One of the loveliest stories to appear in the press recently has concerned Alex Renton, an agnostic who sends his daughter to a church school in Scotland. Recently he caught his daughter Lulu writing a letter to God which went "To God. How did you get invented?"
All credit to the Renton family. Rather than burning the letter up the chimney as his daughter asked or giving her some sort of pat answer. Instead, he e-mailed the letter to various church bodies. The Scottish Episcopal Church didn't get around to replying, nor did the Presbyterians and the Scottish Catholics did reply but gave quite a complex answer. Alex also sent the letter to “the head of theology of the Anglican Communion, based at Lambeth Palace” – and this was the wonderful response:
"Dear Lulu,
Your dad has sent on your letter and asked if I have any answers. It’s a difficult one! But I think God might reply a bit like this –
‘Dear Lulu – Nobody invented me – but lots of people discovered me and were quite surprised. They discovered me when they looked round at the world and thought it was really beautiful or really mysterious and wondered where it came from. They discovered me when they were very very quiet on their own and felt a sort of peace and love they hadn’t expected.
Then they invented ideas about me – some of them sensible and some of them not very sensible. From time to time I sent them some hints – specially in the life of Jesus – to help them get closer to what I’m really like.
But there was nothing and nobody around before me to invent me. Rather like somebody who writes a story in a book, I started making up the story of the world and eventually invented human beings like you who could ask me awkward questions!’
And then he’d send you lots of love and sign off.
I know he doesn’t usually write letters, so I have to do the best I can on his behalf. Lors of love from me too.
+Archbishop Rowan"
Isn't that brilliant? I think its one of the best explanations of God's "invention" that I've seen anywhere, to people of any age, never mind aged 6!
Anyway the Renton family were so impressed that they contacted the Times about it. And I'm very glad they did as the story deserves a wider readership.
