I have come to realize that Jesse Helms stands for everything in politics that is anathema to me.
Swords don't glorify the creator-God. Love does. Self-giving love, best of all.
Jesus himself, as the gospel story goes on to its dramatic conclusion, lives out the same message of the Sermon on the Mount: he is the light of the world, he is the salt of the earth, he loves his enemies and gives his life for them, he is lifted up on a hill so that the world can see.
While some who downplay Christ's divinity have imagined Jesus as a great social worker 'being kind to old ladies, small dogs and little children,' orthodox Christianity has not wanted Jesus to have a political message.
Whatever life after death is, being with Christ which is far better, being in Paradise like the thief, etc, the many rooms where we go immediately. . . that is the temporary place. The ultimate life after life after death is the resurrection in God's new world.
Learning to live as a Christian is learning to live as a renewed human being, anticipating the eventual new creation in and with a world which is still longing and groaning for that final redemption.
We can glimpse it in the book of Acts: the method of the kingdom will match the message of the kingdom. The kingdom…goes out into the world vulnerable, suffering, praising, praying, misunderstood, misjudged, vindicated, celebrating: always – as Paul puts it in one of his letters – bearing in the body the dying of Jesus so that the life of Jesus may also be displayed.
It should be our care not so much to live a long life as a satisfactory one.
That's what a powerful story does. It creates a more intense experience of life for you to watch. That's what a good film does for me, anyway. That process, I enjoy. It just makes for entertaining characters and entertaining films.
I am either blessed or cursed with having little barrier between feeling emotions and displaying them for all to see. My heart is on my sleeve. It's not comfortable but. . . I am an artist so it's useful and my friends are used to me getting teary at any moment. So, it just runs through me and I know it will continue to, but my best source of grounding are animals and nature. Animals live more in the moment and don't worry so much! And nature is proof of a greater power than myself. Both put things in perspective, or at least gently move us forward.
Is it permitted to differ with Kierkegaard? Not only permitted but necessary. If you love him.