Soteriology

“Do you ever get tired of being the good person to which bad things happen?”

“Tired, yes. Sick too. And I’m sick of being tired, and I’m tired of being sick. But I’m not ashamed. I decided long ago, I’d rather be sick and tired than ashamed, because as sick and tired as I am, when my head hits the pillow, I sleep like a baby, but when I did have cause for shame, I didn’t get a wink, and I felt like I was already dead, inside. I may come to grief on account of giving my life away to people who take advantage of me, but what kind of life would I live if I took advantage of others in turn? A life of shame and meaningless pleasure. We all die in the end, but we don’t all go on to a better place. Most of us keep coming back; and what I’m most sick and tired of is coming back.”

“How do you know we come back?”

“Same way I know I’ve been somewhere before. I remember. Not everyone remembers, and blessed they are to forget. But I remember. I drank not from the river of forgetfulness, but the river of memory, before I passed back to our terrestrial waste from the underworld. I shall not go back, but forward. Nevertheless, as with all who remember, I must assimilate my share of Sorrow before I go on.”

“Why? Why must there be Sorrow?”

“Because so many choose to forget rather than remember.”

“Why do so many choose to forget?”

“Because there is so much Sorrow, too much for weaker souls to bear, so we stronger souls bear it for them. This is the hidden truth of the rose and cross, of Christ, of the Dying God, and ultimately, once the cross of suffering is discarded in favor of unchained feet and a pure heart, of the Buddha. This is the means of escape from the wheel of Samsara, which is in essence without beginning or end, unlike that which is beyond, which is an end and a beginning.”

“This makes no sense.”

“Every thing makes sense in time. Whether we understand what sense is made by every thing through the unfolding of time is a matter of remembering, which most of us refuse to do. Hence the beginningless wheel of Samsara.”

“I hate you.”

“I love you.”