An Evening in the House of the Gods

Imagine you have just spent the evening in the house of the gods and now you are stepping out of their front porch and into the street – how would you be? Would you be elated beyond control? Or just filled with unspeakable joy? Or maybe you have a deep sense of satisfaction that nothing in this world has possibly ever given you! Or just that the evening, although measured in time, felt like eternity, in a good way of course, and you didn’t want it to end? Maybe you felt redeemed through the stories told or even saved through their hospitality, maybe even forgiven by their kindness, given a new life and hope through the inspired words uttered during the evening? Or just the sheer ecstasy of meeting with the gods!

Even as you step out, you recollect your stepping in, when you first entered into their home – not extravagant, but tastefully done – the gods have no need to prove their wealth! The environment captures you instantly! The fragrance of the incense, the flickering lights of a thousand candles, the soothing music, indeed the very best of the classical masters, filling the house, drawing you in, inner and beyond the space that you occupy. It was not a museum you entered, but a home, a genuine dwelling place that you immediately were able to call as home, your home. And yet, it was adorned with artefacts, each with a story more interesting than the form they represented, and you did get to hear those stories through the drawling night.

The gods have a life of their own, their families, their tragedies, and even their romances. Their love stories ignite passion and their romances desire! Their sorrows brim your eyes with tears, and in their sorrow you experience catharsis. But it’s their tragedies that capture you the most, the inevitable paradoxes of good rewarded with evil, the rich driven into poverty, the wise made to look foolish and the foolish wise. But maybe the greatest tragedy was to see them, the gods constrained by their humanity – humans and yet gods, gods for sure but in human form! The aura, the beauty, the love is indeed divine and yet formed and embodied in frail humanity. You could touch them, hug and hold tight, and in their embrace you found warmth.

But there must be miracles you say, no one can see god and yet not receive a miracle! But what about the miracles the gods experience, the miracles they enthusiastically share while refilling your glass with the best of France. Amazing stories, of men ministering to the gods, women foretelling unavoidable doom, and yet with love, with compassion, through incarnation, by the sending of a gift, the gift was itself a symbol, the symbol contained the message, a future story, definitely a tragic story – foretelling the event of the son of the gods, a misfired shot, in prime of youth, death in the most unlikely of places! The memory darkens their radiant faces and the gods shed silent tears! You reach out to console, hold their hand, angelic figures indeed, even as the gods are helped, you tell yourself – this indeed is the mother of all miracles – me a human, helping the gods, in their own home!

Everything around you fills you with a sense of wonder even as they draw you on to themselves, and beyond. The images, the pictures, the icons, they beckon you, and you stand before them reverentially, hat in hand, immersed in wonder, awe and joy. You gaze at their beauty and fall in love, in love with a picture, an icon, someone you have never met – a yearning for a stranger, someone you do not know. After all you are in the house of the gods, anything is possible, I mean, everything is possible!

You stand up to leave, filled with ambrosia, you stand with new confidence. There is a bounce in your step, even as you walk down the street, you know you have been divinized, as nothing less is possible after an evening in the house of the gods.