Here’s a little sketch from an idea I had in my Foundation of Christian Thought class. We’re talking about different worldviews, so I thought I’d try a little allegorical scene with some of the different ones. Those included here are Christian Theism, Pantheism, Agnosticism, Secular Humanism, and Atheistic Existentialism.
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“Your usefulness is up. Doug, dispose of her.”
Mr. Steele stood with his feet planted firmly, arms crossed over his vested chest. A grim expression covered his face as he stood over the cowering girl. Her face was streaked in tears, dirt, and dried blood.
She raised her red eyes to her captor’s face and managed to gather some last shreds of fierce courage. “I will never tell you where they are.”
From the shadows in the corner of the room, a huge man with muscles that threatened to burst his sleeveless shirt appeared. He strode slowly toward the girl with steps that echoed loudly in the empty warehouse.
Mr. Steele looked bored with her words. “Wrong answer, Miss Carlisle. Doug, hurry up. She’s annoying me.”
“You won’t get away with this,” Miss Carlisle said with surety. “The author will save me.”
Mr. Steele laughed humorlessly. “Dear girl, there is no author. What an illogical, foolish thing to say. There’s only me, you, your friends who I’ll find sooner or later, and Doug, who is going to kill you.”
“There is an author,” she argued. “She created us, gave us names and personalities–gave us meaning and worth. It’s because of her that I am worthy to be in this story; that’s how I know she’ll save me from you. But even if she doesn’t, I’ll die with honor, because I’ve followed her plan for me in this story.”
“That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard,” the master criminal scoffed. “There is no author. We have absolutely no worth or purpose, unless we give it to ourselves. I’ve given myself the purpose of finding your friends and torturing them, and you’ve interfered with my endeavor. Doug, kill her!”
Miss Carlisle turned her eyes to the giant thug. “Doug, you believe there’s an author, too,” she pleaded. “Please, don’t do this.”
“You don’t understand, Miss,” the big man said. “We are all the author. Everything is one. Our separate characters–they are an illusion. This physical world–it is an illusion. Whether I kill you or not does not mean anything, because everything is one, so nothing is good or evil”
Doug took a step closer, only to be stopped by a woman clad in bright pink swinging down from the skylight on a rope. “Stop!” she yelled.
“Annistasia, what are you doing?” Miss Carlisle shrieked. “You’re not supposed to be here; the author wanted you to be protecting my friends!”
“Miss Carlisle, you know I don’t think there’s conclusive evidence that there is an author, so why should I do what you say she wants?” the woman said, pulling a syringe filled with a strong sedative out of her pocket and facing Mr. Steele, poised to spring.
“Then why are you here?” Mr. Steele asked, uncrossing his arms and looking slightly wary.
Annistasia raised her eyebrows. “I can’t let you kill Miss Carlisle,” she declared.
“Whyever not? If you don’t agree with her that we have an author who makes us have worth, what’s the point?”
“Because,” Annistasia replied, “she is a human, and humans have inherent value.”
Mr. Steele blew air out through his lips, making a “pfft” sound. “What, so where does this value come from?”
“From simply being human,” Annistasia said. “Will you let her go, now?”
Mr. Steele hardened his gaze. “No.”
“Wrong answer,” she said, springing forward. She stabbed the needle into his arm, emptying its contents into his bloodstream and avoiding his fist. He pulled a pistol out of his belt, but the effects of the sedative were already kicking in, interfering with his aim. The gunshot echoed in the warehouse. It drowned out the sound of Mr. Steele’s unconscious body hitting the concrete floor and of Doug’s cry of pain as the bullet hit him.
“Doug!” Miss Carlisle and Annistasia cried at the same time, staring at the bright red spreading across his shirt.
“What?” he asked, panting in pain.
“You’re shot,” Miss Carlisle said as both women leapt forward to help him.
He weakly put up his hands to ward them off. “No, it’s just an illusion,” he insisted. “I’m not hurt, because we don’t have a body. Everything…is…one.” He fainted from bloodloss and collapsed.
Annistasia and Miss Carlisle looked at each other and nodded. Together, they rolled Doug’s body over and inspected his wound. “It’s just a graze,” Annistasia said, ripping a bright pink sleeve off her outfit and using it to bandage his wound. “He’ll survive with hardly a scar.”
When Doug was taken care of, she sat back and looked at the awed expression on the face of the girl next to her. “So, what are you thinking right now?”
Miss Carlisle smiled. “I’m thinking that I was right. He didn’t get away with it. The author saved me.”
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What did you think? Was it stupid? Did you like it? Your feedback will be much appreciated!!!!
“We are all the author. Everything is one. Our separate characters–they are an illusion. This physical world–it is an illusion. Whether I kill you or not does not mean anything, because everything is one, so nothing is good or evil.”
I think the above is meant to be the Pantheist segment, in which case I would like to say that it does not fully represent us. Seeing the physical world as an illusion is not Pantheism, but Idealism. While there are Idealists, many of us are either Naturalists or Dualists, and consider the physical world at least as real as anything else.
“Everything is one” is a popular piece, but should not be over-applied. Any Naturalistic Pantheist will admit that there exist separate, interacting components, from atoms through galaxies.
Nature and non-sapient beings are beyond good and evil, since they lack the philosophy and reasoning to freely choose and act otherwise. Humans, separating themselves from Nature’s patterns, having more power, hold more responsibility.