Born into a Catholic family and a predominantly Christian town, the first stories I remember were from the Bible. The Old Testament accounts of Noah and his ark, David and Goliath, and Moses and the Hebrews’ exodus from Egypt all were repeated throughout my childhood,adolescence, and even today. The one story that definitely sticks out the most (perhaps to thewhole world) is thestory of creation, God forming the world as we know it within six days, and even having a day to kick back and relax. It all seemed pretty impressive to me. Teachers, parents, and religious authorities couldn’t stress enough that with a simple command, “Let there be...” there was life. God was the big man in the sky that was nonchalantly dipping His paintbrush into the mystical and making the nonexistent into (beautiful) life. Pretty convincing stuff for a four year old to become another God-fearing cradle Catholic, which is exactly what I am.
I say “am” because to me, even after hearing theories of evolution and the endless arguments the rest of the world seems to have on the Artist, I can’t seem to escape my roots and doubt the sense of being created rather than have evolved. Now I don’t want to get off on that subject because that’s not why I connect so well with the story of creation, but rather, it helps me to identify where I am from and how I was raised. Now being a Christian, it is my belief to respect my fellow inhabitants of this world, which includes their religions and belief systems, so I find it fascinating to learn about other cultures’ story of creation. And just about every culture: the Atzecs, the Chinese, the Native Americans, the African tribal civilizations all have creation stories which leads me to believe that it is in our human nature to question and wonder where we came from, why are we here, what happens after life and so forth.
Meet Quetzalcoatl, the Atzec god of creation and life. He's easy on the eyes, too.
These questions have led to one of the single most important concerns of our human existence: self-expression. To me, the creation story is as much about the created as it is about the creator, whoever or whatever it may be. The divinely inspired story of creation, no matter which version/culture, sets the example for ideas and ingenuity giving us, the created, full-range of self-expression. The created become the creators.
I like how you brought up the side of the created in this story. That makes it much more universal. Instead of focusing on the various different creation stories I like how you brought up that, in the end, we were all created and are all living now.
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