Insights from Pinnochio?

I had this inspiration in the shower last night.


There are a lot of parallels between Pinnochio and Christian concepts. Whether these parallels were meant to be there, we can only ask Walt Disney (or Carlo Collodi, who wrote "The Real Thing, The Original," the story that Disney reinterpreted to become our beloved Pinnochio).


- Pinnochio represents the human soul.
- Pinnochio's Father is God, the Father, the Maker of Pinnochio. (Of course, the fairy tale has an angel coming in to "breathe life into Pinnochio" but the general concept is there.)
- Father does everything he can to love Pinnochio, to teach him the Way. But of course, the Wolf (i.e., Satan) lures Pinnochio away, and encourages him to become, well, a donkey... to build his workforce. This concept is very similar to Satan (the Wolf) only wanting the human soul (Pinnochio) for his own power. Satan does not care about the human soul. To Satan, the human soul is just a tool to build his kingdom.
- Pinnochio gets eaten by the Whale (wow, the Bibilical story of Jonah, anyone?). (Yes, Pinnochio's Father was also eaten by the Whale, but these parallels aren't exact in the first place... so... slack, please... BUT!! God was with Jonah in the Whale. God is ALWAYS with us... so another way to look at this particular event could be that Father's physical presence in the Whale with Pinnochio symbolizes a personified God who was also in the Whale with Jonah.) And it was in the Whale that Pinnochio finally returns to Father (very similar to how Jonah also returned to God when he was swallowed up by the Whale).
- Despite all the wrongdoings and the betrayal of Pinnochio, Father still held his arms wide open to receive the coming home of his child, one who is already forgiven, even before Pinnochio asks for forgiveness (in parallel with the concept of Salvation).
- The physical transformations of Pinnochio vividly illustrates the changing of the goodness of the soul. When Pinnochio chose to side with the Wolf, he became a donkey. When Pinnochio chose love and to side with Father, Pinnochio transformed from a wooden boy to a real boy. These are parallels to the concept of the human soul going from a mortal state to an immortal state. 


The central idea of the story resonates, for me, with the central concept of becoming a Christian. We don't do it because we want/greed eternal life. Pinnochio didn't become a real boy just because he wanted to. From the inside out, he had to be cleansed by love (or the Holy Spirit). He learned it wasn't about wanting to be a real boy but about the simple and pure will to love Father and to remain by his side. (This was a very tough lesson to learn, as Pinnochio had to literally go through Hell to fully embrace the concept of love.) And because of this transformation of the mind/soul, his body was also transformed. That is, eternal life is a mere consequence of loving God. (I'm downplaying the concept of eternal life a bit here just to illustrate the relative importance of loving God versus eternal life, not to say eternal life is not important.)


We choose to be Christians because we are God's children, and we choose to go Home to God. God has sacrificed Jesus to ensure that all His children can return to Him. (Our imperfection prevents us from setting foot in the presence of His perfection, and Jesus' blood washes away such imperfection.) Eternal life, etc. are important, as we are Heirs to God's Kingdom, and we are thus blessed with such glory. However, such heirloom ought not be the driving force to return to God. Otherwise, would we not just be a bunch of materialistic, thankless, self-centered children who bicker and fight over our parents' inheritance? Where is the love in that? Where is the beauty in such a  relationship? Were we not taught by God to not get caught up with things of the world? We go back to God because we love Him, our Father. And in turn, we learn to love each other as brothers/sisters.


Christianity thus boils down to this simple concept: Love God, our Father.


And so, I think the Beatles really got it right when they sang, "Love, Love, Love is all you need."


** The ideas shared above are mine, not plagiarized nor researched, and so, if there are any similarities to other written works out there, then perhaps we were all inspired to share these thoughts. And of course, the above is not an attempt to decipher the message within Pinnochio, if there is one. It really all is just a brainstorm of ideas that came into my head last night as I was taking a shower.