stumped me that wizards and witches are afraid to utter Voldemort’s name, especially since we only see the Taboo in the middle of the last book. It didn’t make sense just based on fear; in the real world, we don’t circumvent Hitler’s name, for example.

Perhaps this may have been obvious to others, but it wasn’t to me.

Here’s a counterargument to myself; why Voldemort shouldn’t look human.

Voldemort, in the Wizarding World, is seen as a literal deity.

I promised to attempt to answer this question in Part 3:

And so, I can’t help but wonder if the opposite is true… if Tom Riddle creates Horcruxes, would that grant him additional magic powers?

In Part 3, I likened Tom Riddle to a sorcerer in Russian folklore, Koschei the Deathless, also famous for sequestering his soul in objects. This source suggests that Koschei was considered not an ordinary magician, but a representative of the ‘other’ world, the world of death.

So, what if... creating Horcruxes makes you... more than human? Now, I could definitely see god-like status being appealing to sixteen-year-old Tom Riddle. Perhaps, even appealing enough to kill for. Now, his proclivity for Avada Kedavra makes sense. We know it’s an incredibly sinister spell, but at the same time, it’s a very humane way to kill. Why might it be so horrifying?

Here’s a weird theory.

To the best of my knowledge, no one but Voldemort is seen using the Killing Curse more than once or twice.

Perhaps, ordinary mortals can only cast Avada Kedavra a few times, but Tom, having split his soul and having become in some way a non-human instrument of Death, can cast it however many times as he likes, and that is part of what serves to make him so terrifying.

This makes the idea of Voldemort tossing around Avada Kedavras actually incredibly terrifying, if you take into account what that might mean.

The collective cultural fear of speaking Voldemort’s name supports this theory.

Take the chthonic (underworld) deities of Greek mythology; most notably, Hades and Persephone, the king and queen of the underworld.

Hades, the god of the dead, was feared.

So feared that the word ‘Hades’ (”the unseen one”) was so frightening, that people came up with all sorts of euphemisms to circumvent actually saying it and he was rarely even depicted in art. For example, they would refer to him as Pluto (”the rich one”), Clymenus ("notorious"), Polydegmon ("who receives many"), and perhaps Eubuleus ("good counsel" or "well-intentioned"), amongst many other names.

However, he was not seen as evil; just stern, cruel, and fair. Like most Greek gods, he had an associated cult (the Death Eaters, anyone?)

Another interesting connection between Hades and Voldemort is that Hades was associated with snakes.

Persephone (suggested to have a pre-Greek origin and probably pre-dates Hades), who was also a vegetation/fertility/spring goddess, similarly, was referred to as Despoina (”the mistress”), Kore (”the maiden”), etc, because as the terrible Queen of the Dead, it was considered unsafe to speak her name aloud. In mythology and literature, she is sometimes referred to as ‘dread Persephone.’

--Just like how Lord Voldemort is referred to as The Dark Lord, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, You-Know-Who... (and if you’re Dumbledore, ‘Tom’.)

Her central myth served as the context for the secret rites of regeneration at Eleusis (which was basically a mystery cult devoted to her and her mother, Demeter), which promised immortality to initiates.

We don’t know for certain what exactly went on, because, mystery cult -- the members were sworn to secrecy -- but it revolved around immortality and rebirth and possibly psychoactive drugs.

Perhaps ironically, in comparison to the Death Eaters, anyone could join, as long as they could speak Greek and had never committed murder.

And that concludes my assessment!

#tom riddle #the many faces of #tom marvolo riddle #character analysis #lord voldemort #character study #tw: murder #the body horror was 1/10 #don't make your character design hilarious if you want him to be scary #i'm not saying voldemort is a vegetation deity #but i'm not-not saying it either

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cassianus · 3 years

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Understanding the Passions according to the Philokalia - - Healing of the Soul and through the Science of the Fathers:

Now that we have spoken a bit about asceticism and its goal, theosis or deification, it is appropriate I think to address the specifics of that path of conversion and transformation. What is it that we must do on our part and with the grace of God on the path of return - to restore the image that has been sullied by our sin and to open ourselves up to the gift of becoming partakers of the divine nature made possible through Christ?

Alphonse and Rachel Goettmann, in their wonderful book “Prayer of Jesus, Prayer of the Heart” describe this path beautifully; with an understanding arising from and obviously rooted in personal experience. It is perhaps the clearest description that I have come across and since the book is out of print I offer you the following lengthy excerpt:

“Rediscovering that which unifies us, rediscovering our first innocence leads us to become one with God to such an extent that there is no longer the consciousness within us of a differentiated self, distinct from God. All that we know then is love, nothing else: the unique desire for the unique desired One which makes life a communion of love with the Creator and with all that He endlessly creates at each moment.

The opposite is our propulsion toward the exterior which kindles the multiplicity of desires and makes of life only hatred and division: ‘We devour ourselves reciprocally like serpents. The communion of love is replaced by the hidden fear of death, and this death,’ says Maximus the Confessor, ‘is the cause of our turning love into destructive passions.’ The self is so closed in upon itself by this metaphysical anguish that the other, including God, is always, even unconsciously, a potential enemy.

In a person whose spirit is cut off from God, the soul enters into a radical change of perspective and passes into a state of dualism. Instead of living through God, of seeing in His light and with His eyes, the soul sees and lives through the self in an autonomous way. This is a false self, nonbeing, the empirical existence where each act of affirmation of the self increases the dualistic tension between the self and God, between the self and others. And as the self depends upon things to affirm it, the ditch never ceases to be dug and God Himself becomes an antagonistic and hostile being, a rival. Little by little all relationships are falsified: with oneself, with others, with God, with the whole of creation. This ontological denaturation brings to life in us a sort of predisposition to bad faith, where we constantly try to make things other than what they are, so that they serve our appetite for pleasure and power and our arbitrary impulses in every moment. This is the ‘noisy tumult of the passions’ according to the patristic expression . . .

Here is the beginning of decay. Our existence is fractured and we plunge into internal contradictions that can only make us suffer. A person who persists in walking with a broken leg will only suffer; and every desire comes out of this deep fracture which we carry within and which inevitably brings us to tragedy. The great significance of true asceticism is found here: in discerning the motives behind our way of being and acting.

Where does my desire come from and where is it going? That is the ground of asceticism, its primary matter, and the very place of our penitence. Asceticism is a guardian over every interior and exterior movement. Nothing is possible - no accomplishment, no happiness, no peace - as long as desire is turned in upon itself, egocentric and greedy! There is no spiritual way or prayer which can be maintained without battling these passionate desires” (Goettmann, “Prayer of Jesus, Prayer of the Heart,” 120-121).

The Desert Fathers understood the word “passion” to mean all the egocentric desires through which the demon seeks to capture human beings. These we must know along with their most subtle workings within us if we are to fully engage in the spiritual battle that confronts us. Such knowledge and the hard won skill of recognizing evil in order to avoid it is so valuable that St. Isaac the Syrian stated: “He who sees his sin is greater than he who resurrects the dead.” It is through this interior work that the passions are not destroyed but have their energy redirected and reordered toward God - to eternal Life.

The Goettmann’s aptly describe this purification of the passions as a kind of “‘homemade psychoanalysis,’ a therapy which attacks the roots of the illnesses of our being, not only to heal us on a human level, but to heal us for our union with God” (Ibid., 122). Faith is the point of departure for the Desert Fathers from modern psychology; the goal is to share in the life and intimacy of the Holy Trinity and the Fathers see the full flowering of the personality not simply as a function of human needs and potentials.

This is exactly the approach to and understanding of the writings of the Fathers of the Philokalia presented by Hierotheos Vlachos in his masterful work “Orthodox Psychotherapy: the Science of the Fathers.” He presents us with much different understanding of the word "Psychotherapy" than we often have in mind.

Psyche, Vlachos reminds us, comes from the Greek and means "soul". In the Hebrew and Christian tradition the soul is the essence of one's existence. It represents the whole living being of an individual person. The soul in this sense is manifested through the body, the mind and other facets of the one's being. When we speak of "Psychotherapy" then we mean the healing of one's soul.

There are great differences then between modern psychotherapy and Christian psychotherapy. Contemporary psychotherapy focuses more on the mental and emotional dimensions of a person, thoughts, emotions and feelings; in particular by addressing the disorder and pathology that one may be experiencing in these dimensions. But most modern psychotherapy does not see itself as facilitating growth of person in their relationship with God; that is, in the realization and expression of divine truth. It hopes certainly to encourage more efficient living and functioning in the world. And yet, its values and intentions often reflect those that prevail in the culture at the given time. For example, modern psychotherapy often seeks to bolster one's capacity to gratify needs and desire and to achieve a sense of autonomous mastery over self and circumstance; that is, self-realization and self-fulfillment.

Christian Psychotherapy seeks liberation from disordered attachments and self-giving surrender to the power and will of God. The manner in which personal growth and healing take place depend not on self-mastery but upon the grace of God. The true healer, the Physician, is Jesus. The root of our illness, the disorder and lack of integration we experience, our sickness of soul, comes from sin. It is this we seek to remedy in and through our relationship with Jesus Christ (see “Orthodox Psychotherapy, pp 97-118).

It has been said that the Desert Fathers have provided us with a map of the soul:

“The passions and temptations which must inevitably beset any Christian were unearthed and described with almost scientific precision. Pride, vainglory, lust - each passion was isolated and catalogued. This ‘map’ of the Christian soul was then passed on from one generation of ascetics to another, each generation profiting from the discoveries of the previous ones. Not only were the passions and temptations which afflict the soul unearthed, however, but a ‘system’ was developed to combat them. This system was later to become know as ‘hesychasm’ or ‘prayer of the heart’” (Coniaris, “Philokalia: Bible of Orthodox Spirituality”, 148-149).

In future posts, we will consider how the Fathers of the Philokalia came to categorize the principle vices that give rise to these passions, how they manifest themselves and how they are remedied. The Fathers had no illusions about human nature, its woundedness and through the insights born from their spiritual life we stand to gain a deeper understanding of the human person and the truth that peace of soul can be bought only at the price of a long struggle.

#philokalia #passions

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pamphletstoinspire · 3 years

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Easter Tuesday - April 6, 2021

Liturgical Year: Easter Tuesday

by Dom Gueranger, 1908

This is the day which the Lord hath made: let us be glad and rejoice therein.

Our Pasch is the Lamb, and we meditated upon the mystery yesterday: now let us attentively consider those words of sacred Scripture, where, speaking of the Pasch, it says: ‘It is the Phase, that is, the passage of the Lord.’ God Himself adds these words: ‘I will pass through the land of Egypt that night, and will kill every first-born in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments (Exod. xii. 11).’ So that the Pasch is a day of judgment, a day of terrible justice upon the enemies of God; but, for that very reason, it is a day of deliverance for Israel. The lamb is slain; but his immolation is the signal of redemption to the holy people of the Lord.

The people of Israel are slaves to the cruel Pharaoh. Their bondage is the heaviest that can be. Their male children are to be put to death. The race of Abraham, on which repose the promises of the world’s salvation, is doomed. It is time for God to interpose: the Lion of the tribe of Juda, He whom none can resist, must show Himself.

But in this, the Israelites are a type of another and a far more numerous people,–the whole human race; and it is the slave of satan, a tyrant worse than Pharaoh. Its bondage is at its height. It is debased by the vilest idolatry. It has made every base thing its god; and the God that made all things is ignored or blasphemed. With a few rare exceptions out of each generation, men are the victims of hell. Has God’s creation of man, then, been a failure? Not so. The time is come for Him to show the might of His arm: He will pass over the earth, and save mankind.

Jesus, the true Israelite, the true Man come down from heaven, He too is made a captive. His enemies have prevailed against Him, and His bleeding, lifeless Body has been laid in the tomb. The murderers of the just One have even fixed a seal upon the sepulchre, and set a guard to watch it. Here again, the Lord must pass, and confound His enemies by His triumphant passage.

In that Egypt of old, each Israelite family was commanded to slay and eat the Paschal Lamb. Then, at midnight, the Lord passed, as He had promised, over this land of bondage and crime. The destroying Angel followed, slaying with his sword the first-born of the Egyptians, ‘from the first-born of Pharaoh, who sat on his throne, unto the first-born of the captive woman that was in prison, and all the firstborn of the cattle (Exod. xii. 29).’ A cry of mourning resounded through Mesraim: but God is just, and His people was made free!

The same victory was gained in the Resurrection which now gladdens us. The midnight was over, and the last shades of darkness were fleeing from before the rising light: it was then that our Lord passed through the sealed stone of His tomb, unperceived by His guards. His Resurrection was a stroke of death to His first-born people, who had refused to receive Him as their Messias, or to ‘know the time of their visitation (St. Luke, xix. 44).’ The Synagogue was hard of heart, like Pharaoh; it would fain have held captive Him of whom the prophet had said, that He would be ‘free among the dead (Ps. lxxxvii. 6).’ Hereupon, a cry of impotent rage was heard in Jerusalem: but God is just, and Jesus made Himself free!

And oh! what a happiness was this passage of our Lord for the human race! He had adopted us as His brethren, and loved us too tenderly to leave us slaves of satan: therefore, He would have His own Resurrection be ours too, and give us light and liberty. The first-born of satan were routed by such a victory; the power of hell was broken. Yet a little while, and the altars of the false gods shall everywhere be destroyed; yet a little while, and man, regenerated by the preaching of the Apostles, shall acknowledge his Creator and abjure his idols: for this is the day which the Lord hath made: ‘it is the Phase, that is, the passage of the Lord’!

But observe how the two mysteries,–the Lamb and the Passover,–are united in our Pasch. The Lord passes, and bids the destroying Angel slay the first-born in every house, the entrance of which is not marked with the blood of the lamb. This is the shield of protection; where it is, there divine justice passes by and spares. Pharaoh and his people are not signed with the blood of the lamb: yet have they witnessed the most extraordinary miracles, and suffered unheard-of chastisements. All this should have taught them that the God of Israel is not like their own gods, which have no power; but their heart is hard as stone, and neither the works nor the words of Moses have been able to soften it. Therefore does God strike them and deliver His people.

But this very people, this Israel, ungratefully turns against his deliverer; he is content with the types of the good things promised; he will have no other lamb but the material one. In vain do the prophets tell him, that ‘a Lamb is to be sent forth, who shall be King of the earth; that he shall come from the desert to the mount of the daughter of Sion (Is. xvi. 1).’ Israel refuses to acknowledge this Lamb as his Messias; he persecutes Him and puts Him to death; and persists in putting all his confidence in the blood of victims, that have no longer the power to propitiate the anger of God. How terrible will be the Passage of the Lord over Jerusalem, when the sword of the Roman legions shall destroy a whole people!

Satan too, and his wicked angels, had scoffed at this Lamb, they had despised Him, as being too meek and humble to be dreaded; and when they saw Him shedding His Blood on the cross, a shout of exultation rang through the regions of hell. But what was their dismay, when they saw this Lamb descending like a lion into limbo, and setting free from their bondage the countless prisoners of the four thousand previous years? and after this returning to our earth, and inviting all mankind to receive ‘the liberty of the glory of the children of God (Rom. viii. 21)?’

O Jesus! how terrible is Thy Passover to Thine enemies! but how glorious for them that serve Thee! The people of Israel feared it not, because their houses were marked with the blood of the figurative lamb. We are more favoured than they: our Lamb is the Lamb of God, and Thy Blood is signed, not upon our dwellings, but upon our souls. Thy prophet foretold the great mystery, when he said, that on the day of Thy vengeance upon Jerusalem, they would be spared whose foreheads should be marked with the Tau (Ezechiel, ix. 6). Israel despised the prophecy, which is our joy. The Tau is the sign of Thy cross, dear Jesus! It is Thy cross that shields, and protects, and gladdens us in this Pasch of Thy Passover, wherein Thy anger is all for Thine enemies, and Thy blessings all for us!

Jesus shows Himself to all His Apostles, on the evening of the day on which He rose from the grave; and He greets them with the wish of peace. He wishes the same to us, during this Feast of the Pasch. He desires to establish peace among us:–peace between man and God, peace in the conscience of the repentant sinner, peace between man and man by the forgiveness of injuries. Let us welcome this wish of our risen Lord, and jealously preserve the peace He thus deigns to bring us. At His birth in Bethlehem, the Angels announced this peace to men of good will; but now, it is Jesus Himself who brings it to us, for He has accomplished His work of pacification, by dying for us on the cross. The first word He addresses to His Apostles, and through them to us, is Peace! Let us lovingly accept the blessing, and show ourselves to be, in all things, children of peace.

The conduct of the Apostles, on this occasion, deserves our attention. They believe in their Lord’s Resurrection; they eagerly announced the great event to the two disciples of Emmaus: but how weak is their faith! They are troubled and frighted at Jesus’ sudden apparition; and when He graciously permits them to handle Him, they are overpowered with joy, and yet there is a certain inexplicable doubt still lingering in their minds. Our Lord has to condescend even to eat in their presence, in order fully to convince them that it is really Himself, and not a phantom. What a strange inconsistency there is in all this! Had they not already believed and confessed the Resurrection of their Master, before receiving this visit? We have a lesson to learn here: it is, that there are some people who believe, but their faith is so weak, that the slightest shook would endanger it; they say they have faith, but it is of the most superficial kind. And yet, without a lively and vigorous faith, what can we do in the battle we have to be incessantly waging against the devil, the world, and our own selves? He who wrestles with an enemy is desirous to have a sure footing; if he stand on slippery ground, he is sure to be thrown. Nothing is so common now-a-days as unstable faith, which believes as long as there is nothing to try it: but let it be put to the test, and it gives way.

One principal cause of this weakness of faith is that subtle naturalism, which now fills the atmosphere in which we live, and which it is so difficult not to imbibe. Let us earnestly pray for an invincible and supernatural faith, which may be the ruling principle of our conduct, which may never flinch, and may triumph over both our internal and external enemies. Thus shall we be able to apply to ourselves those words of the Apostle St. John: ‘This is the victory which overcometh the world, our faith (I. St. John, v. 4).’

Lamb of God, Who takest away the sins of the world,

Spare us, O Lord.

Lamb of God, Who takest away the sins of the world,

Graciously hear us, O Lord.

Lamb of God, Who takes away the sins of the world,

Have mercy on us.

Adapted from The Liturgical Year by Dom Gueranger

Practice During Paschal Time

The practice for this holy season mainly consists in the spiritual joy which it should produce in every soul that is risen with Jesus. This joy is a foretaste of eternal happiness, and the Christian ought to consider it a duty to keep it up within him, by ardently seeking after that life which is in our Divine Head, and by carefully shunning sin which causes death. During the last 9 weeks we have mourned for our sins and done penance for them; we have followed Jesus to Calvary; but now, our Holy Mother the Church is urgent in bidding us rejoice. She Herself has laid aside all sorrow; the voice of Her weeping is changed into the song of a delighted Spouse. The great liturgist of the 12th century, Rupert, Abbot of Deutz, thus speaks of the pious artifice used by the Church to infuse the spirit of Easter into all: “There are certain carnal minds that seem unable to open their eyes to spiritual things, unless roused by some unusual excitement; and for this reason the Church makes use of such means. Thus, the Lenten fast, which we offer up to God as our yearly tithe, goes on till the most sacred night of Easter; then follow 50 days without so much as one single fast. Hence…that holy night is eagerly looked forward to even by the carnal-minded… Thus the sacred solemnity is sweet to all, dear to all, and desired by all, as light is to them that walk in darkness, as a fount of living water is to them that thirst, and as a tent which the Lord hath pitched for wearied wayfarers.”

What a happy time it was when, as St. Bernard expresses it, there was not one in the whole Christian army that neglected his Easter duty, and when all, both just and sinners, walked together in the path of the Lenten observances! Alas! those days are gone, and Easter has not the same effect on the people of our generation! The reason is that a love of ease and a false conscience lead so many “Christians” to treat the law of Lent with as much indifference as if there were no such law existing. Hence, Easter comes upon them as a feast – it may be a great feast – but that is all; they experience little of that thrilling joy which fills the heart of the Church during this season, and which She evinces in everything She does. And if this be their case even on the glorious day itself, how can it be expected that they should keep up, for the whole 50, the spirit of gladness, which is the very essence of Easter? They have not observed the fast or the abstinence of Lent: the mitigated form in which the Church now presents them to her children, in consideration of their weakness, was too severe for them! They excused themselves from Lenten mortification without regret or remorse. The Alleluia returns, and it finds no response in their souls: how could it? Penance has not done its work of purification; it has not spiritualized them; how then could they follow their Risen Jesus, Whose life is henceforth more of Heaven than of earth?

But these reflections are too sad for such a season as this: let us beseech our risen Jesus to enlighten these souls with the rays of His victory over the world and the flesh, and to raise them up to Himself. No, nothing can distract us from joy. “Can the children of the Bridegroom mourn, as long as the Bridegroom is with them?” (Matt. 9: 15) Jesus is to be with us for 40 days; He is to suffer no more, and die no more; let our feelings be in keeping with His now endless glory and bliss. True, He is to leave us, He is to ascend to the right hand of His Father; but He will not leave us orphans; He will send us the divine Comforter, who will abide with us forever. These sweet and consoling words must be our Easter text: “The children of the Bridegroom cannot mourn, as long as the Bridegroom is with them.” They are the key to the whole Liturgy of this Holy Season. We must have them ever before us, and we shall find by experience that the joy of Easter is as salutary as the contrition and penance of Lent.

But this Easter of ours will have an end; the bright vision of our Risen Jesus will pass away; and all that will be left to us is the recollection of His ineffable glory, and of the wonderful familiarity wherewith He treated us. What shall we do, when He Who was our very life and light leaves us and ascends to Heaven? Be of good heart, Christians! You must look forward to another Easter. Each year will give you a repetition of what you now enjoy. Easter will follow Easter, and bring you at last to that Easter in Heaven which is never to have an end, and of which these happy ones of earth are a mere foretaste. Nor is this all. Listen to the Church. In one of Her prayers She reveals to us the great secret, how we may perpetuate our Easters even here in our banishment – “Grant to Thy servants, O God, that they may keep up, by their manner of living, the Mystery they have received by believing” (Collect for Tuesday in Easter Week). So then, the Mystery of Easter is to be ever visible on this earth; our Risen Jesus ascends to Heaven, but He leaves upon us the impress of His Resurrection, and we must retain it within us until He again visits us.

And how could it be that we should not retain this divine impress within us? Are not all the mysteries of our Divine Master ours also? From His very first coming in the Flesh, He has made us sharers in everything He has done. He was born in Bethlehem: we were born together with Him. He was crucified: our “old man was crucified with Him” (Rom. 6: 6). He was buried: “we were buried with Him” (Rom 6: 4). And therefore, when He rose from the grave, we also received the grace that we should “walk in the newness of life” (Ibid.) To die again by sin would be to renounce Him, to separate ourselves from Him, to forfeit that Death and Resurrection of His which He mercifully willed should be ours. Let us therefore preserve within us that life, which is the life of our Jesus, and which yet belongs to us as our own treasure.

#easter tuesday

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ayamari-no-goshi · 3 years

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Verboten 10 | (T)

ff.net | AO3

Fandom: Danny Phantom (DP)

Summary: AU. When Danny was five years old, he went missing for 2 weeks. In the years that follow, his family tried to make sense of what happened, only for the truth to be discovered years later.

Warnings: rated T for violence, mentions of death, language. Be prepared for some very weird things

Chapter warning: child kidnappings mentioned

Parings: Danny/Sam

Notes: originally uploaded to Ff.net. Cross-posted to AO3 and tumblr. This fic is very heavily inspired by folklore surrounding mysterious wilderness disappearances

Chapter 10

Frostbite was close lipped on their journey to Clockwork's lair, at least in regards to the mysterious and ancient ghost. He instead talked to Danny about different aspects of ghosts and their realm. Although the yeti ghost wanted Danny to return home, he wanted Danny to know about the realm as a precaution, and Danny reluctantly agreed.

As they passed by some of the floating islands, buildings, and doors, Frostbite would occasionally mention which of his allies or neutral acquaintances lived there. It was all so strange. There were buildings which looked like they were from ancient Greece or Rome, while there was another which looked like a modern library. Frostbite explained the form of the lair was heavily influenced by its ruler. A ghost needed to be a fairly strong to be able to create such a large lair, and while the architecture often reflected what the ghost knew while they were alive, it wasn't a necessity.

Eventually, a dark and imposing clock tower could be seen in the distance. "I guess that's the place?" Danny questioned as he tried to get a better look at it.

"It is. When we arrive, it is unlikely I will be able to go in with you."

"Wait, what?" Danny hadn't expected this would be a one on one meeting. From the way Frostbite spoke, he figured someone would be guarding him, at least until he had answers.

The older ghost gave him a sheepish look. "The invitation was only for you. Unless Clockworks invites me in, I will do no more than ferry you to the location and wait for your return."

"Is this Clockwork really so scary?"

"He is far more powerful than I am, so I have no desire to anger him. There are stories regarding how no foe has been able to sway or harm him."

"So you're just going to allow a teenager to go to meet a ridiculously powerful ghost by himself? That's just great. What if he incinerates me or something?"

Frostbite just chuckled. "I do not think you have anything to fear, unless you try to attack him. Clockwork is not known for going out of his way to do damage to someone."

"Great. That makes me feel so much better." Danny's sarcasm was lost on Frostbite.

…

A short time later, Frostbite's sleigh landed in front of the clock tower. Upon closer inspection, the building appeared to be made of a dark gray stone with large wooden doors. Thankfully, there was a small amount of land surrounding the building, so Danny wasn't worried about falling to his death. After being coaxed out of the sleigh, Danny, feeling incredibly self-conscious, knocked on the door.

The door opened, but he didn't see anyone when he cautiously stepped inside. He half expected the door to slam behind him, but instead, it remained open until he started moving towards the only thing in the room, a stair case. Once he reached it, the door slowly closed on its own.

While uneasy, he wasn't exactly scared. Whoever this Clockwork was, he was at least somewhat courteous.

After reaching the top of the stairs, he found himself in a large room filled with gears, pendulums, and what appeared to be mirrors set within large gears. However, after a closer inspection, the mirrors showed shadowy images which didn't appear to be him or anything in the room.

"Do you see anything interesting?" a pleasant voice asked from somewhere behind him, making him jump. He sheepishly spun around to find a ghost with blue skin, red eyes, and a clock pendulum in his chest watching him. The ghost initially appeared maybe around thirty, but after a few moments shifted to appear much older.

"I'm sorry! I shouldn't have looked." Danny wasn't exactly certain why, but he felt almost as if he was being caught in the act by a favorite relative. There was something familiar and personable about this ghost, even when his form shifted again. This time, his appearance was childlike.

The ghost chuckled as he approached. "It is quite alright. Most of my visitors have been drawn to them." He gestured towards the closest one, and the images suddenly became more vivid. It was almost as if it was playing some sort of video. "As you have guessed, I am Clockwork, master of time. I am able to see all events which may or may not come to pass." His form again shifted.

"Err… Frostbite said you wanted to see me?"

"Correct. Beings such as yourself have only shown up a handful of times over the millennia, and each time one does, it often brings great change."

"But what am I? Am I dead? Am I alive?"

The ghost gave a gentle chuckle. "You are still very much alive. You're just able to access the power of your soul, which is not usually feasible while one is still has a living body. However, this is not possible unless you are able to resist the pull of this realm."

"What does that mean?" Although Danny was relieved to know he was classified as living, he was still deeply confused by everything. "Does it deal with what Frostbite explained regarding what could trigger the change?"

"Yes. This world is similar to the human concept of limbo. It is a place where some souls wander until they are lead to the Evermore – true death. But, it is still a world of the dead, and the living are not meant to be here. It has defenses to prevent the dead from crossing back into your world, which unfortunately can cause the wayward human to become a denizen."

"However, there is more to it than that," Clockwork continued as he gestured to the mirror. Strange images flickered within it. "Over millennia, this realm became corrupted. The guides, beings unique to this realm, which used to help guide those wayward souls, are all but gone now. No longer being able to find true rest, souls that remain here often become tainted and become ghosts. Many can spread that taint as well, and some use that to create others like themselves."

"You're telling me that's why my classmates were abducted?" A cold chill ran through him as his body decided to return to his human form.

"Not in this case." Clockwork gestured to the mirror as an image flickered to the first ghost Danny and his friends saw. After a moment, another ghostly figure who suspiciously resembled Mikey came into view. "In Youngblood's case, whether or better or worse, wanted a companion more than anything else. This isn't an isolated case. However, many abductors have a far more insidious reason." The ghost turned to face him. "The living have an energy that the dead do not. It's probably easiest to refer to it as vitality. Returning to your previous question, you still produce that energy so it is safe to say you are still alive."

"Alright. So what makes that so appealing? Does it give, I don't know, special abilities?"

"Some believe so. Others believe vitality will help them restore some of the memories commonly lost upon death."

"That's so messed up," Danny replied after mulling over the information. "The memory loss thing, does that happen to everyone? Will it happen to me? Will I…?" He didn't want to admit it out loud, but he was worried he might become a danger to his friends and family.

The ghost, who was back in his child form, gave him a soft smile. "As long as you're alive, you don't need to worry. As for death, most souls do not come to this realm, but instead find their way to the Evermore. Also, as long as the soul is strong, it can avoid being tainted by this realm and become a force of good or of balance. Those which do have no need to seek out and harm the living." It was impossible for Danny to hide the relief on his face, which made Clockwork chuckle.

"Now let us move on to some of your other concerns. You want to know if you can return home and how you became like that, correct?" When Danny nodded, Clockwork again gestured to the mirrors. An image of a young Danny berry picking with his aunt and sister. The view changed to show a creature, some other ghost, peering at them from behind a tree. After Danny caught sight of it, his family members disappeared from the scene. "This is where your journey began. As you saw earlier, a distraction from this realm can accidently pull you into it."

"What is that thing?" Danny felt uneasy as he watched the ghost beckon to his younger self which somehow triggered his body to switch forms again. There was something about the ghost which made him unsettled. It looked humanoid with dark skin, but did not have any facial features. "I don't remember seeing it, but then again, I don't remember much from that."

Clockwork stared at the image for another moment before glancing at Danny. "Most of them no longer have names. We call them 'Recruiters', but it was believed they had been destroyed several centuries ago. They worked for the previous king."

"Wait, king? You guys have a king? And what do you mean they were supposed to be destroyed?"

"We once did," Clockwork replied as he shifted to his elderly form. "He waged war against this realm and yours, so he was sealed away. The members of his court, made mostly of purposely modified ghosts, were either destroyed or sealed. It appears someone has resurrected those modification techniques."

Danny was about to ask another question when the images in the mirror caught his attention again. It showed the ghost, the Recruiter, examining him. It then handed him something which looked like some type of candy. After young Danny ate it, the Recruiter watched him for a while before attempting to grab him. When the attempt failed, young Danny tried to escape.

Images flashed as his younger self ran away from the Recruiter. Eventually, the boy collapsed outside of what appeared to be some sort of wall and began to cry as a faint glow started to surround him. As the Recruiter again appeared in the scene, it was blasted away by a strange beam. The boy looked up to see Plasmius staring curiously at him.

"Wow… so Plasmius actually wasn't lying when he said how he first met me."

"For the most part, no," Clockwork replied as he raised his staff, which caused the scene to shift to the inside of Plasmius' mansion. The older ghost had given Danny more food and was watching him carefully. "Plasmius did accidently find you, but if he hadn't provided you with more food from this realm, you may have been able to return home as a fairly normal human, albeit with form of minor psychic ability. However, he saw potential in you and became interested."

The teenager was silent for a moment as he continued to watch the images. After Plasmius took him back to the human world, the scene shifted to show him a little older. With a jolt, he realized it was when he disappeared the second time. Instead of the Recruiter, it was Plasmius who beckoned him. The ghost didn't do anything other than talk and play with his younger self. However, Danny was showing evidence of ghostly traits again. "He wanted to make sure he was right, didn't he?"

"Yes. Plasmius has grand ambitions in this realm. He wants power and having someone like you at his side would be a great boon. However," Clockwork froze the image and somehow zoomed into a spot in the background. There was a Recruiter watching them, "you were not alone. This is troubling."

"You mentioned earlier you are able to see all possible events, didn't you? So why do you seem so surprised?"

The ghost, still in his elderly form, wore a tenebrous expression. "While my abilities allow me to see any number of possibilities, it can be difficult to sort through the amount of information I receive. It is also possible, though unlikely, someone powerful was able to block them from my abilities. However, now that I am aware of the concern, it is much easier to locate similar events." The ghost shifted to his child form. "I had wanted to send you home while you adjust to the changes in your body, but you may need trained first."

Uncertain how to respond while the ghost took a few moments to think, Danny turned back to the mirror. It was no longer showing images of his past. Instead, it was flickering through a multitude of scenes at a blinding rate. For a second, he thought he saw Sam and Tucker, but the image changed before he could be certain. Some of the images seemed to show an army of some sort. Overall, it left him unsettled.

"I believe I will need to let Frostbite into the Clock Tower," Clockwork stated, making Danny jump. "I will need him to spread the word of my discovery, and he has information for both of us."

Moments later, the white furred ghost hurried up the stairs with two of his guards. After taking a moment to collect himself, he bowed towards Clockwork. "I humbly thank you for allowing us into your presence."

"There is no need for that. My abilities and agreement with the Observants force me to remain neutral under most circumstances. As such, I prefer to keep to myself, but sometimes when extraordinary people appear," Clockwork gestured to Danny, "curiosity gets in the way. However, this time, I am glad it did." The ghost brought their attention to the mirrors and showed the Yetis the image of the Recruiter.

Frostbite's shock was quickly replaced by rage. "Who would dare attempt to recreate such a vile creature? However, we have unsettling news of our own. The entourage who were escorting the other humans Danny knows home were attacked by the Fright Knight and a horde of Reanimated." When the yeti caught sight of Danny's horrified expression, he gave a small smile. "Fear not. Pandora herself stepped into assist my men and drove them back; not even the Fright Knight dares raise his blade to her. Your friends should be arriving home soon." His attention turned back towards Clockwork. "Pandora explained one of her spies caught sight of them shortly before they attacked my men and took it upon herself to intervene. Her ambassadors will request an audience of the counsel within the day."

"As much as I dislike dealing with the Observants, I believe this is necessary," Clockwork agreed. "Whoever is employing the techniques of the old king has been able to exploit the blind spots in my abilities. It also seems as if they are aware of Daniel and what his existence means. They may also be watching Plasmius."

"This is most troubling."

"Uh, excuse me, but I have no idea what's going on here," Danny interrupted. The conversation had lost him some time ago, but he was relieved to hear his friends were safe.

Frostbite gave him a sheepish smile as Clockwork explained, "It appears someone is trying to make a grab for power. The last time this happened, war overtook this realm and spilled into yours."

"That… that doesn't sound good."

"No. Last time, it was only through the power of the Ancients that we were able to defeat the King. If someone has found a way to access his abilities, then it needs to be stopped before catastrophe happens." The yeti's expression was grim as he addressed Clockwork. "So what becomes of Danny? Will he need to remain with us, or can he travel home? Is it even safe for someone like him to return to the human realm?"

"As he is still alive, there is no harm in him returning him. His parents are working on several projects, one of which will provide his home with enough ambient energy to allow his core to remain stable. However, the more I attempt to peer into the future, the more muddled the images become. There is definitely interference. So, I am uncertain what route will allow the most favorable outcome." He shifted to his adult form. "So, Daniel, I leave the choice to you."

"You said that whoever attacked my friends know about me?"

The time ghost nodded. "Yes. Since you can traverse both worlds without ill effects, your abilities would be of great interest. You could remain here and train with Frostbite…"

"But I would not be able to guarantee your safety as today proved," the Yeti admitted.

"There is also a concern the Observant and the Counsel will not approve of your existence," Clockwork continued. "You could return home, but you would be forced to develop your abilities on your own. However, you would be much safer there for the time being."

Danny looked down at his hands and momentarily stared at the faint glow surrounding them. "Am I a danger to my family and friends if I go home?"

"No, but it is possible to make them more open to this world. If we are unable to prevent our enemies from gaining power, it may cause them to be targeted again."

"Is it okay if I take some time to think about it?"

"Of course. Take all of the time you need."

=========================================

Note: The Evermore is something within DP lore. It was mentioned in a video Butch Hartman released which expanded upon more information regarding the different residents.

Clockwork's mention of limbo and soul guides. To my knowledge, the concept of Limbo is most prevalent to Christians (particularly Catholics). This is a place in between life and Heaven/Hell. In previous Catholic tradition, Limbo is the place where unbaptized souls go upon death, and there were circumstances which could help those souls find rest (the Catholic Church modified its views on Limbo in 2007). Some people say Limbo is also the realm of the fairies, elves, and any creature/entity which lives in another realm that is not heaven or hell. There is a similar concept in Greek mythology which was referred to as the Asphodel Fields/Meadows.

And for completion sake, Purgatory is not the same as Limbo. Purgatory (also per Catholic tradition) is a place of fiery cleansing after death. It's a temporary stop as once the cleansing is completed, the soul moves on to Heaven. While it is not mentioned much, Purgatory is still considered to exist.

Soul guides, also called psychopomps, are creatures responsible for guiding the deceased souls to the afterlife. The belief in them is ancient. Depending on tradition, they can be anything or look like anything. There's even some thought that certain entities known to spirit away people, faeries come to mind, may have derived from this concept. A great representation of this are the Alebrijes found in Mexican traditions (they were recently featured in the movie "Coco.")

The Recruiters are kind of based of off "Shadow People" mixed in with other legends like "Tall Man" spirit and Stick Men/Indians seen in some First Nation lore. Shadow People are a weird phenomenon, even for the paranormal. True Shadow People are not usually considered to be ghosts, but no one is exactly certain of what they are. The inter-dimensional theory often pops up with them because they don't seem to act like "normal ghosts" and are usually considered dangerous. They are reported to negatively influence and harm humans. There are some reports of them attempting to steal people.

Stick Men/Indians and the Tall Man are described as creatures similar to that of the modern tale of Slenderman, and they are again said to either negatively influence or take children. I used these descriptions due to some supposed reports from missing and found children saying creatures of similar descriptions wanted to take them with them, but they didn't meet the correct criteria.

Also, regarding Clockwork's powers… per the show, he "knows everything." However, it would very difficult of an entity to be able to take and absorb all of the information he gets at a time. So, my mind is viewing it as if he's skimming the majority of the information, which could allow events in the background to get missed.

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itsyourchoicedevotionals · 3 years

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Sit Down

“Jesus said, “Have the people sit down…” John 6:10ESV

Our text comes directly from the story of feeding 5000 men and their families. Rough estimates are 20,000 people, plus, were in actual attendance. That’s a tremendous number of people to feed at one time.

Lou and I went to Home Interiors and Gifts’ 25th anniversary, formal, sit down, seven course meal, in Dallas Texas. Over 15,000 people attended. We stood in long lines, before being seated. I have no clue how large the serving staff was, probably 500, maybe another hundred. One thing I read in the Dallas newspaper— the dishes were flown in from every large city across the nation— then they were flown back to their city of origin, dirty. (Oh, I’m thankful I didn’t have to serve or wash dishes.) Can you imagine? Serving was simultaneous. How did they cook the food to perfection and get the food to us hot? This was no small undertaking. Again, Dallas headlines stated ‘the largest, formal, sit down banquet in the nation’ up to 1983.

Think for a moment, Jesus fed a two course meal to 5,000 more people than the HIG banquet we attended. He had twelve servers. For Jesus to tear the bread and fish apart for 20,000 people— days of work to finish. Handing each disciple portions, consider how much time would be used for twelve men to tear the portions— forever… Jesus tore the food into twelve pieces. When the twelve tore off a portion, handing it to one person of each fifty, the miracle of multiplication began. Point being— no one worked for the meal the Master provided.

We people have the crazy idea, we have to work for whatever the Lord gives us. ‘I have to be good and do’……. not! Try again. I have to pay…… not! Try again. ‘I have to trust and obey’… Bingo, right answer. Truth is— we have to sit down, ‘rest’ in the Lord. Our job isn’t striving to accomplish things. But listen to Him for instructions; quit striving; obey Him, whatever He says. Have faith in—believe God for “…He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.”

Since Jesus’ death and resurrection, whatever Jehovah Jireh— God Provider —gives to us is created out of faith in Him. Faith is even one gift of Holy Spirit, 1Corinthians 12:9. One gift, I believe, born in listening to and seeking Him— “…seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things” [aka needs] “will be added to you.” Matthew 6:33ESV, also see Romans 10:17.

Facts are: God didn’t intend for man to do a day of physical labor in his life. Tending to the Garden of Eden was speaking things into existence. Physical working started in Genesis 3 gifted to us through the sin of Adam. Sin still keeps men working, striving to have the best, out do their neighbor, be better than others. Pride says I can, I will, I did. Notice both ‘sin’ and ‘pride’ have an ‘i’ in the middle.

Psalm 23:5NKJV “You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies;…” Yahweh has always desired to do for His people. Most of His own believers don’t sit down with Him long enough to hear His voice, or know what to obey. Then they question— ‘did God really say?’

Sit down in His Presence and wait. Again, listen to His still small voice, the whisper in your heart. “Trust in the LORD, and do good; so shalt thou dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed” Psalm 37:4KJV. Nothing life has to offer out does food received from sitting down with the Master. Trust and obey. It’s your choice. You choose.

PRAYER: Papa God we all want to work, strive, be self-prepared. Help us to sit down and rest in You, leaning upon Your Word, in Jesus’ name I pray.

#Jesus Christ #lord of lords #Word of God #Holy Spirit #God #it's your choice #devotional #banquet #crazy #speaking #existence #striving #gifted #pride #love #hope #faith

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onaf · 3 years

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Of Dogs and Children

Believers in Christ have their hang-ups, their own theological baggage when it comes to the faith. This doesn’t always come in the form of outright denial of the core tenets of the Christian religion. But it can mean there are teachings that are quick to be absorbed mentally, yet slow to penetrate the heart.

For me, one of the most difficult things to understand at heart about Christ is how He condescends to sinners like myself. When I read Matthew 11: 28-30, Christ’s character takes on a peculiar timbre:

“Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

To some, this may be an inconsequential passage. But I wonder how one can think that! What is easier for me to understand is that Christ - the One through whom the universe was created - has authority to judge the living and the dead. It isn’t hard for me to accept how He performed miracles, for what is difficult for the Christ? Theophanies? Old Testament prophecies about Jesus? Awesome!

But a Christ that is lowly? A savior that is gentle when with but one word He could annihilate all that is unholy (namely myself)? A King to whom I am - by rights - condemned forever, but gave Himself as a ransom for me? More food for thought from Hebrews 4:14-16...

“Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”

I think many of us can understand that God would be a righteous judge against ungodliness, that He has wrath against sin, that He wields great power, and that He is holy. But I hope I’m not alone in finding His closeness to the downtrodden, the fallen, and the broken as being really hard to wrap my mind around!

This is a deeply practical problem. You can’t divorce theological conviction from how you live your daily life. Finding Christ’s meekness a difficult concept to absorb, I sometimes lean toward an imbalanced life. Without meditating enough on Christ’s mercy and sympathy to the struggles of a wicked man like myself, I gravitate more toward what I believe I do understand: my wretchedness.

What do you get when you have a believer who understands that he is a sinner deserving of eternal judgement but struggles to accept that he is a recipient of mercy? Though his heart yearns for Christ and His righteousness, a lie makes the honest truths seem beyond reach. The lie is: your redemption is insignificant.

A heart in this condition is divided. The honest hope of this man is truly in Christ, and his salvation has been secured already by the grace of God. But a pernicious untruth has craned the neck of this believer to look inward at the remaining filthiness of sin and to believe this to be the most accurate representation of his state. The Spirit-led part of his heart hopes for the Kingdom of God, but - since his focus has been on the irredeemable sin of his flesh - he has been convinced that the honest hopes of his heart are actually born of self-deception. It is a confusion of the highest order, one that prevents a Christian from living out his true calling with his undivided attention - and a confusion with which I am well-acquainted.

In short, instead of believing that I am a child of God by grace, a fallen part of me condemns me as if I was not. So, in my weaker moments, my heart resorts to an unholy compromise: that perhaps I am welcome in the house of God, but only as a dog. I may be in the dining room, but I only lay on the floor and eat the crumbs from the table while others more worthy garner God’s more rapt attention.

Matthew 15:24-28 says...

“He answered, ‘I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.’ But she came and knelt before Him, saying, ‘Lord, help me.’ And He answered, ‘It is not right to take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs.’ She said ‘Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table.’ Then Jesus answered her, ‘O woman, great is your faith! Be it done for you as you desire.’ And her daughter was healed instantly.”

There’s a theme there that I grabbed onto a long time ago. I knew that I had been bought with a price, the Lord wouldn’t let me forget that. But my heart refused to unfocus from my sinful nature. It instead used this passage in Matthew and keep me where I didn’t belong. The mistake in my thinking was that Christ redeemed me who was dead in my trespasses and sins (Eph. 2:1) and made me a dog - a second rate, quasi-Christian. For the hopeless, going from being dead to being a dog isn’t that bad of a deal. Unless you know better, it’s a great deal. From being cast into outer darkness to at least being in your gracious masters’ dining room is a worthy trade! Everyone knows, however, a dog has no share in the inheritance of the master's children.

But this falls short of what the Bible teaches. To settle for being a dog is a tragedy when, in reality, you’ve been adopted as a son or daughter! The obsession with relegating oneself to the station of a cur is to, in reality, choose to disbelieve the promises of God. It is a tacit allegation of dishonesty on God’s part - saying that He is either not that mighty to save or that your sin makes you an exception to the redemptive rule. This is faithlessness hidden under the veil of fake piety.

Consider the following:

“For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.” Luke 19:10

“There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death.” Romans 8:1-2

But most importantly, this:

“What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? He who did not spare His own Son but gave Him up for us all, how will He not also with Him graciously give us all things? Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died - more than that, who was raised - who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written, ‘For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.’ No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Romans 8:31-39

To say to your own soul that the best God did for you was to bring you from death to a grudgingly-awarded spot on the floor in His general vicinity (with the unspoken threat of expulsion for the slightest mistake) is to do violence to His mighty ability to bring about your salvation (Zeph. 3:17). Why does my heart insist on its own harm by attempting to shackle God’s redemptive work?

One of the greatest resources I’ve encountered lately in dealing with this struggle is found in The Bruised Reed, by the Puritan Richard Sibbes. A great quote here:

“If Christ should not be merciful to our weaknesses, He should not have a people to serve Him. Suppose therefore we are very weak, yet so long as we are not found amongst malicious opposers and underminers of God’s truth, let us not give way to despairing thoughts; we have a merciful Saviour.” (pg. 58)

Even to those who are in Christ but find themselves in sin - as we do all too often - there is hope. Sibbes continues:

“What course shall such take to recover their peace? They must condemn themselves sharply, and yet cast themselves upon God’s mercy in Christ, as at their first conversion. And now they must embrace Christ the more firmly, as they see more need in themselves; and let them remember the mildness of Christ here, that He will not quench the smoking flax.” (pg. 60)

Through these struggles, I have learned some things:

Christ is indeed lowly enough in heart so as to understand our weakness and not despise it.

The redemption that true believers find in Him is no lie, it is not done by half measures - since it is with the death and resurrection of Christ’s whole body that we have been purchased. Thus, the redemption is total, to be fully seen in due time.

To doubt one’s standing with God after being redeemed by Christ is to accuse Him of being less than He is. Do you believe Him to be an effective Savior? Then you must trust that He is qualified to save!

When a sinner is saved by grace, it is to no small and insignificant station. Consider the following:

“For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, ‘Abba! Father!’ The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.” Romans 8:15-17

Where, then, is there room for God’s children to act as though they are just dogs at the dining room table?

#Christianity church puritan puritans salvation doubt bible scripture dogs children despair hope Jesus Christ

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gofancyninjaworld · 4 years

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OPM Revised Manga chapters 99 - 100 Review: Not today, Satan

Hoo hoo hoo. When Murata said he had a bit of work to do for the volume, we had no idea just how extensive it was! There isn’t a single chapter appearing in volume 22 that hasn’t been edited or reworked. And the mighty struggle between Child Emperor and Phoenixman has changed unrecognisably! Shall we go?

A bit of a difference, yes

Story: forget what you thought you knew

The first change comes nearly right away. Rather than leaving Waganma behind, Child Emperor keeps him in Brave Giant’s backpack, freeing both hands to fight. The fight between Phoenixman and Brave Giant is interesting, but it’s much lighter going than before for a very specific reason: the monster sees a connection between himself and Child Emperor and is hoping to keep the costume the hero is wearing intact so he can recruit a fellow costumed monster.

And now it gets freaky. Phoenixman can summon another costume-wearer to a timeless spiritual space in which they can talk. Don’t ask me how! Phoenixman latches onto Child Emperor’s desire to find someplace where he’s trusted and his efforts are appreciated right away, coming terrifyingly close to converting him into a monster -- until he harshes the vibe with a terrible name for the monster he’d like Child Emperor to become. It made my skin crawl, how close he came.

what a terrifying monster! Had he stopped speaking with the above words, he’d have created a monster indeed!

They resume fighting, and eventually Child Emperor smashes him through the floor as in the previous versions, which doesn’t have the effect of killing him so he can reincarnate. Instead, it ‘just’ launches them both through several floors, through the lake of death, and down lower still. The water sweeps Saitama along as well, and all of them fetch up in a charnel house, where all the dead Subterraneans have ended up.

Phoenixman makes a second attempt to persuade Child Emperor. This time he gets closer, sowing seeds of doubt about the goodness of the Hero Association higher-ups into Child Emperor’s head quite directly -- there’s no need for them to talk. Whatever it is he reveals to the boy, it is quite grisly. Thankfully, the spell is broken by Saitama who just bashes into their spiritual realm to declare his disapproval of what the monster is doing, which breaks the spell.

no traumatising children on my watch! Trouble is, Child Emperor isn’t going to forget whatever it is that he’s been told -- this is going to be trouble later.

Just as they snap back to the real world, another wonderful intervention occurs. Zombieman calls, ostensibly to tell Child Emperor about his speculation about the possibility of the Monster Association using the Metal Knight to build robots of their own proving right, but really to thank and encourage him. Giving him the very thing he’d been so desperate to hear from the start.

Since he’d been unable to persuade Child Emperor to turn into a monster spontaneously, Phoenixman tried the other way: by dropping a monster cell into the machine so that all the boy had to do would be to take a bite. It’s a good thing that monster cells cannot work unless they’re consumed of one’s own free will. Despite the pressure being applied to him by the monster cell trying to crawl into his mouth, the zombies trying to tear Brave Giant apart, and Brave Giant’s own time limit, Child Emperor holds firm and finds at heart what’s really important: that heroism is an inner quality, not an external one.

And then the true nature of Phoenixman comes out:

don’t be fooled: you can only trust a monster to be a monster

In keeping with his inner self-reliance, Child Emperor destroys Brave Giant himself, immolating the zombies along with it. Phoenixman tries to take advantage of the situation to kill Child Emperor, being fouled by Saitama long enough for the kid to slip a ticklebug into his costume.

I totally wasn’t expecting this to happen as a result!

the most pathetic monster ever -- please nobody kill him in case he can resurrect stronger

I was irrationally pleased to see Underdogman 24 come find his master, still functional enough to get them out of there (with a subtle push from Saitama). On we go!

Okay, Saitama will be back soon to find where the rude monster that tried to grab them en route came from. He still needs to find those noisy neighbours!

Meta: Not today, Satan

I get two big things out of this story.

First, at the beginning of the year, I mused that OPM wasn’t at heart a battle manga. Rather, it was a manga that had battles (link). Core is the relationship between the small jihad (the struggle against external enemies) and the big jihad (the struggle with oneself to be a better person and lead a good life). I’d used Saitama as the examplar of this struggle.

I was a bit (a lot) confused by the changes at first, but I think that fundamentally, the changes are so as to come back to that important inner struggle that so much of OPM is about.

I thought that Child Emperor's struggle is appropriate to a ten-year old. He's old enough not to have blind faith in adults, but young enough to really need good, reliable ones around and to know that his efforts are truly appreciated. It’s been an issue for several chapters now: right from the first time we saw Child Emperor, being told he was still a child was a great way to piss him off.

Phoenixman sensing that, worked so beautifully and sweetly on his insecurities that he seemed almost a friend. Surely no one could resist...

Thankfully, Child Emperor does have good adults in his life, ones who show up when most needed. Saitama shows up in the spiritual world when Child Emperor feels most cornered by Phoenixman’s spiel and lets him know that he sees what’s happening and it’s not okay for Phoenixman to be pressuring a child so -- giving him strength to resist without taking the struggle away from him. Zombieman called to thank him, and let him know that his efforts were seen and appreciated. Reminding him too, that there were adults he looked up to. It’s so awesome to see that even though he’s blindingly smart, Child Emperor still has some things he aspires to be.

ah, how much your divinely-timed words meant, Zombieman!

Previously, Phoenixman had been mocking Child Emperor for being a kid, for being misled by the adults, and had been fascinated by the possibility that he too could get stuck in his costume, but those were secondary themes against a backdrop of the terror of an ever-growing monster that just would not die. Fortunately, this rewrite, Child Emperor could only push Phoenixman to the point of death that first time, so he never got access to those bigger, scarier forms and thus the fight to keep one’s soul human could take primacy.

Too, I think that Saitama’s presence, lending the boy hero a subtle hand when he most needs it, was very important in grounding the story. Rather than being an all-but-perfect person who already had all the answers and has all the toys needed to enact them, Child Emperor may still need a hand, without it being a discredit in any way to his intelligence, determination, courage, or inventiveness. The threat posed to him by Phoenixman is just that potent.

whoops, can’t let you do that -- you won’t be eviscerating children on my watch

Second, the story has gone almost Buddhist about the sin of attachment. So many monsters are about the thing they're obsessed with. Even if it's a good thing (like justice -- eh, Amai Mask?), that attachment is what warps them. Phoenixman refusing to take off his Birdbrain costume because he was so invested in the character he couldn't accept it was over, literally refusing to take it off even if it killed him.

It's putting into context the thing I intuited about monsters (link) -- that they get rid of conflict and regret. It feels good to be a monster. Being human means feeling the pain, the regret, the conflict, accepting loss, and moving on. Monsters don’t have to do that. They get to get all that they want, at the expense of their humanity.

unhealthy attachment -- literally

Other Business

1. The Monster Association really does have scientists. Whether with Machine God G5′s help or not, they’ve wasted no time in finding out how to make Metal Knight-based robots. Thankfully, they’ve also copied the machine’s weak spots and don’t seem to have the super-resistant materials the original would be made of. Still... that’s worrying. Are the minds and hands that worked on this really dead? What else have they learned?

2. It was so wholesome to see Saitama provide support and encouragement to Child Emperor, stepping in whenever the boy was about to be overcome but otherwise letting him use his wits and courage to deal with the situation. How I wish he’d do so for his disciple! It’d mean so much! Even if it’s just to give an encouraging smile.

3. It took me a couple of rereads to see it, but the ninja duo have been strapped to the side of Underdogman 24. Saitama means to collect this bounty! More bbq meat for him.

4. Gosh, it’s going to be positively crowded at the surface! We’ll have two evil ex-zombie monster ninjas, the support heroes, Waganma, Child Emperor, Saitama, the mercenaries and the disciples all having a fresh air party. Doubtless various people will be departing for various locations soon enough, but this should be a fun mix.

5. Saitama is so absurdly over-powerful that even when he does his thing right in front of people, they can’t understand what happened. No wonder he gets no credit.

6. I really, really, really appreciate getting to see more of Waganma’s thoughts. Yes, they’re selfish, but his desire to keep quiet in order to not be plunged back into the hell he’s grateful to be leaving are very understandable! Previously, he’d seemed sociopathic.

7. So Child Emperor thinks that most of his fellow Class S heroes are either evil, evil-looking, evil-acting, or just plain weird? Not nice at all.

he still has some way to go in learning how to not judge by appearance

8. But Zombieman is just wholesome. Especially his promise to treat Child Emperor to milkshake afterwards. Let it happen!

#OPM #manga #meta #review #long #Child Emperor #Phoenixman #Saitama #wow what a chapter #both adventure and spiritualism in one #Zombieman #the distrust planted in Child Emperor isn't going to leave anytime soon #to the loss of everyone #just what things are the HA higher ups up to?#it may not be anywhere near as bad as the monster makes them out to be #but it doesn't have to be for a child to lose faith in them #the story talks about the need for a balance between self-sufficiency and interdependency #alone we cannot easily cope #but if we lean too hard then other things become a crutch

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arlingtonpark · 3 years

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Harrow the Ninth Act I Thoughts

This is all your fault, @ghostmartyr. If you hadn’t reblogged what seemed like heavy metal boy band fanart, I wouldn’t be in this hole. And for that, I hate you.

So.

When I first encountered the Locked Tomb online, I couldn’t tell if it was a story about edgy, neogothic, teenaged angst, or something better than that.

Turns out, it’s both.

But in a good way.

I love it. It’s great.

It’s unabashed, it’s thoughtful, it’s entertaining, it’s suspenseful.

Gideon the Ninth is finished, and after starting Harrow the Ninth, I decided to blog about it as I go.

I’ll be doing one post for every act of the book. I hope.

Let’s start with our new main character, Harrow. Newly reborn as a god and one of the only survivors of the last book.

So….

Right now, Harrow’s…

Um.

She’s uh…

-gestures at everything-

She’s fucked.

Fucked, broken, in the shit, started godhood on the wrong side of the bed.

200 babies were killed in the name of birthing her. Her parents died in front of her because of what she did. Death has always seemed to follow her, and she carries the burden of all that death.

Harrow despises her existence and wishes she were dead because of the circumstances of her birth, and yet for that very reason she is committed to living, because if she dies, all those sacrifices would be null.

She takes up the duties of governing the Ninth, she applies herself rigorously to mastering necromancy, and when the opportunity arises to become a lyctor, she jumps at it.

Harrow does this because it’s why all those people had to die. She was birthed to carry the Ninth’s legacy; its traditions and obligations and to some extent its very existence.

The twisted nature of the Ninth and her parents is inseparable from that legacy, so in a sense it was that legacy that led to her infanticidal birth, but regardless, this legacy is all she has. It’s all she was ever meant to have. And so she devoted herself to it.

Now that she’s a lyctor and her house’s future will be guaranteed, but to do it, she had to sacrifice Gideon, whom she loved.

It’s more of the same shit from her perspective: more people dying for her sake. 200 babies die to grant her obscene necromantic talent, her girlfriend dies so she can gain even more power. Harrow doesn’t mean to step on innocent people to get what she wants…but that’s always how it’s turned out for her.

But to add insult to injury, even after all she’s sacrificed, she still didn’t get exactly what she wanted.

Her house will have a future, but she can never return to it. She’s essentially divorced from the only thing that gave her life meaning.

She can never return to her old life; to the extent she saw that as desirable, she can’t have that. Her old life is gone forever.

Something also went wrong with her ascension to godhood. She’s violently sick, mentally unstable, and the powers she should have are…half baked, for lack of a better word.

Nobody said you could get hungover from ascending to godhood. Harrow should sue.

It’s like going in to surgery to remove a tumor and coming out lobotomized.

Is she even immortal?

It all stings of pointlessness. All that effort for nothing.

Worse than that; She lost everything. Her home, her love, her pride and dignity.

Her only purpose in life now is to fight these hell beasts that she’s never heard of before. Happy days ahead, surely.

Oh, and one of the people she’ll have to work with is named Gideon.

Does God hate her?

And then there’s God.

This guy is sus as hell.

He’s gracious and humble. Perpetually calm and soft spoken. Empathetic and understanding. That’s what He’s like in person.

But He’s…maybe the villain? I guess.

God works in mysterious ways, and I have no damn clue what His are, but it’s probably ugly.

Yes, He’s a cordial Dude…but he’s still the God-emperor of a galactic undead empire.

Dude wears a crown made from the bones of dead babies FFS.

Not to be accusatory, but this guy definitely has skeletons in his closet.

-bu-dum-tish-

One of the things that really got my attention while reading this series is how the magic system in this world is depicted. Usually, in fantasy stories, the magic system is depicted as being morally neutral. Good guys use it, bad guys it, but the magic itself just is.

The Locked Tomb Trilogy isn’t like that.

Necromancy is bad. Perverse, even.

All the necromancers are frail and sickly. Practicing it is deleterious on the body. Doing too much too fast with it causes even more pronounced harm. As in, bleeding from your sweat glands.

Necromancy works by manipulating the life force of living beings and, primarily, the death force those being give off when they die.

The forces of nature that necromancy utilizes are (apparently) fundamental to the universe, akin to the laws of nature, but the use of those forces in this way are clearly a perversion.

It’s sort of like a bad tv show, like Sword Art Online. Sure, the things that went into making the show are natural parts of the world, but you just can’t put those things together like that.

John and his empire epitomize that.

All known beings in the universe are fundamentally thalergetic in nature. They are beings who radiate life energy. Except for the planets of the empire. Those planets and the star they orbit are thanergetic in nature.

They literally radiate death. And they are apparently one of a kind in that regard.

John is the first necromancer. John used his newly harnessed powers to “resurrect” multiple planets that had died.

Except he didn’t really resurrect anything, he turned them into an entirely new form of being using his entirely new form of science that uses some kind of mechanism that doesn’t occur naturally.

What I’m getting at here is that everything about John, his power, and his empire is artificial. Man-made. Perhaps even John-made.

We don’t actually know what happened during the Resurrection. What killed off the planets, how John attained his God-like powers, and what life John lived before it.

Oh, yeah, and every planet the empire conquers is systematically killed over generations to fuel their necromancer’s powers.

Every planet God touches literally dies.

One thing I appreciate about this series is how layered the story is.

The Locked Tomb series is a fun, irreverent romp. It’s about allowing the past to rest in peace. It’s also surprisingly political.

The metaphor is pretty blunt: it’s about capitalism. What’s more, the metaphor seems to be from a progressive or maybe even socialist perspective.

Ok, so hear me out on this. This is less fan theory than speculation about the author’s intentions.

The empire is a society built on a system that requires them to move from planet to planet, gradually killing those planets until they have to evacuate and move to a new one.

This process of gradual death takes generations to play out, so apparently they don’t even consider it to be an event that happens.

The heart of this system is necromancy, a perverse science that is ultimately derived from natural phenomena.

This system places the most powerful necromancer atop a literal throne and worships them as God.

God’s disciples are the lyctors, second only to Him in power. They attained that power by a very special process.

The lyctoral process is exploitative. It requires the necromancer to use their cavalier as a sacrifice and to turn their soul into a power source.

The lyctoral process is built around domination. The necromancer, in sacrificing their cavalier, subsumes the cavalier’s soul into their being to gain power.

The lyctoral process is dehumanizing. The cavalier is degraded from a person to a mere battery, but the necromancer is degraded in a way as well. The necromancer can never return to their house, or any of the other houses for that matter. Instead they must fight and die for God in his battle against the Revenant Beasts.

If you’re progressive, this may sound familiar to you.

Relationships of exploitation, domination, and dehumanization. A society built around perversions. That rewards people with talent in those perversions with idolatry. That cold-heartedly and shortsightedly extracts every drop of usable resources from a planet until it is dead, then moves on to the next one.

To a socialist, this may sound a lot like capitalism.

Saying that is already bold enough for me, so I won’t try to argue that it’s a one to one allegory. Necromancy equals the profit motive, lyctors represent the relationship between the bourgeoisie and the proletariat (So I guess that means the non-lyctor necromancers are the petit bourgeoisie) and the empire is humanity.

You could make a case for it, but the hot takes in this post are already pretty spicy, so…

OMG Mercymorn. XD

Mercymorn is my favorite out of the new characters. She’s a bitch.

Snide, rude, assertive, bitchy, and standoffish. No, it’s not that I want her to step on me, I just can’t get enough of her interactions.

I guess in real life she wouldn’t be fun to be around, but as a character in a book, she steals every scene. Her arrogant and bitchy remarks always make me laugh.

My one wish heading in to Act II: that Mercymorn is in charge of Ianthe’s training.

Just so she can kick her ass for not measuring up to her standards.

#locked tomb #locked tomb spoilers #htn #htn spoilers #bury the dead but not your gays

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charlemange1 · 4 years

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Ask of the Lesser (Frankenstein/Lovecraft Works): 6 Gods and Monsters

Darkness enveloped my little cell as I waited for my last sunrise. A cruel ending it was, to be hung in the square and have the name Frankenstein permanently branded with unhallowed deeds. The shadow of Victor’s legacy would trap me till the end, and I had only myself to blame. My selfish desires to revive my family had blinded me to Curwen’s dark work. A mistake I realized had likely cost many lives, judging from the number of crates I had delivered over the past few months. Human blood! Oh, if only I had known! How could I hate Victor when in my own obsession I had enabled such atrocities? What right had I to judge him when I was enslaved to the same master?

My head thumped against the wall in defeat. Victor. My mind drifted back to our final conversation in the villa, when we were all that remained of our family and a trembling husk was all that remained of him.

“That daemon has struck down everyone but you, and he is coming, Ernest! I have failed to stop him, and he shall claim you too, if you stand idle!”

“Calm yourself, Victor. You are unwell,” I soothed, watching him pace the floor. “Elizabeth’s death has shaken you.”

“Murder. She was murdered by him, Ernest! You must believe me!” Victor clutched my shoulders with boney fingers. He shoved his journal against my chest, and I saw his nails were gnawed to bloodied stubs. “Here is my journal, dated years ago! Could madness be so precise? So detail-oriented?”

Grief had settled into every line of his exhausted face. His manic eyes pleaded with me through the strands of unkempt hair that floated rather than fell around his head. I ignored the lice crawling in the knotted curls and gently shut the journal.

“Victor, you know I stumble with such fancy words. These are scribbles to me.” I patted his trembling hand. “How about we get some sleep, huh? The servants are pouring some Laudanum to calm your nerves.”

“I do not need calm, we must act,” Victor’s voice rose to the rafters in desperation. My hand discreetly waved forward the servants positioned in the hall. “I have wrought terrible mayhem upon our house, but I will not let my curse consume you too! You are all I have left, Ernest. I beg of you to believe me! Not these mad claims, but me. As my brother, you must heed this threat!”

“Yes, yes, Victor,” I smiled gently and fought back tears. Elizabeth and Papas’ deaths had broken him. My poor, hysteric brother! He had always been the strong one. The one with all the talent pushing my miserable frame to be better. Where had that trailblazer gone? My brother may have been clutching me, but he had abandoned me in spirit. The Victor I had known was gone. The servants filed in to take his imposter away.

“Do not let them do this, Ernest,” Victor fought the hands that restrained him, though he had lost the strength to fight long ago. “Please, believe me! I cannot lose you too!”

“You are mad with grief, Victor,” I soothed. “Rest will restore you.”

You are the strong one! How can you fall apart and leave me alone?

Victor opened his mouth, but my mind was set. Something like defeat settled in his eyes. Victor’s body went limp as the servants’ drug him to his room. His eyes never left me, two watery pits silently pleading to be heard.

Wanting to save a thick-skulled wretch like me.

My hands pressed against my eyes and I wept for words left unspoken. He had cared! Victor had done wrong by turning from God, but I had turned my back on my own brother who so desperately wanted to keep me safe.

Was that why his creature had spared me? Not because I was to insignificant for my death to hurt Victor, but because me living and reducing his suffering to the rambles of a madman was the ultimate punishment? Victor could find strength in those murdered by destroying his monster and avenging them. The misery I had to live with in their absence would not end by Victor putting a bullet through the creature’s heart. My murdered family’s thoughts were at peace, but my ongoing misery was Victor’s shame to carry to the grave knowing he was responsible. His fond letter crinkled in my pocket, and I knew I could not hate him. I knew then too, that the unhallowed work that had withered his spirit and decimated our family could not continue, no matter the intent.

The prison door swung open and a streak of light cut back the shadows. I covered my eyes from the haggard silhouette outlined against the intense brightness.

“Ernest, what in heavens name are you doing here?”

“Walton?” Blinking rapidly, I focused on the captain’s battered frame. “Have you come to take me to the gallows?”

Silence settled between us.

“I want to know why?”

“Why an invalid like me would play with a fire that scorched my brother?” I laughed bitterly. “I thought I could resurrect my family and we could be happy again, but not if their life comes from the death of others. I have seen death, Walton, and felt the void created in its wake. I would never subject anyone to that grief, even if it meant restoring my only source of happiness. I know what such work did to Victor and saw how it tore our family apart. I was a fool to think any good could come of its continuation.” I turned from the captain. “So write your sequel. Tell the world what a fool I am!”

“You are a fool,” Walton nodded. He bent beside me and rested his hand across mine. “But you are not a bad man. You clearly did not know the contents of your wicked cargo. It seems your destiny to be caught up in the madness of others, a lonely ship tossed about in a storm it could never hope to understand. You know better now, though.” Walton’s voice cracked. “Tell me who tricked you? What are they planning with Victor’s work?”

My repressed misgivings of Curwen resonated with Walton’s trembling voice. I had been too focused on my family to consider how Curwen would utilize the spark of life after they were brought back. What had he meant about merging raised souls with new flesh to be unstoppable?

“I do not know the details, but if the end justifies the mean, and that mean is human blood, it is a wicked thing,” I frowned. “Is this an interrogation?”

“A rescue,” Walton corrected, stepping aside to give me a clear path to the door. Seeing the confusion on my face, he pulled out an empty sack and smiled. “Your father was a magistrate. You should know how a few gold coins can sway a verdict. Yet not everyone has deep pockets, if you want the night on our side, we must quit this place and put an end to whatever is brewing on the edges of Ingolstadt.”

Gripping the wall, I pulled myself to a standing position, longing for my cane left by the river. “I will do whatever I can to stop Mr. Curwen from following in my brother’s steps.”

“We will stop,” Walton placed a hand on my shoulder.

“Captain, this is my sin to mend,” I said. “You must not jeopardize your life to let mine be at peace.”

“I fear all life will be in jeopardy if I stand idle,” Walton frowned. “I am more than just the historian of great men’s exploits, and you are not your brother. You do not have to do this alone.”

A roach darted in and out of the shaft of floor light. What chance had I of talking down Curwen alone? Walton knew the thrill of discovery, he could speak a language to Curwen that I had never known and Victor knew all too well. And, despite the pain Walton’s biography had caused me, I realized that Victor’s legacy overshadowed us both, but while I was tied to Victor by blood, Walton merely happened upon him by chance and was unknowingly thrust into this world of gods and monsters. I was shunned for the deeds of my brother, but as I looked at the frail captain, I knew he had suffered too. My hostility was unwarranted, and I extended my hand to relate as much to Walton.

“Shall we destroy that feind, then?” Walton asked, eagerly returning the handshake.

I thought of the morning after the servants had drug Victor away. I had stood in his empty room torn apart by a hasty deserter rushing to an Arctic death.

I shook my head beside Walton. I had ignored Victor for the last time.

“Walton, my brother held this man to the highest regard. I will not underplay the depravity of Mr. Curwen’s work, but perhaps his delusions of grandeur have incapacitated his ability to reason, a crime which I cannot judge, nor you, Arctic explorer. When we enter the university, let me speak with him before any rash action is taken.”

“And if speech fails?”

“You know what Mr. Curwen will do, and that cannot be.”

Walton looked reluctant, but having nearly died in his own quest for glory, he could not protest.

Outside, we were met by a horrid wind that sent overturned barrels bouncing across the streets. Walton found me a broom to replace my cane as we hurried past window shutters slamming open and shut. It seemed nature itself was sick of this wicked business.

“Does this Curwen character work with human flesh?” Walton shouted above the wind as we cleared the courtyard.

“Initially, though his process for reanimation differs greatly from Victors. He boils the body down to salt and relies on black magic for completion.”

Walton nodded with a frown. “By any chance, did you ever inspect Victor’s casket after I delivered him to you?”

“There was no reason to after I saw his face,” I said, confused by this question. A chorus of barks and howls rose up throughout the city. Were they following us?

“I see,” Walton said, eyes darting around in search of bloodhounds. “Given your former disbelief of Victor’s accomplishment, I refrained from sharing certain requests he relayed to me. Requests I felt best to omit from my biography.”

“Do tell?” I said as a man leaned out his window to wrangle the collar of his howling dog in a vain attempt to silence it.

“Victor said he did not wish to be brought back and asked for me to dismember and discard him after death,” Walton admitted, side stepping a bouncing barrel. “An odd request, considering he alone knew the secret of reanimation. Or so I thought.”

“Right,” I said absently. The unnamable smell from Curwen’s lab hung heavy in the air. “Did you do it?”

“I could only bring myself to throw his left hand overboard, I am no butcherer!” Walton shivered from more than the wind. “I did not know if that means anything to you now?”

“It appears straightforward enough,” I breathed as the gates of Ingolstadt University came into view. “Victor cannot be revived.”

#ernest frankenstein #frankenstein #victor frankenstein #mary shelly's frankenstein #frankenstein fanfiction #HP Lovecraft #lovecraft fanfiction #ask of the lesser #The Case of Charles Dexter Ward #classic literature #gothic literature #gothic fanfiction

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kingdomofthelogos · 3 years

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Palm Sunday

Read Mark 11:1-11

Download a printable version here.

John 12:27 reads 27 Now is my soul troubled; and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour: but for this cause came I unto this hour. In this, Jesus exemplified the full index of Philippians 4:8 which reads: finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things. The character of Christ embodied these irrevocable virtues. This is why Christ came and this is the path He walked, despite being both tempted by the devil to serve evil rather than good, and expressed in the garden the anxious lament of a heart burdened with suffering. Jesus knew the price and chose to pay it out of love. What then do we choose in response?

Jesus is consistently the Way, the Truth, and the Life, and He was teaching this even as He went to the cross. When Christ tells the disciples to go and find a colt, they are challenged to go out into the world and see if the truth of Jesus is in fact reliable. This is not just a philosophical teaching, or some moral principle which was disconnected from the world. The instructions to gather the young donkey were centered around a material reality. God wants His children to step out into the world, and use their free will to discover how reliable God’s path really is. God wants us to be able to trust Him, to have assurance that what He says is true.

The character of God is both good and reliable, even though it is dangerous and sovereign in its own time. However, man’s will is quite fickle, being swayed by all manner of vices and desires. As we examine Holy Week, and ponder the events from the Triumphant Entry of Palm Sunday to the Crucifixion on Good Friday, we can see a change happen with how people respond to Jesus. Many are singing hosannas and waving palm branches when Jesus enters Jerusalem. Yet, many of these same people will be crying out “crucify Him” within a week’s time. What will change within the week? Did Jesus change, like a politician who said one thing when running for office but then did something different after obtaining that power? No, Christ did not undergo such a change, for it was not Jesus who changed His position, but the people who were in Jerusalem.

We all understand that different moments bring out different parts of our character. Depending on our various temperaments and personalities, some of us are entertained by things that bore others, and some of us are easily frustrated by things that others can endure without breaking a sweat. We know that each one of us as individuals can behave very differently depending on the moment in which we dwell. Yet, each of us are but one individual, and we have a single soul that is attached to all of our thoughts and actions.

So then, who really were the people in Jerusalem that week when Jesus was crucified? The two images they present are irreconcilable. Their first image is so full of praise at the Triumphant Entry, but their second is so heinous at the Cross. These do not appear to be images of the same people, but yet they are.

We are not made good by our own power or intentions, and none of us are free from deception. As difficult as it may seem to think that the same people were so reverent one moment would be monsters the next, we must understand it is true. Scripture does not lie to us about our own depravity. Rather, it challenges us to accept Christ that we may overcome it. 1 John 5:4 encourages for whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world: and this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith. Being born of God is necessary to maintain the path of goodness, to endure the Way of Life.

Joshua 24:15 famously says and if it seem evil unto you to serve the Lord, choose you this day whom ye will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land ye dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. We live in the era after the fall but before the Judgement of the living and the dead. Moreover, we are blessed to live in the era when Christ has died and resurrected, making us fully able to live in the Kingdom’s salvation, although the Kingdom has not completely come in its fullness. We must choose this day whom we will serve, and whom we will be.

All of life in this fallen era is lived in the valley of the shadow of death; however, it does not have to be lived in death. We must choose whom we will serve. Will we be those who sing hosanna before the Master of all creation? Will we be those who cry “crucify Him?” Perhaps we might be those who passively go along with the crowd and do whatever is popular at the time, a miserable attitude which always leads to death, even if it is not obvious.

We cannot give account for the specific souls who appeared to love Jesus sincerely at the start of Holy Week but then rejected Him so absolutely by the end; but, by the grace of God, we are not asked to give account for another’s soul. However, we will have to give account for our own, and we have graciously been given the opportunity to choose, to willfully conform our sovereign will to our Maker, who will give us more liberty, wisdom, and sanity than we could ever afford on our own.

There is no lukewarm pathway where one cannot choose, for the cosmic principalities have a wanton desire to destroy. We are born in a state of disrepair, under the curse of sin and death. However, we do not have to remain in this condition. 2 Peter 3:17 warns us saying therefore, dear friends, since you have been forewarned, be on your guard so that you may not be carried away by the error of the lawless and fall from your secure position. We must embrace Christ and His irrevocable love, that we may live holy lives where we can think clearly and see life as God wants us to see it, where we can really love God and our neighbor, and enjoy life in the Kingdom of God which will never fail.

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thirddoctor · 4 years

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*nudges you new chair shyly* but they are Simm!master fans so they probs have built-in tolerance to “insufferable”, anyway 1)Can his desire to build new tl empire be him just learning that tls are gone and wanting to go ham and what he really means by empire is just “master empire”? 2)How do you headcanon him being next level feral and physical especially in his misogyny? 3)Did he really care about 10 or just didn’t want his empire plan thwarted? Hope it’s not 2 much ??s

Oh no, I’m fairly certain based on prior interactions that I’m unpopular with that corner of the fandom (or at least my opinions are). Which is fine, we’re just coming at things from very different perspectives.

Anyway!

1—It might make sense if he cared about the Time Lords much, but he never has. I can see him being a bit shocked that they’re gone, but I feel he’d get over it pretty quickly and start thinking about all the possibilities now that they aren’t around to stop him. So I can absolutely see him trying to start a new empire, but it wouldn’t be under their name—it would be under his.

2—The feralness in The End of Time I guess comes from his failed resurrection, though that doesn’t make it any less ridiculous. We should have just had Crispy!Simm. That would have been more fun and saved me from his stupid blond hair and skeleton powers.

His misogyny is a choice I don’t really agree with (there’s this myth that the Master was always portrayed as sexist, but that’s not actually the case), however I can make sense of it as the Master deciding to embrace humanity’s prejudices as yet another way to be cruel.

I’m less bothered by him being physically abusive, because that kind of makes sense to me. The Master has lashed out at people in anger before—Delgado was particularly prone to doing it. He hits a naval officer who questions him in The Sea Devils, he shoves a man to his death in Terror of the Autons because he was in his way, he only just stops himself from striking Farrel Sr. when he resists his hypnotism, etc. Delgado however is very attached to the gentlemanly persona that he plays, so when Queen Galleia tries to slap him, he merely grabs her hand rather than hitting her back. But Simm has no interest in that kind of role; the Master’s had centuries to become much nastier and has shed the few scruples he may have once had, so he’s perfectly willing to strike both the Doctor and Lucy. He no longer sees any reason to hold back.

3—Yes, I think he cared for the Doctor (and to an extent even Lucy) in his own fucked up way. He doesn’t have to keep the Doctor alive after he takes over the world. But he does, because on a certain level the Master has never wanted the Doctor dead, and also because he needs the Doctor to witness his triumph. Whether he’d admit it or not, he cares about the Doctor’s opinion, and he needs the Doctor to see him win, needs him to be impressed, needs him to accept defeat and admit the Master was right. And while I think his “sacrifice” in TEoT was largely motivated by more selfish things like revenge on Rassilon and a refusal to let anyone else be the one to kill the Doctor, there was probably a tiny bit of genuine affection in there somewhere.

The Master “caring” about people though can be a very complicated thing. Like I said, I think he may even have cared for Lucy a little, but certainly not in a healthy way. He still saw her very much as something that belonged to him, something for him to use and mold. I think it’s very difficult for the Master to care about people in a way that isn’t ultimately selfish, because they have such a strong need to control everything and an inability to express their emotions in positive, non-destructive ways.

Hope that answers your questions! Don’t worry, I’m always happy to share my thoughts on the Master.

#Replies #Anon #Ranger yells about the Master #Ranger shut up about Doctor Who #Master meta

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cassianus · 3 years

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Understanding the Passions according to the Philokalia: Healing of the Soul and through the Science of the Fathers

It has been said that the Desert Fathers have provided us with a map of the soul:

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countryshitposts · 4 years

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You’re Shooting Your Bullet The Wrong Way

Midnight Memories

Trigger Warnings: Drinking, violence, name-calling

AO3 Link

Chapter 1

Name Guide

Koku Nippon- Japan

Teikoku Nippon- Japan Empire

Ost- East Germany

Daehan Minguk- South Korea

Daehan Imsi- Korean Provisional Government

Japan isn’t sure if he can honestly try being honest with himself any longer.

His eyes land on his bodyguard, chatting away as they once again walk side-by-side to the Deutsche Towers; everyday, he had been so hesitant and reluctant to take a single step to the direction of the towers- fearing the Man with the Butterflies and his conscience screaming at him that dating and pretending to love a fifteen year-old was morally wrong.

But when he was joined by America to his walk to torture, her own presence was enough to submerge the fear and doubt inside of him.

“Why does Teikoku want you to marry someone younger than you by a decade?”, America asks as she lightly kicks a pebble out of her direction, her eyes wandering around for any sign of danger lurking.

His mood sours at the mention of the marriage, as he rolls his eyes at his brother’s antics, “My brother wants to take away my rights to marry someone I actually like. It’s… kinda obvious that Ost isn’t my type.”

America chuckles, “Then who’s your type?”

Koku doesn’t respond, his eyes turning to the Tower ahead of them, a green butterfly on its sign. He physically recoils at the sight of the butterfly, but he knows that damned drone had already sent its master the message that they are already here. The girl next to him stares at him, wanting him to explain what was so frightening about a butterfly ever since she’d seen him cringe at a butterfly yesterday.

Just then, the doors to the Deutsche Towers open, letting out chilly and cold air that has been trapped inside of that accursed place, being stored of corpses known to rival the course of time. As he and America enter its walls once again, its translucent windows give the whole hallways a somber mood, like it has always been, all the time, forever and ever.

He hears someone’s feet colliding with the wooden steps of the stairs, and he silently grimaces as he looks up to find Weimar on top of the stairs, grin lopsided, his butterflies fluttering around him, his insect-covered suit draping across the stairs like a cape.

Weimar’s smile wasn’t the smile that’d give people a warm time in the sun- it was the opposite; a cold winter settling in after a large famine was brought down upon the great house, his emerald green eyes bearing nothing but days of insanity trying to mask itself as sanity, his light blonde hair trying to match the sunlight but ultimately failing.

“Willkommen zurück”, Weimar says in his signature grin, eyes landing back at America once again, fuelling with hatred and desire to murder her himself.

It confused Koku; did Weimar and America have a distant past that made the man distrust her? If so, why didn’t he tell him about her. Japan turns to look at his bodyguard, who was trying to hold Weimar’s malevolent stare.

Japan elbows America lightly, breaking her staring contest with Weimar, and she meets his eyes, which were now full of irritation, and he gives her a look of warning- never dare cross the Man with Butterflies. If you do, he will unleash your secrets to the public, a torrent of whispers and wings fluttering through the crowd like it was glass and there were holes.

Koku made the mistake of daring to cross Weimar, and he vows never to let it happen again.

“Let us have our lunch, then”, Weimar says in a pleasant tone, his eyes still on America as he takes a few steps down to pat Koku on the shoulder, his hands ice cold to the touch, screaming death and dissonance deep inside of Koku, and he wishes to break free from his grasp as Weimar’s palms lace with a cold poison, enough to kill him in sight.

Weimar lifts his palm from Koku’s shoulder, and he smiles at the older man weakly, as if the touch had drained him of his energy. He nods slightly, one of his hands suddenly brushing America’s hand, warmth dominating the cold as the sudden friction of their touch resurrected him to live for her. He takes a deep breath, glancing back at America with a small smile in his face, as he silently takes her hand; she jolts in surprise, mouth agape as her eyes glint back at him with shock and surprise, but he doesn’t answer any of her hidden questions as he was already leading her to the dining table.

His smile falters a little as he finds Weimar’s children already seated at the table, talking to themselves about a ‘dreamy and charming man’ while Austria stare at them with looks of pity and concern, as if this ‘man’ Ost was talking about has nothing to do with the family at all.

Japan takes a seat at the table as well, a slight distance away from the chattering twins, and an even bigger distance from the Man with Butterflies, who was staring at him with the most unsettling smiles he could muster- perhaps on purpose.

America shifts uncomfortably, still standing, her hands behind her back as she bites her lip, looking around awkwardly for chairs to sit on.

“Um, Mister Weimar”, Japan calls out for the man himself, who was having a heated yet soft conversation with Austria, out of earshot. Weimar’s eyes shoot in Japan’s direction, who was more or less obligated to forget what he was going to request to this man but chooses not to. “Can you bring another chair for my friend?”

Weimar pauses, his conversation with Austria long forgotten, then a smile curls upon his lips, as if Japan’s request was one of the most ludicrous things he has ever heard in his entire life. His eyes turn to America again, who was biting her lip and avoiding eye contact with him, her eyes on a green-winged butterfly. As a reflex, he pulls on her hand, so that America could look anywhere else other than that damned chocho that will see her every secret set aflame and spread into the winds.

Weimar sees Japan’s firm expression, and his smile falters a bit, staring at his plate of rare, pale-skinned meat.

“Ah”, he clicks his tongue, “you’re serious.”

“America needs to eat too”, Japan insists, trying hard not to sound rude or subtle.

“Fine”, Weimar says, no malice nor hatred in his voice as he tells Austria to get a chair. “For the whore”, he adds, under his breath, but despite Japan’s long distance from him, he hears the statement and he scowls.

“Kanojo ni denwa shinaide”, he mutters underneath his breath, and America pivots to look at him, evidently hearing what he said, but he gives her a grin in return as Austria returns with a chair for America herself, who takes a seat next to Japan.

“I want to ask you, America”, Weimar begins, his eyes trailing on the woman next to Japan, a sly smile on his face, “whether you’ve caught my father’s murderer yet.”

Koku raises a brow, as he turns back to look at his bodyguard, her body frozen in place, her eyes on the stew Austria had served the both of them. Why would America, his bodyguard, go around and look for Weimar’s father’s murderer? After all, America hadn’t appeared in all his life until now, simply just walking into his life like it was nothing. On closer look on America’s stew, he sees a finger coated with soup in her bowl, and he reels backwards, knocking into a glass pitcher, which would have fallen if he did not catch it in time.

Beads of sweat start to form around his forehead, his entire world going blurry for a second, as if he was hallucinating the finger on the stew, as if reality was distorting on him, to make fun of him and himself. His grey eyes slowly make its way to his own bowl, and then he sees it;

An eyeball, looking petrified and soft underneath the stew.

The remnants of Koku’s breakfast start to trail up from inside of him, from his intestines, then to his stomach, then up his throat, threatening to vomit all over the entire table.

“Koku?”, his grey eyes meet with America’s green ones, worry and concern laced over her features, “are you alright?”

He swallows the half-digested matter down back to his stomach, as he nods, smiling a little as he stares at the stew once again, haunted by the imagery he had just witnessed with his own eyes. In the corner of his eye, he catches Weimar smirking at him, knowing what he fully saw, as he digs into his meat. Koku, with shaking hands, lifts his hand to try and handle his spoon, but he drops it on the stew, hating the way the eyeball stares back at him.

He catches Austria looking too, giving Koku a grim glance.

America reaches for her spoon, but he didn’t want her to eat fresh human meat, and he abruptly stands from his place, beads of sweat latching on to his face. Japan locks eyes with Weimar, only giving him a small smile of intent; if he says anything of what he had put in the stew, he’d be the one unknowingly fed to his own peers.

He turns back at his bodyguard, his shaking body also resonating in the shaky smile he gives to America. “I’m sorry, Mister Weimar, but me and my bodyguard aren’t hungry… thank you for your hospitality but we’ll be going now.”

His emerald eyes swirl with madness, and he laughs- no, cackles. “Alright then; you’d regret not trying out our stew.”

Once the Deutsche Towers were out of their sight (and so were the butterflies), America swivels to look at Japan, her face laced with curiosity.

“What happened back there?”, she asks, her voice almost motherly for someone like her. “You seem so panicked after you took one good look at my bowl.” Her face morphs into a thoughtful look, and her eyes are now wide with realisation; “did… he put something in the stew?”

Koku nods meekly, his eyes once again on the road, his legs weakly letting him trudge forward into the unknown (or: Minguk’s house), the skies mocking his entire mood, making him release more and more beads of sweat, as they drop to his shoe like raindrops or tears. “I thought I was hallucinating, and even now I was still denying it.”

“Koku”, America stops him from his track, eyes full of worry, “what did you see?”

He slowly shakes his head, wanting to forget he’d ever seen those human parts in his stew, in America’s stew, but like a hard drive being inserted to a database, he cannot remove it so easily from his mind, so he transfers it to the one person he trusts in the entire world.

“I still think I’m hallucinating, but…”, he takes a deep breath, looking back at her. “I saw a finger, in your stew, and an eyeball in mine.”

America blinks, her eyes giving way to horror, as she finally realises what she was going to eat. Her legs buckle from underneath her, almost stumbling onto the concrete sidewalk, before Koku catches her with his arms, stabilising her. Her horrified eyes meet Koku’s, both of them finally realising what they were going to chew upon and put in their stomach. America tugs at her blonde curls, nodding silently as she excuses herself from Koku’s presence, phone in hand as she dials someone.

While he was waiting for her to come back, his mind goes back to what Weimar asked America; why did he ask her if she had tracked down his father’s murderer? Well, a bodyguard would have had experienced military training at some point; and despite him not witnessing all of her skills, he knows she is a prominent and prevalent woman who has experience with combat. And she did say she has brothers, so maybe they work in the police force too…?

America returns a few minutes later, blood coming back to her face, her eyes full of spirit again, just like she had been always and forever, perhaps for eternity, even. She gives him a look of importance, and they make their way to Minguk’s home once again.

“Honestly, if you don’t like teaching Minguk then don’t teach at all!”, America exclaims, as they near the Korean family’s house, a place where his own patience and sanity was tested by Minguk and his uncle.

Japan rolls his eyes; Minguk can be horribly annoying sometimes, but this whole teaching session is a break from Teikoku, a break from the dark force looming closer towards him, a smog of evil and treachery, wanting to tear all the good left in him, wanting to morph and transform him to be as scummy and evil as him, or even worse. There was an ache in his chest once again, as he remembers his mother’s cold and lonely eyes, wishing this was not the fate she had suffered under her own brethren- but of course, she died a sudden death. He did not want to be like his brother; did not want to be a puppet for something else, for Teikoku’s own selfish reasons.

He knocks on the door, ignoring America’s question, and he hears an onslaught of Korean inside of the household. They must be preparing for his visit, then, if they’re thinking of preparing for him like it’s the end of the world and that they can stop it. He hears someone’s footsteps towards the door, and the door opens, revealing Imsi, who was staring at Japan unimpressed.

“Come in”, he says, his eyes deliberately on America, who was meeting his eyes as well, “Minguk is getting ready for the lesson; America, iyagihabsida.”

As Koku settles down with Minguk at the table, he sees America following Imsi into Shanghai’s room; they must have been talking about something important behind his back since yesterday, if America is this desperate to leave his side for something Imsi needs for her to do. For Japan, he has to teach this ungrateful boy math that he pretends not to know the answer and procedures to.

The silence was unbearable; thicker than both blood and water, a silent night inside of the graveyard, trying hard to keep their silence eerie and disturbing too many people working inside, but Koku stays strong as he watches Minguk pretending not to know, pausing item after item, number after number as he taps the tip of his pen on his paper, creating black dots of all shapes and sizes of variety, the tapping of his pen annoying and bugging Koku, who was busily writing a few recommendations of books for Imsi and his friend.

An idea lights up inside of Koku, a smile creeping on his face before he turns to Minguk, who was still waiting for him to take cover for his patience is never long. He sees the twinkle of knowing in Minguk’s eyes, knowing that he knows what to do with all these problems printed on paper but not knowing how to solve problems made in the flesh, so Japan fakes a sigh as he looks disappointedly on Minguk’s paper, which was empty.

“This is the last time I’m going to teach you”, Koku says, “alright?”

Minguk stares at him for a little while, before giving him the number of items for Koku to teach him carefully and slowly, as if he was still a child being taught the alphabet. He opens his mouth as he starts to teach Minguk, but his procedures were carefully not giving the right answer, as he sees Minguk’s eyes flaring a little as more wrong numbers are settled out, and once Koku encircles the answer Minguk stops him.

“Is there something wrong, Kankoku?”, Koku asks in fake curiosity, as Minguk uncaps his pen, looking at his answer with skeptic eyes.

“Your answer is wrong”, he states, tone clipped, “for a math tutor who’s supposed to know his shit.”

Koku blinks, raising a brow, “My answer is wrong? You were the one who asked me to teach you - again - on how to solve this equation. Now tell me, oh wise watashi no gakusei, what I did wrong?”

Minguk studies the - supposedly - wrong solution and answer again, as Koku hides a small grin once the boy starts to talk about the errors of his solution. He had been right, of course; he had done the entire math solution wrong, to bait Minguk out of his entire farce, to make him answer on his own, to see if he had been right and that he was not pathetic enough to have cheated in all of his tests to promise him the highest grades. As Minguk encircles the right answer - triumphantly and proudly, might he add - Koku couldn’t keep the small grin hidden in his face anymore.

Minguk grins at his work, “Takes a student in name to correct the errors his tutor had done”, he turns to look at his tutor, who couldn’t help but chuckle softly, still looking at the papers. He raises a brow. “And why are you laughing?”

“Nothing, I’m sorry”, Koku says between chuckles, “it seems that you don’t need to be taught the equations of quadratic formulas now.”

Minguk’s eyes widen in realisation, finally registering that he had blown his cover of being a dense and unteachable student. “Oh. Wait, then why are you laughing?”

“I’ve always known you were good at this subject- well, good at every subject in your school”, Koku grins a little, “so I was kind of puzzled why you seemed unteachable, and that there’s a growing suspicion in me that you were cheating in your classes. I guess I was wrong, since you’re really smart.”

He stares at his tutor, mouth agape, either from Koku’s words of flattery or that he is still in shock his cover was blown; then again, he must be relieved since now Koku won’t have to question his intelligence once or twice.

“Uh, thanks”, Minguk says, awkwardly fidgeting on his chair, “I’m sorry for torturing you, naneun chucheughanda.”

Koku nods, “It’s fine. I do hope we can get along now?”

Minguk scowls at him, eyes burning with a fiery hatred, making the smile on Japan’s face falter. “You think that I can be friends with someone whose family destroyed mine? No. Jeoldaejog-eulohaji.”

His tutor blinks a little, then frowns. “Alright, I respect your choice.”

Inside Japan’s brain, he was fuming; why did he waste his time and energy with a person who doesn’t seem to understand that he was trying to befriend him, not letting go of the past, this past haunting and deep, deeper than the ravines filled with thorns and bones of those who had died falling or climbing back to the mortal world, this past as painful as the thorns in each rose stem, unforgettable despite every attempt. Minguk is clearly bitter about what Koku’s family did to his (but he cannot put a finger on why), and Koku could understand that- why would he be friends with the man who killed his mother, over and under?

Just then, the door opens, and out comes Imsi and America, both of them looking determined and firm, as if they had hope the entire world was still running around and their veins.

Japan remembered feeling hope, along time ago.

It shriveled up to dust and flew to the winds.

Dinner was a quiet matter in the Nippon house; they can only talk if they had something important in their minds, as everyone listens to their statement while handling their spoons and forks and digging into the food that the cooks have provided for them, the only noises heard is the porcelain plates being played upon. The crickets outside play quiet music, reminding the family they are not alone, as they quietly dine and make conversations with each other.

“Are you sure you’re not hungry?”, Japan whispers to America worriedly, who shrugs as she watches Teikoku eat steak.

“I’m fine, Koku”, she reassures, “why don’t you eat? You haven’t eaten anything since the Deutsche Towers fiasco.”

“You haven’t eaten since we left Deutsche Towers too”, Koku counters, as he peers closer to his meal, still paranoid of seeing an eyeball on it just like the stew in the Deutsche Towers. “Thanks to me.”

America collectively sighs, “There was something in that fucking stew. I’d rather go hungry than eat human meat.”

“Please just eat with us”, Koku pleads.

“The only thing she’d be eating would be men’s fluids”, Teikoku intervenes, a smile on his face, his eyes on America, “like the slut she is.”

Koku chokes on his steak, his eyes pinned on America, who was biting her lip and looking down at the floors. He can feel a burning rage festering inside of him, wanting to throw his spoon on to his brother, uncaring of the consequences since he had just insulted America, who was busily doing her job of protecting him. He wanted to wipe off that smile on his brother’s face, tell him about how he'd had qualms about his joke, but all he could do was glare down at his plate as America shifts uncomfortably down the floors.

It seems that Teikoku can sense the thick and nauseous atmosphere gnawing down everyone’s throats, as Palau awkwardly refills her glass, Tokyo stares at his dinner before picking up his spoon then putting it back down, Hokkaido was helping Okinawa eat his lunch as he fusses around with utensils, making gurgling sounds like the small child that he is. Teikoku takes another big bite off his steak and he laughs, his laugh echoing in the walls of this large house, too large to see the entire exit clearly, no escape, no end.

“What I said was funny”, he says, eyes on America and Koku, his crimson red eyes swirling with the need to make everyone suffer, “why aren’t you laughing?”

Koku takes a small bite of his dinner, also not feeling like eating. You know full well why, asshole.

Palau was the first one to collapse underneath her father’s pressure, as she put her fork down on her plate, plastering on a smile that would collapse after a minute or so, “Haha, that’s so funny, Otōsan.” She shoots an apologetic look towards America, who only nods in forgiveness.

Tokyo fakes a chuckle, which was more of an exhausted huff, tired of his brother’s scummy ways. “Truly funny, Nīsan.”

Hokkaido weakly laughs, fussing with Okinawa to make him giggle. “Okinawa thinks it’s funny as well, Dad.”

All of them give America sheepish looks, but America smiles weakly, silently stating that Teikoku has no match for her wits and that his words fall flat against her defences, her walls as thick as her bones. Koku, meanwhile, sneaks his free hand to entwine with hers for comfort, but she (purposefully or not, it still hurts) inches her hand away, and he has to take a bite out of his dinner so that he could quell and still his beating heart, who only beats for one name only.

Teikoku laughs again, this time more deranged and haunting, as if singing a song to chaos and disorder to come and take his entire family away, the echoes of his laughter still resonating inside this wretched home.

His eyes stretch to Koku, who was picking at his dinner now, not in the mood to eat. “What’s wrong, Koku? Too drained to eat?”

He gives his brother a small and tired smile, trying to diffuse the burning rage inside him. “Yes, I’m going to go to my room now.” He stands up, walking away from the dining table before his route is interrupted by a small laugh.

Teikoku stands from his throne of bright and shimmering gold, his red eyes smouldering. “You do know it is rude to leave dinner without having finished what is on your plate, right?”

“America can have it”, his brother replies casually, and before Teikoku can answer he is already up and running towards his room, followed by America.

“Miss America?”, Palau’s dainty feet catch up with both Koku and America as they both drift into Koku’s room. America turns back to Koku’s niece, flitting in a white frock, her dark hair highlighted with a few auburn curls, her green eyes staring at the woman in front of her.

“What is it, Palau?”, America asks, trying not to coo at the young girl (from her tone of voice and facial expression, it was quite obvious for Koku to see it).

Palau fidgets, leg bouncing a little, “I’m sorry for saying my Dad’s joke was funny.”

America heaves a sigh, kneeling down to reach the girl’s height and wrapping her around with her arms, and Koku sees the ring once again, closely tucked in America’s shirt. “It’s okay, I forgive you. It was your father’s fault, not yours.”

“But still”, Palau looks at America guiltily, and Koku can’t help but be struck with the sense of familiarity in these eyes, “I supported my Dad’s joke.”

Koku sighs, patting Palau, “You didn’t, you were forced to laugh with him. So were the others.”

Palau smiles up at America, her green eyes gazing at her with awe and wonder. “Sometimes, in my dreams, I wonder if you were my mother.”

She runs to her room, leaving America and Koku puzzled at what she meant. Koku gives America a small look as they enter his room. His room wasn’t that clean, per se; his blankets were wrinkled and not folded, clothes strewn across the room, mingling with the crumpled papers that Koku had thrown across the floor for several reasons; an open drawer with a pistol out in the open, and the trails of a knotted rope under his bed. Once America stares at the laptop sitting uselessly on his study desk, Koku kicks the knotted rope deeper beneath his bed.

“America, whatever Teikoku said at dinner, I don’t think that’s true”, he states, as America silently and listlessly looks into the distance, her eyes becoming glassy.

“Maybe it is”, America softly says, her back still facing him, as she hangs her head low, silently untying her blonde hair- the first time he had seen her do that in front of him. “M-maybe I’m just a slut, like what Teikoku said. Like what Weimar said.” She turns to look at him with tears rolling down her cheeks, forest green eyes showing too much sadness swelling inside of her.

Koku shakes his head, as he approaches the girl in tears, looking less like a hardened bodyguard that harbours his needs and more of a hurt girl. “No. Don’t say that America. They don’t know you.”

America chokes back a sob, clearly thinking about it seriously. “No, no, Japan. It’s true.”

He stares at her, “I know I don’t know the real you. That we’ve only known each other for a few days, but still; you’re not a slut. You’re not a minx. You’re not a whore like they say.”

She lets out a startled cry, wiping away her tears. “No. Please. You’re just making this worse. They know me. You don’t.”

Her blonde hair falls down to her shoulders, tears still running down her cheeks as they softly drop down towards the floor, as Koku instinctively envelops her in his arms, feeling her shaking and sobbing body on his. He closes his eyes as he buries himself into America as comfort for his bodyguard, who believes every insult that was slammed across her body as if she was invincible to their attempts of humiliating her, degrading her, turning her into something else in their eyes.

But to Koku, he only sees someone who is… a normal human being, nothing more, nothing less.

“I don’t care if we’ve only met for a few days”, he says, looking back at America, who has seized crying but is now burying her face into Koku’s chest, her hair messy; he can feel his heart beating faster, a warmth surging inside of him but he disregards them to comfort America’s overwhelming feelings inside of her, combing through her hair using his fingers as she wipes the rest of her tears into his shirt, which didn’t bother him all that much.

America looks up at him, solemn green eyes staring right back at his firm grey ones. “I still know who you really are.”

America scoffs, looking away, a hand on Koku’s shoulder. “You’d say anything to stop me from throwing a pity party in your room.”

Koku raises a brow, “Who said you were having a pity party? I genuinely care about your health, since you are, after all, my bodyguard.”

She breaks away from his embrace, and he can feel his heart plunging. “Quit the talk about me being your bodyguard. You think you know me more than them? Prove it, since I haven’t told you shit.”

Koku opens his mouth, trying to formulate words and recalling the times America wasn’t so private about her life, his mind going back in circles, but even before he can answer her, she scoffs, looking dejected.

“See? You don’t know anything about me.” She crosses her arms, looking away, her now loose hair covering the side of her face, “so don’t you ever tell me-”

“You haven’t even let me answer, America”, Koku interrupts, and she turns to look at him, “I may not know your past or your relationships, but from what I’ve gathered from watching and observing you, it’s this; you’re smart- not that especially smart but you excel, especially from all of those observations you’ve made, and the fact that you always think one step ahead; how you’re just so calm and collected, even when Teikoku and Weimar try insulting you; then there was those times you’re all… spunky and sassy- I thought it was annoying when you first showed up, but then… I’ve grown attached to it. And then there’s your moxie and charm, how you seem to handle everything with grace and elegance; I like that about you; even your negative traits, because it shows everyone we’re all human.”

Koku holds her hand, as she stares back at his eyes, the sun and the stars colliding to become a supernova of emotions, their entire world plunging to the inky black depths, no way out through the galaxies because the entire galaxy had imploded to create the world as they know it, universes screaming out about how they are just like the sun and the moon, as heavenly bodies watch and sway to their beat.

It was America’s turn to be speechless, the crickets masking her being unable to talk back to Koku.

“Watashi wa anata ga sukidesu”, he whispers soothingly, kissing her forehead lightly for her comfort. “I think we both need to clear our minds this afternoon and evening.”

America raises a brow, “What are we gonna do?”

Koku stares at the window, which had already offered him a chance at escape. “Drink until Teikoku finds and kills us both.”

He had escaped through his window like a renegade numerous times before; away from bleak and grey reality, to the colourful lights around the City’s centre at night, its lights enchanting and blinding him from afar, his grey eyes flaring up with beautiful fascination at the entrancing and enthralling lights, loving the way they rival the stars in the night sky, with its overly intrusive lights, as if they are spreading out hidden stars from each and every crevice of the world, from the unknown to the known territories they have only uncovered in a matter of time.

Koku had learned how to dodge the boring and monotonous reality to make way for the great wide open, by following the lights in the alleys and corners that are willing to give him a chance of freedom, away from that damned man that sits on his throne of bones, freeing himself from the grasp of calm and seriousness, to embrace happiness and revelry like never before.

America climbs down first, of course; wanting to cushion Koku’s climb down, and also making sure the coast is clear, as if Teikoku was guarding this section of his home, as if any of his guards were to monitor the exits and entrances of this miserable and wretched house. As he scales the building down, he lands on his feet, the grass cushioning his fall. He stares at the stars, winking at him with mischievousness, as he feels a body pressed up to him.

He looks down to find America, staring at the stars, mesmerised. “I miss stargazing with my brothers.” She sighs longingly, and Koku smiles a little.

He tentatively takes her hand, which surprises her a little, as she stares back at Koku, getting lost in her green eyes, even more valuable than the jewelry that Teikoku forces him to wear to show off their fortune.

“I miss this serene surrounding too”, Koku replies, “do you want to explore it more?”

America stares at their hands, entwined like they were a star-crossed the heavens have chosen them to save the entire world from a great darkness. Then her once loose fingers tighten their hold on Koku’s hands, and he does the same, staring into each other’s eyes like they had enough time in the entire world.

“Let’s go.” Two words already made Koku feel as if he is invincible in a world where evil reigned, as they sneak out of the house, past the wired fence, and into the night, shrouded by Lady Nyx’s curtain of stars and the moon.

“When I said we were going to drink, I didn’t mean in a bar.” America sighs as she follows Koku into the sea of dancing people, all handling drinks, the booming music and neon lights blinking on and off no longer a hindrance to him, as he strides inside the bar, like he was one of them, like he had never embraced the suffocating standards that society had given him.

His ears muffle the booming music, as he leads America into the bartender’s table, who was busily chatting with his other customers, a cigarette in hand. He despises cigarettes, but he tries to tolerate them as he approaches the bartender, pale blonde hair matted, his icy blue eyes on a girl clad in revealing clothes. Koku smirks a little as he sits down on the stool, with America remaining standing, eyes narrowed as she peers into the bartender, as if he was familiar to her.

“Hey Rossiya!”, he catches the bartender’s attention, his light blonde hair swishing his way, as his icy blue eyes thaw with warmth, his face rising to a smile.

“Tovarishch!”, he exclaims, as he approaches Koku. Behind him, America’s breath hitches as she continues to stare at his icy blue eyes. Russia notices America right behind him, and his smile falters as another blizzard hits him in the face. “Ah, I didn’t think you’d bring a friend over here.”

Koku - oblivious - snorts, “She’s my bodyguard and friend: America.”

The man stares at America suspiciously, before once again giving Koku a - rather forced - smile. “So, the usual?”

Koku nods, a daring glint in his eyes. “The usual.”

Russia rolls his eyes, already sliding down a glass full of whatever Koku had ordered, as he catches it in one hand, already taking a sip of the substance, fire going down his throat like a muddy hill, the drink naturally burning his throat as he feels hands on his shoulder, aware that America was still there to help him through his horrible choices in life.

He can feel his spirit being fuelled with more fire and energy, combining his heart and soul together to create even the worst of good.

Koku turns around from his chair to look at America, who was more or less disinterested at the fact she was around a mass with people having a good time, or the fact in front of her there were all kinds of drinks, still choosing her job over the excitement of a life in Night’s blanket. She was blankly staring at the bartender, who was lighting up another cigarette while flirting with a tipsy girl.

“Are you all right?”, he asks, quelling down the thought of green masking his every move, as America turns back to him, red splotches on her cheeks. “Do you know him?”

“Oh, uh, yeah”, she says, fidgeting with her fingers a bit, fingering her phone in her pockets, staring back at Russia, “we met once.”

He narrows his eyes suspiciously, but goes back to drinking, trying to hide his envy from the bartender, because being jealous is simply ridiculous; he had never felt these emotions before and he certainly loathes how and why it’s showing up now because America spares Russia a look or two is enough to drive him up the wall.

“I’m going to call someone”, America says to his ear, the loud music now an increasing dynamite in his ears, “mind telling me which quiet place I could call ‘em in?”

“The bathroom”, he simply replies, asking Russia for another drink, “be careful since a lot of people fucking in the stalls.”

“Alright, thanks!” She gives Koku a smile, as she struts down towards the direction of the bathroom, where a dozen drunk guys and girls were littered on and about, but Koku pays attention no more as he gives himself up to the solitude of drinking.

He didn’t know how many drinks he’d had this night - he lost count at a dozen - his vision blurring as the masses of people on the dance floor mix with the now annoyingly bright and flashing neon lights, as he stumbles around, looking for America through the midst of people, already having a migraine with how loud everything looks and sounds. Then, from his drunken haze, he sees America uncomfortably standing through the midst of the people, being disturbed by drunk men prowling on her, one even having the gall to put a hand on her shoulder, and she slaps it away, glaring defiantly into their drunken eyes, glowing with desire.

Koku decides this was no time trying to understand which was real and what was fabricated by his intoxicated mind; there was an overflowing sense of emotions deep in him, a lion finally roaring deep inside him, feeling the need to protect a person he cherishes all his life. He steels himself, trying not to look and act drunk in front of those thugs- he just wanted them to back off.

As he approaches them, feeling America’s air of uneasiness, he hears a few of those scoundrels’ catcalls and statements.

“How come a pretty lil lady like ya haven’t appeared ‘round here?”, one coos, slightly drunk, but his speech was - undeniably - perfect.

“Soooo glad fresh meat showed up in heeeere”, one slurs, his eyes on America’s chest, as if expecting her to take them off, but she just glares right at her. The man just turns to another man with a sly grin. “And a spunkone atthat.”

The third man just chuckles, still looking at America hungrily. “She’d be shubmissive once she gerron teh bed though.”

All men laugh at the statement, as America tries to escape their group but one of them grabs her at the wrist; she tries to pull her wrist away, the men closing in on her, but Koku was faster.

He swiftly enters the group of men and slaps away the hand on America’s wrist, swinging an arm around her shaking body, as she stares at him with her forest green eyes, anticipating his next move. Koku glares at the men, wishing that his eyes could kill, trying to find a way to calm his beating heart and maudlin mind, thinking of words to say, hoping that him being tipsy is not that obvious.

“Who tehfuck are ya?”, one of them says, his face blurry against Koku’s vision, despite him wearing contacts.

“Sh-she’s my girlfrieeeend”, he says, clearly drunk, but still knowing what he’s doing. America from under his grasp jolts at the sudden lie, as she looks up at him once again, confusion and embarrassment in her eyes. “Meaning you can all fuck off.”

There was a tense pause within the group, the only thing trying to break their silence was the booming music and the noise of the crowd on the dance floor, as Koku tried to stand straight, glaring at them all, a storm wishing to unleash a torrent of destruction.

Then one of the men laugh, “I don’t think you are prove that you’re her ‘booooyfriend’.” The rest of the men snigger, as Koku just scowls at them, staring tentatively at America.

She was lost in thought, as if debating whether or not to actually do it with him; even his heart was beating and his mind pounding, but not from the drinks he had taken, and rather from what he was about to do, his knees going weak as his brain conjures up multiple to thousands of scenarios where this would be weighed lightly, and not in a situation where they fabricate something that doesn’t wholly exist, a lie to carve out all lies, a diversion for someone else's blessing. He could think of the most romantic ways on how he and she would do this, not in some bar that reeked of predatory men, but in a gorgeous scenery, rivalling the ones on his mind.

Koku takes a deep breath, before putting a finger to America’s chin, pushing her up, until she can see him clearly now, through his drunken haze and into his grey eyes, trying to see if there was consciousness inside of his mind. “Watashi o yurushite.”

Before America could answer or his beating heart and brain tells him this was needlessly a horrible idea, his lips collide with hers as his mind starts to scream and shout at how he shouldn’t be kissing a girl he likes in the least romantic way possible, to fend off these worthless fucks he’d have no trouble beating to the ground. He feels his entire insides burst with too much emotions to describe, that even his drunken mind could not taint with horrible and indecent thoughts, too infatuated with America to consider imagining her with disgrace.

He feels her knees buckle, and his arms snake across her back as they feel time stop around them, her arms on his waist- he opens one eye to take a curious peek at the girl he was kissing, and starts to go red once he sees how invested she was in this fabrication, as her red lips part to give him more room to kiss her, her eyes closed.

He was guiltily in love with this; in love with the way America’s body was pressed up against him, in love with how she was giving herself away to him for a short while, in love with the way her heart was beating the same beat as his. One of his hands rake through her loose blonde hair, its wavy curls hypnotising him, making him sway to the beat of the booming music, and he wishes that time would not pick up its rhythm again and break their kiss apart.

But of course, the magic is over, as America gently parts from him, her face red and eyes shining of embarrassment and fascination. Meanwhile Koku’s still intoxicated brain feels as if it was going to break itself into tiny little pieces, losing it, missing the way they dance to the tune, as their lips tingle and loved every touch they made.

They break eye contact, as they face their audience, a group of drunk, middle-aged men, whose faces were unreadable, the silence as brittle as his and America’s kiss. His first kiss.

And again, all the men laugh, their breaths mixing, as they stare back at the couple with mocking eyes.

“‘Ve seen berrer kisscenes in pornos”, says one, as he takes a swig of beer, “that was nutin’.”

“Have a harime tellin’ if these two’re really datin’”, another man replies between laughs, and Koku can feel his cheeks searing red.

“I dun feel th’love”, says one another, “the girl looks more like a whore to m-”

Before he can finish that sentence, however, someone punches him on the cheek, and he collides with the walls behind him, and Koku, fists clenched and knuckles bruised, inhale and exhale harshly, his grey eyes glowing with a murderous blaze, no longer choosing to play nice.

“Call her that again”, he snarls between gritted teeth towards the other men, as the man he had punched recovers from his assault, massaging his nose, which was bleeding out blood. “I dare you. I FUCKING DARE YOU TO!”

“H’broke m’nose!”, says the man, still holding his nose, dropping his glass of vodka somewhere. “This asshole broke m’nose!”

“Good.” Koku braces himself for a fight to come, eyes narrowing at the others, who were now marching at him with slow but formidable speed. “‘Cause you’re all going to regret calling her that.”

He had been trained to fight self-defence from a young age; and he knew all moves and had practised them in his room, whenever he thinks he’s in private or with one of his brothers (Teikoku had skill he could never match up to, but he could beat Tokyo in a fair match). He ignores the pain in his knuckles, knowing that he was more satisfied with the fact that he had dealt enough damage to that fucker’s nose.

He turns to look at America, who was staring at his knuckles, then at his determined stare, before he goes back to try and beat up the others too. The fight had gotten everyone’s attention too- soon an entire circle was surrounding them, and much to his chagrin, many started to chant, deliberately causing the pounding on his head to increase, as his vision starts to blur, intoxication getting the best of him-

Pain explodes on his left cheek, as he can feel himself toppling backwards, his eye and cheek swelling up with pain. He hears America’s cries in the background, but it was drowned out by the chantings of the crowd forming. From the corner of his eye, the bartender was not behind his bar, as if he was never there.

“What, not gon’ gerrup?”, one of the drunkards ask snidely, the others roaring with laughter, as Koku’s vision increasingly goes blurry, as he tries narrowing his eyes to see who decided to hit him, his heart throbbing, his lips tasting copper. “See, thish man’s a weakring.”

Koku bounces back like fire, and without warning he sidekicks another drunk man, who slides down the floor as if it was merely a slide and the other growls as he pulls Koku up by his shirt, spitting on his face as if he was spitting acid, but Koku spits back at him, his glare multiplying, as he hits his perpetrator with ease, sending him toppling down the floor, breaking his grip with his shirt. He stares at his last opponent, who was getting ready to try to give him a punch, but he sidesteps and sends the drunkard crashing to the crowd, the crowd oohing and aahing.

“Japan!”, America calls out, as she grabs him by the shoulders, and the neon lights are replaced by her worried face, her eyes swirling with concern and worry, and her lips shaped like an ‘o’, “we need to get out of here! You’re too drunk-”

Without thinking (his mind has now submerged to rock bottom) he closes his eyes and leans in to kiss her again, her lips coated in warmth, making him swoon with pleasure and regret that he did this drunk and without her consent, once again feeling her body pressed up on him, her hands raking through his hair, her legs dancing with his, as he himself combs through her blonde hair once again, his knees going weak, his lungs spreading fire to his heart, loving every second his heart beats for her.

America pushes him away harshly, making him lose his balance for a second, before he catches his own body, before he hits the ground. Once again, in his drunken haze (and perhaps pain), he can feel his mind and heart screaming as one, at how he did not think this through and clearly, at how America would of course not want a drunk man to kiss her as if this whole thing was real, that they weren’t in a bar that reeks of beer and drunk men and women prowling on fresh meat, that he wasn’t at the very least looking mangy-looking.

(His mouth must have tasted like blood from that hit.)

Again, without thinking of his consequences, he opens his mouth, “Anata wa watashi o sukide wanai?” He had no chance of translating his words, as in the corner of his eye one of the men tries to hit America, but she looks back just in time before completely desecrating his face.

America stares back at him, “Koku, your brother’s going to get worried when you show up in your house like that. Let’s go home.”

Koku shakes his head, disregarding the hurt he had gotten from America, “No, not until these guys are on the ground.”

Before America could speak, he goes back to the drunk men who had decided to disturb his peace and ride away from the distorting reality; one tries to catch him with his grubby little hands but Koku quickly clenches his fists and uppercuts the asshole, knocking out one of his teeth, as another tries to punch him again, ultimately succeeding as Koku staggers back but he comes back by striking him with the back of his hand, anger exploding and erupting like a thunderstorm.

Gritting his teeth, he kicks another man in the chest and as he lies on the ground, Koku steps on the man’s rib cage, making the drunk man gasp in pain but before he tries to recover he stomps on the drunkard more, harder- another man tries to sneak up at Koku once again, but America steps in and kicks him on the groin, leaving Koku about to hit him-

He feels a hand tighten its grip around his arm, and with the last of his strength he looks up to find Russia glaring at him, light blonde hair covering half of his face, his icy blue eyes crackling with fire.

“That’s enough”, his low voice booms, but instead of glaring at the one who instigated this whole mess, he turns to glare at America, “get out, the both of you, now. And Japan, go rest.”

He shakes his head, “Iie, noruntiiiirr… they ayamaru.” He takes a deep breath, his adrenaline rush now over, as he can feel his mind trying to shut down, as his legs buckle, but before he falls down the floor, he feels another set of arms holding him up.

“I’ll handle it from here”, America says breathlessly, glaring up at Russia, and Koku’s mind wonders what their past was together, his entire heart once again being poisoned with jealousy.

Russia shakes his head, “No, I’ll accompany you both out of my you both decided to desecrate.”

The drinks now seemed to finally have contaminated his brain; he can only see moving blurry objects, colourful lights dancing in his vision, despite the fact he was wearing contacts (or was one of them misplaced as he was being beaten up by those dudes?), feeling himself being lifted up, as his feet try to make absolute contact with the hard ground, but he feels as if he was in heaven, no boundaries whatsoever.

He hears muffled voices in his ears- but they were not directed at him, and rather at someone else, the voices in each ear making him shake and quake, the intensity of their voices too high for him to muster.

Then the arms holding him up cease to exist, as he drops to the ground; he groans in pain, his hands palming concrete, as he raises his grey eyes, to find two blurry bodies in front of him, both of whom he knows well. America was being pressed to the wall by Russia, whose face was getting closer, closer, closer to America’s-

Before he can muster what had happened, Koku’s consciousness fades, but he knew their lips collided.

Koku’s head pounding was why he woke up in the first place; he feels comfortable, yet hot and warm at the same time. He groans a little, feeling his mind pounding at his skull, begging to be let out but he refuses, now feeling the consequences of last night as the pain of earning a black eye and an irritating hangover now combines, creating an even worse torture method for himself. He silently swears, sitting up with struggle, and to his delight, he finds painkillers and a glass of water on the top of his drawers.

His unequal vision bothers him as well; as if he was standing in the coral reefs of the ocean, one eye fully submerged underwater, the saltwater fully blurring away his vision, and the other trying to peer into the horizon, but it struggles a little.

Koku sighs, as he untangles himself from his blankets, trying to ignore his hangover brain, drinking and taking the painkillers, which calms his blazing headache a little. He opens his drawers and fishes out his glasses; he takes his remaining eye contact out from his eye, feeling the entire world blur around him, before he puts his glasses on. In an instant his vision readjusts himself to fit in his perspective, and he takes a deep breath, trying to calm his heart.

The migraine was horrible, though; as if a thousand thunderstorms try penetrating his walls, as he tries to calm himself down with sheer willpower, as he goes back to lying down, trying to recall the night he had, and how and why he has a damned black eye. He only remembers Russia and America kissing, however, and something warm colliding with his lips, but that was it, as if the night did not exist and it had only skipped into the morning.

The door opens, silently interrupting his thoughts- he grimaces at the thought it was his brother coming to visit him, but it was America herself, who was sporting a large bruise on her eye as she stares at Koku, relieved.

“Thank god you’re okay”, she says, breathless, “your brother-”

“Who did that to you?”, Koku demands, interrupting what America was going to say, a familiar fire burning inside of him once again.

America closes her mouth a little, blinking, then covering her bruised eye with her hand. “Uh, Russia did.”

Koku’s eyes flare with outrage and jealousy. If they had a thing back then, then America was right to leave him as he seems to have hit her a dozen of times.

“He doesn’t sound like a nice guy.” He tries to keep his tone leveled, but he was steaming, as America shrugs, sighing a little.

“He really isn’t.”

America opens her mouth once again, but Koku was not listening, in his haze of a hangover, his jealousy being replaced with a fiery rage, hating how Russia had just done that so simply towards America, and wishing he would have also just punched that asshole’s face to get it over with.

“Koku?” America was sitting on the edge of his bed now, legs crossed.

He clears his throat, now feeling butterflies in his stomach, “Yes?”

America tilts her head, shyly looking at him, her cheeks flustered red. “To make you feel better, you look… kinda cute with your glasses on you.”

He feels his heart explode and puncture his lungs, now having trouble to breathe, his grey eyes shining with red once again.

“Thank you.”

He finally has reason to wear his glasses once again.

Willkommen zurück- welcome back

Chocho- butterfly

Kanojo ni denwa shinaide- don’t call her that

Iyagihabsida- let’s talk

Watashi no gakusei- student of mine

Naneun chucheuganda- i guess

Jeoldaejog-eulohaji- absolutely not

Watashi anata wa sukidesu- i like you for it

Tovarishch- comrade

Watashi o yurushite- forgive me

Anata wa watashi o sukide wanai- you don’t like me

Ayamaru- apologise

#writing #you're shooting your bullet the wrong way #mine #countryhumans #countryhumans america #countryhumans japan #countryhumans weimar republic #countryhumans east germany #countryhumans germany #countryhumans japan empire #cityhumans tokyo #countryhumans palau

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frmartinshomiliesandreflections · 4 years

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16th August >> Fr. Martin’s Gospel Reflections /Homilies on Matthew 15:21-28 for The Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A: ‘Woman, you have great faith’.

Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time, Year A

Gospel (Europe, Africa, New Zealand, Australia & Canada)

Matthew 15:21-28

The Canaanite woman debates with Jesus and saves her daughter

Jesus left Gennesaret and withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon. Then out came a Canaanite woman from that district and started shouting, ‘Sir, Son of David, take pity on me. My daughter is tormented by a devil.’ But he answered her not a word. And his disciples went and pleaded with him. ‘Give her what she wants,’ they said ‘because she is shouting after us.’ He said in reply, ‘I was sent only to the lost sheep of the House of Israel.’ But the woman had come up and was kneeling at his feet. ‘Lord,’ she said ‘help me.’ He replied, ‘It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the house-dogs.’ She retorted, ‘Ah yes, sir; but even house-dogs can eat the scraps that fall from their master’s table.’ Then Jesus answered her, ‘Woman, you have great faith. Let your wish be granted.’ And from that moment her daughter was well again.

Gospel (USA)

Matthew 15:21–28

O woman, great is your faith!

At that time, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon. And behold, a Canaanite woman of that district came and called out, “Have pity on me, Lord, Son of David! My daughter is tormented by a demon.” But Jesus did not say a word in answer to her. Jesus’ disciples came and asked him, “Send her away, for she keeps calling out after us.” He said in reply, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” But the woman came and did Jesus homage, saying, “Lord, help me.” He said in reply, “It is not right to take the food of the children and throw it to the dogs.” She said, “Please, Lord, for even the dogs eat the scraps that fall from the table of their masters.” Then Jesus said to her in reply, “O woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you wish.” And the woman’s daughter was healed from that hour.

Reflections (5)

(i) Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time

The issue of racial inequality was very much to the fore in the weeks after George Floyd was killed by a policeman in Minneapolis. Those weeks have forced us all to look at our own attitudes to people of different races. Certain forms of racism were such a normal part of everyday life in the past that for those of us of a certain generation it was often difficult not to be infected by it. We may not think of ourselves as racist in any way, but we can discover to our horror that perhaps there is some underlying racist prejudice buried deep within us that only comes out very rarely, but when it does shocks us to the core.

The issue of race and of how one race views another has been around since the dawn of humanity. There is even a trace of it there in today’s gospel reading. The woman who approaches Jesus is described as a Canaanite. ‘Canaan’ was the name for the territory that became the land of Israel, and the Canaanites were the people who were dispossessed when the people of Israel captured the land of Canaan, having left Egypt and after spending forty years in the wilderness. The Canaanites were the traditional enemies of Israel. The people of Israel continued to view them with great hostility in the time of Jesus. They thought of them as an inferior race. When Jesus is in the region of Tyre and Sidon in the south of modern day Lebanon, he is approached by a Canaanite woman. The attitude of Jesus towards her is very untypical of his attitude to those in need throughout the gospels. His first reaction to her urgent plea on behalf of her sick child is one of silence. ‘He answered her not a word’. Many of us may have felt that when we came before the Lord in our need, on our own behalf or on behalf of a loved one, we were met with silence. It was as if our urgent prayer disappeared into thin air. At such times, we can easily get discouraged and give up praying. Yet, this Canaanite woman was not going to be put off by silence. Having shouted at him from a distance, she now come right up to him and kneeling at his feet says, ‘Lord, help me’. It was her seriously ill daughter that needed help, but such was the identification of this desperate mother with her sick daughter that she prayed, ‘help me’. It is a wonderful portrayal of a mother’s fighting love for her child. When Jesus does finally speak directly to her, what he says does not sound very promising, ‘It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the house dogs’. It is a little one line parable, but it is fairly clear that the children are the ‘lost sheep of the house of Israel’ and the house dogs are the likes of this Canaanite woman and other pagans. Jesus seems to be articulating the fairly standard prejudice of his people towards Canaanites. Identifying a people with an animal has been a fairly standard form of racist abuse in the course of history.

We might be tempted to ask, ‘What is Jesus at?’ The woman’s retort to Jesus shows both ingenuity and wit. Both of them would have been well aware that children often eat untidily and the pet dogs in a home gobble up what the children let fall. She is saying to Jesus that house dogs like herself can benefit here and now from God’s favour to Israel revealed through Jesus. With her retort, the racial boundary between herself and Jesus completely collapses. He pays her a compliment that is unique in the gospels, ‘you have great faith’. This woman is the only person in the gospels whom Jesus addresses as having great faith. This gospel incident foreshadows the breaking down of racial barriers that will characterize the early church. Within the early church, there was no distinction between Jew, Samaritan or pagan of whatever nationality. As Saint Paul would say in his letter to the Galatians, ‘There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus’. Indeed, in today’s second reading, Paul says that just as Jews have received God’s mercy, the pagans are now receiving God’s mercy, because God desires ‘to show mercy to all humankind’.

That is the message of all three readings this Sunday. The embrace of God is not a closed circle. All have the mercy of God available to them. In the words of today’s first reading, God’s house is to be a ‘house of prayer for all the peoples’. A lot of meetings take place in circles now. Circles have a value; they are egalitarian in shape. Yet, circles can easily become closed and difficult to penetrate. God’s embrace is not that kind of a circle; it is an ever expanding circle that seeks to draw in all sorts of people. The calling of the gospel is to keep widening our circle until it becomes as wide as God’s circle, so that we cease to recognize those different from us as alien, but as a brother and sister in Christ, a brother and sister in humanity.

And/Or

(ii) Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time

We tend to admire people who ‘stick to their guns’, who have a conviction about something and hold to it, even when put under strong pressure to do otherwise. We need strong convictions, based on good values, on the values of the gospel, but we also need to be flexible enough to allow our convictions to be shaped in new and better ways.

It seems from today’s gospel reading from Matthew that one of Jesus’ convictions was that God had sent him to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. He solemnly announces to the pagan woman, ‘I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel’. Jesus understood that only later, after his death and resurrection, would there be a mission to the pagans. What we find happening in today’s gospel reading is that Jesus allows this important conviction of his to be reshaped by the persistent pleading of a pagan woman on behalf of her sick child. Jesus met her initial plea with silence; he met her second plea with a comment that can seem a bit shocking to us, ‘It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the house-dogs’. The ‘children’ were the people of Israel; the ‘house-dogs’ was a standard term that Jews used with reference to the pagans. The woman was not deterred either by Jesus’ silence or by his comment. With a mixture of perseverance, humility and humour, she expressed a willingness to eat the crumbs that fell from the children’s table, as the house dogs often do. Jesus recognized her ‘great faith’ and ministered to her and her daughter there and then. Here was a woman who succeeded in reshaping Jesus’ strongly held conviction. The gospel reading suggests that Jesus recognized that the Spirit of God was speaking to him through this woman’s passionate love for her daughter and her equally passionate faith in God’s presence in Jesus. Here was a woman who, from a Jewish point of view, was a complete outsider. Yet, she became, in a sense, Jesus’ teacher, and Jesus allowed himself to be taught by her.

The gospel reading suggests to us that, like Jesus, we too need to be open to the Spirit speaking to us through those we meet on our life’s journey. In our conversations with people, we can discover that some of our deeply held convictions are being unexpectedly challenged. We can find ourselves questioning what we had been very sure about. It can happen that such questioning can bring on something of a crisis for us. We might even find ourselves wondering if our faith is growing weaker. It may be, however, that God is simply purifying our faith, as it were. God may be showing us that some of the convictions of our faith are too small, that there is more to God’s purpose for our world and for our lives than we had realized. Jesus’ convictions were reshaped by someone who was very much an outsider, a woman in a man’s world, a pagan in a Jewish world. In a similar way today, God can speak to us in unconventional ways. Those from whom we think we have the least to learn can often have the most to teach us. A pagan woman’s passionate concern for her ailing daughter showed Jesus that the gospel ministry to the pagans could not wait until after his death and resurrection. The passionate commitment to the healing of others that is often to be found among those who do not see themselves as part of the church can sometimes reveal for us the deepest meaning of the gospel. We pray today for the openness to recognize and respond to the movement of the Spirit, wherever it is to be found.

And/Or

(iii) Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time

We tend to admire people who ‘stick to their guns’, who have a conviction about something and hold to it, even when put under strong pressure to do otherwise. We have less sympathy with those who change their views to suit the situation, who express one view to one person and a very different view to another person. We rightly feel that such people are not to be trusted or relied upon.

Yet, from another perspective, ‘sticking to our guns’ is not always the best course of action. We need strong convictions, based on good values, on the values of the gospel, but we also need to be flexible enough to allow our convictions to be shaped in new and better ways. Sometimes we discover, in dialogue with others, that there are dimensions to some issue that had not occurred to us; sometimes our experience of life teaches us that the issue is more complex than our conviction initially allowed for. We need a certain flexibility around our convictions. As people of faith, we need to be open to the possibility that the Lord has something more to teach us, that our strongly held views may not always fully correspond to the Lord’s view of things.

It seems from today’s gospel reading from Matthew that one of Jesus’ convictions was that God had sent him, initially at least, to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. He solemnly announces to the pagan woman, ‘I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel’. A little earlier in Matthew’s gospel, when Jesus was sending out the twelve apostles on mission, he said to them: ‘Go nowhere among the pagans, and enter no town of the Samaritans, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel’. Jesus understood that the initial focus of his mission and that of his disciples was to be the renewal of the people of Israel, his own compatriots; only later, after his death and resurrection, would there be a mission to the pagans. What we find happening in today’s gospel reading is that Jesus allows this important conviction of his to be reshaped by the persistent pleading of a pagan woman on behalf of her sick child. The woman needed to be very persistent, because Jesus was not at all inclined to move beyond the circle of the lost sheep of the house of Israel. Jesus met her initial plea with silence; he met her second plea with a comment that can seem a bit shocking to us, ‘It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the house-dogs’. The ‘children’ were the people of Israel; the ‘house-dogs’ was a standard term that Jews used with reference to the pagans. The woman was not deterred either by Jesus’ silence or by his comment. With a mixture of perseverance, humility and humour, she expressed a willingness to eat the crumbs that fell from the children’s table, as the house dogs often do. Jesus recognized what he called her ‘great faith’ and ministered to her and her daughter there and then.

You might remember in last Sunday’s gospel that Jesus referred to Peter, the rock on which the church was built, as a person of little faith; this Sunday we hear Jesus addressing a pagan woman as a person of great faith. Here was a woman who succeeded in reshaping Jesus’ strongly held conviction. The gospel reading suggests that Jesus recognized that the Spirit of God was speaking to him through this woman’s passionate love for her daughter and her equally passionate faith in God’s presence in Jesus. Here was a woman who, from a Jewish point of view, was a complete outsider. Yet, she became, in a sense, Jesus’ teacher, and Jesus allowed himself to be taught by her.

The gospel reading suggests to us that, like Jesus, we too need to be open to the Spirit speaking to us, teaching us, through those we meet on our life’s journey. In our conversations with people, we can discover that some of our deeply held convictions are being unexpectedly challenged. Unlike Jesus, we may not have the freedom to respond to this challenge there and then. However, when we walk away from the conversation and begin to think about it, we can find ourselves questioning what we had been very sure about. It can happen that such questioning can bring on something of a crisis for us. We might even find ourselves wondering if our faith is growing weaker. We may find ourselves asking, ‘Am I loosing my faith?’ It may be, however, that God is simply purifying our faith, as it were. God may be trying to open us up to a new horizon that we had not thought even to have existed. God may be showing us that some of the convictions of our faith are too small, that there is more to God’s purpose for our world and for our lives than we had realized.

Jesus’ convictions were reshaped by someone who was very much an outsider, a woman in a man’s world, a pagan in a Jewish world. In a similar way today, God can speak to us in unconventional ways. Those from whom we think we have the least to learn can often have the most to teach us. A pagan woman’s passionate concern for her ailing daughter showed Jesus that the gospel ministry to the pagans could not wait until after his death and resurrection. The passionate commitment to the healing of others that is often to be found among those who do not see themselves as part of the church can sometimes reveal for us the deepest meaning of the gospel. We pray today for the openness to recognize and respond to the movement of the Spirit, wherever it is to be found.

And/Or

(iv) Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time

We know from our own experience that people can surprise us. We expect them to behave in a certain way and then, to our amazement, they behave in ways that far exceed our expectations. Our initial expectations may have been based on what we had heard about them or how we might have experienced them in the past. When we are pleasantly surprised by others, we need the humility to revise our original assessment.

In today’s gospel reading, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon, a predominantly pagan area. We are not told why he went there, but it does not appear that he travelled there to preach the gospel. In Matthew’s gospel, from which today’s reading is taken, it is only after he rose from the dead that Jesus sent out his disciples to preach the gospel to the pagans. When he withdrew to this pagan region, he was perhaps looking for some peace and quiet, where he and his disciples would not be disturbed. He may not have been expecting to be approached by anyone from the pagan population. However, his expectations were shattered. A pagan woman approached him and asked him to take pity on her by healing her disturbed daughter. It is striking how strongly this woman identifies with her troubled daughter. She asks Jesus to take pity on her, even though her request concerns her daughter. Such strong identification will not come as a surprise to any parent here this morning. That kind of identification is not something you find only in families, as is evident from the strong identification between many of our parishioners and our guests from Kenya this morning.

After the woman’s initial request, there follows one of the strangest exchanges between Jesus and another person that is to be found in any of the gospels. Jesus initially ignores her by remaining silent; he then lets it be know that his mission, at least for the moment, is only to the people of Israel; he then restates that position in what seems to us a rather insulting way by declaring that he is here to feed the children, the children of Israel, not the housedogs, the pagans. Surely that kind of response would have been enough to stop anyone in their tracks, but not this woman. As a housedog, she declared herself happy with whatever scraps might fall from the children’s table. Finally, Jesus caves in and declares to her, ‘Woman, you have great faith’, and grants her request. The sense we get from this story is that Jesus was taken aback by this woman’s exceptional faith. The expectations he had going into this pagan area were shattered. Here was a woman who had such trust in Jesus and in his healing power that she simply would not take ‘no’ for an answer. Jesus must have left that region with a different view of pagans to the view that he had before he entered it. The woman, in a way, turned out to be Jesus’ teacher. He learned a lesson from her – don’t underestimate the housedogs! She might have made him think again about the timing of the mission to the pagans. Perhaps, after all, they couldn’t be expected to wait any longer before they heard the gospel and experienced its life-giving power. Jesus learned something from this woman. God, in a sense, was speaking to his Son in and through her.

If Jesus’ meeting with this woman taught him something, the evangelist’s account of that meeting has something to teach all of us. God can speak to all of us in surprising ways. There was a very popular book by a well-know Jesuit writer some years ago entitle, ‘Surprised by God’. The gospel reading today encourages us to let ourselves be surprised by God from time to time. Like Jesus, we can sometimes find ourselves going to a place where we don’t expect much to happen or, maybe, meeting up with people from whom we don’t expect to learn much. Having gone to this place, having met these people, we discover that, in fact, we learn something very important. I think we often learn the really important lessons of life when we are not trying to learn anything. The really significant human encounters in our lives, the ones that have most to teach us, are often not the ones we have planned or organized or arranged for ourselves, but the ones that just happen without our having done anything to make them happen. We can receive as much from the unexpected interruptions as from what we have carefully arranged. God can touch our lives in places we would not normally associate with God, and at times when God might be the furthest thing from our minds.

Jesus initially tried to keep the Canaanite woman at a distance; yet, he allowed her to break down his resistances. The gospel reading suggests that the people we are tempted to keep at a distance from us may be the very people who have most to teach us, the very ones who are most likely to reveal God to us. It invites us to ask ourselves, ‘When God comes to us through unexpected people, when God comes in strange guises, are we as open as Jesus was to having our own resistances broken down?’ The story we have just heard challenges us to leave ourselves open to being surprised by God.

And/Or

(v) Twentieth Sunday in Ordinary Time

We have all become very aware of the terrible persecution of Christians in Northern Iraq at the hands of the militant Islamic group, ISIS. The city of Mosul in Northern Iraq has had a Christian presence for almost two thousand years. They still pray in Aramaic, the language of Jesus. In recent weeks the last Christian left Mosul. Mosul is part of the province of Nineveh which is being subjected to a massive religious ‘cleansing’ campaign to rid the region of those who do not share the belief of the new occupiers. As we know all too well this cleansing effects other religious minorities, such as Yazidis. Muslims in Iraq who are appalled at what is happening to the Christian community there have taken a stand against this brutal treatment and some have paid for it with their lives. A professor of law at Mosul university was killed by militants for speaking up against what is being done to Christians. Several sectors of Iraqi society have taken up the phrase, ‘I am Iraqi, I am Christian’, in support of Christian communities under persecution. Pope Francis has called the Syriac Patriarch by phone several times to express his solidarity with Iraqi Christians and to reassure the Patriarch that he is following the news out of Iraq with concern.

The primary symbol of the Christian faith is the crucifix, a reminder to us that Jesus died a victim of violence. Although violent towards no one, he was violently put to death by a coalition of religious and political authorities. The most significant person in early Christianity after Jesus was Paul. Although a violent man in his early life, after his meeting with the risen Lord on the road to Damascus he, like Jesus, was violent towards no one but, rather, was violently treated by many and was eventually beheaded in Rome. Both Paul and Jesus were able to recognize the good in those who were different from them and even in those who were most hostile to them. Paul’s most violent opponents were the people of his own race, especially those zealous for the Jewish Law, among whom he was once counted. Yet, in this morning’s second reading, he expresses his conviction that those who are most opposed to him and to the gospel of God’s Son will one day come to experience God’s mercy. ‘God has imprisoned all people in their own disobedience only to show mercy to all mankind’. We have here a very generous vision of God’s merciful love, which is a long way from the ideology of ISIS but very much reflected in those Iraqis who have taken up the slogan, ‘I am Iraqi, I am Christian’.

Paul’s generous vision of God finds full expression in the ministry of Jesus. Jesus, like Paul, was a Jew. He had a strong sense that his mission was to be initially to his own people. He wanted to renew Israel and a renewed Israel would bring the gospel to the pagan world. It was only after the resurrection that Jesus launched the mission of the gospel to the pagan world as well as the Jewish world, ‘Go make disciples of all nations’.. In this morning’s gospel, however, Jesus is approached by a pagan woman. She is described by Matthew as a Canaanite woman, ‘Canaanite’ being a term traditionally used in the Bible for the enemies of Israel. Her need is great; her daughter is seriously ill. Yet, Jesus seems very reluctant to respond to her desperate plea. He tells her that his mission is to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. In a mini parable, he tells her that the food intended for the children (the children of Israel) cannot be given to the house dogs (the pagans), or the children will go hungry. With great humility and humour, the woman expresses her prayer afresh in the language of Jesus’ parable, ‘even house dogs can eat scraps that fall from their master’s table’. In other words, the children and the dogs can feed together. Jesus immediately recognizes her great faith and responds to her request. In a sense, Jesus is helped by this woman to see her not as ‘other’ but as one of his own, a member of God’s people. Jesus encountered faith from an unexpected quarter and it changed him. His eventual response to her reveals that the embrace of God is not a closed circle. It is always expanding outwards.

The worst forms of religious fanaticism always draw narrow circles, with no tolerance for anything beyond that circle. This was not the way of Jesus or the way of Paul. It is not the way of the gospel. Something of that expansive spirit of the gospel was very well expressed by a young Muslim man in Baghdad who uploaded onto his facebook page a photo of himself wearing a crucifix and a note in which he said that he had spent many lovely moments with his Christian friends and had learned to love them as a brother and sister and friend. ‘Today’, he said, ‘we are all Christians, even myself’.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

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