A Piece of Pi

In chapter 6, "A Piece of Pi," Mack and Papa/God/Queen Latifah (as I imagine this characterization of God to look in my head) begin to get to know each other a little bit, or perhaps again. They make small talk for a while, but eventually Mack says, "You know, calling you 'Papa' is a bit of a stretch for me." Papa asks him why he thinks this is, offering that perhaps it is because God is showing Himself as a woman and a mother. Then, she says, "Maybe it's because of the failings of your own papa."

Mack is visibly surprised. "He wasn't used to having deep secrets surface so quickly and openly," as Young writes. Mack says, "Maybe it's because I've never known anyone I could really call 'Papa.'" At this, Papa stops what she is doing, holds Mack's face, looks him in the eye, and says, "If you let me, Mack, I'll be the papa you never had."

Mack struggles with this. He really wants to let Papa be this for him, but this Papa couldn't even protect Mack's daughter. What could she ever do for Mack? Papa answers that there is no easy answer that will take Mack's pain away. She says, "I have no magic wand...Life takes a bit of time and a lot of relationship."

They somehow get onto the subject of why God chose to appear as a mother and a woman. She says, "After what you've been through [alluding to Mack's past with his own father], you couldn't very well handle a father right now, could you?"

They transition to the topic of Mack's freedom of choice to go or stay. Papa says that freedom can never be forced. The truth will set him free, and the truth has a name. She says, "Everything is about [Jesus]. And freedom is a process that happens inside a relationship with him. Then all that stuff you feel churnin' around inside will start to work its way out." Mack makes some comment about how Papa could never know how he really felt. Papa looks at her wrists, which have deep scars, and begins to cry. "Love always leaves a significant mark. We were there together," she says. "Regardless of what he felt that moment [alluding to Jesus' cries about God forsaking him on the cross], I never left him...and I have never left you...the story didn't end in his sense of forsakenness. He found his way through it to put himself completely into my hands. Oh, what a moment that was!"

Wow. What a picture. I've always been taught that God really did turn His back on Jesus on the cross because Jesus took all the sin of the world upon himself, which separated him from God. This is something completely contradictory and completely comforting.

Papa goes on to say at the end of the chapter, after a long commentary about the Trinity and how Jesus could be fully human and fully God, "...unless I had an object to love...I would not be capable of love at all...you would have a god who, when he chose could love only as a limitation of his nature. That kind of god could not possibly act without love...And that is surely not me...The God who is -- the I am who I am -- cannot act apart from love!"

So where is God in the midst of tragedy? Right there with us, whether we feel it or not. Right there loving us, feeling our sorrows, rejoicing in our joys, neither leaving nor forsaking us. That's the kind of God we serve.