The ending to the book, "Clowns of God," was clear: the "end" will come, there will be no evolution, but rather a complete remake - unless. The 'unless' was very small. This is how it was presented:
The former pope writes a book of letters supposedly written by a clown who beseeches man and God to come together: man to be more humanitarian as he has been told, and God to understand the beauty and hope in His creation with more tolerance. This seems odd, but it is conclusive; in the end, our pope and other main characters wind up in a secluded valley in the Bavarian Alps, an old mine shaft present to protect them from the initial wave of radiation, and an enclosed valley to sustain them afterwards. We find that the valley was pointed out to the son of one of the main characters by a man who calls himself Mr Athos. As we are introduced to Mr Athos, it becomes clear that he is the Christ, come again. He has gone around the world and collected His select - including all races, deformities, the high but mostly the low - and ushered them into similarly protected areas. His will be done - the world will nearly end in a bang with only a few survivors, and that is that, like Noah and his ark in distant days. But on learning of Athos's true identity, the pope argues with him: give us more time, he says; let us try one last time to work it out. And in the end, the fingers on the red button pause; we are given more time, but not much.
We can, in effect, bargain with God.
I will not take up with that argument just yet, although I will say that I have often bargained with God and generally lost - or was simply not heard. But we learn that God favors most his clowns, for it was a child with Down syndrome that turned the trick with Christ. It was not the pope, or the leaders of the world or the high and mighty for whom the world was spared, at least temporarily, but the least among us. These, said the Christ, were the only humans who had not displeased him. But what, I have to ask, of the rest of his human creation? Most of us were born for critical intelligence, and crafty manipulation to maintain our survival. This gift, and that impulse, were not, as far as we know, our choice. Why then should we suffer for being as we were made?
Yesterday, Robin Williams, the world's clown, killed himself. Like many baby boomers, I had first seen him on Happy Days and never forgot. He was like nothing I had ever seen. Younger people, if they have heard of him at all, might take him for granted, but we elders know better - he was an original, a comic genius far beyond the likes of Lenny Bruce. He was there not to impact civilization, or to damn the powerful, or to do anything more useful than entertain and, in the movies, pull the heart strings, for a clown has tears as well. The tears of a clown are pure pathos, without thought; they are the tears of the mongoloid, pure, reflective of the moment.
And that was Robin Williams strength - he was, as they said, "always on." He could not help it. His was no act, but a mania, a need, a calling; he was God's fool.
And he killed himself. Seeing his manic life, I don't doubt why - I couldn't take that stream of energy for more than a few hours, let alone a life time. And yet, if anyone was made to be who they were, it was Williams. But God's fool could eventually find no way out of himself. Why?
The child with the mental handicap usually lives for far fewer years than the rest of us. He is often beset with frustration, for he just can't keep up with the rest of us. He does indeed suffer. Even God's clowns, his favorites, suffer. Again, why?
It is one reason that the world seems more and more estranged from something in me. It is home, but only temporary. Not the world as it is in total, but as we see it, for we are given certain ways of thought that can only, or usually, see one way, and that way leads eventually to problems. To the mentally feeble, to the animal kingdom, joy is joy and sorrow is sorrow, and all fits for that moment. For us, almost nothing fits, not for long. We were born, as the saying goes, for trouble, for that is our application of our intelligence; that is what our intelligence is for: to survive; to struggle; to overcome beasts and other men.
It is the same old question: how is this our fault? But we can see how, for, as far as we know, we DO decide. We DO have and make choices. But what of the children, of the impaired, of the clowns?
It is hard to put in words; it is hardly enough to say that we are born into the physics of this place and that is that. What needs to be added is that there are other possibilities, some perhaps functioning even as we live here, a sort of doppelganger existing in another, or several other, worlds with different laws of time, of death, of space. This, here, is ours to suffer and delight as it is presented. It is ours to grow in, or shrink in, as the physics of our beings and choices dictate. Even the children and clowns must suffer here, and so much the pity. Why so remains the great moral mystery, but I am sorry for the children and the clowns. Farewell, Robin Williams. Perhaps the greatest decision we can make is to ask Mr Athos for another chance, if only for the children, the fools and the clowns. FK
The former pope writes a book of letters supposedly written by a clown who beseeches man and God to come together: man to be more humanitarian as he has been told, and God to understand the beauty and hope in His creation with more tolerance. This seems odd, but it is conclusive; in the end, our pope and other main characters wind up in a secluded valley in the Bavarian Alps, an old mine shaft present to protect them from the initial wave of radiation, and an enclosed valley to sustain them afterwards. We find that the valley was pointed out to the son of one of the main characters by a man who calls himself Mr Athos. As we are introduced to Mr Athos, it becomes clear that he is the Christ, come again. He has gone around the world and collected His select - including all races, deformities, the high but mostly the low - and ushered them into similarly protected areas. His will be done - the world will nearly end in a bang with only a few survivors, and that is that, like Noah and his ark in distant days. But on learning of Athos's true identity, the pope argues with him: give us more time, he says; let us try one last time to work it out. And in the end, the fingers on the red button pause; we are given more time, but not much.
We can, in effect, bargain with God.
I will not take up with that argument just yet, although I will say that I have often bargained with God and generally lost - or was simply not heard. But we learn that God favors most his clowns, for it was a child with Down syndrome that turned the trick with Christ. It was not the pope, or the leaders of the world or the high and mighty for whom the world was spared, at least temporarily, but the least among us. These, said the Christ, were the only humans who had not displeased him. But what, I have to ask, of the rest of his human creation? Most of us were born for critical intelligence, and crafty manipulation to maintain our survival. This gift, and that impulse, were not, as far as we know, our choice. Why then should we suffer for being as we were made?
Yesterday, Robin Williams, the world's clown, killed himself. Like many baby boomers, I had first seen him on Happy Days and never forgot. He was like nothing I had ever seen. Younger people, if they have heard of him at all, might take him for granted, but we elders know better - he was an original, a comic genius far beyond the likes of Lenny Bruce. He was there not to impact civilization, or to damn the powerful, or to do anything more useful than entertain and, in the movies, pull the heart strings, for a clown has tears as well. The tears of a clown are pure pathos, without thought; they are the tears of the mongoloid, pure, reflective of the moment.
And that was Robin Williams strength - he was, as they said, "always on." He could not help it. His was no act, but a mania, a need, a calling; he was God's fool.
And he killed himself. Seeing his manic life, I don't doubt why - I couldn't take that stream of energy for more than a few hours, let alone a life time. And yet, if anyone was made to be who they were, it was Williams. But God's fool could eventually find no way out of himself. Why?
The child with the mental handicap usually lives for far fewer years than the rest of us. He is often beset with frustration, for he just can't keep up with the rest of us. He does indeed suffer. Even God's clowns, his favorites, suffer. Again, why?
It is one reason that the world seems more and more estranged from something in me. It is home, but only temporary. Not the world as it is in total, but as we see it, for we are given certain ways of thought that can only, or usually, see one way, and that way leads eventually to problems. To the mentally feeble, to the animal kingdom, joy is joy and sorrow is sorrow, and all fits for that moment. For us, almost nothing fits, not for long. We were born, as the saying goes, for trouble, for that is our application of our intelligence; that is what our intelligence is for: to survive; to struggle; to overcome beasts and other men.
It is the same old question: how is this our fault? But we can see how, for, as far as we know, we DO decide. We DO have and make choices. But what of the children, of the impaired, of the clowns?
It is hard to put in words; it is hardly enough to say that we are born into the physics of this place and that is that. What needs to be added is that there are other possibilities, some perhaps functioning even as we live here, a sort of doppelganger existing in another, or several other, worlds with different laws of time, of death, of space. This, here, is ours to suffer and delight as it is presented. It is ours to grow in, or shrink in, as the physics of our beings and choices dictate. Even the children and clowns must suffer here, and so much the pity. Why so remains the great moral mystery, but I am sorry for the children and the clowns. Farewell, Robin Williams. Perhaps the greatest decision we can make is to ask Mr Athos for another chance, if only for the children, the fools and the clowns. FK
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