Finding God in Your Nintendo 64

Last week, the "Pit Preacher" made his return to UNC. As usual, he offered his peculiar blend of twisted Christianity and hateful rhetoric. And, as usual, he was greeted with derision and mockery.

As one who has been strongly influenced by Christianity, I have never much enjoyed Gary Birdsong. His assertion that "real" Christians never fall into sin strikes me as absurd in light of the Bible. And as a pro-lifer, I hate when "my" views are represented by angry and irrational men like Gary. ("YOU'RE A BUNCH OF BABY-KILLING BABY-KILLERS, YOU MURDERING, WHOREMONGERING BABY-KILLERS!!!")

Despite this, though, I've gained some valuable insight during Gary's visits. We might not learn much about Christianity when he comes to UNC, but we can learn an awful lot about ourselves.

Last week I noticed that most of the remarks thrown at Gary have nothing to do with matters of fact. Students are not interrogating him because they think his beliefs (like the assertion that Jesus Christ rose from the dead) are false.

Instead, students assemble to ridicule Gary for one of his beliefs in particular: The belief that some beliefs are better than others.

Gary asserts that moral and spiritual truth comes from God, and that God expects all men and women to follow his unchanging moral commands.

Unlike some of Gary's views, this assertion is not eccentric - Christianity has always asserted that God is the sole maker of all truth.

Many students today prefer to believe that all truth is relative - that there is no such thing as a moral truth that extends beyond the personal preferences of the individual.

Thus, people need only to "form their own morality," and whatever a person chooses to believe is "true" for them.

It is this attitude that inspired a revealing (and entertaining) speech by a charismatic student in the Pit last week.

Bored of listening to Gary's latest rant, the student orator decided to join him in the Pit to poke a little fun. With a crude imitation of Gary's style, he began to ridicule the preacher's beliefs about truth by using "the `Contra' analogy."

"Most of you have played the video game called `Contra,'" the student began.

"Well, life is like `Contra.' See, there are lots of different weapons that you can use in `Contra'. You can go for pure firepower and use the laser gun, or you can use the spreader gun to hit targets on the whole screen.

"Now some people prefer the laser, and others like the spreader, but everyone likes to play `Contra.' But some idiots are so in love with the laser that they hate anyone who dares to use the spreader. They won't even play with people who want to use different weapons than they do."

The student orator now homed in for the obvious kill.

"Reminds me of people who think that everyone who disagrees with them is headed for hell . fire!"

The crowd roared in laughter and approval. Clearly Gary's rigid insistence that his "truth" was "true" for everyone was as stupid as insisting that every "Contra" player use the same weapon.

An analogy between video games and eternal truth strikes me as a bit suspect, but let us assume for a moment that the analogy is valid.

I didn't play a lot of "Contra" as a kid, but I was a "Zelda" addict. In "Zelda," there are certain parts of the game that require certain weapons.

Trying to defeat Ganon while using the wood sword is just impossible, and you simply cannot get into certain caves without using the hammer. The very nature of the game requires that certain things be done to negotiate it successfully.

Like "Zelda," "Contra" is a game designed by a programmer. Suppose that the programmer created an evil alien monster at the end of level six that could absolutely not be defeated without the laser.

If this were the case, would it be arrogant or stupid for an informed player to tell others that the only way to win was to use the laser beam?

Should a "brother-in-arms-`Contra'-junkie" let his friends "do it their own way" and die while using the spreader gun, or should he loudly insist that they switch to lasers so that they can survive the alien?

It is often said that life is a sort of game. The important thing, then, is to determine the nature of the game.

Christians (not just Gary) believe that God designed our world to run a certain way, and gave us moral instructions to help us reach our final destination.

"Do this," God tells us, not because he wants to ruin our fun, but because he wants us to reach the next level.

On the other hand, the student orator seemed to believe either that God doesn't exist or that God makes no real moral demands on people. In which case any "moral code" we happen to favor will do just fine.

The question for us is whether the nature of the real world is more like the Christians say or more like the "Contra" guy says.

Are we really free to make up our own morality as we go?

And if all moral choices are equal, can we still condemn the moral choices of a man like Hitler - just because we happen to prefer a "different" morality than he did?

Tough questions for a "Contra" speech. If only there were some secret code .

Craig Warner really likes Pac-Man. Reach him at cmwarner@email.unc.edu.