Wiggle Room

From the Touchstone Tarot, the Hanged Man; from the Waterhouse Oracle, 'The Missal:'

          Black illustrates her Hanged Man with the painting of  St. Sebastian. Sebastian was a part of an elite group of the Roman army who guarded the Emperor. When his conversion to Christianity was discovered, the Emperor wanted him to go back to worshipping the Roman gods. Sebastian refused, and so he was tied to a tree and shot with arrows. A widow, thinking she was retrieving a body to bury, found him alive and nursed him back to health. Unfortunately, Sebastian must not have had any moments of acceptance while on that tree about things he can't control, because he later went back to the Emperor to confront him about his sins and was subsequently clubbed to death for his effort. The Missal shows a young woman reading from a prescribed book of prayers and rites for the year. Rituals and routines are comforting, but I wouldn't want to be told that I could only do things a certain way with no creative wiggle room. A zealot of any stripe is still a zealot. Shakespeare wrote that even "the devil can cite Scripture for his purpose."