You ever finish a book that made you feel dense?
Like before you read the damn thing (or listened to the book in this case) you felt smarter about the world. Like you know - or thought you knew - a lot more about the world and this mortal coil you lived in, then a book comes a long and we’ll you realize nope there’s actually doornails smarter than you.
A long while ago somebody gifted me a copy of Steven Pinker’s The Speed of Thought. I didn’t know who Pinker was at the time or what he wrote. Still, I wanted to be nice and give the book the old college try. Three pages in, I put the book down, and it became a coaster.
Don’t get me wrong, Pinker is a pretty good writer, but his sentence structure and his thought process was so thick I had to re-read sentences several times just to get the gist of what the hell he was saying.
I like simple sentences. One of the reasons I like Stephen King is because his sentences are so damn simple to read. Plus, his stories are not too bad.
If given the chance - though I probably disagree with both politically - I’d rather have lunch with Stephen King. I imagine it would be in some dive off the main highway, that served wings and warm beer. We’d talk writing and movies, maybe some politics and religion. I don’t watch baseball and that’d make him a little sad. Maybe I’d tell him a tale or two.
Not so with Pinker. I picture some bistro in New York where I couldn’t read the menu. Sweat would start pouring down my brow as I tried to figure out what wine to have with my meal. Got anything in a box, I would ask. Pinker would hold the floor. He’d impress me with his knowledge. His “hello” would impress the hell out of me. He’d be bored of me in a New York minute. Threaten his agent to not schedule a meeting like that again or else.
Maybe I’m mischaracterizing both men. It’s possible.
All this to say, is that how I felt today as I finished The Devil’s Delusion by David Berlinksi. Don’t get me wrong, it was a good book. The guy can write and some of his sentences cut like a scalpel. That thin dry cut that holds for a second before the blood comes gushing out.
For those of you that aren’t familiar with David Berlinski the guy is ivy league. He’s had some issues with Darwin’s Theory of Evolution and the rise of the new atheism. It’s how I found him, when I had some questions about the Theory of Evolution and Theism. Like you do.
I tend to agree a lot with Berlinksi, but my knowledge of science, philosophy, and biology is very limited. I know enough to be dangerous around a rusted out gas can and zippo lighter.
Hell, once I checked for a gas leak by lighting a match. If we blew (I was with my roommate at the time) we had a leak. I would’ve been a shoe in for a Darwin Award.
When the book ended, I re-started it. Why?
Because if nothing else I want to understand it.
Part of me is tired of being lazy about such things. I like science. I like religion (well love religion really) and philosophy. I’m not good at most of it, if at all. I know I’m a noob when it comes to these disciplines. I know broad strokes, but get lost on the details and what others have written.
I once heard this story about this man that used to visit the Blessed Sacrament all the time. For those of you that don’t know, in Catholicism, we believe that Jesus is truly present body, soul, and divinity in the Eucharist. That in that moment of consecration during the mass, Jesus infuses Himself into a piece of bread. I use to imagine that Jesus was up in heaven and every time - and I mean every time, in every mass in the world - when the host is lifted, Jesus would swan dive from heaven into the bread. I had to humanize it somehow to grasp the mystery. Dumb it down, if you will.
Anyways, back to the simple man - I think he was a farmer - so he would go into this church and just sit there and look at the exposed bread. One day, his priests asked him what he did, while sitting there. Was he praying?
The old man looks at up at the priest and says, “no, I stare at Jesus and He stares back.”
That’s it. That’s all he does. Simple and to the point.
Thinking about it, that’s how I like my faith. Simple and to the point. Like I like my sentences. I think that’s why Catholicism comes so easily for me. Its that simple.
But I like my science and philosophy as well. I like good writing too. So yeah, I’m going to listen to The Devil’s Delusion again. Maybe this time around, since I know what’s coming, I’ll be a tad smarter than a doornail. Maybe not, but I have faith.