Oh Lord - Scroll One
(November 2020 earth calendar)
These are the official accounts in three parts recording meetings between our Lord and his only son. The audiences took place between September 2020 and July 2022.
The minutes were taken by Cicero, a former Roman Statesman, because, ‘he could write a bit’.
(Being a lawyer, Marcus Tullius Cicero had wheedled his way into heaven despite a sketchy C.V.)
‘Hello Father, you got a minute?’
‘Sure, my son, come and sit down. What can I do for you?’
‘It’s about our 'Earth' experiment.’
‘Aahh.’ Pause. ‘Yeees.’
‘Quite. Anyway, time for an update. As you know we created that hot swamp, then allowed a single-cell life-form to escape. From there we let evolution take its course. Well, I’ve come to report where we’re up to.’
‘Good, I’ve been wondering what happened. If memory serves, it was about three and a half billion earth years ago when we launched that project wasn't it?’
‘That’s right, although we caused some confusion when I went to have a look-see a couple of thousand earth years back.’
The Lord chuckled. ‘Indeed. It took a bit of fancy footwork to get you home again.’
‘It sure did. Not sure I'd want to go through all that again! Anyhow, if you remember, that first single cell divided into two. Each half then developed a nucleus and slowly, but quite distinctly, two quite distinct branches of life developed. The first evolved into flora. There were early lichens, protozoa, ferns, corals, bacteria, and sponges for example. They all lived perfectly happily alongside each other, resolving disputes and adapting to a harmonious existence. In fact, so successful have they been that many thrive today basically unchanged in their original form.
‘Indeed,’ said The Lord, ‘some of our finest work I think.’
‘I agree. However, it’s the second branch where things seem to have gone slightly awry. The second demi-cell evolved into fauna, basically animal life. Most species developed and adapted wonderfully well. Some quickly evolved into dominant creatures, a few of which continue almost unchanged to this day. Others, although thriving for millions of earth years, were unlucky and were wiped out by cosmic interference. Perhaps that was partly our fault but, well, it’s too late to worry about that now.
‘All was progressing pretty smoothly till a couple of million years ago when something called Homo Erectus appeared. They were an illogical and peculiar development and we weren’t sure whether The Prince (referring to The Prince of Darkness, the devil himself) had a hand in messing about with an unwilling creature’s DNA. But, despite being irregular creatures, in the early days, they were happy enough. They developed an opposable thumb, particularly important when playing darts and spanning an octave on the piano. Simultaneously they developed a higher intelligence than many other fauna and soon realized that they could take over. They decided they needed to dominate, rule over the other creatures, even the weak of their own kind. Naughty really don’t you think?’
‘I do detest confrontation,’ said The Lord. ‘It just seems all so…… unnecessary. Mind you, your water into wine trick seemed to be the catalyst for plenty of aggressive behaviour. Ongoing I might add. These humans seem to have a problem managing the effects of most elixirs. They tried to hide their lack of capacity by changing the original name of ‘Murder a Lot’ to ‘Merlot’, but it fails to disguise their underlying frailties.’
‘Yes, unfortunate, but despite that little, uh….. wrinkle, at the end of the day we basically let them get on with their own evolution. We can’t afford to intervene too much, it would the compromise the data. I'd hate to come to the wrong conclusions. The thought of passing on various creature’s idiocy to future worlds doesn’t bare thinking about.’
‘I suppose you’re right.’ The Lord sighed theatrically. ‘Do go on.’
‘Right, well, in our analysis so far, the real problem involves a group who call themselves human beings. The name itself suggests a life-form in some confusion. I’ve asked around and quite why the word ‘beings’ is tacked on the end nobody is sure. ‘Humans’ on its own would do perfectly well. Then humans themselves split in two and became known as humans and huwomans. Intrinsically they are the same beast with a few minor physical discrepancies. Subsequently they appear to have dropped the title huwoman. And then, inexplicably, they lumped everything under the less intelligent brand, ‘human’. Nevertheless, the point is that this branch seems to have started off as one half of a single cell, progressed quite nicely for a while, then started a major reverse. A direction in which it is still heading. Humans have evolved into something quite unpredictable, to the point of obnoxious, even reckless at times.’
‘Oh dear.’ Said the Lord, raising his white eyebrows.
‘Quite, not only do they seem hell bent on destroying all the flora, frankly the most attractive evolutionary half, but they also appear to have begun to self-destruct. I don’t know if you remember, but when humans created a thing they called an atomic bomb in the year 1945 of their calendar, I sent a memo to the disciples warning that it may be the beginning of the end of ‘Experiment Earth’. Humans had found a way to destroy themselves. And, I might add, everything else as well. They appear to have come quite close to an apocalypse a number of times but pulled back at the last moment. But, the threat remains with ever-more powerful devices. The whole situation is exacerbated because they insist on choosing leaders of doubtful countenance. There are a few current incumbents who simply wouldn’t have the sensitivity to survive if they lived among the sponges.’
‘Oh Lord,’ Said The Lord.
‘One of the problems,’ continued Jesus, ‘was a simple piece of miscommunication. During their early development I sent an emissary to suggest the humans divided earth into regions. I believed it would not only spice up our experiment but also make it straightforward for the humans to govern themselves in more manageable groups.
Unfortunately, somewhere along the way, ‘region’ was misspelled as ‘religion’. Somehow LI got added. LI actually denotes the number fifty-one in one of their ancient languages, uncomfortably close to fifty-two, the area where our emissary actually landed on earth. So, what they should have had was a number of individually autonomous, peaceful areas. Instead, in addition to our Christianity, they ended up with eight or nine main ‘religions’. Your counterparts, the spiritual leaders of these other religions, are noble deities like yourself, utterly trustworthy and beings of peace and love. The problem is that each religion has a great many followers and within their number exist enough lunatics who want to cause trouble, which they do in the name of their chosen religion. Sadly, this drags down the venerableness of the whole shooting-match. Unintended pun there, but you get my meaning. Consequently, the humans, rather than living in harmony, have battled and bickered for aeons. The only useful service that these hostilities perform is to periodically check rampant overnumbering. Of course, in reality that’s not too big a deal because we merely withhold a virulent pandemic or two. The point to it all is that it appears that these so-called ‘intelligent humans’ cannot be left to their own devices.
Not only have they developed unnerving, murderous tendencies, they are also failing to develop in positive areas either. For example, they have only managed to visit another celestial body on half a dozen occasions, and each of those to their nearest neighbour. Not a great record, I think you’ll agree for a species that considers itself perceptive and resourceful. And on those occasions, so alarmed were ‘The Moonies’ at 'the invasion of ‘The Unhinged’', they took to their underground burrows till their unwanted visitors had departed. I can’t say I blame them. There’s every chance the locals would have been decimated and a flag plonked on the moon’s surface in claim.’
They broke for lunch here after which The Lord had a nap and Jesus went to the driving range to see if he could reproduce the miracle of a straight three-iron. Please click the link below for Scroll Two.
© Marcus Cicero 2020