Ghandi warned in his day of the evil desires of the heart: Politics without principle; Pleasure without consequence; Knowledge without effort; Wealth without work; Business without morality; Science without humanity; and Worship without sacrifice. Look around you at the themes of television programs, sitcoms, theater, cinema, and literature, and you will see the majority depict search for thrills and gratification, irrespective of consequence. Remove personal responsibility, and you abolish morality. Moral principles are based on a set of beliefs, values and norms of behavior agreed to between members of society. If nothing we do is wrong, there are no morals, and we truly are Australopithecines. There is no self-control, no discipline, and hence no growth. Rising popular movements and pseudo religions seek to abrogate the thought of eternal consequence and declare that this life constitutes all there is. Morays of man invite us to surrender to the animal impulses and selfish desires of our hearts on the auspices that we live only once.
I, by contrast, believe that life consists of much more than mortality, a concept that I feel is best described as a play in three acts. Shakespeare first coined this image in written word as he declared that: “All the world is a stage, and the people, merely players. They each have their entrances and exits…[1]”. Just like in his plays, the departure of a character from the play means only an absence from the story, not a cessation of existence on the part of that person. The actor has simply walked offstage. We pass from this story into another of different scope and cast but paralleled in importance to the plots in which we play a part as players in this story.
The concept of a life after this and an existence that lasts beyond the grave is not a new one. When we stop to consider the implications of this concept, it behooves us to consider the implications of our choices and our interactions with one another on the stage of life. CS Lewis says it best:
It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations—these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit[2].
Most of the edicts of the Almighty, that we love our neighbor as we love ourselves, and all commandments acting as appendages thereunto revolve around the eternal nature of the soul.
The first act constitutes a pre-earth existence. Whatever experiences, education, and activities common to our immortal nature appertain thereunto define the events of the first act. The choices we met in that act drove the events under which we entered this second act. Although short, by comparison, in duration, the second act determines all subsequent plot developments in the final act of our immortal progression. However, all memory of Act I remains inaccessible to us during Act II, and people, left in the dark thereby, fall prone to tendencies to complain and misunderstand the events of this life. Apparent unfortunate events lead men to complain to God, eventually losing faith in Him because they see no evidence that His plan will be actualized. During the crescendoing climax of Act II, much of import occurs: upheavals of character and nature, pacts and betrayal, surprise and disappointment. Men are prone during such times to lose faith and heart. People need to remember under these circumstances that the happy ending comes at the end of Act III.
[1] “As You Like It”, Act II Scene 7
[2] CS Lewis, The Weight of Glory, McMillan 1980
1 comment:
That is so beautiful and inspiring. Thank you for your response to my question.
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