Tralee

God’s Acre, Tralee

/ Peter G / Leave a comment

Walking to a day’s work in Tralee IT North Campus, I pass this field.  Puzzled and with a few minutes on my hands, I went to explore and found the sign beneath the cross on the second picture: “God’s Acre”.20161019_142732

It appears that this area is a famine graveyard, dating back to the Irish famine.  But it saddens me that it’s called such a thing.  Having “God space” seems to suggest that there could be space God isn’t Lord over.  It’s theology that is normal in Roman Catholic circles, but also in some charismatic circles (territorial spirits, and areas that are less controlled by Him).  It reminds me of the forerunner to Pokemon Go, Ingress, that my older cousin played for years, where one must capture back buildings in the real world to make them “the right side”.  In both, all of life is spent consumed by taking back territories, something which Jesus seems little concerned about in His vision of Kingdom (“my Kingdom is  not of this world”).

For a theology of travel and because of what I’ve shared elsewhere (here and here), I think Abraham Kuyper (previous Dutch Prime Minister) had a point when he said:

‘There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry, Mine!’

It may not feel that way at times, and there may be many questions raised from it, but if we abandon such sentiment, we lose far more than we gain.  We’d have a creator who wasn’t in control anymore.  We’d have “no-go” areas in the world which weren’t wise to explore as God is not there so much.  God would look more like a pet on a lead, than the “Father Almighty, creator of Heaven and Earth”.  Who could be sure about what will happen in the future, if he can’t control the present?

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