Have you ever wondered how religions can possibly reconcile the fact that their deity is omnipresent, omnipotent, and omniscient, and yet they are not responsible for evil? This is my answer to you.

The universe is governed by two forces, the Seer and the Mover. They have always existed and will continue to exist forever, for they are indestructible and eternal. The Seer remembers all that happened in the past and knows all that will happen. To Her, all events stretch out in an unalterable and static sequence extending ad infinitum to the past and future. However, She is deaf, and she is without any power to change this sequence of events or carry out that which she sees. The Mover, however, does not have memory, cannot foretell the future, and is mute, but He has limitless power to create and destroy. The Seer commands the Mover in every action, and the Mover invariably obeys.

The Seer and the Mover, in fulfilling their destiny, gives birth to two twins: the girl they name Serena and the boy they name Chaos.  As children of their immortal parents, they inherit half of their traits from each of their parents. Serena is endowed the fine craftsmanship of her father and the pensive nature of her mother. She spends her time molding beautiful things and is ever at her mother’s side attending to her needs. Chaos takes after his father in his boundless energy and dynamism, while he is more like his mother in his intellectualism and awareness of past and future. He spends his time as an assistant to his father, running to and fro in an endless stream of errands.

At one point in time the Seer says to her daughter: “Serena, make a utopia, and let me perceive its perfection.”

Serena obeys, as she always does. She crafts a world within a single point, but inside it was untapped potential and ideal Forms. It was lifeless and perfect. All the parts contained within has no motion, and therefore it is in complete harmony. Her mother regarded it and saw that it was good.

Chaos approaches to see what his sister has created. “Let me see it!” He demanded. “Why, there is nothing moving in this?” Before his sister could protest, Chaos pulled the perfect world apart and released its potential. He gave motion and life to the world, the Big Bang.

“You’ve ruined it!” Serena exclaims. “Now that the world is in motion, it would move away from its perfect state and will degrade into complete disorder! Stars will be born; they will collide into one another, and they will explode or dwindle.  Living things will be born and they shall strive with one another and their world until they die. You have introduced evil to my world by giving it life, and there shall be discord in a universe that was once still and perfect.”

Serena knows that her ideal world is beyond repair. Chaos will prevail by consuming her perfect world until all things shall turn to dust, until every atom has been converted into useless energy. Chaos gives life and motion to all things, while Serena brings death and stillness to her creation; however, Chaos will ultimately win because the world can only become more disorderly. So, as you can see, every breath that we take is just Chaos directing the universe’s course to maximum entropy. To live and to give motion to things is to create discord in the countless forms of collision, competition, and consumption. Live is the verb for evil; it is no coincidence that the two words are composed of the same letters, only backwards.

A story cannot be captured in a instant, and must take place over some time interval to allow for change, for that is the nature of stories, a documentation of change. But stories can be mute, for all that story means is an interaction or an exchange between some given existents. The story of our universe is mute, and Chaos is the storyteller of our universe. And though we have only one possible ending, we must dwell in his and the Seer’s predetermined story, or fate, if you like that label better.

Be careful about the stories you tell and the stories you listen to  — because once a story is told it can never be taken back.

Works cited:

“Determinism.” The Information Philosopher. Informationphilsopher.com. N.p. N. d. Web. 29 May 2015. http://www.informationphilosopher.com/freedom/determinism.html

Lavender, Gemma. “What is Heat Death?” Space Answers. Spaceanswers.org. N.p. 17 May 2013. Web. 29 May 2015. http://www.spaceanswers.com/deep-space/what-is-heat-death/

“Plato and The Theory of Forms.” philosophical society.com. Philosophicalsociety.com. N.p. N.d. Web. 29 May 2015. http://www.philosophicalsociety.com/archives/plato%20and%20the%20theory%20of%20forms.htm

Van den Dungen, Wim. “Essay on Theodicy.” Philsoophy: Theodicy. SOFIATopia.org. N.p. N.d. Web. 29 May 2015. http://www.sofiatopia.org/equiaeon/theodicy.htm

In his book If This is Your Land, Where are Your Stories? Finding Common Ground, Chamberlin quotes W. E. H. Stanner’s observation that the word “home” in English is not heavy with meaning like the Aboriginal’s use of the word, which they tend to associate with cultural objects like hearth, totem place, and spirit centre (79). In thinking about land and home as one entity, one must negotiate the contradiction that home is imaginary and land is a reality. But our interpretation of reality is dependent on the way in which our mind synthesizes the physical objects felt through our senses together with the dreams, thoughts, hopes, motives, and expectations formed by our sense of past, present, and future. As a result, the way that we talk about land will inevitably invite the telling of stories about its historic exploitation, its present ownership, and future possibility; our discussion of home conversely must confirm or even reject reality, and so in one way or another, refer to the physical reality of where this sense of home is mapped.

If home is a sense of belonging, then its meaning must embody more than its locality. This discussion of home reminds me of a passage in The Wanderer about how sense of belonging is derived, in which the speaker tells the audience how his wandering has not found him a new home:

“wretched, from there/ travelled most sorrowfully/ over the frozen waves,/sought, sad at the lack of a hall,/ a giver of treasure,/ where I, far or near, might find/ one in the mead hall who/ knew my people, or wished to console/ the friendless one, me,/ entertain (me) with delights.” (24-29)

This poem reveals to us that in the stories we tell about belonging, it is often the people that we find in a place that figure most importantly, and the interactions that forge those emotional connections. Place is given a secondary importance in this definition of home, and while places actively shape the interactions that play out, one might imagine that those interactions, like giving gifts and providing consolation, are so universal that they could have taken place anywhere in the world. Our stories may be flavoured and accented by its locality, but the stories attempt to give significance to our innate and most basic human desires, that of making connecting ourselves to the external world and the people in it. Perhaps it is in appreciating and accepting the universality of the purpose of narratives and their common themes across cultures that we can learn to find common ground, as Chamberlin urges us to do so.

With this in mind, let us re-examine the significance of home in the Canadian context. If stories of home are suppose to give us a way to connect to one another in the country, but our history is one of displacing the Aboriginals and putting them in reserves, these stories are at odds with one another. The current Conservative government is actively promoting the story that Canada was born just 150 years ago, spending millions of dollars to remind citizens of the contributions of Canadians in military exploits and the battles we have fought abroad. This limiting definition of nationhood betray a sense of disunity when these stories are hardly relevant to newcomers and all those who did not participate in the war, and have tenuous links to the land in which we live. Yet the Aboriginal stories focus on stories about the land in such a way that anybody can experience and relate to, because all Canadians live on this land. They use local animals we can see to tell stories of morality and purpose, of how they too give gifts and provide consolation to one another. They use landscapes to talk about the history and future of the place in which we live. The common ground that we want to pursue may lie in talking about the experiences of living in this land in the past, in the present, and in the future.

Works Cited:

“Canada 150” Government of Canada. N.p. n.d. Web. 22 May 2015.

Chamberlin, J. Edward. If This Is Your Land, Where Are Your Stories? Finding Common Ground. Toronto: Vintage Canada, 2003. Print.

“The Wanderer.” Anglo-Saxons.net. N.p. N.d. Web. 22 May 2015.

Hi there! My name is Timothy Choi and I have just wrapped up my third year of studies at the University of British Columbia with a double major in piano performance and English Literature. I am doing this blog as partial fulfillment of the course requirements for English 470, Canadian Studies. In this course we will uncover the ways in which we can intervene in the development and attitudes surrounding Canadian literature, while analyzing the ways in which stories are told as well as which stories we hear and do not hear.

I will be honest; the sole reason why I am taking Canadian Studies is because it is mandatory for the completion of my English Literature major requirements. I have not read many works by Canadian authors, and I had done so only because it was required of me in one of my first year classes. It isn’t that I hold anything against Canadian literature; it’s just that there is nothing particular that strikes me as interesting about what people have to say about Canada. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not as though I haven’t tried. In fact, I think I have tried harder than most people in this country to make sense of Canadian identity and to expose myself to all the experiences this country has to offer in hopes of uncovering its core attributes. When I was 15, I participated in Encounters with Canada, a program that allows youth to connect and meet from all across Canada in Ottawa for a week to learn and discuss a specific theme (my week was International Affairs). In the summer before entering university, I participated in the Explore program, where I spent five beautiful weeks in Jonquiere, Quebec learning French in the intensely Francophone environment. Both attempts at understanding Canadian identity more or less failed for me, but this summer I will embark on my third (and perhaps most ambitious) attempt. Paired with what I will learn and experience from this course, I will spend five weeks in Moncton with Explore and use this opportunity to experience the culture of the Maritime provinces. Following the end of the program in August, I will take a coast-to-coast train ride back to Vancouver, stopping in major cities along the way and passing through the varied and spectacular landscapes Canada has to offer. If I don’t feel any more Canadian after this summer, I don’t think anything could change me.

Stories of nationhood: fables to beguile young men to their early graves?

I am constantly skeptical towards the ideas that justify nationalism, and my background no doubt has something to do with this belief. Born a British citizen while Hong Kong was still a colony of the UK and never having received a Chinese passport, I became a Canadian citizen when I moved to Vancouver at age seven. Nationality seems to me like a mere title; when I visited UK for the first time last summer, it certainly did not feel like home, even though on paper I am, before I was ever anything else, a citizen of the UK. Even more odd and ironic is the fact that I am an ethnic Han Chinese who is not recognized as such on paper, even though anyone who looks at me can see that I am Chinese. The political reality of Canada feels to me like another remnant of colonialism from one and a half centuries ago. The fact that we continue to create stories for ourselves about how we are one nation feels to me like we are trying to preserve the legacy of colonialism, while failing or unwilling to acknowledge that our country is simply too diverse and dissimilar to justify or even validate the existence of a national identity. I already foresee myself playing the role of devil’s advocate in the class discussions, but I think it will enrich my understanding of what is Canada and challenge the beliefs of my peers, so we will all get something good out of my cynicism. I look forward to some lively and stimulating debates from my classmates!

Thanks for reading.

WORKS CITED

Choi, Timothy. “Timothy goes to Europe”. Timothy9. Travellerspoint. N.p. 2 Jan. 2014. Web. 14 May 2015.

Choi, Timothy. “Tyne Cot.” 2014. JPEG.

“Explore” Explore. N.p. n. d. Web. 14 May 2015.

“Home” Encounters with Canada. N.p. n.d. Web. 14 May 2015.

“Toronto-Vancouver Train”  Via Rail. N.p. n.d. Web. 14 May 2015.