Essays in Idleness

Karma, according to one of my most brilliant correspondents, gives a good account of the physics of our universe. “Every action is met by an equal and opposite reaction.” This will seem the more authoritative when it is referred to as “Newton’s Third Law.” It is an iron law, like the law of irony; there are no exceptions. If gentle reader would “follow the science,” this is the high window out of which he should leap.

The contrasting, or shall we say alternative law, is that of Grace. Newton did not list it in his legislative collection. For Grace embraces concepts such as forgiveness, and specifically Divine forgiveness, in all its dogmatic awkwardness and wild, empirical, scientific imprecision.

Jesus Christ is, in the old, “tried and true” calculation, the Son of God; and more, a part of the Divine Trinity. He took human form, and died — not from old age, but in payment for our sins. This does not mean that we did not commit them; less that they were not critically important. It just means we can, at the glibbest level, hope not to get the equal and opposite of what we deserve.

From the scientific point of view, all bets are off with Grace. The theoreticians have not allowed themselves to be entangled in it, the way they have with Dark Matter, and Dark Energy. For how is one to read the mind, of God? If we have free will, He must have it too, infinitely and not merely within a creaturely compass.

We cannot imagine the consequences of our deeds, except, that we are told by the Divine Agencies not to Despair; to, “Fear not.”

Whereas, the more scientific dogma, Karma, commands Despair. Global warming, and Hellfire, is where we all inevitably end. It is what we have been earning since we came to be (by “natural processes”), and we must expect life to be extinguished in the “heat death of the universe.”

God will not even be asked to save us. For according to our Karmic Science, if He exists, He is merely an impartial observer, and has the good taste not to get involved.