Mob Psycho 100 and the Limitations of Perspective

Mob Psycho 100 is perhaps most known for being written by the same author as One Punch Man. The second season started this January, and I was all ready for another season of senseless fun and action. Unfortunately (or fortunately), the season this time around seemed to be more interested in pushing actual serious topics more than the first season. In episode 3, Reigan and Mob are asked to exorcise an “evil” spirit. However, after confronting the spirits and talking to them, Mob finds that they are a peaceful family who are only trying to complete the regret of not being able to be a happy family together while they were still alive. As such, Mob does not think they need to be exorcised like the usual spirits he eliminates. However, the clients (who can’t hear or interact with the spirits) don’t care what they or Mob have to say. The mere concept of spirits is that of evil and fear, and so to them, it is necessary to exorcise them regardless of any other reasoning. In this way, Mob is confronted with two different sides: the human side and the spirit side. Although the problem is resolved peacefully, Reigen realizes that Mob is someone who interacts with spirits on such a regular basis, that there is nothing abnormal about spirits to him. Rather than being a “fearful unknown,” spirits are simply a natural part of everyday life. It is a perspective that only Mob understands because of his affiliation with the spiritual.

So the natural comparison to draw here is that as Christians, we perceive the spiritual in terms of morality, sin, and mercy in ways that others do not comprehend as instinctively as we do. But rather than focusing on a holier-than-thou approach, I really want to focus only on the part that Christians perceive and think about things differently, without assigning any implication of that perception being better or worse. One frustration I have with Christians is that we tend to leap to judgmental assumptions about people who don’t share the same values or sense or morals as we do. Morality is a very tricky and sensitive subject because it is by definition a topic of right or wrong, good or evil. So it is understandable that people, especially those who believe in an objective morality determined by an all-powerful God, are so insulted by those who disagree with their sense of morals. As such, Christians get so upset when they see or hear about people who are not following the morals of Christianity. There are two problems with this. The first is that just because people are not following Christian values does not mean they are bad people or intentionally breaking any sense of moral code. There are probably hundreds of millions of people who, by any reasonable standard, are “good” people despite not believing in Christianity’s morals. I personally know many wonderful people who I strongly disagree with on certain topics. But they still care for others and try to be understanding about others’ feelings and perspectives, such as my own. They may be perceiving morality differently, but they are still striving to be people of respectable morality. These people are very different than those who actually lack a sense of morality or actively break laws for their own gains. The second is problem is that we Christians should not even be getting so judgment in the first place. The entire crux of Christianity is that we are all sinners; there is not one infallible person among us. Yet somehow Christians who sin are more acceptable to us because they “repent.” If anything, I would imagine it to be the other way around; Christians are the ones who should know better than to sin.

Reigen recognizes how different Mob’s perspective is compared to others. It’s not a matter of being special or more knowledgeable. It is nothing more than a statement of fact. He sees the world differently, and as a result, has feelings regarding things that completely contradict how others feel. It is not necessarily a matter of being right or wrong. Certainly, one can argue that Mob was in the right because the spirits were determined to do no harm. Even when tempted into anger, the father ghost resists and would rather be exorcised than harm a person.  However, the real point of contention was not who was morally correct; it was the contradicting perspectives of the characters at no fault of any of them. Even if we are to assume Mob was morally correct; even if we are to assume Christians are morally superior, the lack of perspective of the other side makes it so that they are not choosing to be wrong. They are simply unable to even perceive the “right” choice as a potential option. Therefore, rather than judging and becoming “morally” angry at people who do not follow Christian morals, what we should be doing is conversing about our different perspectives, why we believe them beyond “because my pastor says so,” (and I could rant a whole lot about the differences between morals described in the Bible versus morals described by “Christian” leadership)  and broadening perspectives of both parties – because as much of a perspective as others may be missing out on compared to Christians, Christians are missing out on the perspectives of others.

Therefore, let’s flip this moral superiority assumption Christians love to talk about and listen to. What if Christians are the ones who are morally wrong? What if we are the ones who simply don’t understand the reality of the world? The only way to prove otherwise is to go out and learn everything about the perspectives of others and then still decide Christianity to be the most moral option. As long as Christians don’t understand the perspectives of other beliefs, then we can’t say we are choosing Christianity or Jesus –we have not considered any other options. The fact of the matter is Christians rarely argue in good faith. Whenever they debate other perspectives, they always enter with the belief they are right; to be fair, opposing parties tend to do the same. Regardless, the point I want to make is that Christians all too often fail to understand or even consider other perspectives. Even when they legitimately attempt to, they can’t help but let their beliefs dye their interpretation of other perspectives with bias. And no wonder this happens when we are indoctrinated with beliefs from before we know how to speak.

No matter how much we want to believe we are being open-minded, we cannot fully escape from beliefs that have been repeated by everyone we know for our entire childhood. It is so difficult to truly approach a new perspective with an unbiased point of view. Sure, this happens to everyone, but when your belief is that you are on the side of an all powerful God who has decided the moral objectivity and superiority of life, that’s a far more powerful influence than anything else. And so, we become like a normal human who believes spirits exist to terrorize the living and demands an exorcism of innocent and peaceful spirits. Christians are so bad at actually learning about other perspectives. Not only does this prevent us from successfully reaching out to other people, but it also hurts our own spirituality. Because if you haven’t gone out and learned about other beliefs and made a real, unbiased choice to be a Christian, then you never chose to be a believer; you only followed the path that your limited perspective allowed you to make.

Planet With: Sealing Away Those Who Stray From The Path of Love

In a season where everyone was talking about Hero Academia and Attack on Titan, the actual best anime of the season goes unnoticed by many. Planet With is an anime written by none other than Mizukami Satoshi, the author who penned the legendary manga Hoshi no Samidare.  Anyone who was around back then will remember the countless threads and memes about how we will never get a Samidare anime. Finally, after all these years, we have gotten the closest thing to a Samidare anime. Mizukami is one of the best mangaka of our time, with his stories being full of amazing action, whacky but loveable characters, powerful messages, and what is sorely lacking the most in manga: satisfying endings. Planet With has all of that in anime form, and it has only made me wish even more for his works to get an anime.

Like all Mizukami works, the fight scenes make for great entertainment, but it’s really the message of the story that sets the plot apart from others. In the universe of Planet With, humans have been marked as a species which is evolving too quickly and heading down a path of destruction. Since they are unlikely to choose the path of love, Nebula wishes to seal humanity away in dreams of happiness. However, one person (cat) in Nebula wishes to watch over humanity peacefully with the optimism that they will choose the path of love. He partners with the sole survivor of Sirius, a planet which chose destruction over love, to protect the Earth and show the potential of love that humans have.

For a 1 cour anime, its plot is difficult to summarize succinctly, and I have left out a lot of important details. Even so, I think the major point is conveyed – Planet With is a story about choosing love and forgiveness over hate and destruction and the trials that come with it. It is difficult to believe in the potential for love of those who are filled with hate, and it is even more difficult to forgive those who performed acts of hatred and violence. At what point should you draw the line and stop people from acting out their evil desires? If a group of people is consistently producing violence, is it justified to punish the entire group, including those who have yet to commit any faults? Nebula believes in stopping a species from evolving if they show signs of danger. In contrast, the protagonists want to keep believing that humanity will choose the path of love.

Oops we did.

Planet With’s story applies to Christians in the way we could view ourselves. Christians are capable of so much good, but it would be foolish to ignore all the evils we have committed and continue to commit in the name of God. Recently, I have become more and more disappointed with “Christians.” It was not long ago that I argued the ones atheists always complain about were the small minority who gave Christians a bad name. You could find recent blog posts I wrote only a few years ago that said that. Yet it is becoming increasingly clear to me that such hateful Christians are far from a minority. Maybe the ones who need to be sealed away are Christians…is what crossed my mind as I watched certain characters in the story think the same of their own species. But Planet With is a story of hope, love, and forgiveness. Despite so many characters wanting to seal away humanity, they eventually come together and hope for a better future. Even so, you cannot forgive others without first acknowledging the sins they commit. Like my own self only a few years ago, it’s clear that one of the biggest problems with Christianity now is not only those who corrupt its name but also all of us who passively let those around us continue evil and immoral acts. Even some of the most loving, respectable Christians I know will only acknowledge the Pharisees of today in closed circles and call for prayer that they see the error of their ways. However, this has only served to make the problem fester and the corruption of Christianity from the inside has blossomed thanks to all of us who tried to downplay the problems. I, too, am part of the problem.

I think you mean Christians

Today, the Republican “party of Christian values,” supported by millions of conservative Christians, have come out defending pedophilia, Nazis, murderers, rapists, concentration camps, calling the media the enemy of the people, and other horrors that Christians should be directly against; or, basically what every fascist dictatorship looks like in both fiction and reality. After a lot of thinking and reading about how this insanity came about, I think the biggest problem has been because Christians so rarely speak out against each other.  In Planet With, Nebula is the organization of those who chose the path of love. Yet, when one of their own performs his own idea of justice, they banish him. Christians are called to judge not those outside the Church but those inside the Church so that we are not corrupted from the inside out. We have absolutely failed in that regard.

Even the most liberal pastors I respect speak of the changes in society’s culture and the spread of immorality as reasons why people are fleeing Christianity. I think it is clear that the biggest issue is not the immorality of today’s society but the immorality of today’s Christianity. Christians around me are quick to pray for fellow Christians that they might see why they are wrong, but they aren’t willing to speak out against them, even in today’s climate. So while there are large numbers who actively support neo-Nazis, violence, and racist hatred, there are millions more who passively support it by “avoiding politics” because they either won’t confront those who do or they don’t even realize it is happening. Even worse are the ones who verbally disagree with what’s happening then go on to vote for “Christian” Republicans who will *intentionally* make the situation even worse. The culture of staying away from politics has resulted in millions of Christians who simple wonder how things are so bad when this is exactly what all those critical atheists have been trying to warn us about for decades. What’s happening is not new; it has been festering for years and years and been conveniently ignored under the guise of politics. We have developed a culture that doesn’t discuss politics because it so easily brings out the worst in us. Yet isn’t it because we are so reluctant to witness the worst in others that things like racism, murders, and terrorism can be supported by people we otherwise thought to be good Christians? If the debate of forcibly removing children from parents and locking them up in cages is a political issue, then what isn’t political? We’re now at the point where Christian leadership is no longer just hypocritical, but many leaders are outright lying with messages of hate and fear, and effectively building cults rather than communities for the sake of power and money.

As recent news has revealed, Christian churches and leadership, among many other organizations, have been targeted for infiltration and manipulation for nefarious purposes over the last several decades in what is likely the most sophisticated and coordinated propaganda attack modern society has experienced (and continues to experience). Through extremely slow but methodical influences, Christianity has been corrupted from the inside. What might have started as affirming disgruntled Christians regarding illegal immigration can, over the course of 30+ years of constant lies and fear-mongering, become a justification for concentration camps and eventually genocide. And throughout this time, Christians such as me have done little other than saying that such people are a tiny minority. But this is not just a few people who don’t misunderstand a couple tenants of Christianity; this is a deliberate, malicious, and extremely successful attack on Christianity that has come to fruition, and nobody seems to be able to accept this. Of course, I’m just being a paranoid alarmist here; I’m sure those who warned German citizens about Nazis were just alarmists too. What pains me most is when so many of my Christian friends call it a spiritual problem and pray for it but do nothing else. Yes, there is a spiritual aspect, but it is by and large a physical problem that can be countered by real actions. Prayer is great, but it is also the easy way out rather than confronting those who continue to make the problem worse. After all, what good is faith without works?

With the advent of the internet and social media, there is so much propaganda fanning the flames of hate or at best, frustration at “both sides,” among us, without Christians ever recognizing that it is an intentional, human act to sow discord, hatred, and perhaps even worse, apathy and exhaustion.  Republicans of today only care for power and are manipulating the country with massive amounts of propaganda and blatant lies to maintain that power, with a particular reliance on the Christian communities to remain ignorant, fearful, and uneducated, or at least, uninvolved in politics. The calls for fear and hatred of immigrants and “others” is exactly what you would see in every fascist’s rise to power. It is now, when so many Christians view so much of the world as enemies, that the story of the Good Samaritan and who are neighbors are is most poignant. If Christians do not speak out now, when we currently have calls for white supremacy nationalism and stochastic terrorism from many of the Republican leaders, who are supported by millions of “Christians,” then when will we speak out against such evils? To every person who still does not acknowledge this truth yet: you are exactly how things like the Holocaust happen without anyone stopping it – a lot of propaganda and refusal to admit things are as bad as they are until it’s too late.

How to forgive the one who murdered your entire species?

To tie all of this back into my original point: large portions of Christianity are on a clear path of immorality due to corruption from the inside. We are so busy looking to non-believers and spreading the Gospel to those who have never heard it, that we have neglected nurturing those who claim they have heard it but are now misguided in ways that cannot be rectified easily. I no longer have any words to refute those who think Christianity should be sealed away and removed from society because for better or worse, I am finally being exposed to just how hateful, cruel, and numerous so-called “Christians” can be while invoking God’s name and the countless others who turn a blind eye to it. But Planet With is a story of love and forgiveness. Rather than choosing hatred and revenge, the characters choose to forgive; however, that does not mean a lack of punishment. While the big bad villain is forgiven, he is also properly punished, and it is through facing a punishment that lacks hatred that he finds peace. It is an optimistically hopeful end that I’m sure many feel is too unrealistic to happen in today’s environment. Nonetheless, I want to continue hoping and believing in the best that people and Christianity have to offer. As tempting as it might be to seal away Christianity from society’s culture, I hope that people will mete out just punishment and go no further and keep believing in the potential of Christianity’s intended values and its path of love. But even then, I have no choice but to admit such a dream will be a long and arduous path.

Manga Recommendation: Bitter Virgin

Given the recent political developments surrounding sexual assault, violence, and rape, I thought it would be an appropriate time to recommend one of my favorite manga. Bitter Virgin is a relatively short manga that you can read in a few hours which centers on the story of Aikawa Hinako, a high school girl who was the victim of being raped by her step-father at the age of 14. She gets an abortion only for the sexual violence and raping to continue and gets pregnant a second time. This time, she is forced to wait out the term and give birth to her father’s baby. Because of this history, she develops a deep rooted fear of men and moves to the countryside where her classmate Suwa accidentally finds out about her secret when she confesses at the local church. Thus begins the story of a girl who has experienced nothing but tragedy and a boy attempting to balance her fears and secret with his own growing attraction to her.

I first read Bitter Virgin in high school, and I feel like it did a lot to teach me the kinds of problems girls have to deal with that, as a guy, I would never realize on my own. That is not to say every girl has been raped, but as more and more women have been coming out and publicly telling their stories, it is clear that every girl has at least one story involving sexual harassment.  Without such awareness movements, this would continue to go unnoticed, as women go on pretending to be happy even when they are really crying on the inside. It is becoming more and more obvious how many women in today’s society have had traumatic experiences with sexual harassment, assault, and rape yet remain silent for their entire lives.

While Aikawa is still too young to have shouldered her secret for decades, the story nonetheless touches on this topic. When she first confesses to her mother about her step-father’s actions, she is reprimanded for being a liar and a disgrace. The one person who should have protected her only makes the problem worse. It’s only after the doctor points out she is likely a victim of rape that the mother finally acknowledges the truth – even so, it is the doctor, not the victim, who is able to change her mind. If a girl cannot trust her own mother, who can she trust? Throughout the story, we see Aikawa’s fear not just of men and sexual assault, but also of being found out. To be a victim of sexual assault is considered the greatest shame, and while it never states it directly, the manga makes it a point that she sees herself as “damaged goods” who could never be loved. She lives every day in fear of others discovering her secret, and the amount of psychological damage that entails for a sexual assault victim is something I will never be able to truly relate to.

Interestingly enough, there is also a scene with a false rape accusation. This is perhaps the most relevant scene in the manga to today’s developments with a certain Supreme Court Justice nominee (well, now after drafting this, he is officially confirmed). There are many opinions on the topic, but I think this one line from the manga sums up how rape accusations go the best:

If she had really been raped, she wouldn’t be able to make such a fuss. When you’re raped, you’re scared and in pain. You can’t do anything but cry.

It is disgusting that so many people say things like “if she had really been raped, she would have immediately pressed charges!” As if that is how the mentality of a rape victim will go. A rape victim is instead far more likely to curl up in a ball, cry, and pretend it never happened.  If people find out, there is the threat of the greatest public shame not for the assaulter but for the victim. If she goes without proof, she could be called a liar (what a surprise, that’s EXACTLY what happened), possibly even by her own family. And even if all that goes in her favor, there is still the potential issue of pregnancy and abortion, not to mention having to live with the trauma and scars left behind. Anyone who actually cares about sexual assault victims would know that keeping it a secret for decades is absolutely the most common and realistic response a young girl would make.

Bitter Virgin is seriously the best manga I’ve read when it comes to understanding the mentality and tragedy of sexual assault victims. I have nothing but praise for the author Kusonoki Kei who has stated some parts of the story relate to her own personal life experiences (not the rape).   It is especially impressive in the context of Japan’s extremely patriarchal society and its tendency to downplay sexual assault and rape even more than America, not to mention how a core tenant of anime/manga is the sexual imagery of female characters. Maybe it’s still inaccurate or not as good as it could be, but again, as a guy, it opened my eyes to the cruel reality of sexual assault in many positive ways. So to sum it up, go read Bitter Virgin if you want a mature story on a serious topic that everyone is talking about lately.

I’d like to end by saying how much I respect every woman who has come out and admitted to being a victim of sexual assault. It takes such an enormous amount of courage to do that in a public forum where you will inevitably be greeted by criticism and hatred. And even for the countless others who have not revealed their secrets, you’re amazing too. Just being able to live out each day after undergoing such a traumatic event should be praiseworthy. I’m just a random guy on the internet, so it probably doesn’t mean anything, but still, please, keep fighting on because being able to continue after such a horrific experience makes you stronger than I could ever imagine myself to be.

Summer Pockets: The Adventure You Never Had

Kanon, Air, Clannad, Little Busters. The visual novel company Key has created some of the most beloved nakige in the entire industry, with the anime adaptations receiving extraordinary praise for the most part. However, it has been some time since they produced something that was truly loved. I’m of course excluding Rewrite, that while is an amazing piece of fiction, is simply not a nakige. This has extended to their anime adaptation as it has been nearly a decade since one of their anime has struck the hearts of anime fans. Ask the average fan today what they think of Key, and a surprisingly high number won’t know who they are or haven’t seen more than one or two of their anime (and likely their more recent, poorly received ones). Thus, in some ways, Key’s newest work Summer Pockets and the inevitable anime are a chance for Key to remind everyone that they can write some of the saddest and simultaneously heart-warming stories in the industry.

I don’t want to spoil too much for now, but Summer Pockets was good but simply not at the level of their former glory. That’s not intended to place any amount of blame on them because their best is just so close to perfection, I can’t reasonably expect them to continue producing things as good or better. In the end, Summer Pockets was a story that has very much the kind of tone, theme, and execution you would expect from Key. One of the routes is centered on the girl Kamome Kushima who is in search of a hidden treasure from her childhood days. Spoilers to follow.

With a series of riddles on hand, she and the main character Hairi set out to find 4 keys hidden on the island. The keys unlock a map which then guides them to a secret location where Kamome claims a pirate ship is located. As the two figure out how to decipher the map and find the true route which leads to the ship, Hairi begins to see dreams that suggest he has already experienced this.  Kamome, on the other hand, already has when she first discovered the ship with her childhood friends. Hairi continues to see visions of Kamome as a child and memories of being a part of her group of friends. He begins to wonder if maybe he was one of them and merely forgot, but that shouldn’t be possible. As they approach their goal, his memories of the journey become more and more accurate until finally they find the hidden…boat. It’s not a pirate ship; it’s a simple, broken down boat. The story shifts into a search for the truth behind the memories of Kamome and Hairi and the boat they found. In reality, the memories the two shared were nothing but a story which Hairi read as a child, a story written by Kamome’s mother and inspired by Kamome’s own imagination. As a child, Kamome was too sick to have fun like a normal kid; so, she invented an adventure that she wished she could experience. But like many things from childhood, these facts were distorted over many years. Hairi forgot the truth and experiencing the story in real life gave him a feeling of déjà vu and caused him to recall the story as his own experience. Kamome, on the other hand, truly believed the story was her own life experience. Her desire to live out an exciting adventure muddled together with her own memories and so fiction became reality.

Kamome’s route was really fun to read and one of the most enjoyable non-true routes I’ve read in awhile especially because of how well it stands alone aside from a few questions about how the supernatural elements happen.  It’s fun enough that you can really empathize with Kamome who desired an adventurous experience enough that she mixed up fiction for reality. While it’s true there were supernatural reasons at play, I don’t think it is so psychologically unrealistic. And I think this phenomenon can be applied to faith in a few different ways.

I’ve met a lot of different Christians in my life, and my personal experience has found that the ones who grew up in Christian homes are actually the least likely to be true followers of Christ despite claiming they are. I would group myself as one of such people. Thinking about Kamome’s story, I wonder if a similar phenomenon happens in regards to Christian faith. We grow up being told Christian stories, Bible lessons, and surrounded by people who are “faithful.” But children are not capable of truly understanding the meaning of giving your life to Christ. Some Christians certainly grow up to be respectable and faithful Christians despite facing the harsh reality of life. But many grow up by only continuing to follow the motions without understanding how Jesus should impact your lifestyle and choices. If they go to church and listen to the pastor and say their prayers, then they are good Christians in their minds. I think when your childhood is filled with stories about good Christians, it can be easy to think that you are also a good Christian for no reason other than constantly hearing about it. Like Kamome who believes she went on an adventure she never did, people can believe they hold faith they never had.

Such a thing is incredibly ironic because your faith is not in God; instead, your faith is in a false perception of yourself as someone who does have faith in God. Anyone who questions your faith is clearly in the wrong because you are certain that you are a faithful person. How can you be wrong when your entire childhood memories are filled with stories about being faithful? Kamome’s misunderstanding is compounded by her own mother’s actions. With nothing but love for Kamome, she wrote a story that would make Kamome happy and then went on to reconstruct the story in real life. The truth behind Hairi and Kamome’s adventure: finding the keys, the secret map, and even the old ship, it was all prepared for the sake of living out the fictional tale; but this too, Kamome forgot. Christians who grow up in Christian homes must also deal with this irony. Because they are surrounded by people who want them to become respectable adults of faith, it becomes far easier to simply believe they are. When you live in an isolated community of religion where failure is met only with encouragement to be more faithful, faith is no longer a challenge; it is “inevitability.” Those who see the hypocrisy often end up leaving Christianity, while those who don’t end up trapped in a life of faith without works.

This is all not to say Christian communities are bad or this is the sole cause of Christian faith in name only. However, I do think this is a very real thing that happens to people who have only known “good Christian faith” their entire lives. Kamome got caught up in the adventure of the past which she never experienced. However, she and Hairi still experienced a real adventure in the present.  In the same way, God can use even those of false faith to lead people to true faith. The question is whether or not you can distinguish which of the two you are.

P.S. The adventure of Kamome is based on the very real tourist attraction of Megijima.

Nana Concerts and What That Even Means

I’m not dead! I haven’t actually written anything in forever, again. This seems to be a recurring problem. To be fair, I did participate in NaNoWriMo (and failed, naturally), and then I’m always lazy in December, and then I went on vacation to Japan yay, and now it’s February, wait, March.  The main reason I went to Japan was of course to attend Nana Mizuki’s Live Gate concert! This time, with 7 days at Budokan, of which I went to 4 of them (+the birthday live streaming at a theater). I no longer have the patience to write out a report for every concert I go to, but I’ll say it was once again one of the best times of my life. The best part was probably finally getting to hear Brave Phoenix live after all these years of waiting and always missing the ones where she did perform it. Then there were all the special guests and duets that I would probably regret not hearing if I didn’t go to all of those concerts. I’m already sad I missed the duets at the concerts I didn’t attend.

As I told people about my trip and 4 (5) concerts I went to, everyone always asked if the concerts were the same. Because going to the same concert isn’t worth it, right? Then I have to explain how Nana changes a few of the songs, but there’s a core setlist. I get different kinds of reactions to that. Even if it was their favorite artist, people wouldn’t go to the exact same concert multiple times in such a short period of time. Who does that? I kind of felt like people weren’t really as big fans of whomever they said they were. Then again, I’m a crazy person who flies to the other side of the world to see Nana. I’m definitely the anomaly here; I’m fully aware of that much.

But eventually I finally realized a major difference in perception. Probably, when most people think of going to concerts or listening to singers, they think of enjoying the music. You go to the concert to enjoy music you like and the experience of hearing it live. Going multiple times, especially if you have to pay money each time, isn’t exactly as appealing as the first time. You might want to hear different songs, but the same set list would certainly be less alluring. But I realized I don’t go to Nana Mizuki concerts for the music. It’s definitely a high priority, but in reality, when I think of Nana concerts, I think of spending time with Nana. Being in the same place as her, listening to her talk, and interacting with her through all the wotagei, all of this is what makes her concerts so fun for me. Spending time with Nana and building a stronger connection with her as a fan is what I really care about. Especially with her MCs, where she always has something different to say, and being able to hear her thoughts on the concert or just her daily happenings is really important to me. In the end, as a fan, I just want to spend as much time with Nana as possible and the music is second to that. There is just a completely different interpretation and understanding of why someone would go to a concert. Indeed, for other artists, I would go to listen to a select few songs I want to hear live and after that, I wouldn’t want to go again so soon. But for Nana my motivation, expectations, and hopes are different.

And that difference in perspective is similar to the difference in understanding what Christianity is about. Christianity is supposed to be about a relationship with God through Jesus. It is about mutual love and wanting to love others because of a love for God. Unfortunately, a lot of people don’t view it this way. They view it as being forced to live a lifestyle without fun or being under the rule of a man in the sky, among plenty of other twisted misunderstandings. Even Christians often misunderstand it as a religion where you must follow a set of laws or a relationship based on fear of being sent to hell. But that’s not what it’s supposed to be about, and that’s not what many Christians think of when they think of their relationship with God.

It all comes down to understanding this difference in perspective, and in another way, a difference in definitions based on that perspective. Lately, I have found myself plagued more and more by people simply using and defining words or ideas in completely different ways than I understand them. It makes communication nearly impossible, and it is arguably a dangerous thing to think we are speaking the same language, when in reality, we really aren’t. When I talk about a Nana concert, there is a disconnect between what I think of and what others think of. Of course, that’s natural because I’m a crazy Nana fan and others aren’t, and that influences how I think of a concert. In the same way, people have vastly different experiences and understandings about religion, Christianity, and God. Christians may truly have a beautiful and desirable relationship with God, but we’re still the crazy ones. In fact, even trying to explain Christianity as a mutual relationship can fail because people do not all view relationships the same way. Some people have very negative experiences with relationships or some people view them as mutually taking advantage of each other. I have found even explaining Christianity as love can backfire as people view love as a fleeting, fickle emotion no better than infatuation. I have argued before that Biblical love is far greater and amazing than how we as a society view it today, and that surely has an effect on trying to explain God’s love to others, as oftentimes arguments arise from a difference in what it means to be loved by God.

So what is the solution to this problem in perspective? Well, I don’t have one per se. There are probably a hundred different methods you could try and get a hundred different results with a hundred different people. However, the one commonality to any solution is to first understand the depth of this problem. This is something that does not only help in explaining your perspective on Christianity to others, but it helps in having empathy for others as a whole. The fact that a person’s experiences can so largely affect how a person views not just life but also ideas and the very definition of words is something that is lost on pretty much anyone who doesn’t think about the limitations of language. When we consider that Christianity is such an abstract and spiritual topic, it’s no wonder that it is understood so differently by many kinds of people all around the world. Before we even consider if it’s true, there is the problem of establishing a consistent and mutual understanding of what it even is.