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June 15, 2009

Atheists vs Believers: The Third Period

So Who will it be? Weeks have gone by with no clear resolution, but tonight the metaphysical hockey game will come to a close and we will finally know the truth.

As the players start their march from their dressing rooms, the fans in the stadium are out of their minds with excitement. The arena has become possessed by the game at hand and the enormity of the stake.

The players are also clearly affected by the atmosphere and the animosity between the teams is palpable. Dawkins in jawing with Aquinas while St. Anselm stares down Phillip Pullman. Yet there is one player who stands outside the fever pitch. As goaltenders usually are, the Believers goalie is quieter and more reserved than the other players. As the others head out to the ice, he remains in the dressing room focussing on the game at hand.

After a peaceful moment he pulls on his glove and blocker, picks up his stick and walks into the electric arena.

At puck drop the players stare each other down like and line up like soldiers on a battlefield. The sounds is deafening, yet the lonely Believer's goalie crouches quietly in his crease.

Referee Kant drops the puck and the players spring into action. Play moves into the Believers end and the puck rolls into the corner. It's hard to say exactly what happened next but an agressive Pullman collided with an equally spirited Anselm while battling over whether religion was important or not. Both players ended up lying on the ice, intertwined and unable to get up. The other players immediatly forgot about the puck and began pushing and shoving in the corner. Quickly things escalated from a normal hockey scrum to a full-out Donniebrook as the benches emptied and even Atheist goalie Karl Marx skated the length of the ice to join in.

Yet while the players on both sides tried to decapitate one another, the Believers goaltender remained an outside, watching what had been a good hockey game deteriorate into chaos. He knew right then there was only one thing to do.


He turned and skated towards the fighting players and threw down his gloves and stick, tossed his hemet away and skated into the crowd of swinging saints and dualing deniers, yet instead of joining in the battle he skated past them and knelt down beside the injured players on the ice. He asked them questions to find out how badly they were hurt and listened to what they had to say.

Meanwhile, the other players slowly stopped fighting, turned towards the 3 men on the ice and for the first time realized Pullman and Anselm had been hurt. But they were puzzled by what they saw. Of all they had heard about Jesus, Believers and Atheists alike, they expected to see something miraculous...an instant healing or divine intervention. Instead what they saw was the image of a man on his knees, listening intently to what both the Atheist and Believer had to say. What they saw was nothing other-worldly but something each and every one of them would have been cabable of doing if they hadn't been too busy fighting and arguing about who was right and who was to blame.

Now, at this moment the entire arena had become silent, with all eyes pointing at Jesus. With all the flashy plays, big saves and uppercuts thrown, it was a simple act of kindness that had captivated the audience and put the spotlight on the Believers goaltender who, given this opportunity, delivered a message as simple as the act that had stopped the fighting:

"For those of you that care to hear, God is here for God is love alone. To love one another as I have loved you was, and still is, the only truth there is. Your life is yours to live, and life is so important, but nothing is more important than being ready when you are called to be of service. Love is not religious, or scientific, but life itself and being open to living and loving is the only way true life can ever be experienced, otherwise you are only fighters, battling your way throuh life, blind to both the needs of others and yourselves."

With that, Jesus turned and skated towards centre ice. For a moment, the other players stood still, and then followed suit. When the players had lined up at centre ice, the shook hands and congratulated each other on a game well played and then headed for their respective dressing rooms with 19 minutes still left on the clock.

And so with that, the game ends decidedly undecided, ready perhaps to be continued a different day in a different place, but not here, not now. Although it may not feel as if anything has been resolved, the general feeling is that the premise for the game was all wrong anyways; that the question of God's existence was somehow less important than the result; that the message of peace and love delivered by Jesus was more important than anything else.

Will Grassby