A Piffany about Gods and Superheroes

As a child, every so often, I’d let out a “Shazam!” whether the situation called for it or not.

As a grown-up man-child, I still did! Or still do. But I cannot remember why the Saturday morning TV series from the 1970s would have Billy riding around in an RV with an old man when he has the powers of Shazam!

Watching the 2019 big-screen take on the superhero prompts different, new questions, too.

Such as:

Does the old wizard Shazam in the movie really just give up on finding a worthy champion and grab the next available mediocre white boy? If so, does this perpetuate the notion of white privilege — that a girl or a person of color has to excel so much more than any random white boy just for the opportunity of becoming a champion? Hadn’t the wizard considered any of the worthy foster kids in the home Billy Batson shares? Or did Billy have to consider them worthy?! These are questions that would send you down a deep rabbit hole, so let’s try some easier deep thoughts, shall we?

Billy Batson and his foster family live in Philadelphia, neither Gotham nor Metropolis, yet tied to the DC Comics Extended Universe by both film and comic book. The people of Philadelphia know Batman, Superman, Aquaman, Wonder Woman and The Flash exist, and that they fight crime, and yet…that does not stop criminals in Philadelphia, does it? If we lived in a world where superheroes exist, would we strive to become better humans ourselves? Or would we continue to fall victim to temptations and our defects of character?

In the movies, we’re left with the message that the bad guys will continue to plunder, so thank God that Gotham has Batman, that Metropolis has Superman. You’d think they would stop committing crime altogether in those cities, if not also around the Earth, knowing this. But no. Whether it’s stupidity, or selfish greed, or a lust for power, or envy — oh wait, here come the seven deadly sins coming for Shazam! — humans keep spreading suffering.

In our very real world, we’re often left asking similar questions with respect to big G God. Why would God allow millions of His creations to suffer if He were just and loving? Why would people ever kill in the name of God? Why would people go hungry, go homeless, go hopeless? Where is God for them?

And that’s without even defining who or what God is!

As we enter holy periods of observances for Jews (Passover), Christians (Good Friday/Easter) and Muslims (Mid-Sha'ban and Ramadan), now is as good a time as any to reflect on what binds us all together not just as humans, but as creatures in the universe. For the first time in recorded history, we now can see what a black hole looks like to our eyes! It’s a stunning reminder of how much we know and how much more we do not yet know about ourselves and the universe around us.

So what is God?

The funniest thing about your belief, if you even can stand to laugh at the audacity of faith, is that you most likely didn’t come to your first ideas of faith on your own. Your family chose your religious understanding for you. They raised you to believe in a very specific God.

In my case, my mother’s parents cared much more than my father’s parents or than my parents, and so I was baptized Methodist at the church just a few doors north from the home where my grandparents spent most of their lives. Through fortunate coincidences, I attended Sunday School at the same church as our local TV meteorologist, Hilton Kaderli (fun fact!), and his wife played for our class the “I Have A Dream” speech on what’s known as an LP, or long-playing record album. Although she never told us the even bigger fun fact, which was that the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. decided to minister after spending his first of two summers in our sleepy little town (super fun fact!!).

During confirmation classes at Simsbury United Methodist Church, my lingering memories take me back to fun debates with our pastor about the “facts” in Genesis, and of our field trips to churches and shelters in the cities of Hartford, Conn., and New York City.

Am I still a Methodist, tho? Did MLK ever go to my church? What do I believe?

This BBC synopsis of Methodist doctrine doesn’t seem too disagreeable:

1. All need to be saved - the doctrine of original sin

2. All can be saved - Universal Salvation

3. All can know they are saved - Assurance

4. All can be saved completely - Christian perfection

And yet. Must we hold as self-evident truth that each of us is innately sinful? Or can we instead posit that it’s only other humans and their societal constructs that lead us into temptation and evil?

I love finding allegories in popular culture.

Yoda, the small but mighty Jedi Master at the heart of the Star Wars saga, not only reminded me in one of my darker moments not to try — “Do or do not, there is no try” — but also gave us, via the words of George Lucas, this succinct summation of the dark side of humanity. “Fear is the path to the dark side. Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to suffering.”

Here’s another take on that, from Ringu Tulku Rinpoche, a Tibetan Buddhist Master of the Kagyu Order.

We fear things, places and people we do not understand. Especially if we do not try to understand them.

In my own experience, I have discovered that I only have fear when I lack faith. And I do not mean faith as in religious faith or belief in God, but rather, faith in the outcome of an action. No matter what you wish for — love, career success, or some other personal, physical or professional achievement — requires action. “Faith without works is dead” sounds the refrain in both the Bible and in the big books of 12-step recovery. Thoughts and prayers may put your mind at ease, but they will not manifest results. Results require work. Fear only exists in my life today when I allow indecision to paralyze me. Why would I allow that to happen? It’s akin to writing a to-do list, and then not doing any of the things on the list. Do I want to find everlasting love? Do I want to write books? Do I want to maintain a healthy physical and spiritual life? Of course. That I don’t know when or how these wishes will get fulfilled cannot get in the way of my pursuit of them. I must have faith that investing in my future will pay dividends in the future. Without placing a deadline on that pay-off.

Sometimes I hear people complain that they are stuck in a Groundhog’s Day loop. As if they are living the same day over and over again.

Let’s take a look at the videotape!

I hope I’m not spoiling the 1993 movie Groundhog Day for anyone reading this just now, but Bill Murray’s TV meteorologist (no Hilton Kaderli, he) isn’t exactly living the same day for most of this movie. As he explains in the clip above, he spent untold hundreds or thousands of Groundhog Days learning about everyone and everything in Punxsutawney, Penn., and has gotten himself killed in all sorts of ways, only to find himself back on Feb. 2, and telling his co-worker that “I’m a god.”

Which means he hadn’t learned anything yet. Because, in fact, while everything else in Punxsutawney moved like clockwork, Phil Connors (the guy Bill Murray plays) just keeps trying to bend the day to his whim. As if he were a god. He lives each Feb. 2 entirely propelled by self-will to suit his selfish agenda (get the girl, and get out of town), and not getting the results he seeks. It’s only when he makes the decision to stop acting in his own self-interest and to start helping others that he suddenly (after who knows how many more attempts) finds himself experiencing a life beyond his wildest dreams. It’s then and only then that he can move on with his life into Feb. 3 and everything that comes afterward.

So let’s get back to Yoda and “The Force” for a second.

Aside from finding Yoda a highly suitable higher power for myself, I’ve also found that George Lucas, in amalgamating several religious philosophies, discovered something quite profound and truly magical in The Force. Or Qi. In a production meeting for The Empire Strikes Back, Lucas reportedly said:

“The act of living generates a force field, an energy. That energy surrounds us; when we die, that energy joins with all the other energy. There is a giant mass of energy in the universe that has a good side and a bad side. We are part of the Force because we generate the power that makes the Force live. When we die, we become part of that Force, so we never really die; we continue as part of the Force."

I believe that we are all connected in this way.

As individuals, you and I contain multitudes. If kept in isolation, my multitudes will feed on themselves and convince me of alternate realities which simply are not true, yet feel very believable to me so long as I remain isolated. Once I plug into the collective, my individual energies combine with yours as a whole to create an entirely new energy. The results, sometimes tremendously wonderful; at other times, tragic. You’ve undoubtedly experienced this for yourself on a most visceral level. In a subway car, in an office meeting, in a restaurant, where everything is humming along, and then someone new enters the environment and the entire atmosphere shifts. It can be a crying baby. Or a smiling baby. Or a homeless man. Or a mariachi band. The new individuals bring their energy and influence the energies of everyone around them. It can even happen on the virtual level thanks to social media or TV news. Your mood can change in an instant just from exposing it to outside viewpoints. Some of us may shrink from these moments into isolation, into the comfort of our cubicles or our echo chambers. But doing so doesn’t solve or help anyone. Isolating only separates ourselves from the whole, separates ourselves from the greater good. Isolation only supports the growth of fear, which as my dear Yoda reminds us, leads us only to anger, then to hate, then to suffering.

Where is our God then? Where is our Superman to save us?

He may not come for us, but we may rise to the occasion. Rising does not mean we need to think of ourselves as God or as any superhero, either.

In Twelfth Night, or What You Will, William Shakespeare wrote: 

“Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon 'em.”

The rest of the passage, however, would apply seemingly as much to a hero as to the archenemy, advising the reader to achieve greatness by, in essence, not only faking it until you make it, but also by stepping on those beneath yourself. But Twelfth Night was a comedy. Back here on planet Earth, we’re left to ponder what makes someone truly great, truly heroic. Super or just plain old regular garden variety hero. You don’t have to be Spider-Man or Peter Parker to know that “with great power comes great responsibility.”

Or take Colossus in his speech to Deadpool, from the movie Deadpool: “Four or five moments - that's all it takes to become a hero. Everyone thinks it's a full-time job. Wake up a hero. Brush your teeth a hero. Go to work a hero. Not true. Over a lifetime there are only four or five moments that really matter. Moments when you're offered a choice to make a sacrifice, conquer a flaw, save a friend - spare an enemy. In these moments everything else falls away...”

In fact, you don’t need a radioactive spider to bite you to start becoming your friendly neighborhood superhero. Nor do you need to wait for heroic moments.

You don’t need to have time stand still, or find Darth Vader in your path, to achieve greatness. You can help neighbors and strangers alike without waiting for that life-or-death fight-or-flight circumstance. You don’t have to dream it into existence.

You can start doing the next right thing right now.

What are you waiting for?