Daimon Hellstrom (
birthmural) wrote in
trans_92009-08-24 09:45 pm
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Mmm, good Bible.
Daimon had chosen the location ahead of time. The Church of the Holy Sepulchre was sacred, perhaps more so than the Vatican. It was the place where Jesus Christ was crucified and buried. It had also not been descrated.
Many months had passed since Daimon spoke before a group of people. His palms sweat and he wiped his brow. Silently, he asked God for the strength to not simply speak but to speak on behalf of the Lord.
When the time came, he walked up before the assembled, Bible in hand. While he was nervous, perhaps on the verge of a panic attack, his words were strong and passionate and grew surer the more he spoke.
“I recognize that the people on board this ship come from various walks of life. Some of you, perhaps, are not familiar with Christianity. If this is the case, you may ask whatever questions you have and offer me any comments or insights after I have spoken.” Daimon then gave what he called a “brief summary” of Christianity. It was, in fact, very lengthy and detailed and contained heavy praise of Jesus and the love of God. He then moved on to give a similarly “brief summary” of the context behind the Old Testament.
“Some of you are perhaps aware of the book of Job. Job was a prosperous man. He had seven sons and three daughters. He had herds of animals and acres of land. He was a devout worshipper of God. In the story, the Adversary speaks with God and tells him that Job only praises God because he has no reason to blame him. He says that if God takes away from Job all of his blessings, his animals, his land, even his children, then Job will curse God’s name. God answers that Job will retain his faith and permits the Adversary to strip away everything from Job save his health.”
“A series of disasters befall Job. He loses everything, his land, his herd, and even his children.” Daimon paused. “Job is distraught. Throwing himself upon the ground, he cries:
“‘Naked I came from the womb,
naked I shall return from whence I came.
The Lord gives and the Lord takes away;
Blessed be the name of the Lord.’
“The Adversary spoke with the Lord God again. He tells him that Job continues to praise God only because Job himself has not been afflicted. God allows the Adversary to take from Job his health.
“Robbed of his health, bereft of hope, Job laments. He cries out to God, begging for relief, begging for death, and questioning his justice. Each of Job’s friends berate him and encourage him to have faith but Job refuses. Job’s lament continues until God himself answers him. The Lord says:
“‘Brace yourself and stand up like a man;
I shall put questions to you, and you must answer.
Would you dare deny that I am just,
or put me in the wrong to prove yourself right?
Have you an arm like God’s arm;
can you thunder with a voice like his?
Deck yourself out, if you can, in pride and dignity,
array yourself in pomp and splendour.
Unleash the fury of your wrath,
look on all who are proud, and bring them low,
crush the wicked where they stand;
bury them in the earth together,
and shroud them in an unknown grave.
Then I in turn would acknowledge
that your own right hand could save you.’
“At these words, Job kneels and asks for forgiveness. The Lord grants it and Job prospers greater than ever before. He lives to see his grand children and his great grand children and his great great grandchildren. To the end of his days he sang the Lord’s praise.”
Daimon gazed into the eyes of the people before him. “You may ask, as I have, why the Lord would cause a blameless man such grief. You may, as I once did, come away with the sense that God is not just, that he is fickle and cares not for man but this could not be further from the truth. To ask why God could and does allow such horrible events to transpire to such good people would be folly, for it is as the Lord says: we cannot judge him. We cannot know why the Lord acts as he does, nor can we hope to know. We can only have, nay, we must have faith in his actions. For the Lord is greater than all of us. He sculpted us with his hands and breathed into us our souls. The Lord knows more than we can possibly imagine and has our best intentions in his heart, even if it seems to us that he has caused us nothing but misery.
“Why, you may ask, have I told you this story? ‘What meaning could it have on my life?’ And this, I shall tell you. Every one of us on this ship is lost. We have been stripped of our most precious comforts- our home, our friends, our family. We do not know what lies ahead of us. We may despair, we may weep, we may beg for the mercy and guidance of our Lord. On board this ship, even surrounded as we are by each other, we may still feel, as Job felt, alone and abandoned.
“But I tell you that this is not so. You are not alone. The Lord sees you. In your darkest hour, at the hardest time of your life, you must remember that you are loved. You must remember that there is hope, no matter how dire your future seems. Furthermore, I tell you that though you have listened to every word I said and still do not believe, I tell you this: you are still not alone. For though we come from different worlds, cultures, and beliefs, we stand before each other as equals. We stand here together and so I tell you: we are not alone.”
Many months had passed since Daimon spoke before a group of people. His palms sweat and he wiped his brow. Silently, he asked God for the strength to not simply speak but to speak on behalf of the Lord.
When the time came, he walked up before the assembled, Bible in hand. While he was nervous, perhaps on the verge of a panic attack, his words were strong and passionate and grew surer the more he spoke.
“I recognize that the people on board this ship come from various walks of life. Some of you, perhaps, are not familiar with Christianity. If this is the case, you may ask whatever questions you have and offer me any comments or insights after I have spoken.” Daimon then gave what he called a “brief summary” of Christianity. It was, in fact, very lengthy and detailed and contained heavy praise of Jesus and the love of God. He then moved on to give a similarly “brief summary” of the context behind the Old Testament.
“Some of you are perhaps aware of the book of Job. Job was a prosperous man. He had seven sons and three daughters. He had herds of animals and acres of land. He was a devout worshipper of God. In the story, the Adversary speaks with God and tells him that Job only praises God because he has no reason to blame him. He says that if God takes away from Job all of his blessings, his animals, his land, even his children, then Job will curse God’s name. God answers that Job will retain his faith and permits the Adversary to strip away everything from Job save his health.”
“A series of disasters befall Job. He loses everything, his land, his herd, and even his children.” Daimon paused. “Job is distraught. Throwing himself upon the ground, he cries:
“‘Naked I came from the womb,
naked I shall return from whence I came.
The Lord gives and the Lord takes away;
Blessed be the name of the Lord.’
“The Adversary spoke with the Lord God again. He tells him that Job continues to praise God only because Job himself has not been afflicted. God allows the Adversary to take from Job his health.
“Robbed of his health, bereft of hope, Job laments. He cries out to God, begging for relief, begging for death, and questioning his justice. Each of Job’s friends berate him and encourage him to have faith but Job refuses. Job’s lament continues until God himself answers him. The Lord says:
“‘Brace yourself and stand up like a man;
I shall put questions to you, and you must answer.
Would you dare deny that I am just,
or put me in the wrong to prove yourself right?
Have you an arm like God’s arm;
can you thunder with a voice like his?
Deck yourself out, if you can, in pride and dignity,
array yourself in pomp and splendour.
Unleash the fury of your wrath,
look on all who are proud, and bring them low,
crush the wicked where they stand;
bury them in the earth together,
and shroud them in an unknown grave.
Then I in turn would acknowledge
that your own right hand could save you.’
“At these words, Job kneels and asks for forgiveness. The Lord grants it and Job prospers greater than ever before. He lives to see his grand children and his great grand children and his great great grandchildren. To the end of his days he sang the Lord’s praise.”
Daimon gazed into the eyes of the people before him. “You may ask, as I have, why the Lord would cause a blameless man such grief. You may, as I once did, come away with the sense that God is not just, that he is fickle and cares not for man but this could not be further from the truth. To ask why God could and does allow such horrible events to transpire to such good people would be folly, for it is as the Lord says: we cannot judge him. We cannot know why the Lord acts as he does, nor can we hope to know. We can only have, nay, we must have faith in his actions. For the Lord is greater than all of us. He sculpted us with his hands and breathed into us our souls. The Lord knows more than we can possibly imagine and has our best intentions in his heart, even if it seems to us that he has caused us nothing but misery.
“Why, you may ask, have I told you this story? ‘What meaning could it have on my life?’ And this, I shall tell you. Every one of us on this ship is lost. We have been stripped of our most precious comforts- our home, our friends, our family. We do not know what lies ahead of us. We may despair, we may weep, we may beg for the mercy and guidance of our Lord. On board this ship, even surrounded as we are by each other, we may still feel, as Job felt, alone and abandoned.
“But I tell you that this is not so. You are not alone. The Lord sees you. In your darkest hour, at the hardest time of your life, you must remember that you are loved. You must remember that there is hope, no matter how dire your future seems. Furthermore, I tell you that though you have listened to every word I said and still do not believe, I tell you this: you are still not alone. For though we come from different worlds, cultures, and beliefs, we stand before each other as equals. We stand here together and so I tell you: we are not alone.”
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Sermons, for whatever reason, were not what he was expecting. Nor was the topic; not understanding the will of God, or Fate, or what have you and not being alone.
"No shit we aren't alone," he mutters under his breath. "Hundreds of people on this breathing ship and we're being watched all the time by something a bit more present than God."
Someone is not happy about all the people in a new situation.
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Once it is finished, he gathers himself up, though he doesn't quite yet move to leave.
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Her parents had really liked that word, elite. Sherry shrugged to herself and stood up, pausing beside the old man. She doesn't get the sermon, doesn't want to: Stacy took her away from something bad and gave the little girl something better. Parents that cared for her, in place of ones that were neglectful and too preoccupied to do anything but remark on her existence once in a while. She is not adrift, not lost, and while the ship and her passengers were formerly confusing, they fit better now. It's becoming normal, and it wasn't some intangible being's doing.
Sherry looked around for Eve; it feels weird not having a shadow constantly following her around. "Excuse me," she says politely.
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The words were only affirmation of their own beliefs, their own knowledge; their Mission was unchanged, God was still with them. The yeerks, the separation from their father, the horrible questions of universal morality were only trials. They would continue, they would persevere.
When the man finished speaking, they knelt before their seats, praying, silent and still.
Shortly, Murphy crossed himself and stood, for once out of synch with his brother. Connor continued to pray as Murphy slipped down the row to approach the speaker. His entire manner was utterly respectful and without the joshing or cursing typical to the MacManus twins when he said, "Excuse me."
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It was all in all way too similar to the Church of the Divided God she'd spent a good portion of her childhood in, sorrounded and obeyed by the sycophantic priests.
She was the picture of piety through the sermon, pedantic and old as she found the themes in reality. Head bowed, blazing blue eyes Comfort. God does not bring comfort. He is the changer, the trickster, the unknown and unknowable. Search for comfort with Shaitan!
She could smell the moisture on his palms.
Nevertheless she glided to meet him.
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"May I help you?"
Very tempting.
thread is open to hoppers-in
She threw the robe back to reveal the desert waif's innocent looking features, dark hair as wavy as the dunes, eyes a bright blue-within-blue. "I just wanted to thank you for the sermon, sayyadin. It was a comfort."
threadhop is go
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He listened hunched over, with his chin in his hand, thoughtful throughout the sermon, taking notes on his omnicom. It was a good thing, to get a chance to sit in on one of the teachers of his new school - hah, he had a school named after him, that would never get old - before it actually began.
After the sermon was over, he waited around, taking a few more notes on his omnicom as Daimon went through the rest of the attendees of the service.
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At the end of mass there is a young man, kneeling still, praying quietly. His words are mumbled, but audible if someone tries to listen hard enough, his hands are clasped together, his eyes are closed tight, as he prays with a fervor he has not prayed with for quite some time now.
"Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace. Where there is hatred, let me sow love; where there is injury, pardon; where there is doubt, faith; where there is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light; where there is sadness, joy."
While he is a skeptic and a big fan of science, Jaime Reyes is not an atheist, and has never come even close to being one, not with such a devout family of Catholics. He's not even an agnostic--he's faced the former angel of wrath, and the current Spirit of the Lord's Vengeance. There is no doubt in his mind that God exists, or at least that such a God exists for his universe, even if it's for his universe alone. The doubt comes in the whys.
Why Vista Verde and the fallen innocents there that he couldn't save? Why even have a Spirit of Vengeance when it takes away a chance of redemption? Why was his father shot and crippled when he was lost? Why did his family suffer and think he was dead for that year? Why couldn't he save Nadia? Why had Brenda had to grow up with the father she had? Why did Ted Kord do all he did for the world and get a bullet to the brain as his reward? Why did Paco get the Yeerk in his head? Why did Tovar the Lava King have to be born from a test tube into a lie, and have to die clinging to a life and family he'd never had in the first place, because of someone else's cruelty and greed? Why was Superboy going to die a hero rather than get to live as a Superman if he and Robin couldn't save him?
Part of him knows that he only silences those doubts to let himself be comforted, that despite Daimon's sermon, there is no logical reason to give those doubts up. Part of him also thinks that such comfort is part and parcel of the whole thing, that maybe the accidental finding of an alien artifact in a construction site wasn't so accidental, or that maybe Traci showing up at juuust the right moment to save his family from the Reach blowing them to smithereens wasn't so accidental, that Paco being free now, and that Jaime not having died at his best friend's hand, so that said best friend didn't have to live with that, is no small blessing.
There's a lot of little funny coincidences that he can't really explain, like his whole life's a story and someone keeps shoving just the right people in during really, insanely fortuitous moments.
"O, God, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love; For it is in giving that we receive; it is in pardoning that we are pardoned; it is in dying that we are born again to eternal life." His eyes close tighter. "God, give me strength. Give me the wisdom to make the right choices and the patience to wait for the right moments to make them."
There's so much he takes onto his shoulders, and those closest to him know it, but others might not realize the extent of it.
"Millions are depending on us. On me. Millions. Please watch over them. "
He crosses himself.
"Through Christ our Lord, amen."
There's a pause. Then he speaks to someone other than God.
"No, we're not getting the 'Christ cookies' this time--that's a little sacrilegious, you know. They're communion wafers."
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"Can I help you?"
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"Oh no, I'm fine. I was just, uh, praying." Jaime returns the kneeler to its upright position, and stands up. "Thank you for the service, sir. It's easy to start feeling a little...adrift, here."
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With everything that he had seen, and everything that he had done, he had no doubt about the existence of God, or in his case, the Gods. He had not heard of Christianity before this service, but the message could have been one that Vanion had preached, back in the days of Sparhawk's novitiate.
Breaking his long standing practise, Sparhawk did not slip into a light doze during the sermon, but instead listened. And in his head, he prayed to his God, the god of the Elenes. He prayed to Aphrael of the Styric Thousand, knowing that she could not hear him, or she would have answered.
His prayers were wordless, more feelings and emotions cast into the ether, but the meaning was clear enough to him. And he knew that his God would understand.
Feeling more at peace than he had in a while, Sparhawk opened his eyes and raised his head, just sitting still and quiet for a moment, observing. He wants to hold onto this moment of serenity for as long as he can.
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The explanation of Christianity was interesting. She imagined that Aang was a lot like the Jesus he was talking about, although why father wanted him to die to teach the world a lesson escaped her. Katara was a mother by nature, and there was nothing worse to her than the loss of a family member, even if it was to save the many.
So the actual sermon concerning Job did not exactly touch Katara's heart strings. While she understood she wasn't alone, she knew it because she had gone out and talked to other people. She was certainly not impressed by some explanation that this God knew more than anyone else. If he did, his actions wouldn't resemble human beings so much. What he said to Job sounded suspiciously like arrogant Fire nation jargon, crushing enemies and proclaiming one person or gods strength was no concern of mans. In HER world, spirits vaguely with humans, both good and sometimes bad. Katara had seen how Two and La were earthbound spirits working for the good of man and keeping nature in balance. They never directly forced their presence: they simply WERE.
"Hmph," Katara murmured, frowning and quietly talking to herself. "I think I liked hearing about Jesus more. This God sounds like he thinks no one should question him. If he believed that, he shouldn't make people with the ability to question him in the first place. I don't think I like this particular character. And who goes around making a follower suffer just because someone doubted his followers' sincerity? It sounds like they're making a bet. What spirit does that?"
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Her face, past the tinge of lurid interest, is as cold as it ever is. Still, from the place she's softly settled near Katara—softly enough it might even be a little surprising—she murmurs:
"It's how all the old stories go. They only added the 'he loves you' part later."
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However the last Mass he attended was his father's funeral one sometime back. And yet, he had been wondering what it meant, what God meant with the abilities that he, his family, and others possessed.
Something about the words about not being alone, echoed some of his recent changing thoughts.
He quietly said Amen, and crossed himself.
"Perhaps there is a plan," he murmured quietly.
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"Thank you for the sermon...are you, ah, are you a priest?"
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Once the sermon's ended, she stretches a little nearer the entrance of the church. The makeshift bright-red dress-wrap she wears in lieu of one of the plantsuits probably makes her stand out just as much as her jet-black skin, red eyes, and silver tattoos do.
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After spending months in a monastery with only fellow men for company, the fairer sex was looking especially fairer, especially when they were stretching.
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