Falling Stones

I feel dirty.

I just finished reading a short story by Shirley Jackson. The story is called The Lottery. It's a pleasant enough story at first. It begins with a nice use of imagery. The entire town is getting together for a social event - the lottery. Children are excitedly playing with stones still enjoying the freedom from school granted to them because of summer. Grown men hang around talking about the weather and their farms and the adult things of life. Women were huddling together in gossip or else tending to their children. It all had a very pleasant home-spun sort of a feel to it.

According to the book, "The lottery was conducted - as were the square dances, the teenage club, the Halloween program - by Mr. Summers..." The lottery seems to be a very pleasant affair of entertainment for the community and Mr. Summers himself is described as a very jovial, cheerful man.

As the lottery itself begins to take place there is a heightening of suspense. A sort of anticipation that builds up for the inevitable climax. But then...

Then we hit the climax and run from it straight to the conclusion. The climax is this: whoever the lottery "winner" is gets to be stoned to death by his or her family and friends and neighbours.

Now, tell me this, where is this sense of evil borne? Where does it come from?

I mean, I admit I am not a very good guy. I am just as evil as the next guy, but never would I entertain such pleasantness as to make murder - senseless murder - a sport. They took a woman, Mrs. Hutchinson, and stoned her to death. There was no reason for it. In the Bible they committed brutal acts such as stoning but always with reason, and never as a plaything or pleasant pastime. People have always enjoyed violence, don't really know why but I suppose because it gives them a sense of power or authority. The carnage done in the Coliseum and in so many other instances of history are disturbing. But to reach a fictitious short story and see it come to life in someone's mind as an almost happy thing is far more disturbing. Perhaps the author had intended to show the hypocrisy of society or some other theme. I don't know. All I know is that I feel dirty from having read that. I feel dirty because I compare myself to that evil, that wickedness, and feel as if I were somehow better than they. Better than the fictitious killers of the story and better even than the author who hatched such a plot. But the reality is that I am just as bad as they are. I feel dirty because, although I resent it, I do identify with the plot. I am a killer. I have stoned people to death in my conversations, in my actions, and in many ways. I am not off the hook. I am not guilt free. I am not able to escape jail.

But then again I am. Because of Jesus I can stand upright and not receive the blows of the stones that should rain down on me.