18-Apr-05 (Created: 18-Apr-05) | More in '05.10-Letters To My Daughter'

A man and his piety

Once upon a time there lived a man. He was certain there was Heaven. He was also sure there was only one way to get there. So he registered himself with the God of Heaven through his approved intermediaries and was assured of a place as long as he declared his allegiance to the God all his life.

The man had a wife and a few children. His wife would work all day for other people and gather food with the money earned. She Would then come home and cook a sumptuous meal. Our pious man would lay around the couch and watched movies, and played around with his video games, all in his immaculately maintained exterior, meaning his designer clothes, designer shoes, and designer hair. Although quite cute, the burden of children never attracted his attention as he was not sure that would affect his heavenly outcome one way or the other.

At dinner, he would ceremoniously arrive and serve himself ample portions, just in case if he was to get hungry at night. He would place himself at the table with immense satisfaction expressed with a toss of head and a sigh of relief. He would then declare his piety to the God by closing his eyes most reverently and thank God for such a wonderful provision. He would consume his food and at the end emit the most satisfying sounds, however rude they may be, and would leave the table leaving the emptied dishes for his wife or whoever else to clean. For a man of such reverence "cleaning dishes" did not come across as an act of piety nor thanking his wife. She was a mere mortal and she had no influence in Heaven.

Greatly impressed with the man's performance, God welcomed the man to the Heaven. The man looked around and he could see his wife no where. He said with an air of satisfaction, "I have told the foolish woman to sign up, and see now. I am here and she is not". The Heaven was fully populated. He eventually found his place. He was not sure, thought, why the Heaven looked so dingy.

That night when it was dinner time, he had no food. He was waiting to thank God. Yet there was no food.