birthmural: (Default)
Daimon Hellstrom ([personal profile] birthmural) wrote in [community profile] trans_92009-08-24 09:45 pm

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.”

[identity profile] toariversodeep.livejournal.com 2009-08-29 02:17 am (UTC)(link)
"If he was from my world, he'd have been laughed out of it."

She's halfway serious, too.

[identity profile] el-escarabajo.livejournal.com 2009-08-29 02:26 am (UTC)(link)
This is the point where Jaime facepalms. He and Katara seem to be having an entirely different conversation than these two.

"Uh. Okay, so are we talking here or are we snarking at each other? Because I thought we were having a civil conversation."

[identity profile] kaya-waterwave.livejournal.com 2009-08-29 03:00 am (UTC)(link)
Katara blinked. She thought Damion was going to try and explain the sermon better. Why was he leaving? She was about to say something, but decided against it. He seemed really agitaed now, and Katara knew a thing or two about trying to talk with angry adults. The results weren't really the best.

So much for conversation.

"Well...I guess that's it then," Katara said, watching the man walk off in a huff. "I should probably get going. I don't want to disturb anyone else here. It was nice meeting you Jaime...and talking to you. Maybe we should hang out sometime?"

She looked over at Roxie. "Wanna see if we cab grab something to eat?"

[identity profile] el-escarabajo.livejournal.com 2009-08-29 03:18 am (UTC)(link)
"Sure. Uh, I could probably give you a less cranky explanation of all the stuff he talked about during the service," Jaime offers. "What was your name, anyway? I never caught it."

[identity profile] toariversodeep.livejournal.com 2009-08-29 03:47 am (UTC)(link)
Roxie's face twists, just a little, and then she's slid back into that softly cold, self-limited expression.

She can't nearly bring herself to apologize.

[identity profile] kaya-waterwave.livejournal.com 2009-08-29 04:18 am (UTC)(link)
Katara smiled, then looked over at Roxie. "I'm Katara, and this is Roxie. Although I'm still not sure about everything said today, I'll try to have an open mind. It wouldn't be right if I were selective about what I was exposed to. Hey, who knows, we might see each other in class soon, right?"

She walked off with Roxie, looking confident she would understand all that happened today. "So...I guess you and Damion have met before, or he wouldn't have been so angry. I can't really blame you: for an adult, his emotions are pretty touchy. Still, Jaime seems like a nice guy. Maybe he might have answers."

She looked over at her quiet friend. "Have you decided which classes you'll take?"

[identity profile] toariversodeep.livejournal.com 2009-08-29 05:27 am (UTC)(link)
"Not really," Roxie says, and a hand goes up to fiddle with her glasses. "I want to look at them first. School is usually too slow for me."

She speeds up a little, her shuffling pace having started to halfway fall behind. "... I don't handle blind faith very well," she says, almost to herself.

[identity profile] kaya-waterwave.livejournal.com 2009-08-29 03:20 pm (UTC)(link)
Katara nodded, and adjusted her speed to slow down until Roxie caught up. "There are a few I have in mind. I've been reading the comms, so I have an idea of who's teaching what. I was considering Damion's class...but now I think that might be a no-go. A teacher who can't explain their lesson to people who've never heard it isn't going to be very effective. That would just be them being comfortable teaching what people already know."

Katara did pause here though. "We went into a village once where everyone lived by the predictions of a certain fortune teller. It was all in fun, and even I was suckered in, until one of the predictions would have allowed them to ignore a volcano about to erupt. I learned that blind faith to something can be very, VERY dangerous."

[identity profile] toariversodeep.livejournal.com 2009-08-30 07:27 pm (UTC)(link)
"That kind of thing's why I want to get a look at all the classes before I settle on any," Roxie says quietly. "There's no way to tell how good any of these people will be at being teachers. I'm sure most of them don't even have any credentials." Which is stupid and hypocritical of her, because she doesn't think that credentials are worth anything anyway, but she skips straight over considering that—

"And I've met my god. It's hard to hear people talking about 'interpretations' after that."

[identity profile] kaya-waterwave.livejournal.com 2009-08-30 09:41 pm (UTC)(link)
"I see what you mean," Katara said. "I mean, I guess you could always request a transfer if things don't go as planned with the teacher. Besides, for something like this it helps to talk to the students too, right? I don't know how good anyone is either, but I wouldn't mind knowing what they know."

Katara, however, recalled Roxie in her "dreamspace" and reazlied something like that was likely not to happen if Roxie hadn't met her god in the forst place. "What;s he like? Anything like the god Damion wsa talking about?"

[identity profile] toariversodeep.livejournal.com 2009-08-30 10:04 pm (UTC)(link)
Roxie shakes her head. "Shyama doesn't demand blind servitude or faith without reward." She adjusts her glasses a little. "And he's not all... hugs and bunnies. Bad things happen, and he has a part in that sometimes, but it's part of the natural order of things."

[identity profile] kaya-waterwave.livejournal.com 2009-08-30 11:32 pm (UTC)(link)
When Katara thoufght about it, things weren't exactly hugs and bunnies on anyone's workds, but at least in Roxie's you knew that it was a part of the process. It wasn't fun, but it also was indescriminate. That made more sense to Katara.

"So he doesn't demand blind servitiude, but you follow him. Does he have more...priestesses than just you?"

[identity profile] toariversodeep.livejournal.com 2009-08-31 12:00 am (UTC)(link)
"There aren't many of us." Roxie nods, though. "And gender doesn't matter. It takes the right mindset. There's only a few of us on each world, spread where the cho gather the most."

[identity profile] kaya-waterwave.livejournal.com 2009-08-31 12:15 am (UTC)(link)
"Oh, I see," Katara said. "I think I remember you saying that. So you guys go to the heart of where the Cho go? That sounds really scary. Especially after seeong what they can do."

[identity profile] toariversodeep.livejournal.com 2009-08-31 01:03 am (UTC)(link)
"We kind of gravitate toward each other. The cho know that we'd be able to work against them more effectively on the large if they left us alone." Even if it meant that more people would die locally, she doesn't say.

[identity profile] kaya-waterwave.livejournal.com 2009-08-31 03:17 am (UTC)(link)
Once again, Katara felt an immense wonder at the kind of things Roxie must have seen. She always wondered if she was in any position to worry about her (even after being assured by that "Roxie replica" thaht she could hanbdle herself). There was so much Roxie had to del with on her world.

"Are you...upset that you're here now, instead of your planet?"

[identity profile] toariversodeep.livejournal.com 2009-08-31 03:29 am (UTC)(link)
"... yes," Roxie says, and pauses just a moment to consider that. "I have a job to do. And I haven't been able to commune directly enough with Shyama so far to get his instructions on what I should do now."

[identity profile] kaya-waterwave.livejournal.com 2009-08-31 04:09 am (UTC)(link)
That made sense. Aang never had to check in with the spirits unless he actually needed their help, so it wasn't likely that Roxie would feel at ease now. Despite that, she was still here, still making do, and for that Katara had to feel she still had more courage than most.

"Roxie? Um, you said once Shyama is a god of dreams, right? So...what happens to you when you sleep?"

[identity profile] toariversodeep.livejournal.com 2009-08-31 05:01 am (UTC)(link)
Roxie smiles subtly. "What happens when you wake up?" she asks, softly enigmatical.

[identity profile] kaya-waterwave.livejournal.com 2009-08-31 05:08 am (UTC)(link)
"When I wake up?" Katara asks, smirking. "Normally I get ready for the day and prepare for what it brings. Nowadays I remember I'm on a ship and I feel claustrophobic."

How was that for an answer?

[identity profile] toariversodeep.livejournal.com 2009-08-31 05:15 am (UTC)(link)
It's less thoughtful than she'd have preferred, but she can work with it...

"No, before that," Roxie says thoughtfully. "The transition moment exactly when you wake up. Just that by itself."

[identity profile] kaya-waterwave.livejournal.com 2009-08-31 05:43 am (UTC)(link)
Katara didn't have any words. She never gave it much thought, when it came down to it. When she thought about it though, that moment, wasn't it always like coming to life in a way? She blinked and look thoughtful.

"I don't think there's a real way to describe that feeling, not clearly. We all sort of forget it, and its gone. What about it?"

[identity profile] toariversodeep.livejournal.com 2009-08-31 05:59 am (UTC)(link)
"That's what it's like for me when I sleep."

(no subject)

[personal profile] cityship - 2009-09-24 02:56 (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

[personal profile] cityship - 2009-09-24 04:41 (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

[personal profile] cityship - 2009-09-24 05:25 (UTC) - Expand