It brought to life civilizations yet sent people to the stake. It gave a boy his freedom yet bound his father in chains. It set a crown on Elizabeth’s head yet relieved Mary’s of hers. It begot the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, then became the rope which hanged them.

It is hard for us to make sense on any given level for all thought is fabricated, an aberration. We are non-contingent human beings. Our personality is sketchy and unformed, our heartlessness goes deep and is persistent. Our conscience, our pity, our hopes disappeared a long time ago (probably in Cambridge) if they ever did exist.

We are the smoke rising from the old religion—and have you ever tried to seize smoke?

The last barrier has been razed yet we set them up anew. All we have in common with the uncontrollable and the insane, the vicious and the evil, all the mayhem we have caused and our utter indifference toward it, we have now surpassed. We still, though, hold on to one single bleak truth: nothing is safe, nothing is redeemed.

Is evil something you are or something you do? We see joy on a child’s face and hope to punish him for it. We hope for the future of the world yet will our curses upon it. We want to save; we want to condemn.

But even after admitting this—and we have countless times in every act we’ve committed—and coming face-to-face with this truth, there is no catharsis. No deeper knowledge about ourselves, no new understanding, no new insight, no new hope. We are trapped by our own genius. We know who we are yet wreak destruction upon it. We are incapable of truly loving anyone, yet incapable of persisting without it.

Mors Dei is merely an idea, an intangible concept, an illusion. And though we may hide behind cold formalism and appear genuine in our words, it remains uncertain whether we’re friends or foes. We leave that for you to decide.