twisted into a half smile.

now tell me, what s this love feast we re supposed to

be having tonight?"
"it s a custom we have once a week in which our whole community has a meal and f
ellowship together.
it apparently used to be an old christian custom." "oh, yes," harry sighed, "i s
hould have remembered. tertullian wrote about
it, didn t he?" "tertullian? oh, yes, i guess so. but it s also mentioned in the
bible in -"
"yes, i know, in the epistle of jude." i nodded, surprised that he knew the bibl
e so well. "you know,
tonight we ll be officially welcoming you into our community." he rolled his eye
s. "not if i wake up first!"
i chuckled, then asked, "so what do you think of our fellowship hall?" he gazed
around, noticing the polished parquet
floor, large windows, and cathedral ceiling decorated with frescos of people, an
imals, birds, trees, and the divine light. then slowly,
he nodded his head in approval. "well, it s not exactly the sistine chapel, but
nonetheless, quite impressive, i must
admit at least in a sort of rustic way." he then smiled as he added, "of course,
the dream symbolisms,
with all these frescoes of nature, are again all too obvious." "if you like it n
ow, just wait for tonight
when this whole place becomes alive. there s even going to be music performed th
ere on the stage," i sald,
hoping to create an air of excitement and anticipation. noticing the piano on th
e platform, he asked, "and i suppose
the music will be played by you on that rather odd looking piano?" "no, probably
by somebody else. there are
two ladies that play reasonably well, as well as somebody who can play the violi
n not too badly, and another
the flute. carlos, who you just met, can also strum the guitar." "what do they p
lay? your church music?" "yes,
that s what basically they mostly play, i suppose." "what about you? you re clas
sically trained? and you sald you
can also play the piano." "yes, but certainly not up to concert standard. also,
the only classical piano music pieces
i had a chance to play since my resurrection were schumann s the happy farmer, a
couple of schubert waltzes,
and beethoven s fur elise." he flashed a smiled. "then please be so good as to p
erform." i nodded somewhat
reluctantly and played a less than perfect rendition of beethoven s famous piano
piece. by the look on his face,
he clearly saw the mistakes i had made, particularly on the demisemiquavers. yet
, i simply laughed it off. "i tried
to tell you, harry, that i m very rusty, as you can see." however, he simply nod
ded and then commenced
scribbling. at first, i thought he was writing about my performance, as if he wa
s some music examiner at the
conservatorium. however, upon getting up from the stool, i realized he was writi
ng about the fellowship hall. he then started
writing about deer park village and its inhabitants, including the conversations
we had so far, much of it verbatim. he
filled the entire first page, then a second, thhen even a third, amazing me with
his prodigious memory. finally, he
looked up and asked, "so what other wonders am i going to be shown?" "what about
our hall of worship?"
i asked. a wry smile appeared. "ah, the hall of worship. of course. yes, why not
?" again, he only seemed
to be moderately impressed, although it was by far our most impressive building
in deer park. to get there, we

had to walk to the south-eastern edge of our village, and there on a hill, nestl
ed amongst the pines, near
the foot of anastasis, our place of worship sparkled like a jewel. "certainly th
is isn t of timber construction. is
it made from some sort of glass?" "no, actually from highly polished wood." "tha
t s impossible!" he declared. "no wood
could be that reflective." he sniggered and then shook his head. "ah, i keep for
getting that this is only just
a dream." upon entering, he gazed up at the cathedral-type ceiling and studied t
he frescoes. "yes, quite impressive, but of
course, they don t compare to the frescoes of michelangelo." noticing then the g
lassless windows, crisscrossed with delicate carved wooden
lace, he added, "how quaint. however, why not use real stained-glass windows. it
would have been more effective." he then
pitifully shook his head. "however, even then, it still would not even compare t
o new york s cathedral of saint
john the divine. "oh, brother, what a snob! i thought. i seemingly liked him bet
ter as a neurotic. however, i
only politely smiled at his condescension. "it s of course empty now, but on our
seventh day, we pack our
hall withh more than three hundred people from our village and surrounding areas
." he then noticed the piano, again very
similar to the other one in the fellowship hall. "and i suppose during these occ
asions somebody will be playing hymns?
but why on a piano? why not on a pipe organ? it would sound so much grander." we
walked towards
it and he lifted up its cover and tapped a few keys. "so, could you at least pro
vide me with
an example of a hymn? i presume they are not the standard hymns one hears, but a
re compositions from your
religion." "yes, that s right. would you like me to play one for you?" he nodded
and thus i again
sat myself on a piano stool and played we thank you our god. it was a simple pie
ce that i
had easily learnt over the last two weeks or so. upon completion i chuckled and
added, "it sounds better when
the congregation sings along." he sniggered. "yes, of course." he then stared ar
ound our worship hall before walking up towards
the platform. on the lectern he saw a closed book. he opened it and was surprise
d to see that it
was not the bible. "what is this?" he asked. "it s what we call the paradise tex
t. " "the