#reading homework

My Homework for the Night

My date with Satan commenced at the Sanrio store by Union square where we went to browse through two stories of miniature Japanese school supplies and grooming accessories. Satan seemed kind of nervous. “All the light,” he said, “I don't like all the light.” It's true the Sanrio store has a wide glass facade and glass doors and a plexiglass staircase to better illuminate the many rows of miniature Hello Kitty and Ahiru No Pekkle trinkets—endless, perfectly arranged rows of tiny colored pencils, mite-sized plastic address books, barrettes as small as aspirin—a thousand diminutive products to lodge in a thousand dinky airways, what do you think of that Satan? What do you think of little kiddies choking on Sanrio brand Keroppi-Frog pencil erasers? Satan liked that very much and set to cackling and browsing and didn't seem as nervous once he had something evil to rest his mind on.

...It is understandably easy but unequivocally dangerous to move from viewing Satan as the opposition to viewing any mortal opposition as satanic. To put it another way, all that is of Satan is opposition, but all that opposes us is not satanic. Yet down through the centuries, such an attitude has often prevailed as men have made the slippery step from “This is what we believe” to “This is what God believes, and death to the infidels who believe otherwise.”