Story Stew

The following is a paper I penned during my senior year at Hannibal LaGrange College for my Communication Theory class. It represents what later became part of the underlying philosophy behind how I see the world and understand my place in it. This, in turn, deeply affects how and why I write. Sit back, relax, and open your mind...

Once upon a time...

Stories, Mythos, Fantasy and Fairy Tales serve both as a mirror reflecting and a lamp illuminating (God’s) Truth. Pagan (or pre-Christian) stories reflect and illuminate God’s Truth too. Many bright eyes have seen the writing on the wall across all creation and within life. These stories, both written and oral, hold within themselves rare, timeless beauties to be treasured and retold-- not censured. Brooding tales found in the icy, Viking north such as in The Poetic Edda, or the plethora of oral Celtic tales told by firelight for thousands of years or even The Heliand all, through myth-telling, speak God’s story.

We are seemingly estranged from these ancient peoples. Many would refer to them as “heathen” while failing to understand the connotation, a common treatment of all things not found in the Christian bookstore today.

“Hedinen ‘some one who lives out on the heaths, a heathen’