Cute little carnivores

I don't know how it happened . . . but I got suckered into it.

It happened one night last December - there were these two little kittens that kept coming to our back porch.  Of course it had nothing to do with our children feeding them everyday and building a shelter for them out of the gas grill cover and cardboard.

Well it was a very cold night - getting down to 17 degrees and we were about to go out for the evening.  Just about ready to leave, my wife was reminded that the cats would probably freeze to death if they were left outside.  Just one of these little furry critters could fit into your palm . . . so we did  the right thing and put them in the garage and fed them.

Okay, so long story short, they are now our outdoor cats.  They have grown a bit, but they still sleep on our back porch.  Our kids have named them Nellie and Chloe (even though one of them is a boy).  How do we know?  BECAUSE WE PAID TO HAVE THEM SPAYED.  I didn't think we were going to be collecting any more animals - we already had an inside cat and two hermit crabs.

Now that they have weathered the winter, they are young and strong and take every opportunity to exhibit their worth to us by bringing the corpse of some other cute creature to our back step.  When I come down in the morning the lifeless eyes of a bird or a bunny or some other helpless creature staring at me.   Nearby a very proud young cat is licking its paws.

In fact the other morning I was making an omelette and my 5 year old states rather nonchalantly that Nellie is eating breakfast.  I glance outside and see the decapitated mangled body of a bunny being gnawed on.  It was something out of Saving Private Ryan.  I had to rid myself of the image as I continued slicing mushrooms for my omelette.  I kept thinking how thankful I wasn't eating anything Italian.

It made me think: "How can something so cute be so savage?"

The two don't go together.  It runs counter to the definition of 'kitten.' You think of little fur-balls lapping milk, not predators who kill.  

But maybe this is a kick that I am on.  You see, I can't hack it when people (especially Christian people) act like total jerks.  Spending some time in the city recently, you watch some people act like complete beasts to each other.  Using each other.  Manipulating each other.  Hurting each other.  It makes me lose faith . . . quickly.  I wonder how God can put up with it.  

Not only that . . . but I wonder how can faith be real when people act so disgusting to each other (sometimes in the name of Christ).  One of the biggest questions I routinely choke on is how all of this works in the context of heaven.  Think about it:

1.  We are all sometimes little beasts with each other.

2.  Being a beast doesn't work in heaven.

3.  So we must be changed in some way so as to not reflect our beastliness.

4.  If we are changed that drastically, how will be recognizable to each other?  To ourselves?

Not a whole lot of answers . . . maybe that is where you come in. 

Does it bug you that people who claim to be of faith are nasty little brutes?  Does it keep you from belief?  What is it that God would need to change in us that makes something like heaven possible?  I'd love to hear your thoughts.

Perhaps it al comes down to the whole idea of dying to the self.  If we don't die to the self here in this existence, is the sinful part of the self killed off so that we don't live for ourselves ever after?  If that is true, I would like to get started on that way of living here and now.  

My little Wiccan, Reincarnated Poison Ivy tree

Spring is almost here . . . maybe.


It is the talk of everyone - "I am SO tired of cold and rainy!"  Honestly I don't know what we are going to do if it gets warm out.  My kids will be like, "what is that thing in the sky that makes me squint?"  


If you look closely you can see little buds coming out on the trees.  They say that this is where the Eastern religions get the idea of a cyclical view of life.  Their ideas on reincarnation come from the idea that the earth goes through a birth, growth and then decline and death . . . only to reseed the world for the next season and find its expression in life again.


Certain sects of Wicca hold the same idea . . . birth, growth, death, birth.


It becomes a naturalistic support of a religion, but it is not very accurate.  Did you take note of those same trees last fall?  They didn't die.  They made little buds and then closed up shop for a few months and sent everything down to the roots until it was warm enough to come back in the spring.  So if anything, the trees and the flowers don't speak of cycles or reincarnation . . . they speak of waiting.


Waiting for the sun to return.  Waiting for the conditions to come back in which we can begin growing again.  If it really mirrored reincarnation, my maple should have died and fallen down last November and this spring I should see a Holly Tree.  I am thankful that doesn't happen . . . who knows what I would get every spring.  Can you imagine? 


"Honey . . . you better sit down . . . this year our Maple is Poison Ivy . . . lots of it."


So as you head outside and see the growth happen, remember . . . it isn't coming back to life, it was alive.  It was just waiting for the sun to return.


Perhaps this is a better reflection of the Christian faith.  As a symbol of our hope in the return of God - we wait for the Son to return.  This is hope for the here and now . . . it makes us bloom as we head into Easter.


And then some day when we die . . . we will wait for the return of the Son to bloom an eternal bloom in the garden of God.


And we believers also groan, even though we have the Holy Spirit within us as a foretaste of future glory, for we long for our bodies to be released from sin and suffering. We, too, wait with eager hope for the day when God will give us our full rights as his adopted children, including the new bodies he has promised us. Romans 8:23