YOU

I felt terribly embarrassed. And stupid. Not only outside.

(Not knowing that was in itself a hint)

Called upon to defend a thing written that was, in itself, no less a thing given in response to a call to defend my faith in God, or that could be offered as to my conviction “He is”…and that He exists.

(Though, let’s face it…at His level all notions of existence as we know and understand them as being must have to yield to some amending…so for our purposes in speaking to one another it suffices to Supreme Being…or better perhaps The supremest of being…which still causes the lame machine of our imagination to start up under load)

The man calling me out, not reluctant to identify himself as an atheist, or as among the atheists and agnostics was to me, no dope. A pretty smart and not uncongenial fellow to boot. Not the rabid type as some I have met in exchange, and though I had the sense he was somewhat, if not wholly scornful of most one would call ‘of the theist persuasion’ (and their reasonings), he maintained a civility and some show of respect in his engaging.

But this is not wholly unusual among smart people in any contending when they believe they hold the upper hand in either intellect or argument, for having some love ‘for the fight’ it is often better to not openly be recklessly scornful lest the contest be cut short. For many, the love of the fight is all we have, and should all others be summarily driven away by scorn, left finally to ourselves in silence can prove too haunting.

It is in many ways a ballet, a balancing act, a thrust/parry game of sport or dance where the outright slaying of opponents would ultimately and only result in end of game. No, there is a need to show superiority of skill, some display of excellence or proficiency as made manifest ‘before’ a gallery, real or imagined…where truly the imagined may be more real to us than the warm asses seated that only appear of more solid substance. For we often play before an invisible spectator…visible only to ourselves. And for this display…till we grow weary, another must be kept on the hook.

And as I recall, this particular episode of the game must have been perceived as approaching some end, some “show me the best you got’ sort of taunt, as though an opponent was growing weary with what now appeared silly word games in which he had already scored his card so far above that he cared not what other trick might be tried…a sort of ‘let’s cut to the chase’ move…a put up or shut up ultimatum. Which, if said at very beginning of contests may make them too brief and lacking in pleasure. Stringing a fish along is often more fun than banging him summarily upon the head when in the boat before tossing in the ice box. But the reality is it is said but unsaid…even in the moments before the bait is first tossed out. “Let’s see the best these waters may hold”.

“Why do you believe in God?” in essence the stripped down, get to the heart of it, forget all the other phrasings and questions so phrased that invite philosophical musings already covered, and flexing of intellects set up as either support or wrecking balls. The bait has long since been swallowed, the playing tedious and boring, the drag can be tightened without care now.

“WHAT IS YOUR EVIDENCE?”

I wrote “You” as as nakedly a response as I was able. (TBH, there may have been a few more words around it, as I do not recall perfectly, nor have anymore access to the platform, stadium, website and its data record on which and in which it was made and may still hold its record)

How weak an answer! I knew it even as it was typed, felt it as it was posted, was not left disabused of those feelings after his respsonse and my further weak attempts to defend. I felt at that time, and often since, I had given up ‘all of the game’…like a dog exposing its neck or belly to submission, plainly bested.

But the thing is, when moved to first its considering, and before responding, before first key’s tap, I knew something of a conviction of it, something too intangible as a ‘good’ argument or contention of logic or reason might appear, but I surely felt ‘hung out there’ by it. Too, hung out there to find comfort or anything other than some shame or embarrassment as first mentioned above. It was in all, too, too…weak. Grievously weak.

I don’t remember any clever defending of it, though I am sure I tried, without doubt. I wasn’t even convinced myself that it wasn’t some sort of offering of a flattery; even a get off my back sort of ploy and play as in “You are the better that causes me to believe there is the better”…a real surrendering dog pose. Was that what it was? Is that what I have…in all? Weaker dog’s surrender?

No, I didn’t know. Surely not then and before some friends and all opponents who only appeared to me as now shown truly exceeding in this matter, able to out-throttle (in any sense) a fool, and to my shame. And I am no more sure I know much better now. Why? Why such display of weakness…when put to test?

You.

Really? The best I got? This guy told from youth there’s a lot of horsepower under that hood? And so much so he fell for it…and plainly shown no smarter than only able to rely upon what he has been told. Yet now. Now. No clever ontological-ese that had often served in past? No philosophical/metaphysical even psychobabble-iciousness to parade as categorical plumes stiffened up for struts and strutting?

(Now who’s strutting?)

Me?

You.(?)

You?

That conviction…of You.

No, I cannot escape it. Nor can I explain it. But I can say, and that with all conviction of speaking truth (even if it only be mine…of me)…the You have/has always troubled me. Moved me. Been found invading me. Desired of me and hated of me. I have at once both wanted and rejected all of You. I have even needed you while hating you for the knowing of me, and in order to know me, for the defining of me, the understanding of me…as a not You. I cannot know me as me apart from a you. I am the not you. Yet something knows hell is and would be, and that without doubt, that no you is not merely no me, but an I am plunged into all unrelenting torment…without you…even any ‘a’ or the you.

I am not without, nor can be…without kindredness. Do you doubt? Look merely (stupidly?) to the language we share. A you like enough but enough not like, the me. A you then ‘liked’ in part and a you then also hated. A you able to be owned, and a you beyond any taming or bridling to my likeness. You. You have been with me from the beginning. I have never know me, or a me…that is apart from you, or a you. And for as much as it has been dance, it has been swordplay. As much ballet, as death gripping and grappling. You, by your being not me present the irresolvable to a me…but there it is: am I all and only me…because of you?

How much can the you bear…of me? That even in silence I find you there. A you inside, a you not me…even in judgment of this/that…me. I have and hold true court in myself of thoughts, emotions, imaginations sublime and depraved…at least as a you tell me. They are not…even as I am not…till you answer and tell. I am witness reliant. Inescapably so. Irrefutably so. Even…abysmally…so. I am seen by a you…in all the darkest of dark places I think are all of me, and only me…but you invade.

I can no longer resist, nor care to, what was once seen solely as a thing of shame. An embarrassing thing. A proof of all lack of creativity, a manifestly displayed as despised and all hated among men matter too grievously shameful to admit; of complete and total imaginative poverty. A man without a mind…of his own.

You.

Are always in it.

This man:

Really? The best I got? This guy told from youth there’s a lot of horsepower under that hood? And so much so he fell for it…and plainly shown no smarter than only able to rely upon what he has been told.

and plainly shown no smarter than only able to rely upon what he has been told.

Even Chris Hitchens needed a you…to appear before. Speak before. Write for. Be…for. And for Chris Hitchens to know Chris Hitchens.


Like him, I have a you inside. Which you…is all the difference…if there be shown any necessity to be shown.

Even the You of all.

The not me…that has made me…and makes me…me.

Jesus asks, “Or what king on his way to war with another king will not first sit down and consider whether he can engage with ten thousand men the one coming against him with twenty thousand?”

I like that Jesus took the sting out of rolling over like a dog to surrender to the Unconquerable one. The You-est of all.

And as for lack of creativity…perhaps even total lack of imagination or full display of having no mind in the matter:

So likewise ye, when ye shall have done all those things which are commanded you, say, We are unprofitable servants: we have done that which was our duty to do.

and plainly shown no smarter than only able to rely upon what he has been told.

But, and no doubt…some of you still love the fight.

Is that my invite to throw down?

God knows.

I have come to understand a conviction of truth comes, and must come, prior to either a reception of evidence or its presentation. It has to in order to evaluate evidence…as being sufficient and true, or not.

And that conviction of truth must also be received as a given…even a given thing. Apart from it, and that operation, their can be no weighing. Even of evidence.

And I sense a thing now being weighed…by you.

Truth precedes evidence. It cannot but be so.

Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak: and he will shew you things to come.

And, no less:

And when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment: Of sin, because they believe not on me; Of righteousness, because I go to my Father, and ye see me no more; Of judgment, because the prince of this world is judged.

Each stands where they do.