A Stitch In Space
Page 21
I also want to address the success which Fr. Xris had in making converts. This again was specific to the people he encountered. As I mention in the note addressed to atheists, I did not make my characters do anything for the sake of indulging in wishful thinking. I wrote the characters as consistent with the personalities which they seemed to me to have, and sometimes that surprised me. Freia’s interest in Christianity was actually something of a shock to me. I did expect Hannah to be interested, but I didn’t know—when I started the novel—whether she would actually convert or just be one of those people who are interested but never act on that interest.
Equally important, from the point of view of evaluating success, is the rather larger number of people with whom Fr. Xris discussed his religion, and who never showed any interest and never came within 100 miles of converting.
In evangelization like everything else, our job is merely to do our best. Determining whether we succeed is God’s job. Evangelization so often fails to win converts, especially in the short term, that this truth can be easily obscured. Indeed, we have no way of knowing whether God’s plan for us involves even our eventual success. It may be our job merely to sew seeds, and to leave it to others to reap what we have sown. Perhaps His purpose for me or for you is to be an example to others of patient faith, and our success would actually undermine His purposes.
Worrying about our success can be especially dangerous, as it can lead us to become impatient. Taking shortcuts does not always work out well even in traveling from one place to another. In evangelization, shortcuts are likely to end in tremendous damage. I’ve never yet heard of a bully who achieved anything but making himself feel good.
Author’s Note to Atheists
This story contains several examples of characters who come to believe in Christianity, but none who cease to believe in it. This fact may leave the book open to the charge of being an exercise in wish fulfillment.
The first thing I would like to note in addressing this is that both characters who come to Christianity are not atheists but pagans. The dominance of Christianity within western culture which is still within recent memory may make all metaphysical belief systems which are not Christianity seem alike, but in fact Paganism is much closer to Christianity than it is to Atheism. (Western Atheism, which for the most part is more properly called Materialism, is probably closest to the Buddhism of Siddhartha Guatama, which was itself fundamentally atheistic.)
My main response to such a charge, however, is that it is simply untrue. When I came up with this story I started with the idea of a priest in space, itself given to me by a friend, and when I came up with the other characters, I had no idea of how their story would turn out. As I got to know the characters, they began to behave consistently with their own personality, in many cases surprising me. Freia, in particular, was probably to me the most surprising. When she quoted from the bible, no one could have been more shocked than me.
The other thing to note, in understanding how the story goes, is that I have posited a future in which Christianity is a minority religion. The direction of conversions in this story is a natural consequence of this; for a variety of reasons, conversions from a majority religion to a minority one are more common than the other way around.
Additional
Artwork
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Tom Rothamel, who suggested that I write a story about a priest in space. Should anyone be inclined to blame him for the existence of this novel, I will say in his defense that he had suggested I write a short story. I was the one who decided to turn it into a full-length novel.
I would like to thank Harry Colin and Michael Murray, who were intrepid enough to test-read a late-stage draft of this novel, and whose feedback proved very helpful.
I would like to thank Beth Skwarecki for doing the arduous work of copy-editing (the first half of) this novel for me.
I would like to thank Daniel Tyka for his excellent work on the cover art and for his patience with my inexperience in commissioning artwork.
I would also like to thank the originators and current organizers of National Novel Writing Month. The bulk of this novel was written during NaNoWriMo in 2012, and its deadlines and encouragement proved invaluable. I added about another 10,000 words to that initial draft over the next several months, then began the long process of editing the novel since then, taking a break for about 6 months to write, edit, and publish Ordinary Superheroes.
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Table of Contents
Preface
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Epilogue
Author’s Note
Author’s Note to Christians
Author’s Note to Atheists
Additional Artwork
Acknowledgements