alan@sdcrdcf.UUCP (Alan Algustyniak) (09/18/84)
<I *still* can't find anything good about Good Friday! > Re: vengeful and all-merciful Gods I have always been astounded at people who, after their church bus rolls off of a cliff and three children are killed, give thanks to God for sparing the rest of them. A novel pertinent to the discussions is 'The Living End' by Stanley Elkin. I quote from a review in Time magazine: Ellerbee is the nicest of guys, a ... liquor store owner who voluntarily supports the families of two employees who have been shot during a holdup. When [he] is gunned down behind the counter, he goes to Hell... His sins: selling demon rum, keeping his store open on the Sabbath, uttering an occasional 'God damn it,' having impure thoughts and failing to honor his parents, even tho he was orphaned as an infant...God, who reveals that He was never in it for the goodness. "Were you born yesterday?" he asks a perplexed saint. "You've been in the world. Is that how you explain trial and error, history by increment, God's long Slap and Tickle, His Indian-gift wrath? Goodness? No. It was Art! It was always Art. I work by the contrasts and metrics, by beats and the silences. It was all Art. Because it makes a better story is why.