Tag Archives: resurrection

Believe It Or Not!

The weekly prompt from my Florida writers’ group was ‘believe it or not’, and this humourous tale is what I came up with—

“I swear to yez all, I seen the whole shivaree with me own eyes.  Never woulda believed it otherwise!”

The statement was met with silence at first, and the big man’s two companions took a long swallow from the pints one of them, Rufus Mulaney, had added to his tab.

“Sure, an’ it don’t seem possible,” Mickey Finnerty said, wiping froth from his lip, the first to reply.  “It only ever happened once before, so they say.  An’ even that can’t be proved.”

“Don’t gotta prove it, me lad,” Sean O’Brien countered, savouring the bitter ale.  “I seen it with me own eyes!  Tha’s alla the proof I’ll be needin’.”

“Ye must think we’re all daft!” Mulaney declared.  “Yer sittin’ there tellin’ us ye seen Seamus O’Malley die an’ then come back to life?  Ye musta been well into yer cups!  Such a thing just ain’t possible.”

“All good for you to say,” O’Brien sneered.  “Ye were already passed out by then, breathin’ sawdust offa the floor when it happened.  Any boyo who can’t hold his drink oughta not be correctin’ one who can!”

“Yer tellin’ me Rufe was there when it happened?” Finnerty said, looking back and forth between the two men.

“Aye, that he was,” O’Brien laughed, “right there ‘longside me an’ Seamus O’Malley…that is ‘til he slipped offa his stool an’ landed on his noggin.  Lights out he was, ol’ Rufe.”

“That true, Rufe?” Finnerty said.  “Ye took a drunken header in front of the whole establishment?”

“That’s what Sean tells me,” Mulaney admitted sheepishly.  “I do remember spittin’ wood-chips outta me mouth when I managed to collect meself.  All’s I know fer sure is I never saw ol’ Seamus croak an’ then come back.”

“Ah, ye gombeen!” O’Brien cried.  “How could ye see anythin’ when ye was in a blackout?  I’m tellin’ yez both, sure as I’m sittin’ here, Seamus O’Malley died an’ resurrected hisself, right in front of me eyes!  Yez can believe it or not, I don’t give a shite.”

“Sure, an’ it’s wantin’ to believe ye I am,” Finnerty said, raising a hand to order another round for the group.  “Gimme the wee details so’s I can better picture the grand second comin’.”

O’Brien waited ‘til the three of them had drunk deeply from the refreshed pints in front of them before answering.  “Alright then, ye disbelievin’ dolts, here’s how it all went down.  Me, Rufe, an’ Seamus were sittin’ here in this very spot, knockin’ back a few drafts after church last Sunday.  Father Flanagan had been at his full-throttled best, talkin’ ‘bout how the good Lord raised his son from the dead on Easter Sunday, an’ just like always, the tale raised a considerable thirst in me an’ the lads.”

“Since when are you a church-goin’ man?” Finnerty asked.

“Since me good wife threatened to cut off me allowance,” O’Brien said.  “But that ain’t no never-mind.  The point is, we were just gettin’ the edge offa our thirst when who should come along but the Widow McGroarty, askin’ Seamus if he’d buy her a drink.”

“The Widow McGroarty?” Finnerty repeated.  “She’s a mighty fine-lookin’ lass!”

“Aye, that she is!” O’Brien agreed with a leering smile.  “O’Malley surely thinks so, too, an’ the word is him an’ her been…y’know, dancin’ the Irish jig, so to speak.”

“O’Malley?” Finnerty said, mouth agape.  “What’s a fair colleen like herself see in a gombeen like him?”

“Who’s to say?” O’Brien said.  “Anyways, right at that critical moment, good ol’ Rufe made a space for her at the bar by topplin’ offa his stool.  She stepped right over the lad an’ hopped up beside us.”

“So, that’s why I musta missed what happened next,” Mulaney said, followed by another sip from his pint.

“Aye, ye missed the best part!” O’Brien chuckled into his beard.  “Seamus ordered the Widow a shot an’ a beer-chaser, an’ after knockin’ ‘em both back, she leaned over an’ planted a smooch smack on his goober.”

“An’ that’s when he died?” Finnerty asked, caught up now in the story.

“Nah, that’s when he smooched her right back.  He didn’t die ‘til a few minutes later when his ol’ lady walked into the pub lookin’ for him.  We heard her voice callin’ his name afore she come through the door, an’ by then, Seamus was laid out flat beside Rufe, lookin’ for all the world like he was stone-cold dead!”

“Then what happened?” Finnerty asked.

“Me an’ the Widow McGroarty skedaddled outta the way,” O’Brien said.  “We both thought Seamus had bought the farm right then an’ there, scared to his very death that the good Mrs. O’Malley mighta seen him smoochin’ the Widow.”

“An’ did she?” Mulaney asked, sincerely regretting that he’d passed out and missed the whole shebang.

“Nah,” O’Brien said, finishing off his pint.  “All’s she saw was her husband lyin’ there on the floor.  She figured he was passed-out drunk, so she grabbed him by his collar an’ gave his head a shakin’, the likes of which I hope I may never see again.”

“An’ then what?” Finnerty asked, so enthralled now that he did the unthinkable and signalled for yet another round on his tab.

“An’ right then,” O’Brien said, relishing the moment, “is when the resurrection occurred.  Seamus scrambled to his feet, beggin’ forgiveness from the good woman, an’ allowed hisself to be dragged out the door by his ear.  Dead one minute, brought back to life the next, just like I been tellin’ yez.  Yez can believe it or not.”

“What about the fair Widow?” Mulaney asked.  “I musta missed what happened to her, too.”

“Spare no worries for the lovely Widow McGroarty, lads,” O’Brien said.  “Ever the gentleman, I made sure the lady got safely home to bed.”

“To bed?” Finnerty exclaimed.  “Did yez…did yez…?”

“Sure, an’ that’s another story for another time, me boyos!” O’Brien said.  “It’s thankful I am for the pints yez bought, but now I must be on me way.”

“He done it to us again, Rufe,” Finnerty said, watching as the big man left the pub.  “Why do we fall for his blarney every time?”

There was no answer from Mulaney, however, who had seized that very moment to pass out yet again on the sawdust-covered floor.

Resurrection Relevance

Another Christian observance of Easter is upon us, with its celebration of the resurrection of Christ, the man whom many consider to be the Son of God.

cross

During his brief time on earth, Jesus preached peace, tolerance, faith, forgiveness—and, perhaps most importantly, love for all humankind, even one’s enemies.  In return, he promised eternal life for all who believed and acted in accordance with these precepts.

As a child, I learned quickly that one of my mother’s interpretations of his teachings was that I must not fight with other children.  She was very firm about this.  During my early school years, it seemed like good advice; I was a friendly little guy, and others seemed to like me just fine.

schoolyard

As I got older, however, I learned that not every kid subscribed to her viewpoint.  Some of the classmates I encountered in the older grades were quite aggressive, to the point of being bullies, and for a while I was at a loss as to how to cope.  That was one of the reasons, maybe, that I became a fast runner.

Alas, it was not always possible to escape the marauders, so fighting became the only alternative to being pummelled and punished repeatedly.  It was safer to stand up to the bullies, even if I lost the fight, than to do nothing.

My father quietly helped me with the dilemma of disobeying my mother by suggesting that, although her sentiments were correct, fighting back when attacked was okay.  Starting a fight was really the thing to avoid.

I still remember an occasion in my mid-teens, when my mother agreed to accompany my father to watch me play a hockey game, the first time she had done so.  About halfway through, I became involved in a fight on the ice, not one I started, and was ejected, along with my opponent.  My mother was, by all accounts, aghast.

hockey fight

Although I played recreational hockey for another forty years, she never attended another of my games.

That incident shapes my outlook today when I consider the state of humankind on the planet we all inhabit.  Christ was not the only person to preach peace and love; many devout prophets professing other faiths have advanced the same messages.

But just as not every Christian follows Christ’s teachings obediently, so, too, do some adherents of other religions also stray from their prophets’ words.

The situation is complicated by the fact that there are also false prophets from all religions, who have preached a wilfully-distorted or violent version of the message, demanding their adherents forcefully convert everyone to what they call the true faith—and failing that, to kill them.  They have existed under many guises—the Christian Crusades, Islamic jihad, radical Zionism, the Hindu saffron terror, and so many more.

They survive even today, in a god-eat-god world.

'Its a god eat god world.'

If we assume that the vast majority of people alive right now want to live in peace and harmony—perhaps not anxious to love their neighbours, but at least happy to leave them alone—then why is there so much warfare and bloodshed across the globe?  Are we being driven to demise by the bloodthirsty minority, the zealots, and (as a friend likes to call them) the lunatic fringe?

As a questioning Christian at yet another Easter (believing in the wisdom of Christ’s teachings, but unsure about the promise of a heavenly hereafter), I see benefit in acknowledging, if not a literal resurrection, at least a continuing relevance of his message.  And further benefit in acknowledging the similarities between that message and those of other great prophets of different faiths.

Back in that long-ago schoolyard, there was ample space for me to run from those who would harm me.  On this increasingly-crowded planet Earth, however, whither can we flee from the radicals and fanatics seemingly bent on our destruction?

Shall we turn the other cheek, perhaps to be slaughtered?  Shall we fight back, perhaps ensuring mutual annihilation?

Or shall we continue to do what we can to spread those universal messages of peace, tolerance, faith, forgiveness—and, perhaps most importantly, love for all humankind, even our enemies?

love

It is up to all of us in the end.  Or it will be the end of us.