The Thomas Chronicles

I have a confession to make. I love Stephen King’s writing.

I think he’s one of the most gifted writers of his generation, the Baby Boomers. The fact that he chose to direct his efforts to write predominately horror is incidental. His real gift and the reason why he’s become a household name is his knack of peering into the souls of men and relaying what he saw with sympathy.

His characters are all too human; their defects, their virtues, the little petty evils they do when they think others aren’t looking. They are like us, and he shows us just how capable we are of the most heinous acts. In his most recent movie adaptation of his novella, The Mist, he made this commentary of us via the characters:

Amanda Dunfrey: You don’t have much faith in humanity, do you?

Dan Miller: None, whatsoever.

Amanda Dunfrey: I can’t accept that. People are basically good; decent. My god, David, we’re a civilized society.

David Drayton: Sure, as long as the machines are working and you can dial 911. But you take those things away, you throw people in the dark, you scare the shit out of them - no more rules.

He turns his spotlight on mankind and finds us wanting. We, as another one of characters opined, are essentially a mad race. This is Stephen King’s novels all over. He takes the most malevolent person we think possible and reminds us that he’s still human— like us. His novels don’t shirk from the inevitability of such evil, that they make a desolation of their lives and the lives around them, but they are still nevertheless very human (minus the overt supernatural elements, of course).

This is why I find the statements of his most recent interview with Time Magazine puzzling to say the least.

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PING (pĭng) v. - an abrupt shift in long-held attitudes and beliefs, the result of which is usually contradictory to a person’s history, which also suggests an instability of mind, characterized by hysteria and wild accusations.

You won’t find the above definition in any dictionary or textbook. That’s ’cause I just wrote it. A friend of mine coined the term a few of years back and we’ve been using this term ever since to describe a peculiar phenomenon. After reading Bookworms post yesterday on Rosie O’Donnell’s comments on the Iranian hostage crisis, I thought this was an apt term for her actions.

It is easy to forget that Miss O’Donnell used wear the crown of “Queen of Nice” on daytime television because of the way she’s been acting lately. With good ‘ole Jerry Springer on her right and tough-as-nails Sally to her left (not to mention no-nonsense Judge Judy…), her talk show tried to prove that you could garner good rating and still be “nice”. Naturally, her schtick wasn’t my cup o’ tea, seeing that I still found her too abrasive and forcefully “comic”, but she didn’t do the ad hominems (not that I know of), and she smiled rather generously. She didn’t have the chair-throwing, hair-brain excitement of a Springer, but her show’s format wasn’t conducive to that sort of thing. It resembled the David Letterman show more than Jerry Springer.

She was nice and tried to be civil. Then some time around the turn of the millennium, she abruptly became hostile and belittling of virtually everything wholesome and American.

PING!

She was not alone. Notable Pingers include George Clooney, who used to be as pro-American as it gets but is now muddled in evil oil company, evil America conspiracies; Charlotte Church, who used to be the epitome of the angelic, sugar-and-spice girl but is now a vulgar anti-American, anti-Christian Leftist; lifelong military men, former U.S. generals aiding foreign groups and foreign powers to stop President Bush’s prosecution of the War on Terror; etc., etc…

Then there are the legions of Christians who up and decided that they aren’t going to worry about the Apocalypse anymore and are now “Name-It-And-Claim-It” prosperity doctrine Christians. (If we pray for a brand-spanking new Cadillac hard enough, God is going to give it to us… ) That sounds more like voodoo shamanism than Christianity to me. Nevermind that Christianity is a prophetic faith and that about two-thirds of the Bible is composed of prophecies.

These Pings! happen very often. I can’t tell you how many times I encounter it on the blogs. It’s that seductive temptation crossing all our minds, whispering into the dark caverns of our soul… “Go ahead, Thomas, don’t hold back. Indulge your judgments. They deserve it! Those haters! They judge you, why not give them a f–kin’ dose of their own medicine!”

If we give in and indulge, that gorgon, that ravenous beast that is our ego, will in the end devour all our loves until we become a shell of the men we once were. This is how a Christian goes PING! and becomes a Pharisee, so full of worldly, political concern that he would care nothing for the Kingdom of God. That’s who the Pharisees and the Sadducees were… the keepers of the Law.

On the road to work, on TV, in our government, in our military and our “watchmen”— these Pings! happen all around us.

The question used to go, “Who watches the watchmen?”

The answer is always and forever, “If God does not watch the watchmen, the watchmen watch in vain.”

God help them, but the perils of this world are endless. Let us hope they snap out of it, and that we’ll see them at the Wedding Feast before our Lord.