We have killed God
``Have you not heard of that madman who lit a lantern in the bright morning hours, ran to the market-place, and cried incessantly: ``I am looking for God! I am looking for God!``
As many of those who did not believe in God were standing together there, he excited considerable laughter. Have you lost him, then? said one. Did he lose his way like a child? said another. Or is he hiding? Is he afraid of us? Has he gone on a voyage? or emigrated? Thus they shouted and laughed. The madman sprang into their midst and pierced them with his glances.
``Where has God gone?`` he cried. ``I shall tell you. We have killed him - you and I have killed him. We are his murderers. But how have we done this? How were we able to drink up the sea? Who gave us the sponge to wipe away the entire horizon? What did we do when we unchained the earth from its sun? Whither is it moving now? Whither are we moving now? Away from all suns? Are we not perpetually falling? Backward, sideward, forward, in all directions? Is there any up or down left? Are we not straying as through an infinite nothing? Do we not feel the breath of empty space? Has it not become colder? Is it not more and more night coming on all the time? Must not lanterns be lit in the morning? Do we not hear anything yet of the noise of the gravediggers who are burying God? Do we not smell anything yet of God`s decomposition? Gods too decompose. God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him. How shall we, murderers of all murderers, console ourselves? That which was the holiest and mightiest of all that the world has yet possessed has bled to death under our knives. Who will wipe this blood off us? With what water could we purify ourselves? What festivals of atonement, what sacred games shall we need to invent? Is not the greatness of this deed too great for us?``
Thus says Nietzsche and my view is not different from him. Yes we have killed God. How is it possible that we who professed to be with him have killed him? Are you mad to say this statement? These are the possible questions and more may arise in your mind. Here I am to prove my view.
Our selfish love (desire) for our own life made us to kill God himself. We who have professed to serve him in the poorest of the poor had killed him. We have promised God on the day of our profession that we would live our life to fulfill his Will. Are we really doing what he wants us to do? Or are we doing what we want to do? Are we accountable to God. We are afraid to face God just like our ancestor Adam (Gen 3: 9 - 10). He was powerful because God had given him the power to decide and to act on his own, but he chose not offend God anymore but we read in the same book how humanity slowly and steadily rebelled against God using the very weapon called Freedom. Today we have reached to a certain stage where we all say we don`t God and we have killed using that freedom, and we have buried him in a graveyard where no one can ever enter. We call the graveyard as Heaven.
God has given us freedom not to recreate another world but to renew the world. That is the reason why the Psalm 8 says that God has regarded us apex of his creation. Today we want to become God by recreating everything. For example, we are trying to find out how can we create a new powerful human being with modern Technology like cloning, test tube babies, stem cell research etc.,. This would lead to excision of humanity. We would like to have a perfect world. The desire for perfection is no harm but at what cast? We who claim to be have authority over morality, why are we silent about this? And some of us are ignored of this fact. What a shame! We kill God because of ignorance. This ignorance is a willful ignorance. This cannot be forgiven.
work is the means of self-expression, even our Catechism teaches us that we come to know God through nature which he has created. But today, it`s difficult to say because we have re-modeled. work is the expression of its owner`s dignity. And it is through work that manifests to the world our inner self and our capacities to develop oneself. In a world of Consumerism, privatation and Globalization God is obliged to alienate himself, because his work has been misused, trampled under foot. And He is not able to do because He has given us the gift of Freedom.
Again, if He interferes His goal would be failure and He would be a failure God. So, this alienation of the God from his Creatures I call it as ``Death of God.`` Therefore, God is no longer has a place in our world because sensuality, sexuality, pleasure seeking mentality, survival of the fittest has the primary place. Hence ``Alienation of God is nothing but a cold blooded murder did by the Whole humanity.`` In this we the religious hold important place because our education system, faith life, moral values etc., are only in text level they have not taught to our people through our lives. That is the reason why I say we have killed God.
In the book of Genesis Chapter 1 verse 27 onwards tell us that humankind were created in the image and likeness of God. If that is the case each one of us has God within us. The poor rickshaw wala, road sweepers, sewage cleaners, people living in the slums do have God within them. How often we have seen them suffering. What have we done to them. We allowed them to suffer and die. Do we not have a share in that person`s death? It is not only that person dies but the God who resides in her/him die.
St. Paul in his first letter to Corinthians says that we all are one in Christ and we form a part of his body. Christ can`t be full without us. Therefore each one of us is very important for him to exist. Who knows whom(that she or he could form the most important part of Christ`s body like Heart, kidney, brain etc.) we have killed may be an important part of the body, without which Christ would not be fully alive. Hence we being indifferent to the needs of our sisters and brothers have killed God. We religious translate the Gospel according to our whims and fancy. We pray at-least twice in a day and eat five time in a day. We enjoy all this in his name. But how far have we did what he wished us to do? Have we loved the poor sisters and brothers as we loved our selves? How often we thought about the poor farmers, coolies who in way or the other responsible in feeding us? How many times we made a firm stand with them when they were in need of our support? What is our stand towards these issues?
Remember every time we fail to raise our voice for the poor and for the voiceless we kill God. God is not there in heavens. He has emptied his residence from Heaven and started to live in the hearts of the wo/men when he created humankind. Therefore, the God who is scarified on the altar is also in the poor, waiting for you to be scarified for his sake in the streets. Since we are religious we hesitate to help a poor wo/man who is struggling on the streets, in the gutters, in sewages, etc.,.
Right from our formation period onwards our favourite time pass is to back-bit our own Community members or some of our congregation members. By doing this don`t we kill her/his name? Once her/his name is spoiled s/he is dead. Who is responsible for this? We not only grumble about food, clothing but also our religion, leaders, companions, workers, lay people. For us, except us all the others are fools and sinners. So emotionally we kill others and therefore just like Jean Paul Sartre we too cry, ``The other is my hell.`` If this is this so, just examine how many we have killed Him…
We claim that we are the faith formators but often in our schools other subjects are given much importance. Any functions or felicitations we readily give up our Catechism and moral Science classes. It is some time more worse and heart aching to hear from religious I am not ready to take either Catechism or moral science classes for any (especially lower) classes. So what does our students learn from us? Our own very life, does it give a witness to the values we propose to our students? Do they see in us another Christ? If not, do we not spoil a young soul who had been entrusted to our care. Is it not equivalent to killing a person. I rather would say it is a slow poison which would kill him slowly and steadily. Today many leaders, politicians, criminals were trained in our schools. We kill God in the young soul. We preach values but we never allow the students to practice them. What kind of teachers are we?
Knowing all these, Jesus himself had told the poor people of all times not to do as we do rather to practice what we preach to them. When are we going to change? When are we going to stop killing God? Will our students and neighbours who are living with us see Christ in us? Or are they going to cry out just like Nietzsche and Jean Paul Sartre? Can we prove that God lives in us to the world?
God, in the poorest of the poor cry for food,
God, in the streets look out for us for help,
God, in the abandoned seek for love,
God, in the vagabonds need for guide,
In short God is there in you and me. He could not help us unless and until you and I allow him. So do you plan to give life for him?
A strong warning to you all who like to give a place to God, it is a big risk, it`s a big deal, it can claim your very life which you consider to be precious, if you allow God to live in you.
Dear Friends, I have decided to give life for God….
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