The Sermons and Musings of Carl J. Westman, D.D.

Interview Transcript

2010-10-03T20:46:00.003-04:00

Audiotaped Interview with Carl J. Westman
April, 2003

Interviewer’s name is not given, but is believed to be Rev. Linnea Pearson.

CJW: I was born in Boston in 1911, and my parents, then, and grandparents, were Unitarian. When they moved to a suburb, Everett, when I was two years old, they migrated to the Universalist church. And I grew up in that church. When my father died in an accident when I was thirteen years old, the church became a real support for me, particularly the minister, who took an interest in me. I did things for him, such as running the projector for his illustrated lectures. I was very active in the youth group. I preached my first sermon when I was sixteen to a large audience, who were very kind to me, in spite of my brash teenage assertions. So the church has always been a part of my life. I knew in high school that I wanted to become a minister, but because I graduated in 1929, when the roof fell in on finances everywhere, I could not go to college because I had to help out at home, and that continued for some years.

Interviewer: That was kind of disappointment for you. When did you finally get so that you could go to school?

CJW: Well, I married young, and had a variety of jobs, from an office clerk, to working in construction, with the construction firms that built Quonset Naval Air Station during the immediate preceding years of the war, and then in a shipyard in Hingham, MA, and then I worked as a labor foreman in an iron foundry. And when it began to appear in, I think it was 1944, that maybe I had a chance to go to college, and theological school, and work my way through, I took that opportunity.

Interviewer: Going back for a minute, losing your father at thirteen had to be a very traumatic event for a teenage boy.

CJW: It changed my life in many ways. It was not only the shock of losing one’s father, but also because there was no money in the family, my mother had to go to work, and I had to work after school, going to high school, so I missed out on much of the social life that high school students have, and so, but Sunday being free, was where so much of my interest gathered.

Interviewer: Were you active in the youth group of the church?

CJW: Yes I was. We had a small, but very active, youth group in Everett, and it was part of larger groups in the county, which would have as many as 200 young people at a meeting. So that was a very good experience for me, and in some ways replaced what would normally be the teenage experience.

Interviewer: That’s so common for so many young people in the church. Did you marry someone from the church?

CJW: Yes I did. She was a year younger than I, and she was also in the church and in the youth group. We were married very young, which, looking back, perhaps it was too young; nevertheless, it happened. We were married for many years, finally growing apart, divorced in the 1960s.

Interviewer: Any children?

CJW: I have two sons and two daughters. [A] picture’s on the wall there. They are all doing very well, except my younger daughter Janet, who is the second from the right, who has ALS, the Lou Gehrig disease, and does not have long to live. And ... so we all grieve about that.

Interviewer: I’m sure you do. That’s the tragedy in your life today. Can you tell us about the Universalist Church, and what they were like when you were growing up?

CJW: The Universalist Church, when I was growing up ... in my community, it was a very strong church. The church held 400 people, and it was frequently filled, and sometimes they had to bring out additional chairs. There were over 200 children and young people in the Sunday School, so it was a very strong church for many years. But, in that city, Everett, so many people moved out to further suburbs, and the population moving in was largely Roman Catholic. So, the church gradually dwindled, and I don’t know when it closed, but sometime in the 1940s.

Interviewer: I see. When you first became a minister, can you tell me what it was like?

CJW: Yes. Bearing in mind all that I’ve told you, I was a latecomer to the ministry. I was forty years old when I was ordained, having finished theological school and college, and I think one of the great differences I see between the ministry today and what it was in my time, was that there’s far more attention paid to a minister’s needs than in my time. I made several moves, which were made just for increase in salary, which I had to have because of my family, and I would have gladly stayed if the church involved had been willing to pay me a little more money. Nowadays, I see that there is much attention paid to the minister’s salary package, and that is all to the good.

Interviewer: How did you feel about the fact that the church pays such a low wage?

CJW: It did not bother me; we were all in the same boat. I felt the ministry was where I belonged, and we did get by. My sons and daughters all went to state colleges, so they got through; my sons were on athletic scholarships. And, so, it made out, but no, it was a struggle. I did not even have pension money set aside until 1960, which means I did not accumulate much pension money.

Interviewer: And that’s why you’re having some hardship today.

CJW: Look where I live.

Interviewer: Can you tell us about the merger commission?

CJW: Yes, I was part of it. I was minister in Akron, Ohio, when I was first appointed. Well, first of all, I was on the Board of Trustees of the Universalist Church of America, and their Executive Committee, so I was appointed to the Merger Commission, which was comprised of a number of both Universalists and Unitarians who were charged with the task of finding ways that might support a merger of these two denominations. Merger had been talked about for a great many years. Some people said that merger talks began in 1855, and it took 100 years to get to the point of actually being serious. There were a number of problems that had to be solved, including the name of the new denomination. We were able to work out the differences in organization, and essentially create the organization of the Unitarian Universalist Association, as it became and still is today. There were many who weren’t that enthusiastic about merger. Some Unitarians felt that union with Universalists would hinder growth. Some Universalists felt that Unitarians were too radical, although there were radical elements in both denominations. The work required a great deal of study and reports, but the merger, after a couple of [votes], went through very well, and was – I wouldn’t say it was unanimous, but a very heavy majority favored this merger.

Interviewer: Some churches haven’t really taken up the double name. My church in Colorado hasn’t, and I was wondering about that.

CJW: Well, some of them prefer to maintain their historic name. On both sides. One church I served in Akron, a Universalist church, readily adopted the double name. The church I served in Rochester, New York, did not, because there was already a Unitarian church in the community. Although there were very good relations between the two, each kept their own name – First Universalist, First Unitarian.

Interviewer: Over the years, how has the role of the minister changed?

CJW: That’s a little difficult to answer, because I retired from full service in 1976. I would say that the minister is much better trained in counseling than in my day. I would say that in many cases, laypeople have assumed obligations they should, in terms of the organization of the congregation, so the minister doesn’t have to run everything. People do take care of fundraising and religious education and so on, so I’d say there’s, at least in my observation, there’s a great deal more of lay leadership, being active in our congregations, than in the early days of my ministry. And that’s a very good thing.

Interviewer: So you’re talking about how churches have changed as well. How has the denomination changed?

CJW: Very little, I think. It seems to me that we, more or less, behaved (if that’s the word) as each of us did separately. The general assemblies, which replaced the annual meeting of the American Unitarian Association and the annual meeting of the Universalist Church of America, are much more heavily attended than ever was the case before, in terms of the next general assembly in Boston in 2003, they’re expecting close to 9,000 people, I am informed, which would mean for a tremendous difference. I think one of the large changes I have seen is that women are, I believe, a majority of our ministry, and that’s been all to the good. So many of them have become, were, and are, very effective ministers.

Interviewer: That’s interesting. Now, as you look back on your ministry, what were the peak experiences, both traumatic and in regards to achievements?

CJW: The most traumatic experience was in my first church, Gloucester, Massachusetts, a historic church. It was the first organized Universalist Church in America, but these were the years 1950 to 1953, when McCarthyism was so prevalent that I was under fire for ideas which were certainly not unusual for Unitarian Universalists of that date. I was called a communist. One member stopped my eleven-year-old daughter in the street and told her “Your father’s a communist.” And so we understandably said she didn’t have to go to church anymore. So she stayed home and cooked Sunday dinner, and is a gourmet cook today. Being under fire for ideas that are basically within the Bill of Rights and within our Unitarian Universalist tradition of free speech and so forth, this certainly was the worst experience of my life, my ministerial life. I was very tempted to leave the ministry at that time, with people calling up while I was away and telling my wife that her husband’s a communist, and “Why don’t you all get out of town.”

Interviewer: These weren’t Unitarian Universalists?

CJW: Some were.

Interviewer: Some were Unitarian Universalists? My goodness.

CJW: Yes. I found out later that the postmaster, who was a member of the church, had a mail check put on me. So that was the most difficult experience of my life, my ministerial life.

Interviewer: Well, it sounds like it was your personal life also, with children.

CJW: Oh yes. And they’ve never forgotten it either. The ones who were old enough. The peak experiences? There were many. It’s hard to single them out. I’ve been ... certain recognitions, people who appreciated my ministry... I used to keep a file that I called “Treasured Letters,” and it was rather full. It’s hard to single out any one experience. I guess the successful outcome of the merger commission was one of the top experiences. And I enjoyed being a district executive, where I worked with many churches, helping them to solve problems, get ministers, and so forth, and I guess that was a fairly high point in the ministerial life. But most of all my peak experiences have been with people – persons to whom I related, became very close. Other than that, no, I was never elected to high office – although I served in a number of capacities, but no, my peak experiences [were] the kind of people people I would run into in our churches.

Interviewer: That doesn’t surprise me because we know you’re very loved and respected and appreciated in this community.

CJW: Well, that’s the only way I can put it.

Interviewer: Can you talk a little bit about your experiences in the civil rights movement?

CJW: Yes, a little bit. At the time, I was in Rochester, New York, minister of First Universalist there, and of course we were concerned, some of us in the congregation, and when the young black man was killed in Selma, and the Board of Trustees of the UUA all went there by airplane, at first I was going to do that, but then I talked to other interested persons, and we decided that we would instead hire a bus. And about forty of us went. Most of them were not members of our church, and there was certainly an integrated group, a number of, well, for example, some very intelligent and caring teachers, who happened to be black, were among those who went.

So we had a bus trip from Rochester to Montgomery, actually going to Birmingham to meet the march en route, and south of the Mason-Dixon line, new drivers came on the bus, they were all uptight about having to drive this bunch of people...

Interviewer: I can imagine!

CJW: ... and they were polite, but icy. I remember we arrived in Birmingham, and spent the night at the Unitarian church in Birmingham, sleeping on the floor, most of us, and in the morning, taking the bus to go to the outskirts of Montgomery, where we joined the march into that city. And that was an unforgettable experience, not only for the abuse that was heaped upon us as we marched, but also about walking through the slums of Montgomery, largely occupied by black people ... women who came out saying, “Thank God you’ve come, thank God you’ve come.” So that was an unforgettable experience.

One of the experiences that, when we walked to our bus after the mass meeting was over, another man and I were escorting two black schoolteachers from Rochester, and I can’t begin to tell you the kind of abuse that was heaped upon us, as we walked to the bus, from largely white young men. It would have been easy to yield to anger, but we were disciplined enough to do it. But I felt an enormous sensitivity to the kind of names, particularly, these young black teachers were called. The worst of profanity, if you can imagine it.

And then, of course, there was the famous meeting in Washington, where Martin Luther King, Jr., gave his “I Have A Dream” speech. And again, a number of us in Rochester got together and hired a bus to take us there, and that too was an unforgettable experience.

We also had some civil rights activities in the city of Rochester, where we had some riots. I remember trying to be part of the effort to calm things down, and in the clergy association of that city, we decided to go in pairs, a black minister and a white minister, through the rioting areas, attempting to calm things down. How much we succeeded, I’ll never know. Things did calm down, but maybe they would have anyway. But again, as we walked through, I must say, that we did not get any abuse. And we didn’t. We did stop a couple of young men from looting stores.

Well, there are other things I could mention, but that’s the most I can think of at the moment.

Interviewer: I find myself being surprised that there was that sort of a reaction that far north.

CJW: Oh, yes. Oh, yes. Plainfield, New Jersey, also had riots. No question about it.

Interviewer: Those were really difficult days.

CJW: Yes, they were.

Interviewer: Things have changed a lot since then.

CJW: And of course, not all the members of our congregations approved it.

Interviewer: Really?

CJW: And we lost some members, but perhaps that’s just as well.

Interviewer: Yes, yes. Well, I’m wondering what I haven’t covered. Can you talk a little bit about what you think you might add to this enquiry about your life and the church and the denominations – is there anything I haven’t covered?

CJW: Well, I think that one of the fine, but also difficult, experiences of it was preparing for the ministry at college and theological school. I had to work; we had enough money to buy a small house, in Canton, New York, where St. Lawrence University is located, but in order to survive, I was janitor in the bank (a bank, there were two banks there). And I would go to the bank at four o’clock in the morning, and work until time to get to an eight o’clock class, and in the afternoon I would come back again and work two or three more hours. It was a grueling schedule, but I guess I was young enough not to have to worry too much about it physically. I do remember, Canton, New York, is cold country in the winter, and I have a distinctive memory of walking to the bank at four o’clock in the morning, with the temperature forty-two below zero, and the wind blowing in my face. I think that had a great deal of bearing on my decision to move to Florida and never touch a snow shovel again.

Interviewer: I think you’re echoing the thoughts of a lot of us. Well, thank you so much, Carl, for this interview, and it’ll be in the church archives I’m sure.

CJW: You’d better check to see if it’s recorded!

Interviewer: Yeah.....

Hail And Farewell

2010-07-15T07:28:00.000-04:00

2004

When you read this, my body elements have been returned to the earth of our lovely planet. My spirit, if I have a spirit, may or may not experience a destination or state of consciousness which will be a surprise. I doubt it, but who knows?

I am lucky to have lived so long. Much was learned as I lived the life of Unitarian Universalist minister. But also, I learned much about living and persons at the iron foundry, the construction of Quonset Naval Air Station and the Hingham shipyard. These were jobs where amid noise, dust, grime, heat, and cold where so many men and women worked loyally at difficult tasks.

On the Musings mailing list, I have both a general and particular good memory of everyone of you. You represent fine qualities of living and I am fortunate to have known you.

I still have hope for the human venture; that there will come a day when there is peace on earth and for all people something to live on and a faith to live by.

Carl Westman
October 4, 1911 – October 14, 2004

Labor Day – 2004

2010-07-15T07:26:00.000-04:00

September 6, 2004

In Florida this year, Labor Day is not a day for picnics, ball games, or family visits. Hurricane Frances has paralyzed this peninsula State. Damage is in the billions. Thousands are living in shelters.

I am particularly conscious of the real meaning of Labor Day. I have been a labor union member. Labor Day celebrates working men and women, and the gains they have achieved in working conditions and wages. Furthermore, it is a day to emphasize the work ways that still need improvement.

Why am I now particularly conscious of the meaning of this day? Because working men and women have sustained those of us who need much help to stay alive. Here at the Beneva Park Club, the auxiliary generator is functioning, providing not only light and air conditioning, but also power for the oxygen machines, making it unnecessary for those of us who have a constant need for oxygen to run to emergency and portable tanks and canisters.

More particularly, we “inmates” are thankful for the staff who came through difficult and sometimes dangerous conditions of rain, wind, and flooded streets to get here and serve us. All public transportation was canceled.

Lydia was here to make my bed at 7:45 a.m. Teri and Jacui were dispensing pills and giving shots as usual. There was enough kitchen staff to make our usual and plentiful breakfasts. The young women waiting on tables were as always their polite and competent selves.

Workers of the world and at the Beneva Park Club, we thank you and salute you.

In AS YOU LIKE IT, Shakespeare has Corin the shepherd say,

“Sir, I am a true labourer: I earn that I eat, get
that I wear, owe no man hate, envy no man’s
happiness, glad of other men’s good, content with my
harm, and the greatest of my pride is to see my ewes
graze and my lambs suck.”

(Act III, Sc. ii)

Man Versus Machine

2010-07-15T07:23:00.003-04:00

February 2004

As the major league ball players, managers and coaches make their annual journey to Florida (the Grapefruit League) or Arizona (the Cactus League), I mused about Warren Spahn, the left-handed pitcher who died November 24, 2003, aged 82. No other lefty won as many games in major league history.

Spring training reminded me of an experiment tried about 1960 or 1961 by a major league club, I think it was the Dodgers. They had a pitching machine constructed to pitch batting practice to allow coaches who pitched batting practice to be free for other duties.

Placed on the pitchers’ mound, it could consistently throw strikes, and the velocity could be varied. The pitching machine was called “The Warren Spahn”, who was the top left-hander in baseball for 21 seasons and noted for his control.

Now here is the “kicker” –

The Warren Spahn pitching machine wore out after a couple of spring training sessions, but Warren Spahn himself was still pitching in the major leagues. The man outlasted the machine by 19 or 20 years.

Spahn was 44 years old when he retired. He came to the majors with the Braves when that team was still in Boston. The Boston Braves were never as popular as the Boston Red Sox, but there was a good program the Braves had when I was a boy. They sponsored the “Knot Hole Gang”, where boys and girls could be admitted to the right field bleachers to see a game for twenty-five cents. With Boston’s good urban transit system, it was easy to get to Braves Field on Commonwealth Avenue. I went several times in the 1920s.

Like other athletes, Spahn’s career was put on hold during World War II. He experienced the Battle of the Bulge and the seizure of the bridge at Remagen. Spahn was commissioned as a Lieutenant on the battlefield. He also received the Bronze Star and the Purple Heart. Only one other Hall-of-Famer was awarded the Purple Heart, Hoyt Wilhelm.

Spahn was pitching for the Boston Braves in 1948 when the Braves won the National League pennant. Also on the pitching staff was Johnny Sain, a premier right-hander. A sports editor, late in that season, 1948, wanted Spahn and Sain to pitch all the remaining games and he composed a short poem:

“First we’ll use Spahn, then we’ll use Sain.
Then an off day followed by rain.
Back will come Spahn, followed by Sain.
And followed, we hope, by two days of rain.”

The version I remember is

“Spahn and Sain
And two days of rain.”

Warren Spahn was the best left handed pitcher in the history of baseball in the opinion of many, including me. 20 seasons with the Braves – 8 in Boston and 12 in Milwaukee, and a final season with the Mets and Giants.

All baseball nuts are fond of statistics. So let some figures illustrate why Spahn was the best lefty:

He won 363 games and lost 245
He won 20 games in one season 13 times
Pitched 382 complete games in 665 starts
Pitched 5243 innings, a record for left-handers
Pitched 63 shutouts, National League record for lefties
14 times an All Star

Stan Musial, the Cardinal slugger said, when Spahn at age 42 pitched a 20 win season, “I don’t think Spahn will ever get into the Hall of Fame; he’ll never stop pitching.”

Spahn was elected to the Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility.

Last August, the Atlanta Braves dedicated a statue honoring Warren Spahn – a 9 foot high bronze sculpture depicting Spahn in the motion of his famous high leg kick. Spahn, in a wheel chair, attended the celebration.

In baseball today with the coming exposure of the use of illegal substances to enhance strength. Pitchers going 5 innings to be replaced by the set-up man and then the relief pitcher, the “closer”. Players hopping from team to team for more millions of dollars. We need more Warren Spahns. By the way, the designated hitter rule in the American League, so the weak-hitting pitcher never comes to bat? Warren Spahn had a career hitting average of .363.

He served our country unselfishly. It would be a big plus for the game today for young players to imitate his character and courage, his continuous attention to physical conditioning and his love of the game.

The Warren Spahn Pitching Machine wore out in a couple of years, but Warren Spahn, the living man, pitched 21 seasons in the major leagues.

Did Shakespeare anticipate Warren Spahn? Rosaline, in LOVE’S LABOUR’S LOST (Act IV, Sc. i), says:

“Thou canst not hit it, hit, hit it
Thou canst not hit it, my good man.”

The Gang Of Four (Now Just One)

2010-07-14T22:22:00.001-04:00

February 5, 2004

When I moved to the Beneva Park Club, July 2000, I was assigned to a dining room table where three other men sat, Hugh C., Fred D., and Bob B.

Late last year in my 2003 Musings, I wrote about Bob B., who chose to die with dignity by neither eating nor drinking.

Hugh C. died January 22 this year. As you read his obituary, you can understand that his was a remarkable life.

He didn’t say very much about the years in the Japanese prisoner-of-war camp. He was one of 25% who survived that ordeal. He did say once that rat wasn’t so bad fried in a little palm oil. When he was liberated by the British Army, he said, that the surviving prisoners were given permission to beat up their Japanese guards. But, he commented, none of us wanted any of that.

He always called me “Padre” and quizzed me about the sermon when I went to church. Actually he would ask, “What was the text?” I attempted to recall the gist of the sermon and frequently he would agree with what my minister said.

Hugh had a remarkable memory. He knew by heart and could recite countless poems. I believe he memorized everything Kipling wrote; he could recite all the great speeches in the Shakespeare canon. He knew the words to most of the popular songs of the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s.

He loved humor. By copying my e-mail, I shared with him many of the jokes and satire I received, most of it from my son John.

Hugh had a strong feeling for the hungry, homeless, and sick people of the world. He could never understand how we could spend so much on armaments and so little, relatively, for the needy children and adults of this country and world. I feel the same way.

Hugh chose to die by not eating. When he had to come to the table in a wheel chair and needed help to open paper packets of sugar and to lift the lids of creamers, he said, just a few weeks ago, “I don’t want to live this way; and I won’t.” His mind was clear up to the last. When I visited him in his room, he asked, “Padre, I don’t remember your first name.” I told him.

Fred D. was the fourth member at our table. Fred was moved to a nursing home recently and died there. He was ninety-nine years old. He would have been one hundred years old [on] October 2, 2004.

Three times a day at meals our conversations included a wide range of topics (Hugh never came to breakfast). We discussed politics, current events, international and national issues, religion, sex, poetry, song, food service, Beneva Park policies, personal reminiscences, humor. Hugh, Bob, and I were Democrats and criticized the Bush administration including the Iraq war. We were convinced that his whole approach to leading our nation was outrageous.

Fred D. was not impressed by any political party. He thought our whole cultural, political and economic system was dominated by greed. He believed that the wealth of the country should be spread around. He said more than once that nobody should have more than five hundred thousand dollars.

Fred never married. He was one of 10 children born in Greenport, Long Island. His father was a blacksmith who labored hard to provide for his large family. Frequently Fred said, “I never wanted to go through that.” He also said often enough that his mother did not believe in a Hell in the after life. To her, Fred said Hell was life on earth.

Fred used prostitutes for his “sexual release” as he termed it. On his numerous travels he told us in a new city he always went to the library first and then to the brothel. One prostitute somewhere in north Africa he particularly liked because she was the sole support of an ailing husband. To Fred that was most commendable.

He was astonishingly informed and well-read considering he never went to high school. He loved to play with the language, particularly when a word had several meanings.

He had other different notions. For example, he thought banana skins were food that should be eaten, not thrown away (However, he always peeled his banana at breakfast). At a time when the forest fires were raging in the West, he opined that forest fires would not happen or be much less destructive if the unemployed persons were hired to clear all the dead wood and underbrush in the forests. He thought this debris could be carted out and used for fuel in certain stoves and furnaces, thus reducing our need for fossil fuels. He also believed that a family could be sustained on three acres of ground if they planted, fertilized, tilled and harvested wisely. He said that he had had that experience when he had a house and three acres on the East Coast of Florida.

Fred joined the U. S. Marine Corp in the early twenties. After that hitch, he became a hobo. He had many stories of the hobo life. He informed us that guards were less likely to kick hobos off freight trains if the train was heading for some place that needed low-wage labor. He worked crops in California, forestry in Alaska and temporary jobs in Texas and other places.

Fred had no religious affiliation or convictions he ever said. He did say that he had had to listen to countless sermons; in Christian missions when he was a hobo and needed a meal. He listened to some of our table talk about religion. Bob B. was an atheist, insistently so. Hugh was the son of Methodist missionaries, and I, of course, a Unitarian Universalist. So there was considerable talk about beliefs, doctrines, rituals; [they were] frequently quizzing me about Unitarian Universalist belief.

A few months ago, the Gideon Society was giving to every resident here copies of their abbreviated version of the King James Version of the Bible. A copy was left for me in my room when I was not there.

But Fred was in his room when the Gideon representative came. Fred told us that he said to the Gideon man, “I don’t want it; I don’t bother with that stuff; I’m a Unitarian.”

When World War II loomed, Fred enlisted in the U. S. Navy. He served on a battleship and also a sub-chaser.

In between his hobo days and two hitches in the military, he had worked as a tinsmith and became very competent in the metal working trade. He said the engineers liked him because he could read blueprints. After the war he went to school for further metalwork training. When he finished that training, he was offered a job as an instructor. He chose instead to go to Guam where the U.S. was fortifying that island as part of the Cold War.

He apparently did very well, particularly in training unskilled workers from the Philippines. He respected them, saying how hard they worked and how well they responded to orders and instructions.

He had saved enough money for two trips around the world. Prior to all the trouble in the first war against Iraq, Fred said with a twinkle in he eye that he had been in Baghdad. Then after an appropriate pause, said the airplane had landed there to fix a tire. “We didn’t leave the airport.”

So I miss Bob, Hugh and Fred. I am not sure many others do because some of the off-color jokes and raucous laughter we shared may have been overheard by staid ladies at nearby tables.

“Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried,
Grapple them unto thy soul with hoops of steel.”
(Polonius, HAMLET)

To Begin A New Year

2010-07-14T07:08:00.002-04:00

January 1, 2004

Don, our Sarasota Unitarian Universalist minister, told a story in his December 21, 2003 sermon which keeps recurring in my consciousness. Why? Because it is an inspirational story at the highest human level. Here’s how it goes:

An eight-year-old girl has a serious, possibly fatal illness and needs a blood transfusion. She has a rare type of blood, and a matching donor cannot be found. Then it is discovered that her six-year-old brother has the same rare type blood.

So the boy’s parents sit down with him and explain how his blood is needed for a transfusion in his sister which might help to make her well. The boy listens and doesn’t reply immediately. He says he wants to think it over.

Th next day he tells his parents he is willing to give blood. The doctor wants the boy to understand the process and puts two cots side by side. Then he draws a half-pint of blood from the boy and tells him to watch as the syringe transfers the blood into his sister’s vein.

Very soon her color improves and she looks better, obviously responding to the transfusion.

The doctor says to the boy, “See how you are helping your sister get well. Aren’t you glad you gave your blood?” “Yes, I am,” replied the boy. Then he asks the doctor, “How soon do I die?”

Wicca And Fanatics

2010-07-14T06:47:00.000-04:00

November 1, 2003

Yesterday was Halloween. Here at the Beneva Park Club the halls and nurses station were adorned with jack-o’-lanterns, spider webs, witches hats and other decorations appropriate for Halloween.

Nan and Diane, two of our nurses, wore bizarre costumes with startling make-up. They provided good entertainment for all of us who live routine, unexciting lives, and sometimes need palliatives for cabin fever.

The same day in the newspaper, an account appeared of a local fundamentalist Christian church which does not permit their children and adult members to participate in any Halloween activities. They denounced all Halloween activities as “Satan worship.”

Halloween is not, emphatically not, Satan worship. For many of us, Satan is a creature of the imagination of people who need a supernatural being to embody evil and be held responsible for it. They want their God to always be just, benevolent, and loving.

I can remember in my youthful days when Halloween exhibited much more rowdy behavior than today. A garden gate could lifted off its pin hinge and lugged a few blocks away. A lot of unpaid work, but the occasion seemed to justify it. Small, wooden thread spools could be carefully notched on both round ends with a jackknife. Winding string around the spool, then spinning the notched spool against a window made a most satisfying clatter. Windows of autos and homes could be soaped up. There are many memories.

Then Halloween evolved into “Trick or Treat” where children, escorted by mothers, went door to door, getting contributions into their shopping bags of candy, gum, coins, apples and I don’t what else. This is still a custom.

Then as the United Nations became organized, a new Halloween effort appeared: soliciting coins for UNICEF, The United Nations Childrens’ Emergency Fund. A most worthy practice which I advocated in the churches I served. It was also a way to make our children aware of the dire needs of children in other parts of our world; and to address such needs. “Trick or Treat for UNICEF.”

To label Halloween fun as “Satan worship” is ignorant nonsense. Furthermore, such beliefs, including persecution of “witches” is an historic disgrace to the Christian faith.

How many persons, women for the most part, have died excruciating deaths because of that Biblical sentence found in Exodus 22, “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live”?

In Brian Monahan’s scholarly HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY, his chapter, “God’s Charnel House,” details the repulsive witch-hunt mania which lasted for about 200 years, beginning in 1484. The historian estimated the number of alleged witches hanged, drowned or burned alive to be in excess of one hundred thousand persons. Protestants as well as Catholics were equally zealous in pursuing this fanatical murderous crusade. One almost unspeakable horror was perpetrated by the Bishop of Würzburg in 1627. Burned at the stake for alleged witchcraft were eleven adult victims. But they were outnumbered by six small girls and eleven boys. Next time you see children getting on or off the school bus, imagine six girls and eleven boys being burned to death for alleged witchcraft. That is almost too horrible to contemplate even from a distance of 376 years.

Thus, I cannot consider with any equanimity those fundamentalist Christians of today who label innocent Halloween fun as “worship of Satan.” Who can predict how such fanatics will act out their irrational ignorance?

Persecutions for alleged witchcraft did migrate to America. An alleged witch was hanged in Connecticut in 1647. We are all familiar with the witch trials in Salem. Nineteen were hanged and one pressed to death. Playwright Arthur Miller made that terrible scene the center of his famous play, THE CRUCIBLE. Later in the season the Asolo is staging this play.

Witches exist today. Their organization is WICCA. But their purpose is benign and their activities helpful. If my information is correct, they gather in Covens of 13 persons. Their main characteristic is to embrace the wonders of Nature and to hold fitting rituals that will help them feel at one with Nature.

Rest in Peace

2010-07-13T08:07:00.001-04:00

September 18, 2003

Robert B. died two days ago. He was one of my first friends when I moved to the Beneva Park Club, July 1, 2002. I was assigned to a dining room table where Bob sat with two others who also have become friends. When one eats three meals a day, nearly every day, with the same men, one inevitably gets to know much about them. Bob was the youngest by about ten years of the four of us.

Bob B., a very complex man, had a varied and interesting career.

Born of a farm family in Iowa, he also owned a farm in Maryland. He knew much about agriculture and was appreciative and sensitive to the needs of farmers and their contribution to us all. On his apartment door was a bold-lettered sign, “NO FARMS, NO FOOD.”

Within fifteen minutes of the time I first met him, he informed me, somewhat militantly, that he was an atheist. Not only did this appear in conversations at meal, again and again, but also his obit in the local newspaper printed the words, “He was an atheist.” I am sure that he left specific instructions to his family to include that in his obituary. He felt some connectedness with me, a Unitarian Universalist, because his mother attended one of our churches in Washington, D.C.

He was a navy veteran, having served as a Lieutenant in the submarine service. Fred D., another tablemate, had served on a sub-chaser. Fred told me that he and Bob had discussed battle tactics, sub-chaser versus submarine.

Bob was also employed by the National Institute of Health as a research scientist. One of his projects was recording the sexual and mating habits of monkeys (I don’t know which breed). It was never made clear to me why the N.I.H. needed and authorized this unusual research. Bob knew the Latin names of all of the primates.

In politics, Bob was an ardent and articulate Democrat. I’m sure one of his regrets is not having lived long enough to vote for the Democrat nominee in the 2004 election.

He relished good food. He was quick to criticize the servings at Beneva Park Club if the soup or the entree did not live up to his expectations. “That’s not French onion soup,, where’s the cheese?” is a complaint I heard many times. He had favorite eating-out places – a particular Chinese restaurant, a seafood restaurant that would serve oysters in the shell. He spoke of eating a dozen more than once. On one occasion he told us he ate three dozen! Perhaps he did; I have no reason to doubt it.

On our table, he kept a particular supply of food not available from the kitchen. On a “lazy Susan” which was his own, there were condiments and other items not supplied by the kitchen. There were particular kinds of liquid sugar substitutes; at least two varieties of mustard, chili sauce, pickled watermelon, marinated mushrooms, a large jar of peanut butter, jars of jams and jellies. Now that these are no longer taking up so much space in the center of the table, we have much more space to eat our meals.

He had somewhat of an obsession with women. He frequently talked of his large supply of pornographic videos. Conversations with him became somewhat raunchy, ending up “below the equator”, which was a favorite euphemism of his. He would ask the waitresses if he could lean his head on their bosoms.

But in my view this somewhat unpleasant aspect of his personality was far out-weighed by his constant devotion to his wife, L. She is in an advanced stage of Alzheimers in the nursing wing which is an adjunct to the Beneva Park Club.

Bob had to use a motorized wheel chair. He had a skillful way of holding L.’s wheelchair with one hand and driving his motorized vehicle with the other. Nearly every day he took her riding around the grounds and corridors. Each wore a bright red beret which had some common memory for them. Bob was never sure whether she had some faint recognition of him or some memory of the songs he sang to her. His devotion never flagged.

A few weeks ago Bob was diagnosed with a throat tumor. His difficulty swallowing was increased by the radiation treatments to which he was exposed. Soon after, a feeding tube had to be used and he was moved to the nursing wing.

A couple of weeks ago, or so, he made the decision never again to eat food or have anything to drink. When I went to see him, he was calm and serene. He did not regret the decision. In about ten days, he died peacefully. I am glad that I knew him.

In THE TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA (Act III, Sc. i), Shakespeare has Valentine say,

“And why not death, rather than living torment.”

An Underemphasized Reason

2010-07-13T07:14:00.001-04:00

July 29, 2003

Many of us who believe in the wall of separation between church and state are convinced that if that wall is breached, both individual and associational freedom will suffer. There are churches and religious denominations who seek advantages – getting money from the national budget, imposing particular religious beliefs on public school education, for example. This attitude of “only we have the truth” is illustrated by a quotation from THE FIRST AMERICAN, by H. W. Brands (p.789). Commenting on the fact that some people in England felt possessed of all truths, the apt quotation is, “The only difference between our churches in their opinions, etc., – the Church of Rome is infallible and the Church of England is never in the wrong.”

This attitude, not confined to the churches above, illustrates the necessity of the wall of separation between church and state.

There is another cogent reason: churches and other religious institutions must be free from governmental control and political inroads on religious freedom. This underemphasized reason is highlighted by the following quote in its entirety from the July-August 2003 issue of “Church and State”:

“Atheist Pastor May Keep State Job in Denmark:

“A Danish pastor sparked an uproar recently when he announced that he does not believe in God, but he still may be able to keep his state-paid job.

“The Rev. Thorkild Grosbøll, a Lutheran minister, reportedly said, ‘There is no heavenly God, there is no eternal life, there is no resurrection.’

“Grosbøll was suspended from his pastoral duties June 3 by the bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church, but his future in the ministry has not yet been determined. In Denmark, the final decision over whether Grosbøll should be defrocked falls to the Danish Government’s Ministry of Ecclesiastical Affairs. Under Denmark’s constitution, Lutheran priests are employed by the state and cannot be dismissed by bishops.

“Some 85% of Danes belong to the state-supported Lutheran Church, but only 5 percent of the country’s 5.3 million people attend services regularly.”

I believe strongly that the Lutheran Church should have the right and power to establish standards for the ordaining of its clergy and the right to defrock and dismiss those clergy who violate their rules and standards.

I am an equally strong advocate for the same rule for our Unitarian Universalist clergy, as well as for all denominations and religious associations.

That the Danish government has the constitutional power to employ and dismiss Lutheran priests is a powerful reason not to chip away at the wall of separation between church and state, that, praise be, exists in the United States.

Why? And Why Not?

2010-07-12T21:07:00.001-04:00

July 10, 2003

One of my boyhood friends was Billy Hogan. Billy and his family lived on Ferry Street, not far from my Oliver Street home. When Billy grew up, he became involved in Everett politics. When still a young man, he was elected to city office, becoming Alderman William Hogan.

Billy’s family was just one of the Irish families who became politically active in the Boston area as well as the city of Boston. There was “Honey Fitz”, mayor of Boston and father of Rose. Rose Fitzgerald married Joseph Kennedy, generating the politically powerful Kennedys. JFK, Robert, Ted, just to mention a few who have been described as “America’s political royalty” by one author.

Then there was Congressman McCormack who became Speaker of the House of Representatives. His brother, “Knocko” McCormack ran a saloon in South Boston (“Southey”) where, it was said, one must go to in order to solicit political favors.

Just to cite a few additional names will be reminders of how potent politically were the Boston Irish: James Michael Curley, Maurice Tobin. From nearby Boston, Tip O’Neill, Senator David I. Walsh, William Cardinal O’Connell, Richard Cardinal Cushing.

Many of their Irish forbears were immigrants escaping from the terrible potato blight in Ireland, 1845-1850.

As A. N. Wilson tellingly describes in THE VICTORIANS, most of the Irish were poor. The estates, great and smaller, were owned by the English aristocracy. The food for the peasant Irish was potatoes. That was practically the only food for the Irish people. A man might eat 11 or 12 pounds of potatoes a day. Two million acres were planted with potatoes.

When the blight ruined potato crops, the absentee British landlords did nothing to help. Some were growing corn on their estates,but exported it for profit rather than sharing to prevent mass starvation.

Large numbers of the Irish poor emigrated to the United States and Canada, enduring wretched conditions on the passage and settlement in a new country. To quote A. N. Wilson, there is “the eternally shaming statistic of 1.1 million deaths by starvation in Ireland between 1845 and 1850.”

Two quotations cited by Wilson (p. 83) recognized the inhumane position taken by those absentee, wealthy English aristocrats who owned so much of the land in Ireland.

Philosopher Benjamin Jowett: “I have always felt a certain horror of political economists, since I heard one of them say that the famine in Ireland in 1848 would not kill more than a million people and that would scarcely be enough to do much good.”

Sidney Smith: “The moment the very name of Ireland is mentioned, the English seem to bid adieu to common feeling, common prudence and common sense, and to act with the barbarity of tyrants and the fatuity of idiots.”

WHY? Why do human beings act with such cruelty? We know that the situation described is not unique. The 20th century experienced the Holocaust where 6 million Jews were slaughtered by the Nazis and their allies.

But there was not enough shock and revulsion in that awful genocide to persuade humankind to abandon such killings. The New York Times, June 7, printed this summary of current horrors:

Congo: Since 1999, an intensifying civil war has left an estimated 3.3 million people dead and displaced tens of thousands....

Somalia: 1988-94 ... 50,000 dead

Angola: 1975-2002 – Civil war left and estimated 400,000 people dead and displaced an undetermined number....

Sierra Leone: 1991-2002 – Civil war left tens of thousands dead and 2 million displaced....

Ivory Coast: Since 2002, thousands have been killed and 1 million displaced....

Rwanda: Since early 1990s ... more than a half-million dead and 4 million displaced....

Ethiopia and Eritrea: 1998-2000 ... tens of thousands dead, 650,000 displaced....

Mozambique: 1977-1992 – Civil war left an estimated 800,000 dead....

Africa is not the only continent where such genocidal killings have occurred. When the dictatorship in Argentina was recently overthrown, it was disclosed that as many as 30,000 had “disappeared.” We will never know how many Soviet people died at the hands of Lenin and Stalin, but it has been estimated in the millions.

Is it possible to generate internationally and worldwide the helpfulness and concern that exists among neighbors and families as I described in the prior Musing, “Friends.”

I don’t know. The United Nations could organize peacekeeping forces that could mitigate considerably these genocidal events. But that can never happen until the United States takes the lead, and is willing to yield some sovereignty to international courts of justice. Furthermore, by assuming a front-role in funding international peacekeeping. A small percentage of the Pentagon budget would accomplish wonders in peacemaking.

The peoples of the world compete in the Olympic Games without killing each other. Is it too far-fetched to believe that the example of the Olympic torch could light up the world and seriously address hunger, sickness, boundaries, finance, trade, human rights?

If some solution is not adopted, the human venture is doomed to failure.

Friends

2010-07-12T20:27:00.001-04:00

June 19, 2003

In THE TEMPEST (Act V, Sc. i), Miranda, who has been reared without human contact other than her father, Prospero, and who, following the shipwreck, falls in love with Ferdinand, declares:

“O, wonder!
How many goodly creatures are there here!
How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world
That has such people in’t.”

Prospero, whose experience has been of betrayal by friends and associates, responds cynically,

“’Tis new to thee.”

When we consider genocides, the lying and distortions of governments, greed for oil or fame, surely Prospero was correct. When one looks at politics, financial swindles, some CEOs whose greed is beyond sensible comprehension, how can we dispute Prospero?

And yet, I had an experience last week that strengthened my faith that there are “goodly creatures.”

I was in the home of the Newtons in Hubbard, Oregon, where my daughter, Janet, is suffering from the effects of A.L.S. She cannot talk, swallow, or walk. Thus she is dependent not only on the alert, loving, devoted care of her husband, Ron, and her daughter, Christina, and son Ian, but also from at least a dozen women friends in the area who care enough to help so Ron can get a little relief and tend somewhat to his law practice. Other members of our extended family – sister, brothers, sisters-in-law, others have traveled to Oregon to help in all ways possible.

In addition, Janet depends on certain life-sustaining equipment, powered by electricity. Ron came to my room about 2 a.m. to provide me with a flashlight. The power was out. He went out seeking the cause of the outage. Down the road he came upon a utility crew replacing a pole which had been rammed by a colliding pick-up truck.

When Ron explained how much the power was needed, one of the crew said he had a generator on the truck; and would follow Ron home and leave the generator there until power was restored.

The power was soon restored, but Ron realized that they needed a generator as a stand-by if other power outages occurred. So he called Jim, a friend, who knew something about generators to find out what features were important, what makes were superior, how much generators cost and other details.

Jim replied that he had an extra generator and would bring it over. Within a half-hour, Jim delivered the generator fully fueled and ready for instant use if the need should arise.

I met Jim and his wife, Marion, who is one of the dozen women ready to help Janet as the need arises.

O. Henry once wrote a pungent short story, “Friends in San Rosario,” but friends in Hubbard/Canby are real, not fictional. Miranda was correct,

“O brave new world
That has such people in’t.”

I intend to write next about the many terrible happenings of man’s inhumanity to man, but Miranda experienced “goodly creatures” and so do we.

THANKS BE.

War Is Always Catastrophe

2010-07-12T06:54:00.000-04:00

April 30, 2003

This remark is attributed to Kofi Annan, Secretary General of the United Nations. The relatively low number of casualties in the war with Iraq experienced by the forces of the UK and USA without doubt is a smaller number than many predicted. The number of civilian casualties, children and adults who died or were maimed by the bombing and military actions may never be known. Lest we be cajoled into thinking that war is not so terrible, a few reminders may be sobering.

In a review of THE FIRST DAY ON THE SOMME, by Martin Middlebrook, we are reminded that July 1, 1916 is the bloodiest day in Britain’s history. World War I was largely trench warfare, and, often enough, the trenches of Allies and Germans were only hundreds of yards apart. The British soldiers attacked, advancing toward the German trentches. At the end of that day, the British had more than 57,000 casualties. 20,000 men were dead and three out of four officers had been killed or wounded. All for an attempt to reach German trenches, some less than 200 yards away. Can any words effectively describe such a day?

In HAMLET, Act IV, Sc. iv, the Norweigian captain says to Hamlet and others:

“We go to gain a little patch of ground
That has in it no profit but the name.”

That was the pattern of trench warfare in World War I. You will find that vividly documented in Barbara Tuchman’s THE GUNS OF AUGUST.

There was slaughter on the oceans, too. Most of us are familiar with the sinking of the passenger liner Lusitania by a German U-boat; 1,200 persons [lost] their lives. Because many of them were Americans, this sinking was the event that brought the United States into World War I.

On January 1, 1945, there was another sinking that had a loss of more than 9,000 persons, the worst maritime disaster in history. The German cruise liner, Wilhelm Gustoff was torpedoed in the freezing waters of the Baltic Sea.

On board were 1,000 German U-boat sailors on their way to Kiel to serve aboard submarines. Also there were 370 women of the Naval Auxiliary. But most of the people who died were civilians trying to escape from the advancing Soviet forces. (I read this information in a book review in the “New Yorker” discussing the book CRAB WALK by Gunter Grass.)

In World War II, most killings were of civilians. One need only name cities to stimulate that recollection: London, Coventry, Dresden, Berlin, Leningrad, Hiroshima, Nagasaki – many others.

Unsuccessfully I have been trying to locate an article with a forecasting of the next World War. The essence of the article was that with the advance of science in devising and delivering new weapons there will be no need to send our uniformed men and women anywhere to engage in combat. The weapons will be “smart” missiles, unmanned “drone” bombers and other unmanned aircraft, all skillfully directed to their targets by their inboard computers, satellites and other devilish ways to destroy people.

If that scenario is a real possibility, then the only deaths will be civilians – millions of them. Other than similar retaliations by the “enemy”, our soldiers, sailors, marines and airmen will be safe at home. But is that much consolation? General William Sherman was more correct than he knew when he proclaimed, “War is Hell.”

Some person unknown to me made the observation that the certain proof that intelligent life exists elsewhere in the Universe is that no one has bothered to make contact with us.

Apatheism

2010-07-11T09:28:00.001-04:00

April 15, 2003

“Apatheism” is a word coined by Jonathan Rauch. In an article in “The Atlantic Monthly”, May 2003, he defines apatheism as “a disinclination to care all that much about one’s own religion, and an even stronger disinclination to care about other people’s.”

I am 100% in agreement with 50% of his definition of this new word. I do care much about my own religion. But as with Rauch, I have a strong “disinclination to care about other people’s.” To paraphrase Thomas Jefferson, I don’t care if any fellow-inhabitant on this wonder-full planet Earth believes in one God, three, twenty or none, if he/she does no harm to others.

Jonathan Rauch also points out that more and more persons seem to agree with him. He cites a survey which indicates that “the proportion of people who say they never go to church or synagogue has tripled since 1972 to 33% in 2000.”

I’m reminded of a verse my colleague, Keith Munson, cited in a sermon recently:

If one drop of rain
The sidewalk doth besmirch
It’s far too wet
To go to church.

If you conclude that, as a career professional in religion, this trend disturbs me, you are wrong. The “true believer” in a particular religion has too often been so fanatical about belief that they have prayed to their God and often preyed violently on others.

In Judeo-Christian history alone, there have been such notorious persecution, wars and suffering in the name of particular religion: the Crusades, the Inquisition, the Thirty Years War, the Puritans who came to this land to secure religious freedom for themselves and to deny it to others, the KKK and its violent hatred of Catholics and Jews, the terrible Holocaust of recent memory. There are many other examples.

James Russell Lowell, who lived in the 19th century and more known for his poetry, once wrote, “Toward no crime have men shown themselves so cold-blooded cruel as in punishing differences of belief.”

So two cheers for “apatheism.” This attitude toward religions will not ruin our nation in spite of the money-begging appeals of some intolerant TV evangelists.

There was a healthy, hopeful contrast in the book, LONGITUDES AND ATTITUDES by Thomas L. Friedman (p. 309). Attending Parents’ night at his daughter’s school, in Washington in the gym with a large American flag, a Noah’s ark of black, white and Hispanic singing “God Bless America,” Friedman choked back tears, saying to himself, “Here is the whole story right here, E. Pluribus Unum, Out of Many, One ... Natalie’s school and the World Trade Center have a lot in common – both are temples of America’s civic religion. Our civic religion is built on the faith that anyone can aspire to come to our shores, become a member of this American nation, work hard, and make of him- or herself whatever he or she wants. The economic strength of America derives from millions of individuals doing just that, and the military might of America derives from the ability of all these different individuals to come together into a fist when these bedrock values are threatened.”

So Be It.

Introduction To Musings XIV

2010-07-10T14:05:00.002-04:00

Holiday Greetings
November – December 2003

May the holidays be a time of rest, renewal, and inspiration for you and your loved ones. These greetings recognize how central to our lives are our families. May health and happiness prevail among those you hold dear.

For our family this has been a traumatic year. Daughter Janet Newton died after a doomed struggle with A.L.S. (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, the Lou Gehrig disease). She fought valiantly and her courage and spirit were, and are, a continuing inspiration to us all. Her husband, Ron, daughter Christina, and son, Ian were wholly devoted to caring for her during this tragic period. Other members of the family traveled from California, Arizona, Maryland, Massachusetts, and other far places to help in her care. Janet is free of suffering now, but her life of love and caring will always be our precious memories.

Daughter Marjorie had mastectomy surgery earlier in the year. All indications are that the surgery and post-surgical chemo-therapy have been successful. Marj embraced this serious matter with courage and optimism with the total support of her husband, Dale.

Mildred Swanson, my first wife, and mother of Marj, John, Janet, and Bill suffered a tragic loss. Her husband, Roger Swanson died suddenly of a heart attack in Reading, Massachusetts, on the day before Janet’s Memorial Service. This sad event required much time, travel, and effort by John, Marj and Bill to help straighten out matters dealing with the disposition of much goods in order to have the Swanson house ready for sale and other matters concerning the estate. Mildred now lives in an assisted living facility in San Francisco.

Son Bill Westman had knee surgery in mid-November to repair torn ligaments which happened when he was playing tennis. He will deal with rehab and expects full recovery.

The dark days of this year were lightened by the arrival of another great-grandchild. Dylan Hunter Roseberry was born November 3, in University Hospital, Albuquerque, New Mexico. The happy parents are Maria and David Roseberry. Grandma Alicia reports that the baby is a strawberry blonde with blue eyes and very handsome.

So life and death have been very much a part of our extended family this year. That is the nature of human existence. If we did not care about others, there would be no deep grief nor real happiness.

My own health seems relatively stable, although I am quite aware that I am in decline. After all, I have been on this planet since 1911.

Happy Holidays,
Carl

The Human Side Of The Holidays

2010-07-10T13:52:00.002-04:00

December 3, 2000
Venice

Years ago I read that when jazz musician Benny Goodman was talking with a woman at a party, someone dropped a champagne glass. At the sound of the shattering glass, the woman asked, “What was that?”

Goodman answered, “C Sharp.” We humans are like that – we respond according to our interests. To some the sound would have been startling, creating anxieties about a stained rug or someone drinking too much wine. Others might be amused at the awkward accident happening to somebody else. To Benny Goodman, the sound meant C Sharp.

Today is the first Sunday of the Christian Advent season, when Christian believers begin their preparation to celebrate the virgin birth of their Savior, Jesus, in a manger in Bethlehem. From different points of view, the Christmas holidays also bring out differing reactions and unlike interpretations. Unitarian Universalists many times have mixed feelings about Christmas. Some hear “C sharp”; some hear breaking glass. But the person who denies the power of feeling at Christmas season has never listened either to his fellow-liberals or acknowledged his own emotions.

We try to accommodate in various ways, sometimes sensitively, sometimes rationalizing, sometimes naively. An old friend remarked that Unitarian Universalists never mention Christmas without also referring to Hanukkah. I suppose we do that for several reasons: to recognize the wideness of the cultural patterns we celebrate in December; to included the liberation celebration of Hanukkah, which has been a part of the heritage of many of our families; to create an atmosphere for the cultural universality of December rituals – concerts, charitable giving, both personal and commercialized, and swinging parties.

There is no single origin of our mid-Winter celebrations. One flowing spring is seldom the only source of a mighty river. Other brooks and streams feed into it. We need remember the many sources of Winter celebration – not only Christmas and Hanukkah, but also many others, including in recent years, Kwanzaa.

India may be at least one of the sources of Western culture. The roots of Western cultural origins may have beginnings in the Indus Valley, as well as the Tigris-Euphrates basin and Egypt. There are other sources, including the Roman, Teutonic, and Scandinavian.

Thousands of years before the birth of Jesus, the people of India were devoted to the god, Vishnu. Even today, Vishnu may have more followers than any other Hindu god. Originally, he was a Sun god. As the Brahmanic religion developed, Vishnu became the principal god to whom sacrifice was made. In the Hindu trinity, he is the second member who assumes human form. There are differences between Hindu and Christian mythology. Vishnu was incarnated many times, sometimes as animal, sometimes as man. We should note that what we call the “messianic tradition” was a continuing hope in Hinduism. One day, Vishnu would reappear, he would cleanse the earth from sin, remove the shadows and bring about the reign of justice and truth.

Some of us have roots in the Scandinavian peninsula. The traditions of the Norsemen tell the stories of the great celebrations on the occasion of the Winter Solstice. The feast was known as Jul and honored the divine birth of Freyer.

Zoroaster, who lived six or seven centuries before Jesus, was the founder of the religion that bears his name, Zoroastrianism. This prophet of Persian religion taught that there was a struggle constantly between good and evil. Mythology and legend accumulated after his time on earth. Followers declared that Zoroaster was born of a virgin, was visited by adoring Magi; in infancy[, he] was saved from a powerful enemy. In other myths, the life of Zoroaster paralleled the Gospel stories about Jesus.

About the birth of Buddha, there also grew a miraculous mythology, although he had taught ethics and rejected the gods. Years after his death, he was transformed into what in life he had rejected, a god. Parallels with the Christian stories are found also in the mythology that accumulated around Confucius, who lived about the same period as Buddha, about the sixth century, B.C.E.

Many cultures, many historic periods, many religions have contributed to our Christmas. If that’s all there was to it – a package of myth and legend, tied with the ribbons of strange customs and superstitious rites of numerous early religions, held before us in order to encourage the spending of money, not to speak of exhausting us physically, we could recommend that Christmas be ignored. If the complex patterns of ancient Christmas myth and legend were all there was to it, we could protest that promoting the celebration of Christmas strengthened belief in the unreasonable and unwholesome doctrine of inherited sin. Furthermore, we could protest with justification that adoration and praise of a virgin mother placed an unnecessary and inhuman stigma on natural love between man and woman and the children born to them.

But that’s not all there is to it. There may be considerable dilution of feeling in placing other customs in conscious juxtaposition with Christmas and Hanukkah, because we may not be able to have our cake and eat it too, as far as the deepest and most poignant sentiments of Christmas are concerned.

When we turn to the universality of the Winter feast, when we ring the changes on the likenesses of Christian, Buddhist, Persian, Chinese, and Scandinavian myths, there may be a real question as to whether we just want an excuse for a party, or feel a reluctance to be too different, whereas for the convinced Christian believer, Christmas is Christ’s Mass, and the Mass celebrates the unique and once-and-for-all supernatural atoning sacrifice of God in Christ for all humankind. But I know no Unitarian Universalists who celebrate Christmas for that theological reason.

We like the carols with lovely melodies, with wistful words, whose theology we ignore. An old friend in a church I served many years ago used to say around the Christmas season, “What we won’t say, we sing.” We tend to convey by our attitudes that inasmuch as many faiths have saviors, we will taste them all, like a wine-tasting party.

Do we celebrate because the old pre-Christian tides of anciently imbedded feelings surface when the Winter Solstice arrives? Or, in spite of our rejection of Christian theology, are we still sufficiently conditioned by the Christian centuries to want to celebrate Christ’s birth – and then explain it away to rid ourselves of any intellectual discomfort we might feel? The Christian Christmas stories and music are deeply moving even to an agnostic or atheist.

When one gets right down to cases, there is no more reason to celebrate the Winter Solstice than the theological Christ’s Mass. The early pre-scientific peoples believed the change from darkness to increasing light was the gift of the gods, who were unpredictable in their bounty. We have learned that the changing seasons and measurable variations of day and night are astronomically precise, predictable as planet Earth moves in its rotating, plotted orbit around our sun-star. There is perhaps even less reason for annual re-creation of the feasts of Anglo-Saxons, Teutons, and Scandinavians than there is for our Christmas worship, even though the pagan wassailing, tree worship, and slightly scandalous parties seem in truth to bring a more enthusiastic response in our day than the incarnation theology.

We do not wrestle seriously with these considerations because feelings prevail, hardly less so among self-classified rationalists and agnostics than with anybody else. Feelings will prevail because we will respond to the aroma and sight of evergreen and candle, the excitement of being busy for others, the sounds of Adeste Fideles and Handel’s MESSIAH, the abundance of sentiment, the image of Jul log (not in FL?) and the warmth of human affection.

On Ash Wednesday, the ashes used in most Roman Catholic churches, traditionally, are secured by burning the palms used the previous year on Palm Sunday. In a few countries, Scandinavian, I believe, the ashes, the visible sign of repentance, were the ashes of the Jul log burned the previous Christmas. Were these penitential customs an awareness that the Christmas dreams of peace and goodwill were not realized because of what we humans are and the ways we think and behave?

But in this season, can there not be moments when new content may replace both the superstitions of pre-history and theologies we can no longer believe? Yes! I believe so.

We celebrate the wonder of life in its lovely realization – the wanted, new baby in the manger of the poor. The story of the baby Jesus stirs us deeply because his is a universal story of parents who experience the shattering, mysterious compound of love, danger, fear, and hope, blended with the fact of pain, the surprise of human sacrifice, and the wonder of human growth.

We celebrate the creation of new human life. Do you remember Stephen Vincent Benet’s poem, “Nightmare for Future Reference”? It was written at the height of the Cold War, but we are still under threat with at least 7 or 8 nations possessing nuclear weapons, and who knows how many have biological death weapons in their secret laboratories? Benet’s poem goes:

“That was the second year of the Third World War
The one between us and Them....”

The poet goes on with laconic but sobering words in the framework of a father speaking to his son:

“The lab chief was no longer permitted guinea pigs for experiments and the statistical curve of the birth rate was in a steep and terrifying slide:

I didn’t ask them,
Not even your mother – she was strange those days –
But, two weeks later, I was back in the lines
And somebody sent me a paper –
Encouragement for the troops and all of that –
All about the fall of Their birth rate on Their side.
I guess you know, now. There was still a day when we fought
And the next day, the women knew. I don’t know how they knew,
But they smashed every government in the world
Like a heap of broken china within two days:
And we’d stopped firing by then. And we looked at each other –
Well, I’ve told you now. They tell you now at eighteen.
There’s no use to tell before.
Do you understand?
That’s why we have the Ritual of the Earth,
The Day of Sorrow, the other ceremonies.
Oh, yes, at first people hated the animals
Because they still bred, but we’ve gotten over that.
You can call it a virus, of course, if you like the word,
But we haven’t been able to find it. Not yet. No
It isn’t as if it had happened all at once.
There were a few children born in the last six months
Before the end of the war, so there’s still some hope,
But they’re almost grown. That’s the trouble
They’re almost grown.
Well, we had a long run. That’s something. At first they thought
There might be a nation somewhere – a savage tribe.
But we were all in it, even the Eskimos.
And we keep the toys in the stores and coloring books,
And people marry and plan and the rest of it,
But you see, there aren’t any children. They aren’t being born.”

Some psychologists interpret the image of a child in a dream as indicating the beginning of new life in a patient. New Life! We know that to define human beginnings as the fertilization of ovum by sperm is to describe, not explain. The emergence of living form, the growth of limb, mind, emotion – all these are/wonderful for diagnostic words. Everyone who has ever held a young baby knows that.

At this season, carol, candle, creche, and evergreen remind us with gladness that children are still being born. What theologically is called the “incarnation” is an all-human occasion for renewing the feeling of glad mystery that life forces are still with us, “the light that lighteth every one that cometh into the world.” No particularized theology may monopolize that full joy and deep wonder.

We celebrate another universal feeling. Church historian Hans Lietzmann helped put this in historical and cultural perspective (A HISTORY OF THE EARLY CHURCH (Vol II, p. 166 – 168). The Roman poet Virgil (79 B.C.E. – 14 B.C.E.) had predicted a time when a savior, coming to the world as a divine child, would erase sin and usher in a golden age. Many Romans thought that Caesar Augustus was that divine incarnation. For centuries to follow, all Caesars were deified. The Age of Augustus was extolled as one which brought better fortune and lessening misery as the Pax Romana brought universal peace. Temples of Peace, dedicated to Rome and Augustus, were built in city after city. Wrote Lietzmann, “A community of feeling passed over the boundaries of the provinces and the differences of race, and created the vitally necessary ideology of the Roman Empire.” So it is today – there is a community of feeling which is all too brief. There are World War I legends of soldiers climbing from the trenches and meeting as friends in Christmas battlefield truce. Personnel executives have told me how difficult it is to discharge persons at Christmas. We are more generous, not only with family, but also to worthy causes and needy persons. Christmas is an incarnation briefly of the dreams of all peoples of the world as it might be, when there would be peace on earth and goodwill to all. We do not need the psychologist to tell us that the babe in the manger or the crib room of the hospital is a sign of hope, for on him/her we project our deepest yearnings, the purer dreams of a human society where the symbols of religion will represent the reality of peace and the full recognition everywhere of the dignity of every person. Dr. Edmund Sinnot (THE BRIDGE OF LIFE) wrote, “Man’s objective now is not to make superior individuals reproduce themselves more efficiently, but to make individuals superior. Greatness will not be the result of evolution, but of aspiration.” (p. 124)

Consider four lines from W. H. Auden’s poem, “In Memory of W. B. Yeats”,

“Follow, poet, follow right
To the bottom of the night,
With your unconstraining voice
Still persuade us to rejoice.”

Because humankind has a dream, still persuade us to rejoice. There will come a time, in a couple of weeks, when the long night ebbs and more light shines on the babes of the world. When that illumination moves silently, transforming shadow to light, then something in our bones, our blood, our cultural heritage cries out that no matter how dismal the prospect for human redemption, no matter how formidable the portents of disaster, in spite of the blows with which we have been struck, there is a spirit of creation abroad in the world which calls us to protect the innocent, to warm our homes with light and love; and reverently embrace the cosmic mystery, which, I believe, underlies all the matter, energy, and value structures of this universe, this planet, our home.

Centuries before the Christian era began, long before the liberation struggles of the Maccabeans formed the Hanukkah celebration, the Greek dramatist Euripides had words for this occasion in the concluding prayer chorus of IPHIGENIA IN TAURUS, (p. 89):

“O great in our dull world of clay,
And great in heaven’s undying gleam,
Pallas, thy bidding we obey:
And bless thee, for mine ears have heard
The joy and wonder of a word
Beyond my dream, beyond my dream.”

That is the aspiration for the human side of the holidays – we hear the joy and wonder of a word and a world beyond our dreams, because the fulfillment of hopes depends upon the quality of our aspirations and upon our persistence in making real what has been ideal.

[Editor's Note: This sermon appeared at the end of the final (2004) bundle of musings, but was dated as being from the year 2000.]

A Fresh Angle On A Word

2010-07-09T10:34:00.002-04:00

November 25, 2002

The 13th chapter of 1st Corinthians in the scriptures are probably the most familiar passages to most persons in the hundreds of varieties Christian beliefs and sects. The King James Version (1611) begins:

“Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal.”

The Oxford Annotated Bible (Revised 1952) begins:

“If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.”

“Charity” in the King James Version and “love” in the Revised and other modern versions are translations of the same Greek word, AGAPE.

The change of translation is based on the modern use of of “charity” to indicate alms-giving or the help the more affluent give to the poor. “Love” is currently believed to be a more accurate and more comprehensive rendering of AGAPE. Some scholars believe that when Paul was writing to his friends at Corinth, he was writing of the “love of God” for His human creations, and, consequently, what persons should believe and act toward their fellow men and women.

A modern Bible scholar, John Dominic Crossan, in EXCAVATING JESUS, a book he co-authored, writes, “We Christians translate the New Testament word AGAPE as love, meaning charity or alms-giving. Better to translate it as ‘to share.’”

The nuance of the word, “share” spoke to me this week as Thanksgiving arrives on Thursday. The table will be heaped with roast turkey and tasty vegetables, along with tangy cranberry sauce, topped with rich desserts.

But not everywhere in the world, because millions will be hungry and children starving. I will be remembering a saying of many years ago, the source forgotten, “If we all ate at one table, no one would be allowed to go hungry.” That metaphor represents what The Man from La Mancha sang, “to dream the impossible dream.” Also from the lyrics of that song, “to fight the unbeatable foe.” Fred, 98 year old tablemate at meals, would consider human greed the unbeatable foe. To overcome that foe is a mammoth task.

Yet if we continue to dream the impossible dream where all children are fed; and support efforts to achieve it, perhaps tomorrow there will be fewer hungry persons than today; and next year, fewer hungry persons than this year. And every year after that.

Crossan’s suggestion would make that opening verse of Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians read, “If I speak in the tongues of men and angels, but do not share, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.” A challenging perspective?

John Dominic Crossan makes an accompanying and excellent point, though not all would agree. He wrote that the underlying prophetic ethical demand is justice, both in the Hebrew scriptures (Old Testament) and Christian scriptures (New Testament). The most illustrative example I can think of at the moment is Micah, Ch. 4, verses 3 – 4:

“He shall judge between many peoples,
and shall decide for strong nations afar off;
and they shall beat their swords into plowshares,
and their spears into pruning hooks;
nation shall not lift up sword against nation,
neither shall they learn war any more;
but they shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig tree,
and none shall make them afraid.”

To conclude with Shakespeare, where Pompey says in ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA, Act II, Sc. i)

“If the great gods be just, they shall assist
the deeds of the justest men.”

Such are my dreams this Thanksgiving week.

Untitled

2010-07-09T09:44:00.001-04:00

November 9, 2002

“I am beholden to you
For your sweet music, this last night.
I do Protest my ears were never better fed
With such delightful pleasing harmony.”

So Shakespeare has Simonides say in PERICLES (Act II, Sc. v). That was my experience also last night when the Gulf Coast Symphony and the 100 voice Key Chorale presented Beethoven’s Symphony #9 – the Choral Symphony (Sara sings with the Key Chorale).

With Leif Bjarland conducting with complete vigorous command of the orchestra, chorus and soloists, I was transported to realms of mystery and exaltation. I am no musician; I cannot read music (some of you know the probable cause of such ignorance). But I am deeply moved by music, more frequently by the three “Bs” – Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, but also by a wide variety from Louis Armstrong to operatic choruses; and, yes, even the “golden oldies,” Glen Miller, e.g., and an occasional polka. Writing this has put an end to the “dry spell” in these musings, the cause of which I know.

I have been informed that Beethoven’s 9th is particularly difficult for choristers. Margery Dearden writes in the program notes [that] “Beethoven makes superhuman demands of his singer, carrying the sopranos into the stratosphere, and almost seems to abandon them up there....”

Beethoven held high the ideal, the hope, of human brotherhood ... found in Schiller’s “Ode to Joy,” the text for his superb musical paean to that dream of the human family.

The first verse reads:

“Joy, thou source of light immortal,
Daughter of Elysium,
Touched with fire to the portal
Of thy radiant shrine we come.
Thy pure magic frees all other
Held in custom’s rigid rings.
Men throughout the world are brothers
In the haven of thy wings.”

In our world of 2002, where the war drums beat, where hate is a spreading virus, and suspicion prevails, to hear the 9th, the “Choral”, is to take heart again that we will not wipe out our human family in a stupid, heedless Armageddon.

A Moving Story

2010-07-08T06:55:00.001-04:00

July 1, 2002

This is my second full day of residence at the Beneva Park Club, an assisted living facility.

I’m very grateful for Sara’s important help in planning the best use of limited space, her muscle power along with her grandson, Ian, in moving things around, and removing items from Jefferson Center. Ian, with today’s young man’s knowledge of computers, sorted out the maze of wires, hooked up my Dell, the TV, and the VCR.

Earlier in the month, son John spent much time and energy removing and storing items and getting me ready to move.

Temporarily I’m quartered in #124, while my permanent room, #119 is awaiting the arrival of a replacement air conditioner. All my books and many other items are stored in another room on this floor. It makes no sense to shelve them only to repack them when I am moved to #119, which I hope will be within two weeks.

I am comfortable. The food is institutional, but good. Breakfast is the best meal. It is partially that I have little taste or strong desire for meat dishes. The courtesy of the serving staff is A-one. The whole staff – office, nursing, cleaning, housekeeping, as well as dining room personnel, not only do their tasks efficiently, but also their cheerful, helpful attitudes make for a pleasant day. Just consider one item – my bed is made every day. That is just one convenience that I have not enjoyed for years.

I was assigned a seat in the dining room with three men. If I wished, I could ask for a change of seating. I don’t think I will. I am interested in their life stories, although constant repetition sometimes makes me wonder if the events were real or are augmented by creative imagination.

Fred, 97 years old, is the oldest man in the Beneva Park Club. He has been a marine, sheet metal worker, world traveler and hobo. He seems to take most pride in his adventures as a hobo. He seems well-read. He summed this quality up by saying whenever he arrived in a new city he always went to the library first before going to the brothel.

Bob, the youngest of our quartet is only 84 years old. Within 10 minutes of meeting him, he forcefully asserted he was an atheist. He was an officer on a submarine during World War II. Later he worked for the Department of Agriculture. His work there had something to do with the mating habits of primates – monkeys, chimps, etc. I do not understand why such research was a part of the function of the Department of Agriculture. When I see my son, Bill, perhaps he can enlighten me. Anyway, Bob knows the Latin names of all the primates and readily trots out that knowledge.

Hugh, who is a year or two older than I am, is also an interesting person. He was born and reared in India where his parents wtiere Christian missionaries. Hugh, I gather, was a teacher in Asia. In World War II when Japan conquered Singapore, Hugh became a prisoner of war for three and a half years. He only hints at the agonies he must have experienced. He did remark that rats were not bad eating. “Tastes something like chicken when fried in a little palm oil.” Hugh addresses me as “Padre.”

I am pleased that my first friends here are Fred, Bob, and Hugh. However, already one woman stopped me in the hallway and asked, “How can you stand those three characters?” I assured her that I was enjoying my meals with them. She looked at me skeptically and moved on. I had the temptation to quote Shakespeare to her where in TWELFTH NIGHT, Toby says to the clown, “Dost thou think because thou art virtuous, there shall be no more cakes and ale?” I resisted the temptation to cite that famous quote, fortunately for me.

So went the first two days of my living here. If they are any harbinger of days to come, I will not be bored or have time hang heavy on my hands.

Wealth More Precious Than Jewels: A Parable

2010-07-07T09:55:00.001-04:00

April 15, 2002

A wise woman who was traveling in the mountains found a precious stone in a stream. The next day she met another traveler who was hungry, and the wise woman opened her bag to share her food. The hungry traveler saw the precious stone and asked the woman to give it to him. She did without hesitation.

The traveler left rejoicing in his good fortune. He knew the stone was worth enough to give him security for a lifetime.

A few days later, he came back to return the stone to the wise woman.

“I’ve been thinking,” he said. “I know how valuable this stone is, but I give it back in the hope that you can give me something even more precious. Give me what you have within you that enabled you to give me this stone.”

Sometimes it’s not the wealth you have but what’s inside you that others need.

Although noble in intent, this parable has flaws. Suppose the traveler was addicted to cocaine, and would pawn the gem for money for a number of “fixes?” Suppose the traveler was “on the lam” from an indictment on criminal charges and the gem could provide funds for travel to a country where there was no extradition treaty with the U.S.? But such suppositions are nitpicking. I should value the parable for its story of unhesitating, unquestioning generosity.

The traveler rejoiced in his unearned good fortune. It is not for me to criticize the benefits that a little or a lot of money can provide. To denigrate or condemn affluence, just because it is affluence, is for persons more radical than I am. One of the abuses of wealth occurs when it is the only dimension of one’s appraisal of self.

In the parable the traveler discovered that more valuable than the precious stone was an understanding of the generosity of the wise woman. The actions of many people in all times and places are motivated by greed, envy, or self-justification. Because of the prevalence of such traits, we are surprised, sometimes, to discover generosity without expectations of “paybacks” in one way or another. But there are such wise persons, women and men. We can be glad of that.

Jesus’ parable of the Prodigal Son illustrates the same truth more vividly in its non-judgmental love of parent for child. Some commentators have suggested that the proper title for this parable is “The Forgiving Father” not “The Prodigal Son.”

Was the older son justified in complaining? Many persons would say “yes.” The father recognized the older son’s complaints, but replied:

“Son, you are always with me and all that is mine is yours. It was fitting to make merry and be glad for this your brother was dead, and is alive, he was lost and is found.”

Notice that the father did not refer to the prodigal as “my younger son,” but rather, “your brother.” A subtle point, perhaps, but telling. I am not naïve and I am aware there are families where brother cannot tolerate brother. The primal myth of Cain and Abel illuminates the malicious dysfunction that can happen among siblings. But generosity and joy prevail when a prodigal conies to himself and comes home. Family celebrations of such redemptions are a unique experience of happiness in human affairs.

A Unique Experience

2010-07-06T09:03:00.001-04:00

January 7, 2002

Jefferson Center, where I live, has 201 apartments and more than 200 people live here. There are some couples but most of us live alone.

Every year there is a recognition luncheon for those residents who are 90 years old or older. As I now qualify for this group, I was included in those being honored at a luncheon today.

There are at present 12 residents who are 90 or older. Being one of the 12 is a unique experience for me.

At today’s luncheon, five of us being honored sat together. I was the only male. One of the 12 is at a rehab facility. I don't know why the other six were absent. Other Jefferson residents sat at other tables.

We were entertained by a family singing group whose repertoire, outside of “Jingle Bells,” was entirely Christian gospel which was appreciated, apparently, by most of those present. I personally would have preferred some secular music, but I kept a straight face and applauded politely.

The leader of the group, the mother, talked proudly about her seven children. They all have biblical names ending in “h”. With her today, and doing some singing and movements to music, were Sarah, Josiah, and Zachariah, about 7, 8, and 10 years old, respectively.

We were then served a nice lunch of sandwiches cut in triangles, potato chips and grapes. (Nobody asked me why I didn’t touch the grapes.) Dessert was a delicious cake with ice cream.

Of the five of us 90-plus sitting together, the most remarkable person was the oldest. Mildred Flick is 98; walks with considerably more vigor than I and the others can; has good vision – she does put on reading glasses; her mind is alert and “with it”; and told us she takes no medications. How about that!!!

Sitting next to me was Malva, a friend who is one of the better bridge players in Jefferson. She gets around on a battery-powered wheel chair. She is one year older than I am. We have played many hands of bridge. This we have enjoyed, particularly when we are partners, because our bidding gives us some idea of the shape of the partner’s hand. With some other players at Jefferson, this is a complete mystery.

Becoming qualified for this “exclusive” club of 90s-plus was a pleasant occasion. It would be nice to be around for next year's recognition luncheon.

Introduction To Musings XIII

2010-07-05T21:26:00.003-04:00

December 2002

HOLIDAY GREETINGS

As the Solstice draws near, which has sparked several religious traditions, 1 wish everyone much happiness, warm memories, and wonder-full moments.

This year has been traumatic and dramatic for me and my large family. We were shocked and grieved that daughter, Janet Newton in Oregon, was diagnosed with A.L.S. (the Lou Gehrig disease), for which there is no known cure. She has endured much pain and suffering. Her husband, Ron, is constantly at her side with love and hope. Their children, Christina and Ian have been strong and loving. Other members of the family and friends have rallied around.

As we have experienced these tragic days and months, I have found meaning in the anonymous saying, “Love can break your heart; but it’s worth it.” I won’t try to elaborate that, but if you reflect on that saying long enough, you will catch the profound meaning.

This year has been dramatic for me, too. I made the decision to move to an “Assisted Living Facility.” I am content that I made the decision myself. No one had to make it for me.

In my sixth month here at the Beneva Park Club, I know that my move was a proper one at this time of my life.

Although costs have risen beyond my anticipation, the staff is competent, friendly, and caring. Living here is a good experience.

There are fewer Musings than other years. I am a bit pessimistic about political and international issues.

This has resulted in fewer judgments, perhaps, than in other years. However the events of this year have caused me to think upon some words of Reinhold Niebuhr (from “The Irony of American History”).

I did not appreciate Niebuhr when he was alive. He could make “Liberals” quite uncomfortable. But I have thought much about the following quotation, particularly in discouraging hours:

“Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our lifetime; therefore we must be saved by hope. Nothing which is true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history; therefore we must be saved by faith. Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone; therefore we are saved by love. No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as it is from our standpoint. Therefore we must be saved by the final form of love, which is forgiveness.”

This is deep wisdom, particularly to one in the declining years.

I sign off with unbounded affection to you and yours,
Carl

The Reformation – and Martin Luther

2010-07-05T18:57:00.003-04:00

October 28, 2001
Venice

Rewrite of
October 26, 1958, Akron
Also: Rochester 10/29/61, Revised 10/25/64

This is Reformation Sunday, marking the birthday of the Protestant Church and the revolt from Roman Catholicism. Next Wednesday marks the four hundred and eighty-fourth anniversary of the day Martin Luther tacked the 95 theses to the door of Wittenberg Cathedral. The religious, political, economic, and social changes effected by the Protestant Reformation represent [some] of the most important, if not the most important, changes in the history of the Western world. I would like to discuss the leading person of the Reformation, one of the most controversial persons in history, Martin Luther. He was a saint, sinner, vulgarian, or anti-Semitic bigot, depending on the point of view from which he is seen. His followers hailed him as a true prophet of the Lord. Roman Catholics called him a child of the devil and accused him of demolishing Christianity. The agrarian reformers of that turbulent sixteenth century said he was the toady, tool, and supporter of the feudal lords and princes. Religious radicals, Carlstadt and Muenster, for example, compared him to Moses, who led the way out of captivity in Egypt, but then deserted his followers, leaving them to perish in the wilderness. Those who have looked at this personal life with critical eye have thought him to be a coarse libertine who broke with his Roman Catholic tradition so that he might marry a nun and rear children in sin and vulgarity. The critics submit Luther’s own writings, TABLE TALK, as evidence of his degraded personality.

This we know, the history of the world was altered because Martin Luther lived. In abolishing the authority of the Pope, Martin Luther established the freedom of the Christian. When this principle became established, the administration of the religious institution became the responsibility of the parish, a congregation of lay people. Martin Luther did not anticipate, and actually opposed, some of the consequences of the Reformation he spearheaded. The principle of the authority of the lay congregation had extreme political as well as religious effects. The self-administration of religion pointed the way to worldly self-government as well. Therefore, it is of particular importance to the liberal groups whose guiding principle of freedom is the most uninhibited, to try to understand Martin Luther. This presentation divides into

1) the setting,
2) the Augustinian priest,
3) the reformer and supporter of princes, and
4) the man, Martin Luther.

Although Martin Luther is the most notable figure of the Reformation, he was not born when the Reformation began. To know the Reformation, we need to understand that the Renaissance, the revival of learning, the recovery of the ancient Greek belief in the worth of the humans, had been in progress for at least two centuries. Petrarch and Boccaccio had notably advanced Humanist studies. The Medici family, also of Florence, had been the greatest patrons of art, sculpture, literature, and philosophy that the European world had known. Under their patronage, Michelangelo, DaVinci, Mirandola, Raphael and others had created arts and letters that still summon our wonder at their genius. In 1453, the world’s greatest cultural center, Constantinople, had fallen to the Turks. The scholars there who had preserved the manuscripts and art objects of Hellenism fled to Italy and other parts of Europe. 12 Universities were founded in Germany between 1409 and 1506.

Not only did the Renaissance signal the revival of arts and learning, but a most important political movement was beginning to make its strong eddies felt in the ebb and flow of the Holy Roman Empire. Although Germany lagged somewhat, England, France and Spain had assumed form as nations. The mass of people had no share in the political rewards or freedoms, although they were the objects of the most severe hardships and sufferings. Their unquestioned place was serfdom.

The Roman Catholic was the authoritarian church. There was no toleration of heresy, but the seeds that were to bear fruit in Luther’s time had already been sown. John Wyclif of England, opposed to the wealth of the church and clerical interference in all walks of life, believed that the Bible should be the possession of the people and had translated the scriptures into English. Wyclif was executed for heresy, his ashes scattered on Thames, but neither his convictions nor his bravery were forgotten. 1373 marked the birth of John Hus, a Bohemian priest, who was influenced by Wyclif’s teachings and Hus preached an evangelical doctrine which was anathema to the Roman Catholic church. John Hus avowed publicly that the head of the Church was Christ, not the Pope. The unprincipled church gave him safe conduct to the Council of Constance, but broke faith and burned him at the stake, July 6, 1415, but neither was his memory forgotten nor his principles rejected by his followers. In 1498, the austere monk of Florence, Savonarola denounced the Pope. After a succession of temporary triumphs and then humiliating defeat, Savonarola was burned at the stake. But even as smoke and smell from the burning flesh and faggots were dispersed to the winds, so the knowledge of his revolt became widely perceived by later reformers, including Martin Luther, who was but a fifteen-year-old student when Savonarola was executed.

Something else had happened which was to make the world different than it had ever been before. Moveable type printing had been invented – the peoples of the world would not only become more literate, but the printed word was to bring them the wisdom of scripture in their own language, and they read the protesting pamphlets of the reformers.

In this seething caldron of social change, a baby boy was born to a peasant miner, Hans Luther and his wife, Marguerite, in 1483. November 10 was St. Martin’s day, and the infant was named Martin after the patron saint. Martin’s parents were peasants, but Hans Luther was not content to accept the poverty and misery of the miner’s lot. By individual effort he labored to make his lot better and his family more comfortable and privileged. In these beginning times of individualism, his efforts brought some rewards. Martin was able to go to school and University to be prepared for the practice of law, which was his father’s wish for his eldest son.

The schools at that time were organized, administered, and taught by the Church and its various orders. Martin’s early schooling was directed by the Brethren of the Common Life, an order dedicated to education. Then, in the University, he was influenced by the Augustinian order. Under the strong influence of the monks, together with his personality, which was unusually sensitive to supernaturalism and mystery, along with his fine mind, which was capable of wrestling with the intricate language of philosophy and theology, Martin Luther found his hopes turning toward the Church and away from the Law. Although Hans Luther was deeply religious, his wish that Martin be a Doctor of Law was so strong that when Martin announced that he was to become an Augustinian monk, his father was deeply hurt. Years were to pass before he really forgave the son who was frustrating the parent’s deepest wish.

After a farewell party, Martin’s friends escorted him to the Augustinian cloister at Erfurt on the 17th of July 1505. He entered its gates there to endure the privation of the order and to know the religious joy of humbling his passions, following the tedious routine of prayer and study, eventually, when ordained to know the mystery or celebrating the Mass, in which the wafer and wine became the body and blood of Christ.

As a monk, Martin Luther was conscientious to a degree we would believe to be unnatural. He fasted for days at a time, went night after night without sleep so that he might devote himself to prayer unceasingly (and in so doing permanently injured his health). He whipped himself to subdue the desires of the flesh. Although he was a model of holiness to his brother monks, his personal anxiety increased. He became increasingly morbid. Luther, a child of his times, feared the devil and believed the arts of witchcraft could have a dreadful effect on him. The iron discipline of the Augustine order had the natural effect of subduing his outward expressions of feeling and intensifying the inward fires of human passions.

Following his ordination as a priest, he turned to teaching at the University and soon became a most popular teacher. His large following of students was drawn for several reasons. His peasant inheritance gave him the common touch, plain talk, and natural illustration which reached the core of subjects. To a lesser degree than monks of more aristocratic background, was he bound to narrow conventions and traditional formulas. Following his master’s degree, he earned the degree of Doctor of Theology, a scholastic honor rare in those days.

His talents and drive soon won greater recognition. When only 31 years old, in 1515, he was appointed District-Vicar of the Augustinian order. Thus, in addition to his devotional duties as a monk, his university responsibilities as a teacher of philosophy, he had the additional duty of administrative responsibility, superintending the 10 Augustinian monasteries in his district.

This devout Augustinian monk was obsessed not only with neurotic fears for his salvation, but also he was upset by dishonesty and corruption readily discovered in the church of that day, which was dominated by the Renaissance Popes, who had a high degree of sensitivity to artistic beauty and an insensitive attitude toward personal and organizational corruption.

Martin Luther and another monk made a pilgrimage to Rome. He had hopes that this would be a high experience in his life, but [it] resulted in considerable disillusion. In Rome he could not help observing the corruption, hypocrisy, and political knavery of the hierarchy. The irreverence of the priesthood shocked this simple, devout German peasant priest. It is said that while climbing the sacred stairs on his knees, that Paul’s words to the Romans fixed themselves in Luther’s brain, “the just shall live by faith.” He realized that acts of piety like climbing stairs on his knees were of little effect. The extent to which the Rome visit influenced his revolt, we do not know. Perhaps it was a small but significant episode in his life.

The real spark of the Reformation was ignited when the Roman hierarchy decided that in order to build magnificent St. Peter’s Basilica, much money had to be raised. So the sale of indulgences was authorized. The doctrine was that by their purity the saints had built up a bank account (so to speak) of piety, on which the sinful could draw to lessen their years in Purgatory. So, Tetzel, a monk went through the countryside urging the peasants to buy indulgences so that their dead relatives might be released from Purgatory sooner. It is said that Pope Leo X, who was the son of Lorenzo de Medici, said cynically about the response of the believing peasants, “This story of Jesus has helped us a lot.”

On October 31, 1517, Martin Luther tacked a manuscript to the door of Wittenberg Cathedral. 95 propositions for debate were listed. Luther questioned the indulgences with a series of logical propositions, the most telling of which proposed that if the Pope had the power to release souls from Purgatory, then he should do so at once, not for money, but out of the spirit of love and charity.

Although years were to elapse between the nailing of the theses to the door of Wittenberg Cathedral and the actual formation of the Reformed Church, that date is historically looked upon as the birthday of Protestantism.

Luther’s theses were formal statements, but his vernacular comment was, “God will not tolerate this flea market.”

News of the opposition of this Augustinian monk to the plans of the hierarchy soon reached Rome, and action followed. There were years of ecclesiastical maneuvering. Luther refused to recant. He had a famous debate with John Eck and undoubtedly would have been executed except for a new historical tide. Nationalism was dawning; and the feudal lords and princes of Germany were very much opposed to the Roman Church drawing off large sums of money from the homeland for St. Peter’s or any other foreign enterprise.

Luther began to write and his statements pointed unquestionably to strong differences with the Church at Rome. He proposed the priesthood of all believers, and that there were only two sacraments authorized by scripture: baptism and the Lord’s Supper. These statements were heretical, unquestionably, and Luther was summoned to appear before the Diet of Worms (“Here I stand”). Luther was excommunicated, and would have been seized, except Frederick, elector of Saxony, had him spirited away to Wartburg Castle. But the printing press was pounding out Luther’s writings, [which] were distributed widely, and the people responded. When Luther emerged from Wartburg, he found himself organizing a Reformed Church.

Then occurred one of the more puzzling aspects of Luther’s strange character: The impetus to religious freedom had other consequences. The peasants revolted against the landlords and princes. It was somewhat natural, but unexpected that they should seek to throw off political and economic oppression when the way to religious freedom had been pointed out. From our perspective we know this is one of the glories of religious freedom – other benefits to humankind are natural consequences. But Luther proved to be the the toady, the tool, the supporter of the princes. Neither the implications of religious freedom nor love for the peasant people from which he sprang mitigated the severity of his condemnation of the Peasants’ Revolt. To the aristocratic Lords and Princes, Luther offered these words of encouragement, “Hearken dear Lords... Let him who can stab, strike, and strangle... These are such times that a prince can go to heaven more easily by spilling blood than others through prayer.”

The peasants were crushed, murdered, tortured, starved.

Luther was not a tolerant man. Even admitting that like all persons, he was a child of his own age, we find it difficult to reconcile this devout man who professed the Lordship of the gentle Christ with the Luther who was savage not only with the Peasants’ War, but also had a bigoted hatred of Jews, and was unremitting in his urgings to destroy and persecute them.

Luther could not get along with other reformers. He refused to shake hands with Zwingli, because the latter would not accept Luther’s interpretation of the Lord’s Supper.

But Martin Luther was not only an Augustinian priest, a reformer of strange and devious as well as noble ways, he was also a man. When the reformers were celebrating freedom from the Roman Catholic church, the monasteries and convents were opened, the monks and nuns sought marriage and Christian homes, sometimes marrying each other. Catherine von Bora was a nun jilted by a suitor shortly after her release from the convent. Martin Luther tried to be a marriage broker for her and find a suitable husband. However, when it was reported to him that Catherine von Bora would marry only Dr. Amsdorf or Dr. Luther, he investigated further, he checked it out, with the result shortly after, Martin Luther and ex-nun Catherine von Bora were married. They established their home in the Augustinian cloister where Luther formerly had led the monastic life.

Theirs was a busy home with much affection, the ex-nun soon became “my Katie” to Luther. Not only were children born to them, but also they were hospitable and generous to the homeless. At one time not less than eleven orphans shared their home and table. The reminiscences of this home life are found in Luther’s TABLE TALK, remarkable for the insight it gives into the personality of this father. He was gentle, but at times objectionably vulgar and rude.

When illness or the plague struck, as it did frequently in those days, the hand of death entered the home. Of the children, Elizabeth died in infancy. When little Hans was ill, Martin Luther composed and to comfort him sang the famous childrens’ Christmas carol, “Away in a Manger”. Hans and Paul lived to maturity. Marguerite lived to girlhood, but in a agonizing time of trial for the busy parents, she died of illness. In the grief of that occasion, Luther formed the tune and words of his greatest hymn, “A Mighty Fortress is our God.” [CJW note: based on Psalm 46]

This aging father had innumerable organization details of the reformed church. He was called to settle disputes between princes. His health, never good since his monastic days, grew worse. After a winter journey under difficult conditions, he died after attempting to resolve a conflict between two Lords.

What shall we say of this man? He was a leading reformer. He was a reactionary who was unbelievably harsh with his fellow peasants. He was intolerant. He was an anti-Semite. He was coarse and vulgar. But also, he was a great preacher and scholar. He translated the Bible into German, giving the people the Scripture. His courage sparked the Reformation, giving birth to the numerous free Christian groups, among which in later years our own was to be numbered. He was the Reformation’s greatest hymn writer. Albert Schweitzer, who had a doctorate in music as well as doctorates in medicine and theology, remarked that the only person who really understood Martin Luther was Johann Sebastian Bach. He was a kind and loving but financially embarrassed father. He was a teacher who won the respect of his students.

But the most affectionate and most human epitaph that the Reformer earned was written by the ex-nun who became his wife and the mother of their children. A month after his death, Catherine von Bora Luther, writing to her sister, Christina, said, “Who would not be sorrowful and mourn for so noble a man as my dear Lord, who served not only one city or land, but the whole world? Truly I am so distressed that I cannot tell my sorrow to anyone. If I had a principality or an empire, it would never have cost me so much pain to lose them as I have now that our Lord God has taken from me, and not from me only, but from the whole world, this dear and precious man.”

Religion must be not only in a person’s heart as an inward loyalty to that which he or she believes true and righteous, convictions must become known in the world. And no reformation is ever complete until justice is accomplished and the world of persons ruled by all persons, because equally they are entitled to the human dignity and worth which should be the birthright of all souls. Those who are devoted to such religious values will discover in their own experience that the cause of reform is never jaded, its goals ever re-defined.

Not because we would endorse the theology of Luther’s greatest hymn, but because a tribute to him is fitting on this 484th anniversary of Protestantism, may we join in singing #104, “A Mighty Fortress is our God.”

Celebration

2010-07-04T09:44:00.004-04:00

October 8, 2001

October 3rd to 7th were some of the most meaningful days of my life. My family came great distances to celebrate my 90th birthday, October 4.

The festivities began October 3rd with dinner at Sara’s. Bill, Alicia and Erik had arrived earlier. Alicia, after finding the necessary pans, baked a sumptuous birthday cake.

Arriving at various times:

From Brasilia – Bill, Alicia, Erik
From California – Marj, Dale, Mark, Martin, Lauren
From Tennessee – Carl A.
From Virginia – Kathy, Ken, Erica, Alex, Ralph, Marie and her friend, David
From Maryland – Shawn
From Oregon – Janet, Ron, Christina, Ian
From South Carolina – Michael
From Atlantic Beach, Florida – John, Renee, Kevin, Andrea, Troy, Kyle, Serena

[My] birthday, October 4, was celebrated at the large house Marj and Dale had rented on Longboat Key. Delicious barbecued food, a champagne toast to the old man, delightful inter-relationships as family members enjoyed each other’s company.

Members of the family did all the planning. I did not have to do anything but be there and enjoy. And enjoy I did.

One consequence of old age is one shrinks in height. But even before my two inch loss, grandsons Michael, Carl, Ian, Ralph would have towered over me – all of them well over six feet tall. And all the other males were taller than I am except for the great-grandchildren.

Then on Friday, October 5, was the open house at the Sarasota Unitarian Universalist church. The courtesy of the church in providing the most appropriate South Wing was much appreciated. I was placed in a chair where people could come and greet me – and the estimate is that over 150 people came, most of them from the Sarasota membership, but also friends from Lakeland, Winter Haven, Tampa, Port Charlotte.

The family, with Sara’s help, did all the planning. I understand John and Ron had to make two additional food and wine “runs.” I was overwhelmed by the affectionate warmth of the occasions. I can only echo Cardinal Wolsey in HENRY VIII (Act II) where he says:

“For your great graces
Heap’d upon me, poor undeserver, I
Can nothing render but allegiant thanks, ....”

I am very grateful that I was the catalyst for a wonderful family reunion. In addition, I received a deluge of greeting cards.

Let me go on record right now – after this carnival of joys, hugs, memories, hopes, gifts, great food, fine wine, when I reach “the undiscover’d country from whose bourn, no traveler returns,” when I have “bought the farm,” or other euphemism for the inevitable hand of death, no memorial or funeral service is at all necessary. Wherever you happen to be. Open a bottle of bubbly or other favorite beverage and talk old times. If you wish, there are two favorite readings you can meditate on. The first is Shakespeare, of course, from THE TEMPEST, where Prospero tells Ferdinand (Act IV, Sc. i)

“These our actors,
As I foretold you, were all spirits and
Are melted into air, into thin air;
And, like the baseless fabric of this vision,
The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,
And like this insubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff
As dreams are made on, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep.”

The second meditative piece is from the writings of Bertrand Russell:

“An individual human existence should be like a river – small at first, narrowly confined within its banks, and rushing passionately past boulders and over waterfalls. Gradually the river grows wider, the bank recedes, and the waters flow more quietly, and in the end, without any visible break, they become merged in the sea, and painlessly lose their individual being. The man who, in old age, can see his life this way, will not suffer from the fear of death, since the things he cares for will continue.”

Hallelujah and salutations.

Praise And Amen

2010-07-04T09:27:00.001-04:00

September 14, 2001

The Prayer Service today initiated by President Bush was an inspiration. It was unimportant that my particular theological nuances were not expressed. The service was majestic, thoughtful; and beautiful in music, people, color, symbolism.

In THE WINTER’S TALE (Act 1, Sc. l), Shakespeare has Archidamus say to Camillo,

“I speak as my understanding instructs me,
and as my honesty puts it to utterance.”

In the days and nights since the terrorist attacks of September 11, like millions of others, I was glued to the TV. There is much to be said and remembered about the grief, rage, the unstinting heroic actions of firemen and policemen, some of whom sacrificed their lives in the service of others; and the uniting of the people of our land. But for this Musing, I want to tell how that prayer service in the National Cathedral gave me a strong sense that our nation’s principles and people not only share a common heritage but also I glimpsed a future buoyed by hope. There is progress on the road to recognition of everyone as part of one world family.

First of all, I was deeply moved by the persons participating in the service.

The service was opened and closed by the Rev. Jean Holmes [Dixon] who is Bishop pro tempore of the National Cathedral. The opening scripture and prayer were delivered by the Rev. Nathan Baxter, Dean of the Cathedral, an Afro-American. Anyone in my age bracket must be astonished and heartened by these leaders of the Cathedral. In my early lifetime that a woman and an Afro-American should hold these important clergy posts would have been unbelievable. I praise the Episcopal Church for selecting leaders who, because of what they are, affirm the oneness of all our people.

The roster of other leaders of the service was equally inspirational. Not only what they said, but who they were:

A Moslem imam
A Jewish rabbi
An evangelical preacher, Billy Graham
A Roman Catholic Cardinal
[A] minister of the United Methodist Church, Houston, an Afro-American.

The service was deeply appropriate and truly ecumenical, and, dare I say it – universalist. I have not been a fan of President Bush, but in calling for this service, along with his plain but effective words in the service were uplifting in a week when the whole country was shocked and sorrowing. I will probably disagree and criticize him again, but in this traumatic week, he has demonstrated excellent presidential leadership.

Then too, in the service was the excellent children’s choir. Note the wording – not boys’ choir, but children’s choir, for were girls among their number. Furthermore, I have seldom heard a soprano as superb as the soloist – she was a beautiful Afro-American.

We are a nation of ALL of our people. That was the impact and message of this historic service.

In HENRY V (Act IV, Sc. iv), the King says to Gloucester:

“There is some soul of goodness in things evil,
Would men observingly distill it out.”

Home Schooling – Positive? Negative?

2010-07-01T09:55:00.002-04:00

August 29, 2001

A long article in the August 27 issue of TIME discusses the current trend to home schooling. According to the article, “there were at least 850,000 students learning at home in 1999.... Some experts believe the figure is actually twice that.” The basic cause seems to be that many parents are concerned about the quality of education in the public schools. About 25% of parents who adopt home schooling do so for religious reasons. Other reasons are given for home schooling, but the aforesaid seem to be the main ones.

Is this trend good or bad? Some statistics seem positive: “The average SAT score for home schoolers in 2000 was 1100 compared to 1019 for the general population.” Home schoolers also did much better on the Iowa Test for Basic Skills.

However, what cannot be known is if these high achievers would have done just as well in the public schools. The parents’ attention to their children’s educational needs was the strong factor. As the article points out, e.g., that only 3% of home-schooled fourth graders watched more than three hours of TV a day, vs. 38% of all fourth graders.

The public schools have no control over how many hours school children watch TV.

The public schools face many problems, most of them attributable to under-funding – crowded classrooms, teachers’ salaries, need to improve physical facilities. Under present laws, the fewer students in public schools, the less per-pupil funding. For example, “the state of Florida has 41,128 (1.7%) learning at home this year, up from 10,039 in the school year 1991-92; those kids represent a loss of nearly $130 million from school budgets in the state.” Furthermore with a large measure of school support coming from property taxes, the more parents doing home schooling, the more difficult it is to pass property taxes for school budgets.

However, the article also poses this question about home schooling: “Better at teaching them what? Home schooling may turn out better students, but does it create better citizens?”

I am still an advocate of public schools for public education. To lift a line I picked up reading a “Who dun it”, two questions need full, reasoned answers: “How To? What for?” Maybe home schooling can answer “How To” better for some pupils if the parents are skilled, thorough, and committed. But, “What For” is the parallel educational necessity. Not being a professional educator, my view of “What For” is best asserted by what the public schools meant for me.

The boys and girls, young men and young women I knew only because of the public schools represent warm, good memories which I never would have if I had been home-schooled.

In the elementary grades there was Woofie Simpson about whom I wrote in a prior Musing. I recall such a schoolroom event as exchanging valentines, leading to a childish “crush” on two girls, Hazel Parmenter and Lillian Snoen. Irma Tallmadge lived three houses down on Oliver Street, but her parents never permitted her to play with the other children on the street. So I would never have known her except for the public schools. Recess times in the schoolyard were good fun and healthy play unknown to home schoolers.

In the junior high and senior high school years, more friends and events: Bud Manion, who walked frequently with me the mile or so to high school, sometimes his sister, Virginia, with us. Myer Myerson, who with his parents, escaped Lenin’s Soviet Union crossing an ice-bound river to get away. “Swede” Larson, six foot four inches tall, strong and athletic, but didn’t like to participate in team sports. He was a skilled diver and swimmer. We went together to Fenway Park a couple of times. There were nice girls in high school with whom it was fun to talk and joke: Margaret Breaux, Ethel Diaz, Sadie Tomsky, Agnes Daly, Regina Kukowsky. Margaret Amot. (Protestant, Catholic, Jewish) Everett was a working class city, so we had names from every European country. We learned through personal experience, tolerance, acceptance, friendship. For this the public schools may be credited. Home schooling would never have provided me with these values and memories.

In Shakespeare’s RICHARD II (Act II, Sc. iii), Bolingbroke, later Henry IV, says after Harry Percy offers his services:

“I count myself in nothing else so happy
as in a soul remembering my good friends.”

The teachers were important in my growing years. In second grade, I remember Mrs. Sparrell (we called her Mrs. “Sparrow”), with tears streaming down her face, telling us on November 11, 1918, that the World War was over. This was one of my first impressions of what war really is and does. Then there was Miss Peabody in 6th grade, a martinet in some ways, telling us that if we had trouble understanding a paragraph, read it aloud paying particular attention to punctuation. In junior high, Mrs. Leach caught on that I was very near-sighted and had been hiding it for years because I didn’t want to be called “four eyes”, which was a common epithet for kids who wore glasses. As a matter of fact, I was not called “four eyes” when I then started wearing glasses, maybe because I was a husky fellow.

In high school, I have two particular memories. Miss Matilda Clement in sophomore English introduced me to Shakespeare, for which I am ever grateful. She also took the class to the first Shakespeare play I experienced – THE MERCHANT OF VENICE, staged by the Boston University players. When it seemed that I might not be allowed to graduate from high school because I did not have a required music credit, the Assistant Principal, Mike O’Neill, after hearing my story, waived the requirement. In the interview, I could sense that he became angry at the music teacher who was the cause.

How could I have had such experiences if I had been home-schooled? Once again, [I turn to] Shakespeare, who has Prospero say in THE TEMPEST (Act I, Sc. ii):

“thy schoolmaster, made thee more profit
Than other princesses can that have more time
For vainer hours and tutors not so careful.”

Then there is the documented matter of “Americanization.” In the large immigrant tide (1880-1920), the public schools made a tremendous successful effort to train the children of immigrants about our nation’s origin, its heritage, and the civics of government.

Thus, from my perspective, if you think the public schools fall short, correct the deficiencies. Make teachers’ salaries comparable. Women now have opportunities in science, business, industry, medicine which they never had when I was in school. Compete with that reality. I believe a large increase in public funding would provide the personnel and settings where more and more parents would choose the public schools. To my mind a much better use for large appropriations than a “missile defense system,” which probably wouldn’t work, but a gravy train for big dollar supporters of the Bush League.

Prayer

2010-07-01T09:46:00.001-04:00

April 29, 2001
Sarasota

July 29, 2001
Port Charlotte

The Meaning of Prayer in Human Experience, updated from March 20, 1960, Akron

The first stimulus to this presentation occurred when there popped up on my computer screen a story about a father teaching his daughter Caitlin the Lord’s Prayer. She pronounced each word carefully. Coming to the end, she prayed, “Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us some E-Mail.”

What is the meaning of prayer in human experience?

If you become irritated to hear such words as prayer, Lord, [or] God, it is OK to tune me out. I have been reliably informed that sometimes a better sermon is heard when one tunes out the pulpit – that is, what one preaches to oneself However, some Scotsman, I do not know if it was David Hume, Thomas Carlyle, or my old friend and mentor, Angus MacLean, who once said that in times of much trouble or peril, even the atheist is permitted one wee prayer.

The second stimulus to this talk was an article in the Sarasota Herald Tribune on January 2, 2001, indicating that many older Americans use prayer to ward off stress. “According to the study, prayer is used more often than exercise, heat, relaxation techniques, humor, or herbal remedies to maintain overall health.” Another sentence from the article, “Seniors who prayed or used other spiritual treatment were also found to use more positive and self-reliant coping strategies.” Is that what prayer is, a ritual or spiritual sedative, Prozac for the mind? A coping mechanism?

The followers of an obscure religious sect in the Far East pray as they stare at their own reflections in a mirror. Is that what prayer is? The contemplation of one's own image?

When Albert Schweitzer was making his third voyage to Africa in 1929, a violent storm occurred while he was busily writing the last chapter of his book on Paul the Apostle. Because the ship pitched too violently for him to write at the little desk in his cabin, Schweitzer kept himself steady while writing by kneeling down with his writing board on the bunk, his feet wedged against the bulkhead. The steward happened to come in, and seeing him in this position said at once, “Oh its not quite as bad as that yet, sir.” Is this what prayer is, assuming the posture and saying the words of prayer when dangerous events seem to threaten our lives and welfare?

Let me repeat an anecdote I told in the LEAP class a few weeks ago. John Greenleaf Whittier once asked Ralph Waldo Emerson what he prayed for. “When I first open my eyes upon the morning meadows, and look out at the beautiful world, I thank God I am alive and that I live so near Boston.” Is that what prayer is, thanks for being alive and gratitude for being in a particular geographical location?

Prayer means so many things in human experience that perhaps case studies of some famous prayers may enable some greater grasp of the meaning of prayer. These prayers are not reported on a chronologically progressive basis, but rather we will ado a little moving back and forth historically.

There is a “show me” prayer, variously attributed to Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Voltaire, Thomas Paine, and Rousseau:

“Oh God, if there be a God, save my soul, if I have a soul.”

St. Augustine in his earlier years could not control his erotic passions and could not live a celibate life. His notorious prayer: “Oh God, save me from sin, but not quite yet.”

Nearly two thousand years before that self-serving prayer, Moses experiencing depressing adversity, prayed in this wise, (Exodus 32/32):

“Alas this people has committed a great sin in that they have made a god of gold for themselves. But now, if thou wilt, forgive their sin; but if not, pray blot me out of thy book.”

About 80 years ago, the minister of the Universalist Church in Gloucester, Massachusetts, who, when requested to deliver the prayer at the inauguration ceremonies of the city government, spoke in so candid and unusual style that his prayer created a sensation state-wide, even nationwide. Dr. Levi Moore Powers, a minister of unusual courage, intellectual power and social passion prayed like this:

“We pray for the retiring mayor. He might have done better and he knows it and now we are sending him to the state house. Help him to be the representative he may be and ought to be.

“We pray for those who must guide our city in the coming year. There is Alderman Daniel Marshall. You know what a good fellow he is and how everybody likes him – the most popular man in town, though there are those who say he needs a stiffer backbone. If that is so, Lord, give him what he needs, and if it is a lie, help him to refute it.

“Then there is Alderman Johnson who needs thy help, Lord. This is a new job for him. But everybody speaks well of him and many who did not know him voted for him because those who know him best said he was all right. May he end this year with this good opinion confirmed and increased.

“Most of all we pray for him honored in being chosen mayor. But we have given him a hard job, Lord. You know very well that the laws of this city have not been well enforced. May he accept this responsibility and not only do his duty, but insist that all those responsible to him do their duty as well.

“Not alone for those we have chosen do we pray, Lord; we pray for ourselves. We confess, Lord, that we are a logy, grouchy set of citizens, most of us. We no sooner elect men to office than we find fault with them. Help us to see that good citizenship is an all-the-year job that cannot be delegated to others.

“We pray for the voters of this city; there are some too lazy to vote but not to lazy to grumble. Bless them. We pray for the citizens who want good streets, good schools, good fire and police protection and good health officers but who wish other people to pay their cost.

“We pray for the business men whose votes are always determined by the expectancy of special favors for themselves. Bless them, if you can. We pray for those who believe that all laws should be enforced except the laws which they do not like or which, if enforced would trouble them.

“We pray for the comfortable who do not care for anything so long as they are left at ease.

“We pray for the political managers who swap votes and sell out their friends and let bad candidates go unopposed.

“We pray for the ministers who say what it is pleasant to hear rather than what is true. We pray for all connected with the newspapers who openly advocate civic righteousness and secretly promote crooked politics.

“We pray for the lawyers who use their knowledge to help those who wish to evade the law and so enable themselves and others to get something for nothing.

“We wish, O God, that these people might be blessed, but perhaps we are asking too much. It may be that the only thing you can do is to let them go to hell.

“Increase our love and devotion to our city. May we be zealous of its good name and prosperity. May wealth, happiness, intelligence and character so increase that the proudest boast we can make shall be that we are men and women of this city. Amen.”

Father Joseph Manton, a Roman Catholic priest of the Redemptorist Order, was one of New England’s most skilled and eloquent preachers, with a radio program that not only his fellow Roman Catholics listened to, but also many others who admired his magnetic speaking skills. I listened whenever I was in the area.

About forty years ago on St. Patrick’s Day, Father Manton delivered the invocation at the breakfast honoring Robert Briscoe, then Lord Mayor of Dublin, Ireland. It was a rare occasion in Boston, when that city so strongly touched by Irish immigrants and even now, the country’s most typical Irish-American cultural area. The piquancy of that St. Patrick’s Day feast was increased by the wonderful fact that Lord Mayor Briscoe was Jewish.

Here are Father Manton's words at that St. Patrick’s festive occasion:

“Almighty God, our good and gracious Father, we find ourselves a bit bewildered this morning. You know that the first President of the Irish Republic was a Protestant; the present Lord Mayor of Dublin is a Jew; the news is going around that the Lakes of Killarney belong to a Yank; and historians keep whispering in our ears that St. Patrick was a Frenchman.

“Help us then this morning to hold high the brimming cup of hospitality to a good and great man and to greet him not as a stranger but as a treasured friend. And, dear God, stay the man up with monumental patience as he heroically endures a hundred toastmasters from here to the West Coast who will gaily imagine that the very fillings in their teeth are fragments of the Blarney Stone, as they ring all the obvious changes on a Jewish Mayor of Dublin. Help the poor man not to be banquet-weary of all these glib attempts to paint a green beard on Moses, or by the end he will be seeing little leprocohens.

“Deliver him, O Lord, this real Irishman who risked his life for the land he loved, from any professional Irishman (with an angle) – there are mercifully very few – but spare him even these; the sham shamrocks, the bogus bogtrotters, the synthetic Sinn Feiners, and especially the extravagant psycho-Patricks who love too loudly through a green haze an Ireland that never was.

“Finally, dear God, bless this man, our friends; and his meal, our food and today let the blessings come down generously even on the English muffins and the orange juice, so that, having broken our fast at the top of the mornin’ we may rise to thank You from the bottom of our hearts. Amen.”

From the indigenous tribes of this continent, whom the European invaders named, “Indians”, came this prayer, “Great Spirit, may I not judge my neighbor until I have walked a mile in his moccasins.”

Then there is a notable prayer uttered nearly 800 years ago by the man whom some have described as the only Christian since Christ, St. Francis of Assisi:

“O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; to be understood as to understand; to be loved as to love; for it is giving that we receive, it is in pardoning that we are pardoned and it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life.”

Then there is the 17th century Nun’s Prayer, found in a religious house in Gloucestershire, England:

“Lord, Thou knowest better than I know myself, that I am growing older and will someday be old. Keep me from the fatal habit of thinking I must say something on every subject and on every occasion. Release me from craving to straighten out everybody’s affairs. Make me thoughtful but not moody; helpful but not bossy. With my vast store of wisdom, it seems a pity not to use it all, but Thou knowest Lord that I want a few friends at the end.

“Keep my mind free from the recital of endless details; give me wings to get to the point. Seal my lips on my aches and pains. They are increasing, and love of rehearsing them is becoming sweeter as the years go by. I dare not ask for grace enough to enjoy the tales of others’ pains, but help me to endure them with patience.

“I dare not ask for improved memory, but for a growing humility and a lessening cocksureness when my memory seems to clash with the memories of others. Teach me the glorious lesson that occasionally I may be mistaken.

“Keep me reasonably sweet; I do not want to be a Saint – some of them are so hard to live with – but a sour old person is one of the crowning works of the devil. Give me the ability to see good things in unexpected places, and talents in unexpected people. And, give me, O Lord, the grace to tell them so. Amen”

In dealing with these prayers of human experience, there is no analysis of the origin and evolution of prayer. Prayer began with attempts at cosmic bribery as well as cosmic communion. Primitive persons thought God or the gods could be cajoled, bribed or persuaded. Many people today still believe that.

But these prayer examples, as widely different in attitude as in historical placement, deal with some of the meanings of prayer that can touch the sensitivities of our personal experience. No one who has experienced shattering tragedy or terrifying injustice can blame Job’s wife for her prayer of condemnation, “Curse God and die.” There are times when under the overwhelming burdens of events that seem utterly unjust, our prayers are neither thankful, interceding nor adoring. They are protests of indignation. This experience of anger against the cosmos is one of the meanings of prayer, too. It is a vehicle which asserts that the human being has rights of protest.

The prayer of Moses is another aspect of the experience of prayer. Moses had tried to lead his people in ways he believed good; he had tried to persuade them to the worship of Yahveh and to abandon idol worship. When he encountered their falling away from the high ideals and good practices, Moses’ prayer faced facts. Moses felt responsibility for those he was leading. He did not say, “O God I have not made an image like these sinful people.” He prayed, “forgive their sin or blot me out of thy book.” In such self-honesty and sharing of responsibility prayer exalts even moments of sorrow and disillusion.

When Levi Powers shocked and astonished those gathered at the Gloucester inaugural, he illustrated vividly prayer as an experience of social power. He did not pray for the prophets of Israel, but for the politicians of Gloucester; he did not quote the children of Israel about their sins, but bluntly prayed that Gloucester men and women in the 20th century would face up to the conditions of good citizenship. Prayer can be a relevant experience. Unless it is relevant, it is probably idle exercise. Whether in the meditations of solitude or the eloquence of public invocation, prayer as a meaningful experience must be relevant to the condition of the individual and the well-being of all.

hi the third act of Hamlet, Claudius has a brief soliloquy while waiting for Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. Two lines of that soliloquy apply:

“My words fly up, my thoughts remain below
words without thoughts, never to heaven go.”

Father Manton’s prayer at the breakfast for the Lord Mayor is an appealing example of another aspect of the prayer experience – graciousness. Prayer can illuminate the quality of our experience with words and ways that might be embarrassing in direct dialogue. Prayer helps us build bridges between our differences so that our encounters in human affairs are gentle and appreciative with a proper leaven of laughter.

What can we learn of the Native American’s prayer to the Great Spirit? Be careful in judging other people before you know what they have had to deal with.

A religious columnist reminded his readers that the prayer of St. Francis to console rather than be consoled, to love rather than be loved, is a marvelous example of movement from the passive to the active, “We love, we serve, we give.” It occurred to me last night, thinking back to Don’s fine sermon series on the meaning of life, that those six words aren't too shabby a definition of life: We love, we serve, we give. The older I get, the Nun’s Prayer speaks to me more and more directly. I believe it speaks to everyone who, for example draws a social security check. For sure, I need to heed the precepts and advice of that prayer.

A few years back, I was in someone’s house who kept a shelf of National Geographies. Pulling one out at random, I found an article about which I took extensive notes.

In former years a fishing fleet sailed annually from Portugal to the Grand Banks. During the season, the fishermen fished from dories; then worked back on the vessel slitting and salting the catch. Danger was commonplace and hard work the daily routine. On one of these voyages, Antonio Rodrigues Chaloa, a good doryman from Oporto, was separated from the vessel by the closing in of fog. When a gale came up, Antonio was blown far from the vessel. When five days passed, the captain and shipmates gave him up for lost – one more good man who had gone down to the sea in ships, never to return. Then on the fifth day, Antonio’s dory came into view. So exhausted was he that he had to be lifted from the dory to the vessel. An observer on the voyage asked Antonio about the long, lonely days and nights of danger, storm-tossed and fog-bound. “What did you do?” Antonio replied, “I prayed. I did what I could. Then I prayed and thought of my wife and seven children back in Portugal. The compass was out – that’s why the fog got me. Then during the storm, I anchored and rode to the wind, using my oars to keep the dory headed into it. Often I had to bail for my life when the heavy seas broke over. I was afraid, for my anchor line was only a piece of rope. If it broke, I would be drifted off the banks and out in the open straits. Then I knew I’d be finished.

“But the anchor rope didn’t carry away. I had to row plenty, to keep the dory headed to sea. I made a bit of shelter with the sail. I ate raw cod and I drank the fog moisture wrung out of my woolen cap.” That was all he said after rowing five days and four nights against a gale in order to keep a fourteen-foot dory headed to windward in waters of the Arctic Circle.

He prayed, but he kept the dory headed into the wind. Prayer must include the will to struggle as well as be thankful.

William Inge, Dean of St. Paul’s Cathedral, London, England (I believe he died in 1954), once said, “Prayer gives a man the opportunity to know a gentleman he hardly ever meets. I do not mean his Maker, but himself.”

Whether called prayer, meditation, inward determination to focus mind/emotion/ethic, or coming to terms with oneself, or seeing ourselves as we are contrasted to what we could be, whether or not addressed to a particular god or gods, the experience can be one of illumination, communion with the highest we know, a confident step toward mysteries never to be fully revealed and a confrontation of our human condition in all its grandeur and all its misery. It does not matter whether the experience occurs in church, in solitude on one’s knees, striding a busy street, celebrating a public occasion or working at some needed service. The experience will sharpen our consciousness of essentials, recall us to those vital things of most value to living and touch us with both the knowledge and the mystery of the great tides of life in which we are all engulfed.

Man Of The Millennium

2010-07-01T09:45:00.002-04:00

April 23, 2001

On this date, 385 years ago in 1616, William Shakespeare died. He was 52 years old – a long life for that time.

In the 1000 year age recently closed (December 31, 2000), who but William Shakespeare can be named Man of the Millennium? I am aware that some would nominate Martin Luther or Gutenberg or Mozart or Michelangelo or Charles Darwin or Albert Einstein or whomever. But for me, William Shakespeare is the ONE.

His productivity was prodigious. From 1587 to 1613, 26 years, he wrote 36 plays and probably collaborated on 2 more, poems: The Sonnets, The Rape of Lucrece, The Phoenix and the Turtle. Furthermore, he was more than playwright and poet, he was producer, director, sometimes actor. Create, rehearse, perform, manage – his was genius with great energy and business know-how. He retired a wealthy man for his time.

But it was the quality of his genius which has endured. He had unique insight into the foibles, faults, hopes, deceits and glories of the human character. When we consider Hamlet, Lear, Richard III, Henry V, Falstaff, Brutus and a host of others, it shines through that he had an unsurpassed knowledge of the human self. One biographer, Anthony Holden, wrote, “...we do not read Shakespeare, he reads us.” No wonder, that every day, somewhere in the world, in some language, a book about William Shakespeare is published. “A rarer spirit never did steer humanity...” as the Bard of Avon himself has Agrippa comment about Antony. (Antony and Cleopatra, Act V, Sc. 1).

J. B. Priestley, in his study, LITERATURE AND WESTERN MAN, wrote, “If the day ever comes when Shakespeare is no longer acted, read and studied, quoted and loved, Western Man will be near his end.”

If you are one of those who might say, well, “Shakespeare has not influenced me”, a few years back on a PBS program, English journalist, Bernard Levin expressed it this way:

“If you cannot understand my argument, and declare ‘It’s Greek to me’, you are quoting Shakespeare; if you claim to be more sinned against than sinning, you are quoting Shakespeare; if you recall your salad days, you are quoting Shakespeare; if you act more in sorrow than in anger, if your wish is father to the thought, if your lost property has vanished into thin air, you are quoting Shakespeare; if you have refused to budge an inch or suffer from green-eyed jealousy, if you have played fast and loose, if you have been tongue-tied, a tower of strength, hoodwinked or in a pickle, if you have knitted your brows, made a virtue of necessity, insisted on fair play, slept not one wink, stood on ceremony, danced attendance (on your lord and master), laughed yourself into stitches, had short shrift, cold comfort or too much of a good thing, if you have seen better days or lived in a fool’s paradise – why, be that as it may, the more fool you, for it is a foregone conclusion that you are (as good luck would have it) quoting Shakespeare; if you think it is early days and clear out bag and baggage, if you think it is high time and that that is the long and short of it, if you believe the game is up and that truth will out even if it involves your own flesh and blood, if you lie low till the crack of doom because you suspect foul play, if you have your teeth set on edge (at one fell swoop) without rhyme or reason, then – to give the devil his due – if the truth were known (for surely you have a tongue in your head) you are quoting Shakespeare; even if you bid me good riddance and send me packing, if you wish I was dead as a door-nail, if you think I am an eyesore, a laughing stock, the devil incarnate, a stonyhearted villain, bloody-minded or a blinking idiot, then – by Jove! O Lord! Tut tut for goodness sake! What the dickens! But me no buts – it is all one to me, for you are quoting Shakespeare.”

Ben Jonson, Shakespeare’s contemporary, testified:

Soul of the Age!
The applause! Delight! The wonder of our stage!
My Shakespeare, rise! ...
He was not of an age, but for all time!

Unexpected Caring

2010-07-01T09:45:00.001-04:00

April 16, 2001

One of the sentences in the “Nun’s Prayer,” found in the seventeenth century in a religious house in Gloucestershire, England, reads: “Give me the ability to see good things in unexpected places and talents in unexpected people, and give me, O Lord, the grace to tell them so.”

An historical example of this wisdom may be found in Pope Alexander VI (Roderigo Borgia, 1492-1503), the most notorious of the Borgia Popes. Among other acts, he ordered the burning at the stake of Savonarola, one of the precursors of the Reformation. Pope Alexander VI’s personal life seemingly knew no moral limits. He had many children, among whom were Cesare, who probably murdered his brother, Juan, and the infamous Lucrezia. Alexander VI kept his mistress, Giulia Farnese, in the Vatican, whose nephew became Pope Paul III, a half-century later.

According to some historians, Alexander VI staged orgies in the Vatican which were unlimited in lewdness, details of which are too shameful for me to recount.

Why in the world would he be an example of “talent in an unexpected person?”

In his book, CONSTANTINE’S SWORD, James Carroll documents the official role the Church played in the slaughters, discriminations, and contempt against Jews perpetrated through the Christian centuries. (Protestants need not feel smug, for the reformer, Martin Luther, was just as much a bigoted anti-Semite.)

Because the Inquisition in Spain expelled the Jews, as well as torturing them and seizing their wealth, large numbers of Iberian Jews sought help in the Papal States and Rome. Nine thousand is the estimated number.

Pope Alexander VI welcomed the Jewish refugees to Rome. He declared, “Jews are permitted to lead their lives free from interference from Christians, to continue in their own rites, to gain wealth and to enjoy many other privileges.” (Carroll, p. 364)

According to Carroll, there were at least twenty-three other Popes who took similar attitudes in spite of the anti-Semitism and contempt for Jewish people which was part of the theology and practice of the institutionalized Church all through Christian history.

Shakespeare had this same insight into finding some good in unexpected people. In ROMEO AND JULIET, Act II, Sc. 3, Friar Lawrence has a soliloquy which ends,

“Virtue itself turns vice, being misapplied;
and vice sometimes by action dignified.”

The suggestion in the Nun’s Prayer that we have the grace to tell them, [but in this instance, we cannot.] Pope Alexander VI has been dead for almost five-hundred years. But he is a reminder that there may be some good in unexpected people, and the discerning eye and ear may find it.

Fair Trade?

2010-07-01T09:42:00.001-04:00

March 7, 2001

A comprehensive biography, THE FIRST AMERICAN, The Life and Times of Benjamin Franklin, is an excellent scholarly achievement. It is no exaggeration to classify Benjamin Franklin a genius. He can be accurately called printer, editor, entrepreneur, electrical engineer and inventor, oceanographer, scientist, philosopher, diplomat, agitator, ladies man, and one of the principal founders of our Republic.

At least one of his proposals indicates he was a master of satire, too. (Brands, p. 215/16)

Around the 1750s, Philadelphia had a higher crime rate than other colonial cities because under the Quaker influence, there were less punitive laws. Franklin and other citizens were much concerned about public safety. Franklin proposed safety measures and better methods for the constable system. But this attention to safe streets missed the problem’s roots: the proliferation of criminals. Since the 17th century, the American colonies had been forced to serve as a dumping ground for criminals convicted in England.

Protests to England were ignored.

[In 1751,] David Hall’s “Gazette” reported [of] murders, mutiny, mayhem. Hall editorialized, “Britain! Thou art called Mother Country; but what good mother ever sent thieves and villains to accompany her children; to corrupt them with their infectious vices....”

Benjamin Franklin was equally outraged, but admitted that there might be grounds for asserting that with a change of environment “their natures may possibly change if they were to change the climate.”

Franklin wrote (could he have been serious?) that a bounty be paid to persons who would collect rattlesnakes and transport them to England. “There I would propose to have them carefully distributed in St. James Park ... and other places of pleasure in London; in the gardens of the nobility...; but particularly in the gardens of the Prime Ministers, the Lords of Trade and members of Parliament....”

Franklin pointed out that the British government considered the transportation of felons to the Colonies a matter of trade. “Trade required returns.... Yet the trade in serpents would not be quite equal, for snakes posted fewer dangers than felons. The rattlesnake gives warning before he attempts mischief, which the convict does not.” (p.216)

Does Franklin’s satire have any useful application today?

Our prisons are overcrowded. We have more persons behind bars than all the European nations combined. Could we imitate the England of colonial days and ship many of our criminals to other countries?

For example, with all the crime, distress and trouble caused by the flood of cocaine coming from Colombia, could we not send at least a few hundred criminals there? A parachute drop? Wouldn’t that be a fair exchange of trade?

But such fantastic speculations have no reality and are of course unworkable. The Colonies had to deal as best they could with the felons transported here by England. Their descendants, at least, became part of the incremental progress and prosperity of the United States.

We will solve our problems, or not solve them, depending on our foresight, wisdom, and readiness to face problems both openly and realistically, and to develop the will to embrace bold solutions and act.

In Hamlet at the opening of Act IV, Sc. iii, Claudius reflecting on his plotting, has a short soliloquy as he awaits Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, saying among other lines,

“Diseases desperate grown
By desperate appliance are relieved,
Or not at all.”

(P. S.): I neglected to mention on page one that the author of this fine biography is H. W. Brands)

Roots Of Belief

2010-06-27T09:01:00.003-04:00

February 23, 2001
updated from June 13, 1993

For four years of my life, I was a Unitarian. Two of those years I don’t remember, because it was in infancy until I was two years old. 47 years a Universalist, 39 years a Unitarian Universalist. When my parents moved from Boston to Everett, I was brought up in a Universalist Church. I taught Sunday School when still in high school. At the age of 16, I was Youth Sunday preacher to a large congregation who were most kind to my youthful and brash extravagance of expression. That Universalist Church was not only a shelter when I needed one, it was also a free forum where I could express radical ideas about religion without either being “put down” or leaving the church.

Shakespeare has Berowne say in LOVE’S LABOR’S LOST: “Young blood does not obey an old decree.”

In the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s, from that one Universalist Church, five young men entered our ministry: Owen Whitman Eames, Wallace Fiske, Frederic Harrison, Robert Sterling and a few years later, yours truly, as one of the so-called second “career” persons. (In the 1930s, one did not have a career. If lucky, one had a job.)

A few years later, while living in Whitman, a southeastern Massachusetts town and a member of a small, struggling Unitarian church, I was encouraged to prepare for the Universalist ministry by two Universalist students from Tufts Theological Seminary, Albert Zeigler and Fred Harrison. Fred was an old friend from Everett school and church days. Al became a life-long friend. I mourned their deaths.

Tufts was established by Universalists, but I went to St. Lawrence, also established by Universalists. I have been twice married – once in pre-consolidation terms to a Universalist, and once to a Unitarian.

How has Unitarian Universalism impacted on my life? What you see and hear is what you get.

But to add to that, one of the major ways that Unitarian Universalism has influenced me is that I learned to wrestle with the large questions of life: Who am I? What can I believe? What must I do? I have not always been on top. My shoulders have been pinned to the mat often enough. But I have tried and still try to deal with the Big Ideas. Even though I am now a Unitarian Universalist, in the following I will use the word Universalist, because as mentioned, most of my life has been in Universalist churches. It is also my way of reminding persons that the neglect of Universalist in many ways ignores (or snubs) half of our heritage. This pisses me off; and is a constant temptation to wave goodbye. But I never claimed to be an unemotional creature.

One of the ways I have learned to deal with the large questions could be condensed in the title of a pamphlet written by my friend, teacher and fellow Universalist minister, the late Angus Hector MacLean, distinguished professor of religious education at St. Lawrence University, “The Method is the Message.”

One of the most frequently asked questions of my life has been, “What do Universalists believe?” The theological origins of Universalism, that all souls would be saved; there was no Hell into which sinners were cast forever – this theological basis did not have much relevance in the 20th century, because most persons did not believe in Hell after death. There were sufficient hells on earths. Most of the mainline churches had stopped preaching fire and brimstone.

So I would answer something like this: Universalists do not believe alike in many ways. We differ. The proper question is: “How do Universalists arrive at their beliefs?” From where I stand, one can assume that a Universalist accepts the body of tested truths accumulated and continuously refined by the historian, the geologist, the astronomer, the physicist, social scientists, and practitioners of other authentic learned professions. The Universalist believes reason to be a guide and validates propositions through experience and experiment. The Universalist places freedom and the worth and dignity of all persons as the highest values. The Universalist still looks with hope on the nature and destiny of the human venture in spite of calamitous and cruel events. Theologies are NOT divine revelations. All theologies are interpretations of human experience. Always there are varying interpretations of human experience.

Sometime in the years 1926-29, my minister, Ulysses S. Milburn, placed in my hands an essay written by John Erskine, then a distinguished professor of literature at Columbia University. I have never entirely forgotten it. The title was “The Obligation to be Intelligent.” With provocative wit he wrote of the need to combine intelligence with other desirable qualities of living, using as a text, Kingsley’s line, “Be good sweet maid and let who will be clever.” Erskine criticized the all-too-common attitude that there is a division between goodness and intelligence. In Erskine’s words, “stupidity is regarded as first cousin to moral conduct and cleverness is the first step into mischief, that reason and Good are not on good terms with each other, that mind and heart are rival buckets in the well of truth, inexorably balanced, full mind, starved heart – stout heart, weak head.”

Years later, I found confirmation of Erskine’s thesis. The term “egghead” is not usually intended as a compliment. Adlai Stevenson was so named, not by his supporters, but by his opponents and critics.

Of course the intention of my Universalist minister was to impress on this teen-age rebel that the application of intelligence to religion is necessary. Can a religion for our time be anything but a thoughtful religion? Should not religion make sense? I may not be all that intelligent, but I try. At least I believe I have developed a “nonsense indicator” which works for me much of the time.

A Contrary Opinion

2010-06-26T07:07:00.002-04:00

January 23, 2001

As “Super Bowl Sunday” nears, the Tampa TV stations are fully participating in the “hype” that leads up to this national event. “Panel Talk” of the Home Testing Institute prints this:

Super Bowl

“Over 800 million people in 188 countries across the world, including some 130 million in the U.S. will watch the Super Bowl on TV this January. Many of these people, however, will wish they were at the game instead. That's a big change from the first Super Bowl back in 1967. For that contest, only 61,946 people attended, leaving more than 30,000 seats empty in the Los Angeles Coliseum. Even more amazing is the fact that tickets to that game would have cost you a mere $6 - $12 dollars. The lowest face value on a ticket to last year’s game was $325. Advertising expenses have changed too. A 30-second commercial in 1967 cost $42,000, whereas last year, the same length commercial ran $2.2 million. The Super Bowl has grown in other ways as well. It is now the second largest day of food consumption in the U.S.”

Shakespeare has Trincolo say in THE TEMPEST, Act II, sc. ii,

“I do now let loose my opinion, hold it no longer.”

I no longer watch professional football on TV. The game has become ritualized old hat as far as I am concerned. (Now there is a real slander on The American Way of Life.) I am reading a most enlightening biography, THE FIRST AMERICAN – The Life and Times of Benjamin Franklin, by H. W. Brands. To me, that is a more interesting way to spend Sunday evening, January 28. I am a heretic in many other ways, too.

But I wonder why the Super Bowl is the second largest day of food consumption in the U. S. Why must one eat up the deli plate, chow down the hot dogs, grab handfuls of Buffalo wings and gulp six-packs of beer because 22 men are kicking, passing, tackling, blocking, dancing on the TV? Sooner or later, some psychologist or sociologist will write an essay on that and maybe satisfy my curiosity.

The Talking Heads on the tube gloat in the 250 million dollar impact that the Super Bowl will have on the Tampa economy. OK, I can understand that. But in January of any year the hotel/motel/restaurants that the football fans are occupying in January 2001 would be filled by persons coming to the Gulf Coast of Florida for the warmth, sunshine, and beaches.

Maybe [the] Super Bowl is the modern replay of the Roman Saturnalia with all its excesses.

It’s About Time

2010-06-25T07:34:00.001-04:00

January 1, 2001

As the new millennium begins (2000 was the last year of the prior millennium), some quotes on time:

Shakespeare has Jaques say (As You Like It, Act II, sc vii):

“And then he drew a dial from his poke,
And looking at it with lack-luster eye,
Says very wisely, ‘It is ten o’ clock.
Thus we may see,’ quoth he, ‘how the world wags
’Tis but an hour since it was nine,
And after one hour more, ’twill be eleven
And so from hour to hour, we ripe and ripe,
And then from hour to hour, we rot and rot;
And thereby hangs a tale.’ ”

The following timely quotations are drawn from the Commonplace Book, “American Scholar”, Autumn 1999:

“Time will bring to light whatever is hidden, and it will conceal and cover up what is now shining with greatest splendor.”
Horace, 5 B.C.

“I propose to define time as the social interpretation of reality with respect to the difference between past and future.”
Nicklas Luhman, 1976

“The long run is a misleading guide to our current affairs. In the long run we are all dead. Economists set themselves too easy, too useless a task, if in tempestuous seasons they can only tell us that when the storm is long past the ocean is flat again.
John Maynard Keynes, 1923

“For new nobility is but the act of power; but ancient nobility is the act of time.”
Francis Bacon, 1597

“Oh, yes, I’d do it all again; the spirit is willing yet; I feel the same desire to do the work but the flesh is weak. It’s too bad that our bodies wear out while our interests are just as strong as ever.”
Susan B. Anthony, on her deathbed, 1906.

And to conclude with a famous line from the Bard of Avon, when Macbeth says:

“Come what come may.
Time and the hour runs through the roughest day.”

Introduction To Musings XII

2010-06-24T09:01:00.003-04:00

November – December 1991

Holiday Greetings To You And Yours

This twelfth year of Musings has been eventful. The high point of the year was my family celebrating my 90th birthday.

There were several downturns in health this year, but the skills and care of the internist, cardiologist, surgeon, and nurses were positive counter-measures. I am a very lucky fellow.

In spite of the turbulent and dangerous dawning of the 21st century, marinate your holidays and all your days with hope, love, warmth. In your thoughts and prayers remember those whose lives have been torn apart and devastated by terrorism, bombs, and dread of the future. My faith is still that while the human venture suffers much, it still will prevail.

Bless you all,
Carl

The Unsponsored Mind

2010-06-18T07:11:00.001-04:00

November 2, 2000

Steve Allen died, Monday of this week. He was an immensely talented man in many areas of theater and television, including pianist, composer and lyricist, author and first star of the TONIGHT show.

“The unsponsored mind” is a phrase coined by this versatile, thoughtful courageous man. When he was on the air many years ago, Mr. Allen protested that sponsors were attempting to limit his freedom to express personal opinions. When Mr. Allen signed a petition urging clemency for a prisoner condemned to death, a sponsor became alarmed and exerted pressure to compel Allen not to become identified with any more “controversial” matters and problems. Amid this insistence not to rock any boats which might have a dampening effect on sales of the sponsor’s products, Mr. Allen protested that it is one thing to sponsor entertainment. It is quite another to expect that the sponsor can control the performer’s mind in the marketing “pitch” in which commercials are produced.

Mr. Allen’s brave position stimulated me to a sermon many years ago. While not reproducing the whole sermon, the opening paragraphs were:

The value of the unsponsored mind is not limited to the commercial, entertainment world. The free mind principle is the root of our religious faith. Everything in our heritage grows branches, blossoms and fruit from that fundamental root.

The unsponsored mind is the most vital of intellectual responsibilities. The unsponsored mind is neither a flippant cynicism which glibly rejects serious matters, nor is it a gullible naivete which lightly floats higher or lower with every changing tide of public opinion.

In Bunyan’s timeless allegory, THE PILGRIM’S PROGRESS, when Christian runs to seek eternal life, two neighbors seek to bring him back – one is “Obstinate”, the other “Pliable”. This is an allegory of the unsponsored mind, too.

As Milton wrote, “truth is a running stream, not a locked in pool.” When we fail to reconstruct the truth on the occasion of new discoveries of the mind or fresh combinations of accruing human experiences, then we are captured by old “Obstinate.”

The comparable hazard is that we shall confuse an open mind with a vacant one. Then, as in Bunyan’s allegory, Pliable is robbing us of conviction. Disaster is created by gullible mentalities as well as obstinate ones. The irrationality of the mob, the shallow minds which flutter with the breeze of every doctrine, no matter how palpably false, deters progress and inhibits strong ethical behavior. To the pliable we say with Emerson, “nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind.”

Leo Tolstoy once wrote, “the one thing necessary in life as well as in art, is to tell the truth.”

STEVE ALLEN, you will be sorely missed.

Focus

2010-06-18T07:07:00.004-04:00

September 27, 2000

To begin each chapter of his book, WISDOM OF THE AGES, Wayne W. Dwyer uses a particular quotation, usually from an ancient source, several times from Hindu or Buddhist sources.

In his chapter, “Triumph”, Cicero is quoted on “The Six Mistakes of Man.” Marcus Tullius Cicero (106 B.C. – 43 B.C.) was Rome’s most famous orator. Dwyer points out, (p. 22) “[Cicero] was a brilliant orator, lawyer, statesman, writer, poet, critic, and philosopher who lived in the century before the birth of Christ and was momentously involved in all the conflicts between Pompey, Caesar, Brutus, and many of the other historical characters and events that make up ancient Roman history. He had a brilliant and long political career and was an established writer whose work was considered the most influential of its time. In those times, however, dissidents were not treated kindly. He was executed in 43 B.C.”

Cicero’s “Six Mistakes of Man:”

The illusion that personal gain is made up of crushing others.

The tendency to worry about things that cannot be changed or corrected.

Insisting that a thing is impossible because we cannot accomplish it.

Refusing to set aside trivial preferences.

Neglecting development and refinement of the mind, and not acquiring the habit of reading and study.

Attempting to compel others to believe and live as we do.

Wayne Dwyer goes on to elaborate and embellish each of Cicero’s points. Dwyer writes well in the genre of what we used to call “positive thinking.”

For me, however, Cicero has invited each of us to think out applications evolving from our own experience and knowledge. I decided to focus on one of his six precepts sequentially, one each day for six days. I am not aware of becoming any wiser, but, somehow, I have a deeper and more sensitive awareness that a good life must embrace warm relationships with all persons in our orbits and include ideas that are the pathways to meanings.

When you come across some ethical or aesthetic inspirational sentences, I suggest you focus on them, taking one a day for several days. Think about it daily; reflect on it before each meal; use it as a mantra as you lie down for the night’s sleep. You, too, may find it a rewarding experience.

Remember Helena’s soliloquy in ALL’S WELL THAT ENDS WELL? Shakespeare provided a text for this musing:

“Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie,
Which we ascribe to heaven: the fated sky
Gives us free scope; only doth backward pull
Our slow designs when we ourselves are dull.”

Land Of The Bean And The Cod

2010-06-17T08:46:00.001-04:00

August 30, 2000

This is an expanded comment on an E-mail sent to John and Renee about a year ago.

In a citation some years ago, I was described as a “Son of Massachusetts.” That I am, born in Boston in 1911. As the odds are that I am not likely set foot in the Bay State again, I feel nostalgic every once in a while. Were it not for New England winters, I would have been seriously tempted to make my retirement “digs” there.

Growing up as a child of a Swedish immigrant father and a mother who was the daughter of Swedish immigrants, I was not a “Yankee” - immigrants and their children were not eligible for that title. For us, the boys in my neighborhood, Yankees were our opponents. We would sometimes gather in a gang, walk to better neighborhoods and seek trouble with “Yankee boys”. For the most part, just call each other names, although on rare occasions, some fisticuffs.

For years I did not question the romantic bosh which was taught in school or emphasized in the press, particularly at holiday times. The Pilgrims and Puritans were very much romanticized, I later found out. The Puritans around Boston were characterized as hypocrites by visitors. They executed Mary Dyer on Boston Common because she was a religious heretic. They banished Roger Williams and others, again, because their religions differed from the Puritan (Calvinistic) way. In Salem, twenty women and one man were executed because they were alleged to be witches.

The Pilgrims, settled in Plymouth were, maybe, a little better but many of their myths are unfounded. The book, SAINTS AND STRANGERS, by George Willison (which I own) describes some of their ways. Mayflower descendants tried to get the book banned. But the Pilgrims were not all saints. They stole the seed corn the Indians had stored for the next year’s planting. The landing on Plymouth Rock is a questionable legend, in spite of the canopy covering a rock in Plymouth Harbor. The rock was assembled from several pieces, late in the 19th century. Myles Standish led a group of armed Pilgrims to Wollaston to attack Roger Morton and his group because they did not like Morton’s “paganistic” practices such as dancing around the Maypole.

There’s more I could cite, including their justification for wiping out Native Americans by referring to the Biblical precedent of the conquest of Canaan, including Jericho, where all the inhabitants, men, women (except one), and children were slaughtered by the invading Israelite tribes. Other instances in Scripture were used as justification.

My old friend, the late Carl Seaburg, in his book, BOSTON WAYS, quoted a limerick:

“Here’s to the town of Boston
And the turf that the Puritans trod,
In the rest of mankind
Little virtue they find,
But they feel quite chummy with God.”

However, there is much of value in New England, past and present. One enduring memory is how impressed I was as youngster by the statue by Cyrus Dallin outside the Museum of Fine Arts, “The End of the Trail”, figure of an American Indian on his horse, slumped over, totally discouraged. The sculpture signified the unstoppable conquest by Europeans.

There were poems learned in school, fragments of which I still remember – Emerson’s “Concord Bridge” for example.

“By the rude bridge that arched the flood,
Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled.
Here the embattled farmers stood
And fired the shot heard round the world.”

There is the poem which started collections in schools around the nation to preserve the USS Constitution, “Old Ironsides,”

“Aye, tear her tattered ensign down,
Long has she waved on high,
And many an eye has danced to see
Her banner in the sky,”

The Boston area has a superb complex of first-class universities and colleges: Harvard, M.I.T., Tufts, Wellesley, Brandeis, Radcliffe, Boston University, Boston College, Bentley, Emerson, Lowell Textile. Northeastern. Where in the world, in such a small geographical area, can that array of educational facilities be matched?

The historian, Drummond, noted, “In 1860, of the 321 high schools in the United States, half were in Massachusetts.”

For years, Boston had the “Watch and Ward Society”, which took upon itself the censoring of books and the monitoring of public entertainment, condemning what these self-appointed judges deemed immoral. For years and years, however, in spite of such censoring, the Old Howard burlesque theater, just off Scollay Square, was an enduring institution. There were countless of us teen-agers and young men who received first lessons in the revealed beauties of female bodies as the strippers strutted, pouted, teased, and took their time in removing their flashy gowns, and then all the rest of their garments. A guy I knew, around the early 1930s, who played saxophone in the pit orchestra of the Old Howard (the best view) took unrestricted delight in fully detailing the anatomical charms and oddities of the most private parts of the “star of the week.” There are many of my generation who have fond memories of Ann Corio, Gypsy Rose Lee, and Lily St. Cyr (“sincere” - get it?) They were the most glamorous stars of the Circuit.

The Old Howard is gone and Scollay Square is tamed – now Government Center, but the “Combat Zone” is probably still there for bawdy entertainment and education.

I have mentioned before how Fenway Park is a shrine for the loyal, frustrated fans who may never behold the Red Sox win the World Series (The Curse of the Babe). But good memories are somewhat compensating: Smoky Joe, Joe, Tom, Bobby, Ted, Walt, Dom, Ellis, Yaz, Tex, Lefty, Jim, Jimmy, Jimmy, Johnny, Dwight, Carlton. If you need last names, forget it.

Massachusetts brings memories other than Boston. In western Massachusetts on the Mohawk Trail there is, or was, the Hairpin Turn, a difficult loop for the autos of the 20s and 30s. Near the Hairpin Turn was the town of Florida (who named that one?) Also in the western part of the State, there were those who praised the drinking water from the Cobble Mountain Reservoir. “Cobble Mountain Gin” it was affectionately called.

Then there is picturesque Cape Ann, not as well known as Cape Cod. I was never more impressed with Nature’s FORCE as when I witnessed a violent storm breaking over Bass Rocks, near Gloucester.

That’s enough nostalgia. However, if you like to eat well and are in Boston, don’t overlook the many fine restaurants, the Durgin Park, the Union Oyster House, Jimmy’s Pier 4, or Jake Worth’s. When I was growing up not so many people “ate out”. Saturday night supper at home for many, if not most, families was Handschumacher’s franks and Friend’s Beans. I met Victor Friend as he was a member and staunch supporter of the Melrose Universalist Church.

I could go on and on. Another time I’ll comment on Boston religions – note the plural. In a prior Musing I recalled the Boston Marathon. I have not written about the swan boats in the Public Garden, cranberry bogs, Provincetown, or Revere Beach. But enough already.

Hypocrisy In The Headlines

2010-06-17T08:20:00.001-04:00

July 16, 2000

In an article in the “U.S. News and World Report,” July 17, 2000, pages 18-20, the large type headline is, BLASTS, BUT NOT FROM THE PAST. In slightly smaller type, the sub-title was, THE GOVERNMENT HAS FAILED TO MAKE CHEMICAL PLANTS SAFER, RISKING LIVES.

Being curious about what this rather conservative, business-oriented weekly publication was blaming “the Government” for, I read the article. The report dealt with accidents inf chemical plants. Quoting the article:

“Since 1998, an average of five plant workers have been killed every month in the United States by explosions or leaks of chemicals that have become integral to modem life, according to tracking by the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board.... A recent analysis of the data by Wharton School researchers shows that from 1994 through 1999, these accidents injured nearly 2,000 people – mostly workers – and forced more than 200,000 nearby residents to evacuate their homes, schools or offices – or wait apprehensively – until the situations were under control. Property damage from 1,913 chemical accidents the industry reported over those five years: $1 billion.”

A chart was displayed, “Chemical accidents: A new EPA database of 14,500 plants shows these reporting the most accidents between 1994 and 1999. But many plants have yet to submit data.” Of the plants listed, Dow Chemical Co. Freeport, Texas, led the way with 21 accidents.

The chemical plants where these accidents occurred were NOT owned or operated by the Government. The plants were corporate enterprises. Should not these corporations be labeled as failing to make chemical plants safer, risking lives?

Marianne Lavelle, the writer for U.S. News blamed a government agency, the Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board, for these accidents. Underfunded and with no authority to punish, only probe, the agency has been ineffective. If you are at all informed you must be aware that business interests constantly pressure Congress and State legislative bodies to reduce regulations and block new ones. The article reports “Nearly 70% (or 34,000) of the 49,000 companies required to submit detailed five-year accident reports to the Environmental Agency last year never bothered; the agency is now trying to determine whether they broke the law or masterfully navigated their way around it.”

Do not these chemical corporations have the primary, ethical, and humane responsibility to reduce hazards and increase safety measures for the workers and the public? Cannot they understand that such neglect in the relentless drive for ever-increasing profits injures workers and the public?

Do they not understand that sooner or later this neglect and opposition to regulations will result in much more government control when the citizenry becomes alarmed, informed, aware and ready to act?

Consider the award of billions of dollars this week, penalizing the tobacco companies for their failure of responsibility and willingness to deceive.

“Sow the wind; reap the whirlwind.”

Read the fine print and text beneath inaccurate headlines. The full story may be much different.

The Star And The Link

2010-06-16T07:58:00.001-04:00

July 9, 2000
Sarasota

[Expanded from the original, dated 1976 and filed under 1979]

Reading: APOSTLE OF LIBERTY, George Akers, p. 70-71 (Jonathan Mayhew)

Thus for example, we ought not to believe that there is, or that there is not a God; that the Christian religion is from God, or an imposture; that any particular doctrine fathered upon it is really contained in it, or not; or that any particular sect of Christians is in the right, or in the wrong; ’til we have impartially examined the matter. And see evidence on one side or the other. For to determine any point without reason or proof cannot be to judge freely, unless it be in a bad sense of the word.

To attempt to dragoon men into sound orthodox Christians, is as unnatural and fruitless as to attempt to dragoon them into good poets, physicians, or mathematicians. A blow with a club may fracture a man’s skull; but I suppose he will not think and reason the more clearly for that; though he may believe more orthodoxly according to the opinions of some.

... We may as well pick our neighbor’s pocket for fear he should spend his money in debauchery, as take from him his right of judging for himself, and chusing his religion, for fear he should judge amiss and abuse his liberty.

Let us all stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free; and not sufer ourselves to any human impositions in religious matters; it is better to throw off the yoke even now, than let it gall us for a life time: it is not too late to assert our liberty, and free ourselves from an ignominious slavery to the dictates of men.

Sermon:

Jonathan Mayhew lived forty-five years between 1720 and 1766. Years after his death, some named him, “The Morning Star of the Revolution”; and a church historian has called him “The link between 18th century Puritan religion and 19th century Unitarianism.” Robert Treat Paine, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, said that Jonathan Mayhew was the “father of civil and religious liberty in Massachusetts and America.”

Surely he ought to be of interest to us. Particularly, because he would have been outraged to be called either “the star” or “the link.” Mayhew was loyal to the British King and British Parliament. In terms of Unitarianism as it developed, Mayhew was passionately opposed to the Arian, Deistic, and Socinian theologies which characterized many 19th century Unitarians. Mayhew would be equally irate at Universalist salvation theology of the time because he believed thoroughly in divine judgment, punishment, and hell.

Jonathan Mayhew was not always consistent with his own deeply-held principles. He preached tolerance, but was guilty of intolerance on more than one occasion. His contemporary, John Adams, who said he had been influenced by Mayhew, said that “a dozen volumes would be required to delineate the character of Jonathan Mayhew.”

Therefore, I am attempting to high-light the life of Jonathan Mayhew – his remarkable family heritage; the religious climates that prevailed in his age, the political influence he had on two continents, even though he was never in his life more than 100 miles from Boston, and the crucial intersections between his religious beliefs, the issues of the day, and how he used his pulpit to energize public opinion.

HIS REMARKABLE FAMILY

When Jonathan Mayhew was born in 1720, he was a fifth generation American. To me, a 1st generation American, born in the twentieth century, I am awed that an early 18th century child was a fifth generation American.

His forbear, Thomas Mayhew, left Tisbury, England, in 1631, one of the astonishing number of 20,000 persons who migrated to Massachusetts in 13 years. In 1641, Thomas Mayhew acquired title to the island of Martha’s Vineyard, 100 miles square. Thomas Mayhew named himself “Governor Mayhew”, with some accuracy because Martha’s Vineyard was the only feudal manor in New England until it was annexed by Massachusetts in 1691.

Martha’s Vineyard was not a deserted island. Living there were 3000 Pokanoket Indians, a branch of the Narragansett tribe.

While Thomas Mayhew Sr. was interested in land and making money from it, his son, Thomas Mayhew Jr., who had emigrated from England with his father, and somehow had received a liberal education, devoted himself to bringing Christianity to the Pokanokets. Thomas Jr. spent the remainder of his life as a missionary on Martha’s Vineyard with remarkable results. By the year 1652, “there were 283 converts, a school for Indian children and two Indian meetings each Sabbath.”

I am not asserting that Christian missionary efforts are a worthy enterprise. These Indians would probably have been better off with their own nature religion. However, I cannot be very harsh on such missionary enterprises when I recall that for years in the Unitarian directory there was listed “The Society for propagating the gospel among Indians and Others.” The 19th and 20th century Unitarians had missionary efforts in India, and the Universalists [had missionary efforts] in Japan.

The Praying Indians, as they were called, became so well-known that by 1649, a London missionary society began to help the Mayhews’ efforts. In 1657, Thomas Jr. was lost at sea on a voyage to raise missionary funds. His father sought a replacement for the missionary work, but finding no one, took on the task himself at the age of 60 and continued in it for 25 years.

Following his death, the family carried on the work. The Mayhew family suffered many deaths – infants, mothers in childbirth, fathers, sisters, and brothers dying too young. The family economic situation deteriorated over the years. But the mission to the Indians was as example of Indian/Colonist goodwill, seldom if ever duplicated. In the bloody King Philip’s War, 1675-76, the Pokanokets, although outnumbering the Europeans 20 to 1 on the island, never attacked. A church historian (Latourette) has written that the “missionary Mayhews represent what is likely the longest and most persistent family missionary endeavor in the annals of all Christianity.”

From this island heritage, Jonathan Mayhew, son of Experience Mayhew, great grandson of Governor Mayhew, arrived at Harvard in 1740 to be educated. He was not committed to the ministry then; that call came later in his Harvard years.

During his college years the New England theological kettle was bubbling with sermonic debate. The Monday newspapers printed full sermons preached the day before. Religious news was daily fare such as the astrological predictions and Ann Landers’ column are today. For the remainder of his life, Jonathan Mayhew was to increase the heat to boiling controversies.

THE RELIGIOUS CLIMATE THAT PREVAILED

From its beginnings, the Massachusetts Bay Colony had been Calvinist in its theology. The five points of Calvinism were (a summary perhaps oversimplified):

1) Absolute predestination
2) Particular redemption
3) Total depravity
4) Irresistible grace
5) The perseverance of saints

By Mayhew’s time, this tightly woven theological system showed some signs of unraveling. The rationalistic writings of Isaac Newton, John Locke, and other Deists were being read and discussed at Harvard. Biblical revelation as the complete and unerring word of God was no longer believed by some to be as seamless and complete tapestry.

As much as Rationalism, Arminianism had been threatening Calvinism. The liberals, among whom Jonathan Mayhew could be numbered by the time he finished Harvard and decided to become a minister, were increasingly Arminian, supra-rational and hedging on the doctrine of the Trinity. [Of] Arminianism, Conrad Wright, a Unitarian Universalist historian wrote, “Arminianism asserted that men are born with the capacity both for sin and for righteousness; that they can respond to the impulse toward holiness as well as the temptation to do evil; and that life is a process of trial and discipline by which, with the assistance God gives to all, the bondage to sin may gradually be overcome ....

“Supernatural rationalism asserted that unassisted reason can establish the essentials of religion: the existence of God, the obligations of morality, and a divine order of rewards and punishments.”

But unlike Deism, it insisted that natural religion must be supplemented with a special revelation of God’s will – the Bible.

“Finally the liberals tended to be anti-Trinitarian, largely because they were convinced that the doctrine of the Trinity was not scriptural.... They were not ‘Unitarian’, since only a small minority believed in the simple humanity of Jesus.”

Quite apart from Harvard’s heady intellectual climate, Jonathan Mayhew’s father, Experience Mayhew, was Arminian in his thought. He found in his mission work with the Pokanokets on the island that it was impossible to teach the complexities of Calvinism to the Indians. A God who chooses to save only a portion of mankind (His elect) could not be the basis of a widespread appeal to the Indians to become Christian and to give up their “pagan” ways. Experience taught them, “all that truly believe in Christ, Christ will save, Indians or English, high or low, bond or free.”

Although Jonathan Mayhew had some initial difficulty locating a church, in 1747 he was elected minister of West Church, Boston, a most desirable pulpit. The parish was largely composed of rising, prosperous merchants. Mayhew's salary was set at £15 a week, plus a full woodbox and house rent – a very comfortable salary package for that time.

Most of his Calvinistic colleagues shunned him because of his liberal views. Only a few would exchange pulpits with him, an important practice of the day. [CJW note: 3 sermons] One hundred years later, this was to happen to Theodore Parker when his Unitarian ministerial brethren refused to exchange pulpits.

One anecdote how some people detested Mayhew’s unorthodox preaching: While still a teen-ager, Paul Revere attended a service where Mayhew spoke. Paul’s enthusiasm for the sermon “resulted in a beating by his strict father, fearful that young Paul would stray into heresy.” The sermon that caused Paul Revere to be thrashed may have been one of the character inputs that years later, in 1775, motivated Paul Revere to make his famous ride awakening every Middlesex village and town that the British were coming.

Significant from the point of view of our theme of the Star and the Link were Jonathan Mayhew’s plain, bold statements on the right and duty of free inquiry, private judgment and liberty.

POLITICAL INFLUENCE AND THE INTERSECTION OF RELIGIOUS BELIEFS AND THE ISSUES OF MAYHEW’S TIME

While Mayhew always based his social commentary on scriptural foundations, inevitably because he spoke boldly, he was politically controversial. In 1750, he preached on “Unlimited submission and non-resistance to higher powers.” [CJW note: scroll Google] He cited the English traditions of the Puritan Revolution off 1642 and the Glorious Revolution of 1688 as the right of citizens to “rid their nation of a ruler who does not govern for the common good.” It was the most important defense of the right of revolution to be plainly said in the American Colonies prior to 1776. One sentence was memorable: “Rulers have no authority from God to do mischief.”

[CJW note - “ ‘Divine’ right of kings – quote Charles I: ‘The state of monarchy is the supremest thing upon earth: for kinds are not only God’s lieutenants, and set upon God’s throne, but even by God himself are called gods.’ ”]

Mayhew also infuriated the growing Anglican Church in the Colonies by denouncing Bishops and leading the fight to prevent the settling of an Anglican Bishop in Massachusetts. That such an attitude infringed upon Anglican’s liberty to have a resident Bishop if they wanted one, deterred Mayhew’s attack not at all. His fear that the alliance of Crown and surplice in Massachusetts would destroy the freedom tradition outranked his belief in religious liberty. There were other inconsistencies in his polemics. But through his preaching, along with others who supported this point of view, the British Parliament and the King were influenced – they desisted in the attempt to appoint an Anglican Bishop for Massachusetts. They feared, and rightly so, that the political cost would be too great.

The last ten years of Mayhew’s life were continuously controversial – religious and political. He attacked the Calvinistic concepts of original sin and the Trinity. He taught that Adam and Eve sinned, but since they were the only violators, they alone were guilty. Furthermore that it was unjust and impossible for God to impute the sins of their parents to posterity. Such was not agreeable to truth, reason, or scripture. Therefore Christ’s atoning death was unnecessary. He still believed in Christ’s atonement, but this was a logical weakness in his theology. It was not only what he said, a few others were also saying these things, but in the way he said it – plainly, boldly, argumentatively.

Politically, Britain and France were fighting for possession of the North American continent. When had history ever offered a richer prize? Mayhew used his pulpit as a sounding board for Holy War. To him, France was both a tyrant and the champion of Romish superstition, “forces of the devil seeking to enslave both religiously and politically.” He reviewed the progress of the war in his sermons and gloated in the fall of Quebec.

Today, it may seem somewhat bizarre, if not immoral, that Mayhew should also remind his congregation frequently how good business was in wartime. But his congregation was largely comprised of merchants who prospered under war conditions. His biographer noted, “Seldom in the annals of Christendom had righteousness and profits seemed so indissolubly welded.”

Mayhew was loyal to England and praised the coronation of King George III.

Then came sparks that would eventually ignite the fuse of the American Revolution—the Writs of Assistance – the right to search for contraband and smuggled goods, which the Colonists merchants insisted was a violation of the fundamental property rights, with which Jonathan Mayhew publicly and eloquently agreed.

The Stamp Act of 1765 became a serious and inflammatory constitutional issue. British taxation without representation became obnoxious in Massachusetts. Mobs gathered and hung the English Governor in effigy. Then Mayhew preached on Sunday, August 25, 1765 (texts existing may be inaccurate). His text was from Galatians, V 12/13: “Ye have been called unto liberty.” The next evening, Monday, the mobs struck again, attacking the homes of customs officers, destroying records, looting and destroying the house of the Lieutenant Governor. Many believed, including English officials, that Mayhew’s sermon was the incendiary cause. An Episcopal clergyman wrote the Archbishop in England, “one of the most seditious sermons ever delivered, advising the people to stand up for their rights even to the last drop of blood.” !!!

Mayhew was shocked that he should be so accused. There was even some talk of transporting him to England for trial on charges of sedition. Pitt, the English Prime Minister, wisely decided that to attempt that would really inflame the Colonies. If they
did not know clearly then, who can tell now that Mayhew set off the riots? Whatever he said may have been as much in the tone, spontaneous gestures, and inflections he used as much as the actual text.

Anyway, the Stamp Act was repealed. When the notice arrived, there was the largest celebration in Boston's history – a 23 hour party with wine supplied abundantly by John Hancock, a wealthy merchant then, later the first signer of the Declaration of Independence.

But no revolution yet, for there were cheers for King and Parliament because they repealed the Stamp Act. But Parliament had reserved the right to legislate for the Colonies.

I have said nothing about Jonathan Mayhew’s happy marriage. This would be an important episode if there were Mayhew Chronicles as a few years ago there were the Adams Chronicles. Mayhew’s one surviving daughter, Elizabeth, married Peter Wainwright. Their first son was named Jonathan Mayhew Wainwright. Since then, the oldest son of the oldest son has always carried the name. Among them, JMW became an eminent Episcopal clergyman, who at the time of his death in 1854 was probably the most famous Episcopalian in the U. S. – Bishop JMW of New York. How ironic, when his grandfather had successfully been instrumental in preventing the King from naming and settling an Anglican Bishop in Massachusetts. Those who memories go back to World War II will remember General Jonathan Mayhew Wainwright, the hero of Corregidor. He was the fifth in the line to bear the name.

In 1766, three months before his 46th birthday, Jonathan Mayhew took ill, and died in a few days. The funeral procession was the longest Boston had ever seen.

Jonathan Mayhew was not a great original thinker. His logic was sometimes imprecise. He was influenced by European rational and Arminian thought. His theology was a link to later Unitarianism, although he would have been appalled at such coupling, and would have delivered a caustic, hostile sermon about it. His political thought, as well as his religious thought, was influenced by Thomas Hollis, a wealthy Colonist who constantly sent Mayhew books, particularly on political liberties as well as rational philosophical thought. Mayhew was not always ready to grant to others the privileges he claimed for himself. But thoroughly consistent heroes have never lived.

But Mayhew’s religious and political zeal was based on liberty, experience, inquiry, the right of private judgment, all undergirded by passionate convictions – guidelines which can serve all the rest of us inconsistent souls – at least until something better comes along –and that’s not likely.

Our second President, John Adams, when old in years, long retired, rich in honors, but still strong of mind and passionate for the United States, said, 68 years after he heard Mayhew’s sermon on unlimited submission, “If 4th of July orators really wish to investigate the feelings which produced the American Revolution, then that’s the sermon to read.”

[Postscript – from Abraham Lincoln]

We are a mighty nation and as we run our memory back over the pages of history, we find a race of men whom we claim as our fathers.

They were iron men, and we understand that by what they did it has followed that the degree of prosperity which we enjoy has come to us.

They were pillars of the temple of liberty; and now that they have crumbled away, that temple must fall unless we, their descendants, supply their places with other pillars hewn from the solid quarry of sober reason.

Passion has helped us, but can do so no more; it will in the future be our enemy. Reason must furnish all the materials for our future support and defense.

The sentiment in the Declaration of Independence gave liberty to the people of this country, and hope to all the world.

Let us readopt the Declaration of Independence and [with it] the practices and policy which harmonize with it.

Let all Americans, let all lovers of liberty everywhere, join in the great and good work.

Memorial Memory

2010-06-15T10:30:00.001-04:00

May 29, 2000

Our minister, Don Beaudreault, stimulated this recollection. In his Memorial Day sermon yesterday, he spoke eloquently of times past, recalling his experiences of war and people in the armed forces. Neither Don nor I ever served in the armed forces, but he evoked a Memorial Day remembrance: The Memorial Day parade in Everett. (Some people called it Decoration Day.)

I was nine or ten years old – certainly no earlier than 1920. Standing on the sidewalk on School Street, near the parade’s beginning, even though I was a boy, I felt patriotic emotions.

More vivid in my memory is not the marching band, the detachment of sailors from Charlestown Navy Yard, or the auxiliary organizations, but the veterans of three wars. First, the veterans of the Civil War riding in the large open automobiles which were called “touring cars.” There were six or eight of these veterans, aged of course. Sixty years at least had elapsed since they fought at Gettysburg or Shiloh or stood guard at Appomattox when Lee surrendered to Grant. In their youth, some of them probably knew veterans of the American Revolution.

Then a larger group, veterans of the Spanish-American War, marched by, perhaps remembering a comrade who died of yellow fever or on San Juan hill.

The World War I veterans were the most numerous and vigorous, wearing their uniforms, their calves wrapped in puttees. (I’ll wager not many of you have ever seen puttees.) They wore their odd-shaped battle helmets which looked like small upside-down wash basins. These veterans were paying tribute to comrades who fell at the Argonne Forest or Belleau Wood.

I was too young to sense or appreciate the mystic bonds that these defenders of our freedom must have felt. The links are long and strong in our nation’s chain of memory. Wars are terrible disasters. I questioned the Korean War and was opposed to the Viet Nam war, but like Don, I cannot be a pure pacifist:

“Breathes there a man with soul so dead
Who never to himself hath said,
This is my own, my native land.”
(Sir Walter Scott)

Regardless of what could and should be criticized in our nation’s policies and actions, never should the men and women who served be demeaned or less than honored. I have experienced the emotions of pride and gratitude at Arlington National Cemetery. I have been deeply moved at the American Cemetery near Cambridge England. The soil of all continents and the deeps of every ocean are the final resting places of so many who shipped out and never returned. Yes, I am a patriot.

A few years later than the parade I described, when I was a Boy Scout, the Boy Scout Troop marched at the rear of the parade. We had no drilling in marching; and some of us were awkward adolescents, so we were a scraggly bunch. But numbered among that small troop were Carl Stein and Vincent DeLuca. By the time of World War II, I had not lived in Everett for some years, but somehow I learned that Carl Stein, an officer in the Tank Corps, had been killed in North Africa and Vinnie in France.

They were fellow scouts and good guys.

“Greater love hath no man than this,
that a man lay down
his life for his friends.”
(Gospel of John)

The Venetian Virulence

2010-06-15T10:14:00.000-04:00

May 1, 2000

This commentary is sparked by an article e-mailed me by my daughter, Marjorie. The following summary of the article started my thinking: From Ken Albers’ article:

“The director Ken Albers noted that of all the plays in the canon, the two that seemed to cause the most problems, create the most controversy and carry the most “baggage” are The Merchant of Venice and The Taming of the Shrew.

“For Merchant, because it presents us with an atmosphere clearly rife with anti-Semitism, with protagonists who clearly embrace an anti-Semitic point of view, and with a Jewish antagonist as a figure of usury and venality that openly challenges our desire for a sympathetic anti-hero.”

Almost all of the article is devoted to Albers’ belief that The Taming of the Shrew is Shakespeare’s second-best love story, next to Romeo and Juliet. I disagree when I recall Rosalind and Orlando (As You Like It) and Beatrice and Benedict (Much Ado). The “baggage” in the Taming is our modern recognitions of male chauvinism and domination and the rise of Feminism.

I want to comment on the “baggage” that The Merchant of Venice must carry. That “baggage” is our present-day repudiation of anti-Semitism. The Merchant is rife with anti-Semitism. Co-incidentally, The Merchant was the first Shakespeare both my daughter and I attended. I was a sophomore in high school; many years later, she was in high school and similarly experienced Shakespeare for the first time. Today, both of us, as well as her husband. Dale, are ardent fans of the Bard. So are son John and [his wife] Renee and daughter Janet and [her husband] Ron. All of them make yearly pilgrimages to Ashland for the Oregon Shakespeare Festival.

There were always large measures of anti-Semitism in the Western world, including our own country. If you are old enough, you can recall the anti-Semitic rantings of Father Coughlin and the activities of various semi-fascist and hate groups before World War 2. The Holocaust, when six million Jews died in death camps in Hitler’s insane reign, made most of us keenly aware of the genocidal results results of anti-Semitism. We were made more sensitive to the slanders, lies and discriminations perpetrated against Jewish people.

Shakespeare’s age was different. Jews had been expelled from England in 1290 and not allowed to return until forty years after Shakespeare’s death.

So it would be very unusual if Shakespeare did not share much of the prevailing anti-Semitism. The stereotype of Shylock as the usurer might have made Shakespeare think a little because his father, John Shakespeare, was accused of lending money at 20% interest, which was usury. The prevailing laws did not allow Christians to charge any interest at all. Jews were not allowed to pursue any occupation but money-lending.

In the play, at first glance, Shylock is the villain; Portia the wonderful heroine; Bassanio and Antonio are heroes; Jessica and Lorenzo are the romantic young lovers.

This “Musing” is titled The Venetian Virulence – virulence in the sense of hatred, rancor, animosity. I could have added “hypocrisy” to this.

Let us take a different look at the cast of characters:

Bassanio is a spendthrift, deeply in debt, and believes his financial crisis could be resolved by marrying an heiress, Portia. In other words, Bassanio is a fortune-hunter. His best friend, Antonio, to whom he is already in debt, will help him, but Antonio’s money is all at sea in shipping ventures. So he must borrow from Shylock. Antonio does this although the drama makes plain that he has despised and insulted Shylock.

In Act I, Scene iii, after Antonio has asked for the loan of 3000 ducats (six figures today), Shylock says:

“Signior Antonio, many a time and oft
In the Rialto you have rated me
About my moneys and my usances:
Still have I borne it with a patient shrug,
For sufferance is the badge of all our tribe.
You call me misbeliever, cut-throat dog,
And spit upon my Jewish gaberdine ....

You call’d me dog, and for these courtesies
I’ll lend you thus much moneys?”

Antonio: “I am as like to call thee so again,
To spit on thee again, to spurn thee too...”

The transaction is completed, and the price for nonpayment of the loan is the pound of Antonio’s flesh. After Shylock has exited, Antonio remarks to Bassanio,

“The Hebrew will turn Christian: he grows kind.”

Thus Antonio asserts that Christians are kind and Jewish people are not. Any look at Christian history knows that that is an arrant falsehood. Was Shakespeare being ironic?

Some scholars believe that Antonio and Bassanio are lovers, Bassanio being bi-sexual. The roles could be played that way. In our time, that would just be interesting or “so what.” But in Shakespeare’s time it would have been scandalous.

William Shakespeare may have been somewhat liberated from the pandemic prejudice against Jews when one appreciates Shylock’s famous, passionate plea:

“... I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions? Fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means? ... If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die? And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge? If we are like you in the rest, we shall resemble you in that....”

Jessica, Shylock’s daughter, and her lover, Lorenzo, can beguile us with their lilting love poetry, particularly in the opening of Act V. We may overlook her crime in stealing her father’s money and jewels. But she is a thief. Lorenzo is quite willing to prosper too, with the wealth she robbed from her father. A fine romance? Hah!

Then consider Portia, the heroine. Her wonderful speech at the trial:

“The quality of mercy is not strained...” etc.

This has been the recitation at countless elocution events quoted in innumerable sermons; more remembered than any of Shakespeare’s soliloquys, except perhaps for Marc Antony’s obituary eloquence or Hamlet’s, “To be or not to be....”

But Portia’s mercy is a one-way street. She shows no mercy for Shylock, who must forcibly convert to Christianity [and] lose all his possessions.

The incidence of the rings, where Portia, disguised as the lawyer, persuades Bassanio to give her the ring, can only be described as a teasing trick with no worthy motive. In Julius Caesar, the Bard has Brutus say to Lucilius, “There are no tricks in plain and honest faith.”

Because he must become a Christian, Shylock can no longer maintain his money-lending business. Christian laws did not permit him, a Jew, to have been experienced in any other trade, profession or business. He is totally deprived of his daughter, his wealth, his business. His line in Act IV, Scene i, when all this has happened must be one of the saddest and most satirical in the Shakespeare canon, “I am content.”

You might assume from all this that I would not want to see The Merchant again. Quite the contrary. I am eager to watch how these various roles are played. With his dramatic skills and profound knowledge of how we act and what we are, Shakespeare may be saying look below the facades of human behavior and appreciate how we can be shallow or deep, wise or foolish, behave hypocritically or sincerely, act selfishly while seeming otherwise.

To dramatize these emotions, sometimes openly, sometimes subtly, is part of the never-ending genius, charm, and stimulus of Shakespeare’s works.

Sources:

The Merchant of Venice, W. Shakespeare

SHYLOCK, John Gross
SHAKESPEARE, THE INVENTION OF THE HUMAN, H. Bloom
SHAKESPEARE A TO Z, Charles Boyle
ASIMOV’S GUIDE TO SHAKESPEARE, Isaac Asimov
SHAKESPEARE: A LIFE, Park Honan

The Unpurchasable

2010-06-14T08:28:00.001-04:00

April 5, 2000

“The only Jesus Christ I know is Eugene Debs.” Fifty-five years ago, or so, I clearly remember Dean John Murray Atwood quoting this in a class where he was advocating the merit of the occasional biographical sermon. The Dean was quoting a prisoner at Atlanta Penitentiary where Eugene Debs had been sentenced to ten years in prison for his opposition to the United States participation in World War I. He also strongly criticized the 1917 Espionage Act, under which conscientious objectors were imprisoned.

I am now reading a thoroughly engrossing biography of Eugene Debs, HARP SONG FOR A RADICAL, by Marguerite Young. My surmise is that you will read about Debs in more Musings than this particular piece.

Born in 1855, Debs went to work at the age of 14 in a railway shop. He became a locomotive fireman. In a few years, he was a leading organizer of the American Railway Union, which lost its strength in 1895 when Debs was jailed for contempt of a Federal injunction when he was leading a famous strike against the Pullman Sleeping Car Company.

Debs became a convinced Socialist [and] established the Socialist Party of America. He was the Socialist Party candidate for President of the United States:

In 1900, he received 96,000 votes
In 1904, he received 400,000 votes
In 1908, he received 400,000 votes
In 1912, he received [900,000] votes.

In [1920], Debs ran for the U. S. Presidency from Atlanta Penitentiary. He received the unanimous votes of his fellow inmates, but prisoners’ votes did not count. But he received 915,000 votes, 6% of the total votes cast – a remarkable number for a man who was in prison.* Through all the campaigns he was know as “Debs The Unpurchasable.” (Gore and Bush, take note, neither one of you will ever be honored by that title.)

President Harding, responding to demonstrations and pressures from working people, pardoned Debs in 1921, but did not restore his citizenship of which he had been deprived by the WWI Sedition Act.

Broken in health, Debs died in 1926. In 1976, Congress posthumously restored his citizenship.

For many people, his speech at the 1917 Espionage Act trial was relevant, pointed and eloquent:

“Your Honor, years ago I recognized my kinship with all living things and I made up my mind that I was not one bit better than the meanest of the earth.... I said then, I say now, that while there is a lower class, I am in it; while there is a criminal element, I am of it; while there is a soul in prison, I am not free.”

Shakespeare had words that were prophetic of Eugene Debs. In JULIUS CEASAR (Act 1, Sc. 3), Cassius says to Casca:

“Therein, ye gods, you make the weak most strong;
Therein, ye gods, you tyrants do defeat;
Nor stony tower, nor walls of beaten brass,
Nor airless dungeon, nor strong links of iron,
Can be retentive to the strength of spirit....”

[* Editor’s note: It was in 1912 that Debs won 6% of the popular vote. Although he enjoyed a slightly greater number of votes in 1920, when he was imprisoned, the total represented a smaller percent of the popular vote – 3.4%.]

How Things Happen

2010-06-14T07:26:00.001-04:00

February 18, 2000

In his book, THE FUTURE OF HISTORY, the author [and] historian Howard Zinn is being interviewed by David Barsamian, who comments, (p. 154): “You conclude A PEOPLE’S HISTORY with this particular incident in 1992: ‘The Republican Party held a dinner to raise funds at which individuals and corporations paid up to $400,000 to attend. Fitzwater told reporters, “It’s buying access to the system, yes.” When asked about people who didn’t have so much money, he replied, “They have to demand access in other ways.”’

Zinn responded.... “He’s giving us good advice, telling us that if we are going to change the system, we are going to have to organize, we’re going to have to create power, we’re going to have to do it without that wealth and without the military force that the government has at its command. ...I wanted to end the book with that kind of warning and lesson given by somebody in the Establishment who knows how things happen.”

I was reminded of these observations when protests in Seattle at the meeting of the WTO (World Trade Organization) resulted in much media emphasis on the 500 or so people who were arrested. What, seemingly, was not news was that all but 51 of these cases were thrown out of court: sloppy police work, flimsy evidence, etc. In his newsletter, Jim Hightower wrote that the remaining cases represent misdemeanors, not crimes – “pedestrian interference,” or “failure to disperse.”

In addition, as I recollect it, there was very little standard media news informing the rest of the country and the world that there were 50,000 protesters, almost all of them non-violent, who took to the Seattle streets, including 30,000 trade unionists who marched peacefully to emphasize their views. They were protesting the possible exportation of millions of American jobs to third world countries where lowest wages and unregulated working conditions would prevail. Furthermore that unchecked pollution would add much to the sum of human misery. (I am not arguing at this point for the economics or environmental claims of the protesters. The subject is too difficult for my present limited knowledge. I hope to remedy that. But I can envision the dire possibility that world government might arrive as world government ruled by a few mammoth international corporations with United States military might as its police arm and enforcer.)

But the Seattle turmoil did illustrate the point that George Bush’s secretary, Marlin Fitzwater, made that when people didn’t have money, “they have to demand access in other ways.”

In TROILUS AND CRESSIDA (Act III Sc. 2), Ulysses says,

“Things in motion catch the eye
Than what stirs not.”

In this Black History month I read that historian David Kennedy related a startling reminder how, until the middle of the 20th century, there was prejudice so wide and so deep as to be almost unbelievable and unspeakable today (FREEDOM FROM FEAR, The American People in Depression and War, 1929-1945).

Prejudice was rampant... “We will not employ Negroes,” the president of North American Aviation flatly declared. “It is against company policy.” Kansas City’s Standard Steel Corporation announced, “We have not had a Negro worker in twenty-five years, and do not plan to start now.” In Seattle, the district organizer of the International Association of Machinists put the Boeing Aircraft Company on notice, “labor has been asked to make many sacrifices in this war,” but the “sacrifice” of allowing blacks into union membership is “too great.” (Kennedy, p. 765)

President Franklin Roosevelt remained aloof from this obvious country-wide prejudice and discrimination. His concerns were lifting the depression and winning the war. Into this historical scene came A. Philip Randolph, head of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, an all-black union. Randolph sensed “how things happen” when there is no money.

In 1940, at its annual convention, the Brotherhood, with Randolph’s determined leadership, passed a resolution urging the government to avoid discrimination against blacks in the armed forces. With the help of Eleanor Roosevelt it was arranged to present that resolution to the President in person.

The meeting with FDR included not only Randolph but also Walter White, executive secretary of the NAACP and other black leaders.

Two weeks later, however, a Roosevelt aide announced that “the policy of the War Department is not to intermingle colored and white enlisted personnel in the same regimental units.” (Kennedy p. 766)

Randolph was shocked and angered because he thought FDR had given him a sympathetic hearing in the plea to desegregate the armed forces. Disillusioned, he called for Negroes to take to the streets. While some black leaders were reluctant, the idea caught on. But the possibility of 100,000 Negroes marching in Washington shook up President Roosevelt. Efforts to halt the idea failed and another White House meeting ensued.

Roosevelt failed to persuade Randolph to call off the planned march. FDR was equally adamant that the march must not occur.

Finally, Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia of New York City, who was present at FDR’s request, said, “Gentlemen, it is clear that Mr. Randolph is not going to call off the march, and I suggest we all begin to seek a formula.” (Kennedy p. 767)

The formula agreed to was Executive Order 8802, which stated that “There shall be no discrimination in the employment of workers in defense industries or government because of race, color, creed or national origin.” The FEPC (Fair Employment Practices Committee) was established to investigate complaints and to act. There was no mention of desegregating the armed forces. That would not happen until President Truman ordered it in 1948.

However, one Negro newspaper noted, “ it demonstrated to the Doubting Thomases among us that only mass action can pry open the doors that have been erected against America’s black minority.” (Kennedy)

The FEPC was a forerunner of the civil rights struggles and marches of the 1960s, when so much enabling Federal legislation was passed. At the 1963 March on Washington, 250,000 people gathered (I was among them) and heard the cause of civil rights held high, particularly the famous I HAVE A DREAM oration by Martin Luther King, Jr.

A. Philip Randolph was a key figure in the March on Washington. From his staff he loaned Bayard Rustin to plan and organize many of the details of that spectacular protest. Bayard Rustin did a first-class excellent job in that huge, momentous task.

How Things Happen? Shakespeare provides advice. In Henry VIII (Act III, Sc. 1), Queen Katherine says to Wolsey and Campeius,

“Out with it boldly:
Truth loves open dealing.”

P.S. I have not [changed] “Negroes” because at the time of the events described, this was the common parlance. I am aware that today’s accepted term is “Afro American.”

Funny

2010-06-10T10:28:00.001-04:00

February 12, 2000

While there is an idea or two cooking for MUSINGS 2000, the newest book to come to me sparks the first musing of this new year. If, as I do, you happen to believe in the healing power of humor and salvation by laughter, have I got a book for you!!! THE STUPIDEST THINGS EVER SAID BY POLITICIANS, by Ross and Kathryn Petras, will give you moments of hilarity on the darkest days. Dan Quayle seems to have the most citations, but Presidents Bush and Clinton are well represented. But there are many others who qualify for the title of this book. Here are samples:

ON THE AIR FORCE, UNWORRIED
[The Air Force is pleased with the performance of the C5A cargo plane], although having the wings fall off at eight thousand hours is a problem.
– Major General Charles F. Kuyk, Jr.

ON THE ALAMO, ENEMY SOLDIERS WE NEVER KNEW WERE THERE
[Alamo defender William Barret Travis] is the guy that with three thousand Russians threatening to attack ....
– Senator Strom Thurmond when campaigning for reelection in his hometown of Edgefield, South Carolina, reminding the audience of local heroes including Alamo defender, William Barret Travis.

ON ANIMALS, INTERESTING DEMOCRATIC OBSERVATIONS ABOUT
A zebra cannot change its spots.
– Vice President Al Gore

ON THE FUTURE. WHERE IT IS ...
It’s a question of whether we’re going to go forward into the future or past to the back.
– Vice President Dan Quayle

ON DESEXED WORDS
Personhole is not an acceptable desexed word.
– Shirley Dean, councilperson from the Berkeley, California, City Council, explaining why the council had changed the wording in a sewer equipment request back to “manhole cover.”

ON HUMAN RIGHTS, GREAT MOMENTS IN
You hear about constitutional rights, free speech and the free press. Every time I hear these words I say to myself, “That man is a Red. That man is a Communist.” You never hear a real American talk like that.
– Mayor Frank Hague, Jersey City, New Jersey, 1938

ON METAPHORS, VERY BADLY MIXED
I wanted to have all my ducks in a row so that if we did get into a posture, we could pretty much slam-dunk this thing and put it to bed.
– Mayor Lee Cooke of Austin, Texas

ON POLLUTION. WHAT IT REALLY IS
It isn’t pollution that’s harming our environment. It’s the impurities in our air and water that are doing it.
– Vice President Dan Quayle

ON THANK YOUS, DAMP
I cannot tell you how grateful I am – I am filled with humidity.
– Gib Lewis, speaker of the Texas House.

ON X-RATED MOMENTS IN PROVINCIAL LEGISLATURE
Mr. Speaker! Mr. Speaker! Won’t you please bang that thing of yours on the table.
– Agnes Kripps, Canadian Socred, to the Speaker of the British Columbia legislature during a heated discussion on sexual terminology.

ON VISITS, INSIGHTFUL COMMENTS ON
I haven’t been to Michigan since the last time I was there.
– Attributed to Vice President Dan Quayle

Well, there’s a sampling. If, wherever you are, you pick up long-distance belly laughs, chuckles or hoots, you can surmise that I have picked up this book again.

Introduction To Musings XI

2010-06-09T09:24:00.004-04:00

November/December 2000

HOLIDAY GREETINGS

Shakespeare has the Earl of Warwick say (Henry IV Part 2, Act III, Sc. 1):

“There is a history in all men’s lives,
Figuring the nature of the times deceas’d;
The which observ’d, a man may prophesy,
With a near aim, of the main chance of things
As yet not come to life, which in their seeds
And weak beginnings lie intreasured.”

I make no claim whatsoever to have a “near aim of the chance of things.” No Red Sox fan would ever have the chutzpah to assert that. After the 2000 Presidential campaign, with its weird, unprecedented aftermath, I remembered that since I first voted in 1932, I have voted in the Presidential elections for the winner 10 or 11 times; and for the loser 7 or 8 times. I would never [have] amassed much of an estate betting on my choices. I guess I am one of those in the well-worn cliche, “often wrong, but never in doubt.”

My health is a little less robust than when I sent you Holiday Greetings in 1999. After all, in less than a year, I will be 90, if I make it. I agree with Robert Frost who said, “In three words I can sum up everything I learned about life. It goes on.” Amen to that.

Measuring The Past – Weighing The Future

2010-06-09T09:13:00.001-04:00

January 2, 2000
Venice

(re-write of March 21, 1982, Lakeland)

Thirty-nine years ago the Universalist Church of America and the American Unitarian Association consolidated, and the Unitarian Universalist Association became a new religious name on the continental scene. Today, I would like to review briefly the values that each brought from an historic past – values which should not be erased – and re-affirm proposals and principles which seem to me essential to justify an on-going religious enterprise which asks for loyalty and support. We are justified if we are useful in service to the human family, courageous, and thoughtful in evaluating the conflicts and stresses in society, and aware of the need to provide situations where we celebrate life together – worship. No religious endeavor is worthy of the commitment it requires unless it serves persons in their needs, challenges society to create both larger liberties and stronger social cohesion, and deepens our human grasp of the importance of the great ideas: the nature of this creating universe, our purpose and destiny on this earth and the “source of human good.”

There were Universalists and Unitarians hundreds of years before the movements were organized on this continent. The associations and denominations were structures to unite congregations and to house and protect ideas which had previously existed as heresies within other religious frameworks.

That all humankind, without exception, was not condemned to everlasting Hell, but was to be saved, was a theological affirmation existing from earliest Christian times. In America, the early Universalist preachers were almost exclusively “Bible Universalists,” many of them self-taught. They rebutted the orthodox claims of Hell and damnation with proof texts from the Old and New Testaments which indicated clearly that many of the Old Testament prophets, and in the New Testament, Jesus, Paul, and others believed that the nature of God was love, and that eternal creating love, by its very nature, prohibited eternal damnation, even for one single human soul. Hosea Ballou, the pioneer Universalist preacher, was riding circuit, place to place, preaching Universalism. He stopped in homes overnight. Somewhere in New England he stopped overnight with a farmer who did not agree with him and they discussed Universalism. The farmer’s son was somewhat of a drunk and when he did not return from town, the farmer was worried. He was afraid his son would go to Hell. “All right,” said Ballou, “We’ll find a place on the path where your son will be coming home. We’ll build a big fire, grab him and throw him into it.” The farmer was shocked, “That’s my son, I love him, I can’t do that.”

“If you, a human and imperfect father, love your son so much you wouldn’t throw him into the fire, how can you possibly believe that God, the perfect father, would do so?”

It is fair to report that the orthodox opponents could find numerous biblical proof texts which seemed to buttress their position that a few souls would be saved by the grace of God. But most souls were destined for eternal punishment in Hell.

This demonstrates one can “prove” almost anything from scriptures. Those who advocate “scientific creationism” using the scriptures as laboratory proof that evolution is erroneous do not seem to recognize that by the same means, scripture, one can “prove” that the earth is flat. So it would seem consistent to me that a believer in “scientific creationism” should, logically, belong to the Flat Earth society.

In Christian beginnings, universal salvation was a doctrine defended by many of the early leaders of the Church. Even when it became a heretical doctrine, some five hundred years after Jesus lived, there were frequent re-assertions of the doctrine of universal salvation by courageous heretics.

In modern Universalism in America, there was Dr. George de Benneville. Influenced by the Universalism of some of the German pietists who were a small but influential wing of the Protestant Reformation, de Benneville was preaching Universalism in Pennsylvania in the 1740s. John Murray, disciple of James Relly, came to America. After the remarkable experiences of the New Jersey landing, he found his ways to New England. Much to his surprise, he found a Universalist group in Gloucester, Massachusetts, in 1770. We would call it a fellowship today. After a series of dramatic events, he became minister of the first organized society of Universalists in America, The Independent Christian Church.

The movement spread rapidly in New England and Pennsylvania, soon reaching out to gather societies in New York and Ohio. In 1805, Hosea Ballou’s famous TREATISE ON THE ATONEMENT was the theological proposal which made most Universalists unitarian (small u) in their theology years before Unitarianism became an organized movement.

Unitarianism has roots as deep or deeper in the soil of human history. The Hebrew scripture proclaimed a monotheism at least from the time of the ethical prophets, 800 years B.C.E. The New Testament offers no evidence of Trinitarian belief. Belief that God was three was a later development of Christian dogma.

Disbelief in the Trinity became heretical. While monotheism remained the foundation of Jewish and Moslem theology, the Christian Church punished those who deviated from the Trinitarian dogmas.

Nevertheless, Unitarian thought flared again and again. Servetus, most well-known of the anti-Trinitarians of the Reformation period, was burned at the stake by John Calvin in Geneva, but his influence was not destroyed thereby. In the same sixteenth-century, the Socinian or Unitarian movement was organized in Transylvania by Francis David. David, later imprisoned, died in jail, but Unitarianism has persisted in Hungary for more than four hundred years.

Unitarianism in England pre-dated the movement in America by almost a century. Under the leadership of Theophilus Lindsey and Joseph Priestley, organization was made effective in the founding of Essex Hall Chapel in 1774.

In the United States, although there were early Congregational preachers who were Unitarian in thought, specific organization was delayed.

King’s Chapel was the first Anglican (Episcopal) Church in Boston. However, in 1785, the membership elected a liberal minister, James Freeman. Importantly enough, when the Bishop would not approve Freeman and refused to ordain him, the Parish delegated its Senior Warden to ordain Freeman – a radical departure from and rejection of the Anglican/Episcopal practice of ordination by the Bishop through whose laying on of hands on the ordinand maintained the doctrine of apostolic succession.

The American Unitarian Association was formed in 1825. It was not a uniting of churches, but was an individual membership organization. The inspired preaching of William Ellery Charming and the Unitarian influence on the faculty of Harvard Divinity School were important in the founding of the AUA. Ralph Waldo Emerson and Theodore Parker, among others, strengthened the intellectual position and increasingly isolated the Unitarian movement from the prevailing orthodoxies.

For more than a hundred years, the Universalists and Unitarians maintained their denominational separateness, each accumulating heroes, heroines, traditions, trusts and institutional habits which were difficult to alter or abandon. Recognizing, however, that their theology and social attitudes were developing along parallel lines, there were overtures toward merger as early as 1865.

Both denominations took pretty much in stride the revolutions in scientific ideas and adjusted theological positions to cohere with modern thought. Darwinian evolution, the higher criticism of the Bible, and Freudian theories of our motives and inwardness all were accepted generally by both denominations and were positions which helped liberals toward a better understanding of human nature in a world of natural and orderly processes.

[CJW note: Mainline religions stopped preaching hellfire & brimstone; reference to a cartoon which depicts a minister giving a sermon in which he declares, “No matter how badly you have sinned, you don’t have to worry about losing your coverage!”]

In the 1950s, deliberations about merger intensified and in progressive steps, studies were undertaken, and various merger proposal voted, which led to the conclusive vote in 1960. The negotiations had been complicated and there was opposition, but the consolidation was overwhelmingly approved by the delegates. At the time, some of us remembered the words of the prophet Amos, “Can two men (sic) walk together except they agree?” Unitarians and Universalists agreed that their religious association was one and to walk together henceforth.

It is important to remember the values of the old which have been preserved in the new:

First, there is the basic theological/philosophical tradition of individual freedom, reason, character, optimism . This right of individual belief is maintained specifically in the purposes and objectives of the UUA: “To strengthen one another in a free and disciplined search for truth as the foundation of our religious fellowship.”

Second is the great Reformation affirmation of the priesthood of all believers. We make no division between the clergy and the laity that asserts or implies that the clergyman has a unique, sacred calling. We ministers are trained to carry out the duties and responsibilities of the ordained minister, but we have no wisdom from on high that is denied the person in the pew or chair. The freedom and responsibility of both pulpit and pew have both historical precedent and continuing symbol in our traditions, in the ordination in King’s Chapel of James Freeman by the Senior Warden, a layman and ordination of John Murray by the Gloucester Universalists – laypeople all.

The parallel institutional right of congregational independence was a high value in both Unitarian and Universalist traditions and it has been preserved in the constitutional documents of the UUA.

There are many traditions in our historical past which are points of referral and wise guidance, but the most vital are the freedom of the individual and the independence of the congregation.

What shall we dream and try to make real in the future? The future cannot be precisely determined by the conditions of the present. One of the mysterious, tantalizing, and hopeful features of this dynamic universe is that effects can never be exactly predicted from observable causes. Prediction of things to come is always a venture of chance. I do not happen to believe in crystal balls, tarot cards, or the daily astrological column.

But it seems to me that one of our responsibilities is theological. When one looks back on the “death and Glory” argument which badly split the Universalists in the 19th century, when one considers the agitation and hot debates in the humanism/theism controversy of a few decades ago, as well as other issues on which there was division, one must surely recognize that theological debate is seldom a placid encounter. As one historian has remarked, “there is no rancor like that between theological opponents who fight for the glory of God as if the very devil were in them.”

We do need a theological framework which provides a reasonable enclosure for the revolutionary changes which are occurring in electronic communications, science, politics, economics and government. The UUA has a program, “Building your own theology” which I recommend, if you have not already used it.

But we must be just as wary of establishing a creed as were our forbears. The fact that a religion may be appraised as modern is no warrant whatsoever for an attitude requiring conformity to it, or being arrogant about it. In the historical room of the Universalist Church in Gloucester, there hangs a replica of the original Charter of Compact of that first organized Universalist Church. If you ever visit there, read the whole compact, but particularly notice the 9th article: “whereas the privilege of choosing and professing one’s own religion is inestimable; and in order to maintain that privilege unimpaired, in case any person associated with us should suffer persecution from the undue exercise of power, we do agree and resolve to afford him all legal means of extricating him from difficulty and of enjoying that freedom which is held forth by the Constitution.” The language may be slightly archaic, but the ethic is as imperative today as then.

Universal salvation, among us, has become less a theological proposition for the after-life and more an article of faith for the people living in this world – to affirm, defend, and promote the worth of every human personality and the use of the democratic method in human relationships. This is the additional meaning, The Big Idea, that has been transfused into the grand old theology of the universal salvation of all humankind.

There is no blinking the requirement that our faith must be not only free, but also exacting, for the defense of all souls is no trivial or easy task. It is something we must do together. John Coleman Adams, one of the superior of our 19th century preachers, once said that “our forbears were too jealous of their liberties to cultivate their unities.”

The defense of the free mind requires a good deal of unity. We should be neither boastful of our knowledge nor extravagant in our claims of virtue. Even as a consolidated association, we are tiny compared with the millions other churches can count. Nevertheless, we need to exert our efforts, the ounces of our weight, toward achieving a world which will consider all persons on earth worthy of salvation here on earth, which will Define salvation in terms of enough to live on as well as freedom to choose a faith to live by.

We live in communities where there is a multiplicity of differing religions, denominations, associations with differing theologies, symbols, sacraments, rituals, traditions. What is most needed for the 21st century is not a unity of faith, as faith is commonly understood, but rather an urgent witness to stimulate and encourage all persons to live up to the ethical demands of their own religions. We do this best by living up to our own. In our own way and in cooperation with others whose faith symbols may differ widely, can deal with issues of human dignity, rights, freedom, hunger, sickness, and the search for the common good.

Random Quotes – For Your Musing Or Amusing

2010-06-08T08:34:00.000-04:00

November 1999

(On genealogy) One does not have to go back very far to be everyone’s cousin. After the lapse of a mere 20 generations, everyone has 1,048,576 direct ancestors – great, great, great, etc. grandparents. Apart from a few immigrant groups, every Englishman of English grandparents may claim to be descended from everyone who was alive in England at the Norman Conquest (1066). IN THE LIGHT OF HISTORY, J. H. Plumb

Actual Classified Ad Blunders (Newsletter of NFO):

For Sale: an antique desk suitable for lady with thick legs and large drawers.

We do not tear your clothing by machinery. We do it carefully by hand.

A superb and inexpensive restaurant. Fine foods expertly served by waitresses in appetizing forms.

Dog for sale: eats anything and is fond of children.

Dinner special – Turkey $2.35; Chicken or beef $2.25; children $2.00

“Rumor is a pipe
Blown by surmises, jealousies, conjectures,
And of so easy and so plain a stop
That the blunt monster with uncounted heads,
The still discordant wavering multitude,
Can play on it.” (Henry IV, Part 2, Introduction)

(Do you think the “Enquirer” would be willing to run that on their
masthead?)

For fast acting relief try slowing down. Lily Tomlin

“We get into the habit of living before acquiring the habit of thinking.” Albert Camus

If the world’s population of nearly 5 billion people was reduced to a village of 100 people, this would be the result:
58 would be Asian
12 would be African
10 would be Western Europeans
8 would be Latin Americans
5 would be North Americans
1 would be an Australian or a New Zealander

CJW comment: I know it doesn’t add up to 100, I just copied the NFO item. The missing six must be Eastern Europeans.

“We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.” Sir Winston Churchill

“If all the year were playing holidays, To sport would be as tedious as work.” Prince Hal, HENRY IV, Act 1

“A woman came to ask the doctor if a woman should have children after 35. I said 35 children is enough for any woman!” Gracie Allen

“No one, on his deathbed, ever said, ‘I wish I’d spent more time in the office.’” Vincent Foster (Counsel in the 1st Clinton term)

Problem that has haunted Western thought: “Why would a good God allow evil in the world?... a trilemma created, ‘If God were good,’ observed C. S. Lewis, ‘He would wish to make his creatures perfectly happy, and if God were almighty He would be able to do as he wished. But the creatures are not happy. Therefore God lacks either goodness or power or both....’ ‘The only excuse for God,’ said Stendahl, ‘is that he does not exist.’” Daniel Boorstin, THE SEEKERS, p. 13

“There is no sure foundation set on blood,
No certain life achieved by others’ death.”
KING JOHN, Act V, Sc. 2

“The artist... speaks to our capacity for delight and wonder, to the sense of mystery surrounding our lives; to our sense of pity, and beauty, and pain; to the latent feeling of fellowship with all creation – to the subtle but invincible conviction of solidarity that knits together the loneliness of innumerable hearts, to the solidarity of dreams, in joy, in sorrow, in aspirations, in illusions, in hope, in fear which binds men to each other, which binds together all humanity – the dead to the living and the living to the unborn.” Joseph Conrad, “The Conditions of Art”

Did “The Body” Get A Bad Rap?

2010-06-08T08:06:00.001-04:00

October 8, 1999

The news and TV talkers have gabbed to the nth degree about a statement made by Jesse “The Body” Ventura, Governor of Minnesota, in an interview published by Playboy magazine. The ex-professional wrestler and Navy Seal was widely quoted as saying, “Organized religion is a sham and a crutch for weak-minded people.”

What I did not hear in the heaps of criticism was Ventura’s full answer to a question about legalizing prostitution, as in the Netherlands, which the Governor favored for rather persuasive reasons. When the interviewer asked, “This isn’t a very popular position in America, is it?” THIS is what the Governor replied:

“No, and it’s because of religion. Organized religion is a sham and a crutch for weak-minded people who need strength in numbers. It tells people to go out and stick noses in other peoples’ business. I live by the golden rule: treat others as you want them to treat you. The religious right wants to tell people how to live.”

Do you recognize how the Media pulled part of a sentence out of context in order to sensationalize Governor Ventura’s answer? If he had said “some organized religion, etc...” I would have agreed with him, and so would millions of others. After all, the USA is the most church-going nation in the world, and while church attendance on Sundays has been estimated at one hundred million, 30 to 35% of Americans are not members and/or do not support an organized religion. That does not mean, however, that they are not religious. That is a whole other subject. And after all, the religious right does want and tries to tell us all how to live. The Governor was correct in that.

The whole interview occupies the large part of ten pages. To single out that one answer and put a “spin” on it, is neither good news-gathering nor fair comment.

Many of the Governor’s answers are interesting. He is consistently candid, plain spoken. Even though I cannot agree with many of his positions and beliefs, I admire his openness and frankness. Here are a few examples, although I wish more people would read the whole interview.

When asked why he was drawing larger crowds on his book tour than Kissinger or Newt Gingrich, he answered, “The answer is that people are searching for the truth, for someone they can truly believe in. The truth may not be what they want to hear, but at least they know they’re getting it.”

To a question about Pat Buchanan, he replied, “I respect him. He makes people think. He and I differ drastically on social issues, and that would hold him back from being the Reform Party nominee. Mr. Buchanan puts certain issues like abortion on the front burner. We in the Reform Party do not. We don’t even have abortion on our platform. It’s not a political issue. It’s been decided by the courts, and it should be challenged in the courts.”

When the interviewer asked, “How do you feel about protesters who burn the American flag?” Ventura answered, “If you buy the flag, it’s yours to burn.” That would not be a widely popular answer, but certainly the position can be defended.

When asked, “What do you think of gays in the military?” I believe the Governor made a sensible, forthright answer, “Who am I to tell someone they can or cannot serve their country? I couldn’t care less if the person next to me is gay as long as he gets the job done.”

When the governor was questioned about the death penalty, he replied, “I don’t support the death penalty. In the private sector I did, but not as Governor. I wouldn’t want the responsibility of sending someone to his death. Minnesota doesn’t have a death penalty, so it doesn’t matter to me.” Although most of you know I have been opposed to capital punishment for longer than most of you have been alive, but I can see the merit of his stance on this issue.

Jesse “The Body” was quite frank about professional wrestling. It is entertainment, not sport. The bouts and endings are choreographed and rehearsed. But constant training is required because the crowd-pleasing brutality or pseudo-brutality must be plausible. Even then, I read the other day about a professional wrestler who had his neck broken in a match and may never walk again.

If Governor Ventura should ever run for higher or national office, I doubt that I would vote for him. But of this I am sure, he would tell it as he sees it, no matter who becomes offended. That is a quality of political statements now most sadly lacking and most to be desired, no matter where, left, right, or center you may be positioned.

Happy Birthday To:

2010-06-07T20:35:00.001-04:00

October 4, 1999

Happy Birthday To:

Sara’s Grandson, Kirk McKean (14)
Comedian Jan Murray (82)
Actor Charlton Heston (75)
Author Jackie Collins (58)
Author Anne Rice (58)
Actor Clifton Davis (54)
Actress Susan Sarandon (53)
Actress Alicia Silverstone (23)
ME (88)

Kirk is a tall, slim teenager.

I have only a vague recollection of Jan Murray’s comedy. I’ve not read Collins or Rice. I’m not familiar with the acting of Clifton Davis or Alicia Silverstone.

Charlton Heston and I sharing the same birthday!!! So much for astrology.

On the other hand, Susan Sarandon’s views of public issues seem to be much like my own. So ....

Anyway, HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO US ALL. I had a good one.

Reading Room Reflections

2010-06-07T06:56:00.000-04:00

September 19, 1999

Sitting in the spacious, excellently lighted reading room of the Selby Library the other day, I was reminded of notes I took a few years back when reading IN THE LIGHT OF HISTORY, by the English historian J. H. Plumb (published 1973). He wrote of the momentum for knowledge in the late 17th century. In publishing, it was an era of encyclopedias and dictionaries.

Plumb wrote that the English High Church bishops viewed with anxiety the spread of lectures, science, particularly – “popular education led to questioning accepted beliefs in religion and politics. What began as scientific curiosity often ended in political and moral speculation.” It was a great age of libraries and book clubs, hi the libraries serious works hugely outnumbered fiction ... and toward the end of the century there was an obvious connection between dissenters, liberals, and libraries. At Birmingham, 18 out of 19 members of the committee who ran the library were dissenters led by Joseph Priestley; the originators of the London Library were men with a strong liberal bias, supporters of America and sympathetic to the early aspirations of the French Revolution.”

This thirst for knowledge was often found in combination with a critical and realistic attitude toward politics and religion. The governing circles “were horrified that miners were reading Thomas Paine.”

I recall how important in my boyhood was the Parlin Library, near Everett Square. There I developed my life-long habit of reading books. Beginning with “boys’” stories – Frank Merriwell, Tom Swift, Zane Grey’s westerns, Tarzan, I gradually responded to biographies, histories, Lamb’s Tales from Shakespeare, the heroic myths: King Arthur, Charlemagne, Roland and Oliver, Ogier the Dane. Then the novelists: Charles Dickens, James Fenimore Cooper. Alexandre Dumas’ (the elder’s) THE COUNT OF MONTE CRISTO was thrilling reading. My continuing fondness for good mysteries was sparked by the Sherlock Holmes stories by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

Charles Parlin was a benefactor of the City of Everett. My Junior High was Parlin Junior. Incidentally, in my third year of Junior High (equivalent to the 9th grade), I was one of those awarded the “Parlin P.” Qualification was based on academic grades, athletic tests, and character (the latter the appraisal of teachers). I barely qualified for the athletic part because I was not a swift runner. However, I did OK in strength tests – pushups, chinning the bar, throwing the baseball. I still have that “P” letter – I don’t think I ever had it put on jacket or sweater. It was a bit moth-eaten the last time I looked at it.

Today, with the Internet and computer science becoming so wide-spread, will the libraries still be an important part of our education and absorption of culture? I hope so, because much as I like the computer and am fascinated by it, it doesn’t replace good books.

In 1951, when I was doing some graduate work at Boston University School of Theology (BUST), I remember the Professor of Church History, Edwin Prince Booth, emphasizing at the beginning of the semester, “History is in the books. If you want to know church history, or any other history, go to the books!!”

Will that still be true in the computer, information, fax, TV, video age? I surmise that my grandchildren and greatgrandchildren and their millions of countrymen and women will answer that question. Will the progressive, even radical ideas many of us encountered in the books be available on the sophisticated, electronic networks? For in the books, time and again, was a counterpunch, or a basis for debate when special interests or “establishment” powers were quite willing to have the people remain in ignorance of other ways and ethical principles.

Shakespeare has Caliban, who hated Prospero, say in THE TEMPEST (Act III, Sc. 2),

“Remember
First to possess his books; for without them
He’s but a sot, as I am, nor hath not
One spirit to command: they all do hate him
As rootedly as I. Burn but his books.”

Remembrance Of Things Past

2010-06-06T11:20:00.000-04:00

August 31, 1999

Remembrance Of Things Past
(With apologies to Marcel Proust)

Marj sent me THE PERFECT STORM by Sebastian Junger. As I took the book out of the envelope, I fanned the pages, and, suddenly, on page 263, “Hough’s Neck” caught my attention. This is a curious juxtaposition of circumstances. In late August, I was thinking back 74 years. Late August always stirs these thoughts. Hough’s Neck is a protruding spit of land in Quincy Bay where my father was drowned. (August 25?)

Uncle John Granstrom, his brother Andrew Granstrom, and my father were on a fishing trip. They moored the motor boat off Hough’s Neck and were rowing the dory to shore to buy supplies. As Uncle John told the story, a sudden, violent squall arose and the dory capsized. He came up and held on to the dory. He never saw his brother or my father come up. My father was a strong man and could swim, so we never knew the precise circumstances.

We were staying at the Granstrom’s “cottage” at Wollaston Beach. Actually it was a substantial two-story house with three bedrooms. It only lacked a central heating system to be a year-round house.

Uncle John was brought back, either by the state police or the Coast Guard. That Sunday morning remains one of the unforgettable days of my life. When they brought the news, my mother started screaming, “Carl’s gone!!! Carl’s gone!!!” I walked out of the cottage and paced on the sparse grass patch, trying unsuccessfully to grasp what had happened. I was called back to the cottage and was told by my uncle and aunt, “You must now be the man of the family.”

My father’s body was not recovered for a week, being found in Hingham Bay. Uncle John told me, with a lack of sensitivity, that the casket must remain closed because crabs had eaten away at my father’s face and body. That image gave me bad dreams for some time. The service was at the funeral home of Christian Berrglund, a Swedish undertaker in Cambridge. When I leaned against my mother, one of the aunts pushed me by the shoulder and reminded me, “You are now the man of the family.”

Just into my teens – and expected to be a “man”. I was lamed emotionally- a mixture of guilt because I couldn’t be a man; resentment toward those who were putting me in that category; and feelings of inadequacy a deplorable package to be saddled with at that age. If there had been money and motivation for psychological counseling, maybe it could have all been worked out. But there wasn’t and the scars have never been completely healed to this day.

There was so much I never knew about my father. Did he come to this country just because he was a younger son and could not take over the family farm? Why did he never say a word, to my knowledge, about his service in the Swedish Army? Why was he never home to evening meals, coming in late, usually under the influence of alcohol? Did he prefer to stay away from his family (us, that is)?

But there are some good memories, too. He took me to baseball games at Fenway Park before I began 1st grade of school. My memories of that are vague, but he told me a few years later that at one game we attended, we saw Babe Ruth pitch a shutout for the Red Sox. Babe Ruth was a top-notch left-handed pitcher before his home-run prowess made him an everyday player and outfielder. I do remember one game in the early 1920s, when Ruth, then a Yankee, threw out a runner from third after a sacrifice fly. The throw from deep left field was perfect, on the line at the catcher’s knee – no bounce. I have never seen a better throw.

When I was about ten years old, my father took me with him a couple of times on Saturdays when he was not working his regular job. We went to Roxbury, to a dark, dank, small garage built into a rise of ground.

There, he and a couple of his friends would repair automobiles. Bottles of whiskey and beer were passed around frequently. Those were Prohibition years, but this seemed to make no difference to them (or most everybody else). Generally in the 1920s, anyone could get liquor without difficulty. The authorities were unable to cope with the widespread disregard of the Prohibition laws. Liquor was easily available.

I met my father’s best friend, Joe Dosti. Joe Dosti was a veteran of World War I in poor health because he had received a dose of mustard gas in the trench warfare in France.

Once when I was there they went to a bowling alley, taking me along. My father was a good bowler. At least twice at Thanksgiving he brought home a large turkey which he won in bowling competitions.

So I do have some treasured memories, although I have related almost all of them in this piece.

There were those who attempted to do some male “parenting” to me in the following years. The minister of the Everett Universalist Church, Ulysses Sumner Milburn, sent me on errands for him or the church. I ran the stereopticon with the glass slides when he gave his lectures on his travels in Europe. Dr. Milburn recruited Loren Paine, a young stockbroker, to do things for me. He took me to such events as a Bruins hockey game at Boston Garden; to a forum at Faneuil Hall; to a concert.

As I look back, I was not sufficiently responsive or appreciative of those efforts. I became something of a loner, understandably, between school and after-school jobs. I was really close only with my grandfather, John Wilson. I would be unrealistic to wish things had been different – because life was what it was, period. I have lived a long life. All in all, it has been a good one. I have been blessed with affectionate, generous sons and daughters, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, many friends over the years, live an interesting retired life – music, theater, films, drama, church, bridge, conversations, reading, crossword puzzles, learning the computer. I have skilled physicians who keep me alive and functioning, and a particular caring friend. I identify with what Sean O’Casey, the Irish playwright wrote:

“I have found life an enjoyable, enchanting and sometimes terrifying experience and I’ve enjoyed it completely – a lament in one ear, perhaps, but always a song in the other.”

My Irish Boss, 1926-1929

2010-06-06T11:03:00.001-04:00

July 31, 1999

After my father died, my after-school job in much of the above years was delivery boy and other tasks in a small grocery store of the John T. Connor chain, located on Norwood Street, not far from Everett Square. This grocery chain was merged a few years later with another group of grocery stores and became First National Stores. Years, subsequently when super-markets were organized, “Finast” emerged in that enterprise with a name I have forgotten.

At the time, the John T. Connor firm had a personnel practice of hiring immigrants from Ireland to manage their one-man stores. My boss was Joseph Murphy, with a thick Irish brogue. I don’t know how long he had been in this country. He was about 30-35 years old, unmarried, and boarded, room and meals, with an Irish family near the comer of Summer Street and Broadway. Every noon his landlady sent down a hot lunch which he ate, interrupting his meal to serve customers. On Saturdays, when I was there at noon, he would eat in the back room without interruption. I would wait on customers. I do not remember restaurants in Everett at that time except for one “Waldorf”.

He was paid $30 a week, plus $1.00 for every $100 of sales volume. Thus, if total sales for the week were $900 his wages were $39. The simple cash register just recorded the amount of sales and totals for the day or week. So he had considerable paper work to do. The complex scanners and computer-like terminals at check-out counters were about sixty years in the future. When a customer had several items, the prices were listed with pencil and added on the brown paper bag. Both the Boss and I were rather quick and accurate and took pride in that skill.

I was paid $4.00 a week for five afternoons from 2/30 PM to 6; and all day Saturday 8 AM to 9 PM. Once in a while, but not that often, I would get a tip when I delivered a grocery order, 25 cents was the usual gratuity. I had a two-wheel push cart, the wheels about 3’ in diameter and the box about 5’ by 5’.

There were certain skills developed in that store. Butter did not come packaged but in large round tubs which were mounted on a slant in the icebox. I learned how to cut ¼ pound, ½ pound and 1 pound wedge, using a trowel-like cutter. Once again it was a source of pride when I hit the proper weight right on the nose.

When not delivering, I had other tasks, unpacking and re-stocking shelves; taking cases of “tonic” (Coca-Cola, Moxie, root beer, ginger ale) to the cellar; in the cellar, filling ½ peck and one peck paper bags with potatoes which arrived at the store in large burlap bags. Occasionally there would be a thoroughly rotten potato – one of the most disgusting objects I ever had to handle.

Murphy was a good boss – never harsh with me. He was a natural psychologist, as I realized years later. More than once as I was stocking shelves or handling cases, he would say to a customer, “Look at young Carl, strong as an elephant he is.” (In that wonderful brogue). Well, I was a teen-ager who ate up that praise and worked even harder.

He was a good man, too. One of the weekly deliveries, the greatest distance, was to a poor Irish mother who had four children, all probably under six years old. They occupied the top flat of a run-down “three decker.” When I think about it, I can still sense the pervasive stench of unwashed diapers as I climbed to the top floor. (No Pampers then).

This Friday order was always the same, 2 pecks of potatoes. My instructions were not to collect any money for the order or take any tip. Many times I wondered if that was all they had to eat – potatoes. In those times, no public welfare, no aid to dependent children, no WIC. Murphy told me not to collect, [was it] because he was paying? Or, perhaps, the John T. Connor Co was unknowingly subsidizing the order. I believe there were also a few customers he carried “on the cuff” although he said nothing about it to me.

I never saw the father when I made those deliveries. I asked the Boss once about that and he said, only, with that lilting brogue, “The drink is a terrible creature, it is.”

I have a warm memory of Murphy, my Irish boss and a good man.

Buddha, Christian Saint

2010-06-05T09:55:00.001-04:00

June 27, 1999

The story is ancient and found in several legends – parables may be a more accurate mode. In the Christian roster of saints, once there were St. Baarlam and St. Josaphat. Their story has had versions in the traditions of Slavonic peoples, French, German, Scandinavian. The story is fully told by Wilfred Cantwell Smith, one of the superior scholars of world religions in his book, TOWARD A WORLD THEOLOGY. The story may have been transmitted from Georgia (not our neighbor state to the North) about the 12th century by monks at the monastery of Mt. Athos.

This rewrite of a sermon is to inform, particularly members of my family, of my attitude toward other religions. Furthermore, to reflect on the age-old dream of one religion for one world. But I do not relinquish my right, or anyone else’s right to criticize acts and claims in the arena of public issues.

The story, although explicitly Christian, is set in India. Josaphat is an Indian price; Baarlam, a monk from the Sinai desert. Baarlam persuades Josaphat to renounce wealth, luxury, family, pomp and seek instead moral and spiritual truth. He does. Both become Christian saints.

Wilfred Cantwell Smith believes that the Georgian monks received the legend from Islamic sources, because there was a similar and older story in the tradition of the religion of Mohammed.

But the legend is older still than Islam, for it is the story of Prince Siddhartha Gautama, who became the Buddha, gaining enlightenment under the Bo tree. He renounced power, wealth and family, became a pilgrim searching for spiritual enlightenment and moral standards – and became the founder of one of the world’s great religions.

This could be an opportunity to discuss how religious legends, heroes, myths have migrated to unlike cultures through trade, war, immigrations, colonizations, missionaries. But for now, does this story of Buddha, Christian saint, point to a basic deep religion whose root is the same, although the branches and flowers are unlike in different cultures and times? Vivekananda, the Hindu who came to world attention on the occasion of the Parliament of Religions in Chicago, 1893, said: “The same light shines through all colors and in the heart of everything the same truth reigns.”

Is the same truth at the heart of everything? Could it ever be recognized by all peoples?

For thousands of years there have been dreams and prophecies of one world faith which had the power to seize the imagination. One human family in one world, sharing one faith, is a vision of goodness, truth, beauty and unity. Six hundred years before the time of Jesus, the ancient religions of Persia coalesced around the prophet, Zoroaster. In the sacred writings of that faith, there appears these words, “Have the religions of mankind no common ground? Is there not everywhere the same enrapturing beauty beaming forth from many thousand hidden places?”

Earlier than that, in ancient Israel, the prophet Micah proclaimed the universality of his god (Moffatt trans. 4):

“In after days it shall be
That the Eternal’s hill shall rise
Towering over every hill
And higher than the heights.
Nations shall stream to it,
And many a people shall proclaim it.
Come, let us go to the Eternal’s hill
To the house of Jacob’s God
That he may instruct us in his ways
To walk upon his paths.”

The early Christian attributed to Jesus the command to win the world to one faith (Matthew 28/18 ff): “Full authority has been given to me in heaven and in earth; go and make disciples of all nations, baptize them in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost and teach them to obey all the commands I have laid on you.” Most biblical scholars agree that these words represented the missionary zeal of Christians of a later time, not the actual words of Jesus. Many Christian groups have been strongly motivated to convert the whole world to Christian faith which would be universal.

In the 6th and 7th centuries of the Common Era, the religion of Islam spread across several continents moved by a militant missionary spirit. Even now we read that there are more converts to Islam than Christianity, particularly in Africa. In our own country, Islamic religion becomes more and more persuasive to many persons.

The feeling for one big world-wide church or mosque or temple is expressed not only by missionaries, but also, occasionally by the so-called “man on the street.” More than once in a couple of cities, in conversation with an acquaintance, it was said to me, “I can’t see what difference it makes which church we go to; we’re all going to the same place.” (Usually this was a person who went to no church at all.) One can dismiss such a wish because it does make a difference which religious organization one chooses. But this does not get at what such persons have in mind. They sense either through ignorance or wisdom that there is a basic religious center which everyone shares, however differently it may be expressed or celebrated.

But dreams of one faith for one world have been just that – dreams.

When Vivekananda said, “the same light shines through all colors and in the heart of everything the same truth reigns,” he gave insufficient weight to the reality that the light is refracted through a spectrum of differing facets. If there is one truth at the heart of it all, that truth has been obscured by many different and contradictory forms and rituals.

It is pertinent to observe that religious rituals, beliefs, institutions have had a different context in every century. The Christian church of the 1st century was different from what it became in the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th centuries. The Universalist Church and the Unitarian Church of the 18th and 19th centuries were different from what Unitarian Universalist churches are today. Religious faith and institutions always interact with other historical forces and each changes the other. If there is a basic unity, it is obscured, even buried by much diversity, considerable intolerance and intricate cultural complexity.

In many parts of the world, including our own country, there are substantial minorities who are not identified with any religious organization. Many such persons are not stirred at all by religious symbols, rituals, or doctrines.

Wilfred Cantwell Smith makes a searching comparison (p. 87): “The crucifix with the nailed body of Christ is a Roman Catholic symbol. The cross (no body) is a Protestant symbol.” Smith continues, “A crucifix may for certain Roman Catholics represent love, for certain Protestants, superstition; for certain Jews, oppression.” Sophisticated intellectual understanding of religious symbols will not alter the deep-seated negative feelings many persons have difficulty dismissing.

Thus, even though there may be similarities or even a basic essence to religion, the complex historical developments, the painfully elaborated differences, the many antagonisms have so camouflaged any central essence that its reality is dim and obscure, if it exists at all.

The difficulties of one faith winning the world are multiplied when one considers that nearly every religious group has an internal record of conflicts and divisions. There are heresies, creedal disputes, persecutions, executions. The wars of religion in the Christian West stain with blood many of the pages of history. They still do – consider the Balkans.

Furthermore, wide differences in culture, the different scriptures, rites of worship, creeds and church governments combine for a formidable array of obstacles blocking any realization of one faith in one world. There is no evidence I know of that “Earth would be fair and all her people one” if we all went to one big church – even a Unitarian Universalist Church. Some would say, “particularly not a Unitarian Universalist Church.”

What then of world faith? Does the story of Buddha’s legendary migration to become a Christian saint, under an alias, have nothing to teach us?

Religious faith is plural, not singular. Christianity is not going to prevail from “Greenland’s icy mountains to India’s coral strand” despite that rousing old missionary hymn. Neither is any other world religion. The world we live in is varied in culture, climate, economics, politics, and always, everywhere, struggles for power. To recognize the plurality is simple realism. To have a reverence for reverence, however (an Asian attitude) is a virtue we all may cultivate. By that I mean to respect the faith of others, to acknowledge that they are just as sincere in their beliefs as we are in ours is a standard much to be desired. This does not mean that we do not stand by our own convictions and values, or acquiesce in pronouncements we believe wrong.

Growing from that point of recognition is another attitude which philosopher, William Ernest Hocking called “point of tangency.” He illustrated this by writing about a Danish missionary in Kowloon who maintained a rest house for Buddhist pilgrims with a chapel for meditation and prayer, whose altarpiece combined the Buddhist lotus and the Christian cross. Hocking noted, “The institution was a mere point of tangency, but as such, it had the promise of more.”

Some of our Unitarian Universalist societies have made attempts to create points of tangency. The late Ken Patton’s creative efforts at Charles St. Universalist Meeting House are a vivid recollection for me. About fifty years ago on the church platform there was a bookcase containing the scriptures of the world’s religions: Judaism, Christianity, the Koran of Islam, Hindu, Buddhist, Chinese. Over the platform, above the pulpit, there was a large (about 6’ by 6’) black light picture of the galaxy, Andromeda. On the bookcase, there was an antique Near-East oil lamp, boat-shaped, signifying the lamp of knowledge. In my view, that lamp of knowledge was a prime fore-runner of the many artistic versions of the flaming chalice we see today. In addition, there were representations of music, poetry, art.

But there are difficulties because religious symbols with profound meanings are not invented suddenly, even when grouped creatively as Ken did. William James once wrote to the effect that knowledge about a thing is not the thing itself. Authentic religious symbols acquire meanings incrementally through long traditions, generations of story-telling, centuries usually, and because the symbols have resonated with deep uncharted feelings. Nevertheless, points of tangency deserve appreciation because they represent a possible stimulus for humane religious witness on our perilous planet.

No religious organization can bring together all the deep-rooted differences in theology, symbol, sacrament, ritual, tradition. What is most needed is not a unity of faith, as faith is commonly understood, but rather an urgent witness to stimulate and encourage all persons to live up to the ethical demands of their own religions. We do this best by living up to our own.

We cannot make the many faiths one. Even that would not solve human problems. But we ourselves in our own way AND in cooperation with others whose faith symbols may differ widely, can deal with issues of human dignity, rights, freedom, hunger, sickness and the search for common ground in our communities. These are the human points of tangency for all religions with ethical goals and humane standards.

Shakespeare The Shrink

2010-06-05T09:28:00.001-04:00

June 23, 1999

Among many scholars it has become commonplace to acknowledge that Shakespeare preceded Freud by several centuries in understanding our guilts, resentments, angers, hungers, power-seeking, obsessions – our human condition. Harold Bloom, a lifelong teacher of Shakespeare, said in an interview, “I keep telling my students that I’m not interested in a Freudian reading of Shakespeare, but a kind of Shakespearean reading of Freud ... the Freudian map of the mind being in fact Shakespearean ... what we think of as Freudian psychology is really a Shakespearean invention, and for the most part, Freud is merely codifying it.”

Harold Bloom also writes in his massive work, SHAKESPEARE THE INVENTION OF THE HUMAN (p. 17), “[Shakespeare] extensively informs the language we speak, his principal characters have become our mythology, and he, rather than his involuntary follower, Freud, is our psychologist.”

Years before I had Bloom’s scholarly comments before me, I sensed that Lady MacBeth dramatized guilt; Lear was willing to give much but not his power; Hamlet, whose inner life has been and always will be the inspiration as well as the enigma of innumerable PhD theses; Falstaff, the roisterer, cynical about many of our supposed prized values – the list could go on and on.

But it is not only in the presentations of Shakespeare’s men and women on stage that he-anticipated Freud, Adler, Jung and their compeers. But also, his words are specific. For example, Cassius talking to Brutus (JULIUS CAESAR, Act 1, Sc. 2) says:

“Therefore, good Brutus, be prepared to hear
And since you know you cannot see yourself
So well as by reflection, I your glass
Will modestly discover to yourself
That of yourself which you yet know not of.”

Read that again, particularly, “Since you know you cannot see yourself So well as by reflection, I, your glass will modestly discover to yourself, that of yourself which you yet know not of.”

Even in Shakespearian Elizabethan cadence, this could be the opening remarks of a therapist today as he or she greets a client for the first time. Many, many years ago when I did a Senior paper on Carl Rogers’ therapeutic method, if I had quoted Cassius’ words to Brutus, I’ll wager that I would have received a higher mark.

I don’t know whether Shakespeare can be classified as a psycho-drama playwright and producer, psychologist, psychoanalyst, or all three, so I just called this piece, SHASKESPEARE THE SHRINK.

I recommend his many works. If you are alert and honest with yourself, somewhere in the plays and sonnets you will find yourself dramatized – hang-ups, neuroses, repressions and all.

The Good Old Days? They Were Not That Good!

2010-06-04T07:44:00.000-04:00

April 25, 1999
Tarpon Springs

May 9, 1999
Sarasota

[Editor’s Note: This is a sermon, based on a March 1, 1994 musing]

In order to solve the problems of crime, corruption and education, we are frequently exhorted to return to a time when Christian religion prevailed because that faith was the foundation of our nation. A typical paragraph from a letter to the Editor is representative of the attitude of many fundamentalist Christians:

“Our nation was founded by godly people seeking to further their Christian faith, and God wondrously blessed and sustained their efforts, and those of succeeding generations. We must realize that we compromise and reject our founding values at great peril to our nation.”

Somehow, many people seem to believe our problems can be solved by returning to a world that never was. The ancient Greeks believed in a Golden Age. Hesiod wrote, “They lived like Gods, free from worry and fatigue; old age did not afflict them; they rejoiced in continual festivity.” They were not immortal but they died as “though overcome by sweet slumber. All the blessings of the world were theirs, the fruitful earth gave forth its treasures unbidden. At their death they became guardians and teachers of the living.”

That Golden Age never existed. There never was a pre-”sin” Paradise in a Garden of Eden either. Such beliefs were never founded in historical fact, but on dissatisfaction with given circumstances, frustration with social problems that seemed unsolvable, perhaps as methods of social control, or attempts to explain mysteries about the human condition.

We do face massive and complex problems with crime, poverty, education, taxes, downsizing/unemployment, dealing with how to pay for doctors, hospitals, prescriptions, insurance premiums (whether you call it a crisis or not.) It is a PROBLEM when you face it; it is a CRISIS when I face it. However to believe that today’s vexing, frustrating issues would be solved by a return to the beliefs and actions of the “Founding Fathers” is to lend validity to a nostalgic glow which is artificially lighted.

For example, in the book BOSTON OBSERVED, written by an old friend and fellow Universalist minister, Carl Seaburg, he quotes a letter written by a visitor from England, Edward Ward, in the year, 1699:

“....(Boston) is the metropolis of all New-England. The Houses in some parts joyn as in London. The buildings, like their women, being neat and handsome. And the streets, like the hearts of the male inhabitants, are paved with pebble.

“The inhabitants seem very Religious, showing many outward and visible signs of an inward and spiritual grace. But tho’ they wear in their Faces the innocence of Doves, you will find them in their dealings, as Subtile as Serpents. Interest is their Faith, Money their God, and Large Possessions the only Heaven they covet.

“Election, Commencement and Training-days, are their only Holy-days; they keep no Saints Days, nor will they allow the Apostles to be Saints, yet they assume that Sacred Dignity to themselves; and say, in the Title Page of their Psalm-Book, ‘Printed for the edification of the Saints in Old and New England.’

“They have been very severe against adultery, which they have punish’d with Death; yet, notwithstanding the harshness of their Law, the Women are of such noble souls, and undaunted Resolutions that they will run the hazard of being Hang’d, rather than not be reveng’d on Matrimony, or forbear to discover the Corruption of their own natures.”

Edward Ward observed the Bostonians’ widespread religious hypocrisy and greed for money and possessions (“Money was their God”). His paragraph on adultery was a gentle but candid observation of sexual promiscuity. Typical, however, is his implicit condemnation of women, but not their necessary male partners. Would we really solve our problems by such materialism, morals, and manners?

In the same 17th century, a Quaker, Mary Dyer, was executed, hanged on Boston Common for religious heresy and protest. Anne Hutchinson and Roger Williams were expelled from the Colony because they were religious dissenters. The late 17th century also witnessed the hysterical, infamous Salem witch trials, when 20 women and one man were executed.

In Great Britain, the cruelties in mine and mill in the expanding mercantile era are almost beyond belief. The work-day ran from 12 to 15 hours a day, 6 days a week. Most sickening and disgusting of all, children as young as five or six were full-time workers in mill and mine.

In mines where the passages might have been only 18” high, little boys and girls, crawling on all fours, hitched to small coal carts struggled through. Infant mortality? Half of ALL children born in the cities of GB died before reaching the age of six. In many cities, 1/3 to ½ of all infants were illegitimate. Women were forced into prostitution in order to eat, left their newborn infants in corners, or smothered them, or left them at the door of an orphanage. They utterly despaired of feeding them and housing them. Mother’s Day? Every day for them was grief and shame and suffering.

This was a period when the owners and entrepreneurs thoroughly believed in the economic law of supply and demand. If costs went up, demand would decline. Therefore, cheapest labor. Not to speak of the conclusion of some, that terrible, deadly living conditions were an acceptable form of population control. And these were Christians in a Christian nation. This was a time when a person could be indicted, jailed, fined, ostracized for publicly denying the doctrine of the Trinity, the deity of Christ or the miraculous physical Resurrection. But there was no law or prevailing opinion to halt the cruel and deathly exploitation of children and women for profit.

Similar conditions prevailed here in mine and mill. Do you recall Sarah Cleghorn’s bitter lines written before child labor laws were enacted in our country?

“The golf links lie so near the mill
That almost every day
The laboring children can look out
And see the men at play.”

Good Old Days? I don't know about you, but I would NOT want a return of such cruelty, malice, exploitation, intolerance and ignorance. In spite of all the numerous letters to editors, NONE of our problems would be solved.

Furthermore, I believe that the last thing the Christian right-wing would want is a return to the religious beliefs of “Founding Fathers.” Washington, Jefferson, Monroe, Adams, Tom Paine were Deists. Briefly and perhaps over-simplified, Deists believed in a God of Nature, who in the beginning set up a Universe governed by natural laws – clockwork was a favorite analogy. But this God of Nature did not interfere in the affairs of humankind to damn or save anyone. Deism represented a substantially different and heretical theology from the Christian gospel of the Atonement, Trinity and Resurrection. You can look it up, as they say.

What do you think of this description of our world: “This is the present: everything is tottering, immeasurably confused, tumultuous, unmanageable. Everything is debased, exhausted, past hope.” Is that a quote from Jerry Falwell or Pat Robertson? No, that was written by J. G. Drysen, a German historian in the 1840s.

One more quotation, who do you think said this, “How does it become a man to behave toward this American government today? I answer that he cannot without disgrace be associated with it.” Was that Ross Limbaugh, Pat Buchanan, Ross Perot, Ken Starr? None of these, it was Henry David Thoreau in 1848.

We learn from history if we are aware of it and are not beguiled by nostalgic falsehoods or non-historical myths. Our social problems are formidable. We need all the help we can muster. Helena, in ALL’S WELL THAT ENDS WELL, says,

“Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie
Which we ascribe to Heaven; the fated sky
Gives us free scope; only doth backward pull
Our slow designs when we ourselves are dull.”

We are no longer sparsely populated colonies with unlimited natural resources but a nation of nearly three hundred million people. There is no “going West” for pioneers any more. There are no longer deep-soiled prairies waiting for a first plowing. In the larger cities there is an inner core of overcrowding, pollution, hopelessness. Easy answers are unrealistic. To mention just one, there is an illogical conclusion to the continuous building of more prison cells. Are to become a nation comprised of the jailed and the jailers?

Then, too, consider the continuous discussion about health care programs – and the failed effort in Congress a few years ago. We know opposition is heavily financed – not only health, but big dollar opposition to issues of ecology, pollution, and so on. I suggest a simple question when looking at fierce opposition to what seems to be progressive legislation – WHO BENEFITS? Who will make the Big Bucks?

Joseph Califano, who was a political force in the Lyndon Johnson era, speaking about fierce Congressional quarrels about health programs, said, “When you toss trillions of dollars up in the air, the pushing, shoving, fighting for it is going to be brutal with no holds barred. Do you think the ignoring by Congress of something like the Canadian plan has anything to do with the probability that the Big Bucks, the trillions would not be there for the special interests?”

On that and other issues, when you read or do the TV news, why not ask yourself, “Who benefits?”

I do not have unqualified answers. Today, I am not proposing or arguing for particular positions. But in spite of gloomy appraisals, there are positive indications. Violent crime is decreasing; women and minorities are getting increasing recognition, although the task is far from complete. The “Welcoming Church” principle, if we persist, can be contagious enough to sow the seeds of a Welcoming Nation.

But, with all our prized individuality we need a stronger sense of community. Many are disgusted with politics, special interests, ridiculous excess in campaign money-raising and spending.

If you are one of those, like I am, who remember the 30s and 40s, who were there, you know that the sense of community worked in the Depression and WW2; we knew we were all in those tough times together. Think about this: The Lone Ranger never rode alone.

Turned off, too many people do not vote. In the recent election in Sarasota County, the voter turn-out was between 10 and 15%. But the remedy is not to turn away from politics but become more involved. I know so many of you here today are socially responsible, that I’m aware I’m preaching to the Choir. But do not let him or her who says to you, “I’m too disgusted to vote” go unchallenged. The answer to bad politics is better politics. I believe that if there were a 75 to 80% turnout of eligible voters in municipal, county, state, national elections, our legislative representatives at all levels would be compelled to new perspectives of responsibilities in their duties. They would think twice or thrice before becoming the acquiescent agents of special interests. Is a rising tide of civic involvement too much to hope and work for?

One of my fondest hopes is that around the year 2075, my great-great grandchildren and yours and their peers all over the Planet will look back on us and say, “The good old days, they were not that good.” Why will they say that? Because there will have been substantial progress in alleviating pollution, overpopulation, health problems, ethnic hates and wars.

But that can happen only if in OUR time the ounces of OUR weight are in the arena of humane concerns with an ever-rising consciousness that we are all in this together; that we will be adding some building stones for a better present and future.

If any wish to do further reading, or check my references, the following is suggested:

IN THE BEGINNING, THE ADVENT OF THE MODERN AGE, Jerome Blum, Scribner’s, New York, 1994

BLASPHEMY, Leonard Levy, Knopf, 1993

SAGA OF ENGLAND: 1840-1940, Sir Arthur Bryant

REASON TO BELIEVE, Mario Cuomo, Simon and Schuster, 1995. Also his speech to the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, earlier in 1999.

When Will We Ever Learn?

2010-06-03T07:04:00.001-04:00

April 23, 1999

When MacDuff is told by Ross that MacDuff’s wife and children have been murdered, MacDuff cries:

“Did Heaven look on,
And would not take their part?”
(MacBeth, Act IV, Sc. 3)

An agonized cry like that must have been expressed by parents and friends of the victims of the murderers in Columbine High School.

The nation is stunned and reeling because of the horrifying tragedy in Littleton, Colorado. The dead and wounded portrayed in grieving interviews and by graphic camera work, provoke almost all of us to ask, "Why?" HOW?"

Why did the two high school juniors commit these murders as prelude to killing themselves?

How were these seventeen-year-old young men able to acquire the weapons and assemble bombs of various kinds with no one, particularly their parents, knowing, or worse still, noticing their activity and doing nothing about it? Are there others involved?

By the time you read this, there will have been many proposed answers and multiples of theories, none of which will wholly explain the terrible event.

Will we learn? What must we do?

Some grieving parents find some solace in believing that this tragedy is somehow all part of a plan of God. I cannot share that faith or comfort. In my view, “What kind of God would that be?” Neither can I see any Divine purpose, nor do I have any assurance, that good always emerges from evil events. But I do believe there can be consequences.

“Unmerited suffering is redemptive.” That is a quotation from Martin Luther King, Jr. I believe Gandhi's non-violent philosophy of change is behind that, if not his actual words.

“Redemptive” in this context is not salvation for one's individual soul. Rather it is the lessening of evil in the life of society; progress in laws or attitudes that protect minorities from acts and crimes committed by organized bigots; an increased appreciation of all human beings. James Reeb, Viola Liuzzo, Medgar Evers, Martin King are examples in in the civil rights struggles of the 1960s. They did not seek suffering. They did not deserve to to be murdered; yet they were. Their deaths dramatized the issues and called millions of others to the cause.

An historical incident recorded by Edward Gibbon illustrates this sad but true aspect of the human condition.

At the beginning of the 5th century A.D., Honorius was Emperor of the Roman Empire. Up to that time, the savage games of gladiators were the highlight and entertainment of the Roman citizens. Gibbon believed that as many as several thousand gladiators were savagely slain every year in the arenas.

There were protesters. Pollentia, a Christian poet, pleaded with the Emperor to end this bloody custom. Prudentius, a Christian preacher found no response to his exhortations.

But Telemachus, a monk from Asia, descended into the Arena to physically separate the fighting gladiators. The people in the stands, angry that their entertainment was being interrupted, overwhelmed Telemachus and stoned him to death.

The excited mob apparently sobered at his cruel death at their hands. When Emperor Honorius then then abolished the bloody, deadly games forever, there was no substantial protest by the people.

Telemachus did not deserve to die. But it was his martyrdom that ended the gladiatorial games – not the poetry of Pollentia; not the preaching of Prudentius. (DECLINE AND FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE, Vol. II, Ch. xxx, p. 138-9)

“Unmerited Suffering is Redemptive.”

Can there be a positive consequence to the awful carnage at Columbine High School?

Is it possible that there will be motivation and momentum to make it much more difficult to to obtain handguns, rapid-firing rifles, sawed-off shotguns? The National Rifle Association opposes any limitations and their big-dollar lobby has been effective.

Bob Herbert, in his column in the Sarasota Herald Tribune, April 22, writes: “In 1996, handguns were used to murder 2 people in New Zealand, 15 in Japan, 30 in Great Britain, 106 in Canada, 213 in Germany, and 9,390 in the United States.”

Must we remain a violent Nation?

The tragedy of Columbine High School cannot be erased or forgotten. But if one consequence of that terrible day is a keener national consciousness of the need to restrict the possession and use of firearms, then perhaps we will begin to learn other lessons, too – the "Why?" of the senseless violence of high school students on a killing spree.

Three Events

2010-06-02T14:05:00.001-04:00

March 8, 1999

Three events this day inspire this musing.

First, Joe DiMaggio died. The press, TV, and radio are fulsomely relating his distinguished life and stellar baseball career. Apart from occasional TV, I saw Joltin’ Joe only once in a baseball game at Fenway Park. My clear memory is his lining a hit between center and right fields. Ordinarily a double, nearing second base, Joe glanced over his right shoulder and accelerated going over second to third and sliding safely under the throw. He had a long, loping stride that was faster than it appeared. A sports reporter noted that DiMaggio had never been thrown out going from first to third.

My other DiMaggio memory is of a clerk in the warehouse at Quonset Naval Air Station during WW2. She was still in her teens. As she studied her typing notes, she was singing a children’s chant,

“Joe, Joe, DiMaggio
We want you on our side.”

Second, while waiting to be picked up at the Y, a woman entered, her T-shirt bearing the message:

“Aging is inevitable
Maturity is optional.”

I thought to myself, “Right On.”

Third, Peanuts in today’s cartoon is in bed with Snoopy on top of the quilt. In the first panel, Peanuts says, “Sometimes I lie awake at night, and I ask, ‘Is life a multiple choice test or is it a true or false test?’”

In the second panel he goes on, “Then a voice comes to me out of the dark and says, ‘We hate to to tell you this, but life is a thousand word essay.’”

I find synergy between the message on the T-shirt and Peanuts’ soliloquy. Life and living are too complex for easy answers or uninformed guesses. “Maturity” may depend somewhat on one’s age. There was a time, like so many teen-agers, I believed it was mature to be old enough to get a driver’s license, to acquire an auto, and smoke cigarettes.

Now, as an “old old” as the statisticians classify me, I am bold enough to suggest certain distinguishing qualities of maturity. This is today’s list. If I wrote it heretofore or days hence, there would be differences.

Neither do I assert or imply that I have lived up to these, my measures of maturity. But I have tried to so believe and act. Peanuts might object that this is more than a thousand-word essay, but here goes:

WE have the power and/or potential to use critical-thinking when faced with issues and problems. Use that power.

Recognize both a sense of limits and unrealized opportunities.

Do your best daily with appointed tasks and prepare to sleep with no self-condemning remorse.

Be plain-spoken with no cruel intention.

AS long as it commands your mind and your heart, keep and serve your faith. In Henry VIII (Act 3, Sc. 2), Shakespeare has Cardinal Wolsey say to Cromwell,

“Had I but serv’d my God with half the zeal
I serv’d my King, he would not in mine age
Have left me naked to mine enemies.”

Read YOUR sacred scripture, whether Torah, Christian Gospel, Koran, Buddhist or other Asian insights, Shakespeare, Adam Smith, Emerson, Marx or whatever. Believe me, the rewards for as little as two or three paragraphs a week are fresh insights as well as rediscovery of what, for you, is enduring wisdom.

Be a thermostat not a thermometer. In important situations or issues, where you have informed convictions, try to set the temperature rather than just reflect it.

Keep love in your life. Give love – it will sustain you.

Be aware that the artist, sculptor, poet, musician, composer, playwright, actor, film-maker portray our human condition in ways that can reinforce our better hopes and dreams, as well as by their vivid, creative representations remind us that we humans can be brutal, selfish, greedy, bigoted.

Recognize, with all honor and respect to our prized individuality, that everyone exists by the presence of community – family, religious, medical, academic, fraternal, labor, business, city, nation, world. Hillary’s title, IT TAKES A VILLAGE, has more social depth and reach than at first impression and applies not just to raising children but also to saving our human venture on this planet.

Know that not only you, but everyone you meet has a fear to be confronted, or a pain to be eased, or a conflict to be addressed, or a threat of darkness to be lightened, or a joy to be shared.

Do not feel guilty about savoring the gustatory pleasures of gourmet food or the exhilaration of fine wine. On occasions of course. Indulged every day, the celebratory zest quickly fades away.

Well, there it is. Because it fits my mood, I conclude by quoting Arthur Miller. I believe he will be judged the the best playwright of the 20th Century. (Quoted, “Entertainment”, 2/5/99):

“He who understands everything about his subject cannot write it. I write as much to discover as to explain.”

Our Human Condition

2010-06-02T09:05:00.000-04:00

February 17, 1999

I became weary and bored months ago with Clinton, the impeachment, the trial, the obsession of the “talking heads” with their sniggling satisfaction at grimy details and snide speculations. The trial is over; Clinton acquitted. But the hashing and re-hashings continue, and will continue until the next seamy sex scandal monopolizes the media.

There has been comment here and there, that Clinton got off easily and deserved severe punishment for his lies, cheating and idiotic behavior. Perhaps he will be indicted after his term as President expires, but that seems doubtful at this time.

Whatever happens, however, Clinton has been punished and will be punished to the end of his days. Make no mistake about that. He will be always conscious of what he did. Can any punishment be more harsh for a President who knows his acts will be a part of the history of this Nation?

When I was a boy and teen-ager in the Universalist Church in Everett, on the wall of the church auditorium were the principles of Universalism. This set of principles was replaced in 1935 by succeeding principles, reflecting changes in the way that Universalism was expressed.

But, prior to that, looking at the wall next to the pulpit, I thought frequently of the 4th principle: “The certainty of just retribution for sin.” That retribution was not “Hell”, because Universalists rejected completely the theological notion that most Christian churches believed: that there was a Hell of eternal fire where God punished sinners forever.

WE know that the convicted criminal is punished. But, what about the thief who is never captured; the swindler who gets rich bilking many persons; the hit-and-run driver who is never identified? Does just retribution catch up with them?

Are we punished for our lesser sins? Lying about “where I was last night;” spreading false rumors; deliberately creating bad feelings in a group; being false to promises; not telling the truth on that resume; cheating on the exam? And so on.

Henrik Ibsen once noted, “Look into any man's heart you please, and you will always find in every one, at least one black spot which he has to keep concealed.” (PILLARS OF SOCIETY, quoted by Katherine Hall Page, THE BODY IN THE FJORD.)

In agreeing with Ibsen, I may just be identifying us both as dour Scandinavians. Nevertheless, we pay for our sins, whether you identify “sin” as “missing the mark,” which is probably the early meaning in the Hebrew Scriptures, or consciously doing wrong, going against one’s conscience, transgressing laws or deeply-rooted cultural mores.

There is certainty of retribution or punishment unless one is a sociopath. Recall the Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale in Hawthorne’s THE SCARLET LETTER. If I tell a lie, no matter if no one else ever knows it, I know I am a liar. So with Clinton. If after leaving office, he has a spectacular career or distinguished accomplishments; and if the public generally forgets his calamitous 1998 year, he never can. Nothing can delete the self-knowledge of his or our sins, although the counselor, psychologist or psychiatrist may help us to accept and adjust.

Jesus is credited with saying, “Let one without sin cast the first stone.” (Yes, I know THAT joke, and its punch line.)

The account in John, Chapter 8, verse 9 ff, goes on, “... and they when they heard it, went out one by one, beginning from the eldest, even unto the last. And Jesus said unto her, ‘Woman, where are they? Did no man condemn thee?’ And she said, ‘No man, Lord.’ And Jesus said, ‘Neither do I condemn thee. Go thy way, from henceforth sin no more.’” (RSV)

We all fall short; it is a human condition.

In ALL’S WELL THAT ENDS WELL, Shakespeare had an additional insight into our shrouded inner motives and outward actions. Helena is in love with Bertram, who is a greedy rogue and callous philanderer. Parolles is a pretentious character, a liar and a coward. I learned that WS chose “Parolles” as a name because of its French derivation, meaning “all talk.”

In Act IV, Sc. III, one of the French Lords remarks, with Parolles on stage,

“The web of our life is of a mingled yarn, good and
ill together: our virtues would be proud, if our
faults whipped them not; and our crimes would
despair, if they were not cherished by our virtues.”

AMEN!

P.S.: I wish I could ask Will S why he had Helena fall in love with the unpleasant Bertram. Or, was the title, ALL’S WELL THAT ENDS WELL, sarcasm?

The Bible Says ...

2010-06-01T09:02:00.001-04:00

January 27, 1999

“In religion,
What damned error, but some sober brow
Will bless it, and approve it with a text,
Hiding the grossness with fair ornament?”

(Bassanio, meditating on his casket choice, MERCHANT OF VENICE, Act III, Sc. 2)

Since last November, I have saved a news story that told the following:

Columbus, GA – “Saying they didn’t want same-sex marriages performed in their churches, Southern Baptists in Georgia voted Tuesday to exclude congregations that ‘endorse’ homosexuality....”

“‘The unanimous verdict of scriptures is that practicing homosexuality is a sin,’ said the Rev. J. Gerald Harris. ‘Love must not compromise the church’s allegiance to scripture.’”

Quite apart from the “lower” and “higher” criticisms which Bible scholars have been pursuing for more than a century, to proclaim anything in scripture as “unanimous verdict” is to be on multiple layers of shifting sands.

Do believers in Bible inerrancy follow through with actions dictated by scripture? For example, would you have a rebellious son put to death if he doesn’t obey his father and mother? According to Deuteronomy 21-18/21, that is a Bible command.

In those primitive, cultic times it was perilous for a bride not to be a virgin. According to Deuteronomy, 22-20/21, she was to to be stoned to death at her father’s door. How about that, Ladies? Incidentally, I did not locate any text that stated that if the bridegroom was not a virgin he was to be executed, or even reproved.

In Shakespeare’s MEASURE FOR MEASURE, Angelo, the Duke’s deputy, as the play proceeds, becomes a hypocrite and cad. When his illicit sex with Marianna, which he planned, is exposed, he whines, “What’s this? What’s this? Is this her fault or mine? The tempter or the tempted, who sins most?”

The Commandment, “Thou shalt not kill” has many contradictions in scripture. In addition to the examples given, if a son strikes his father or mother, that calls for the death penalty. Many other scriptural commands call for execution. If you doubt that, check out the following:

Leviticus 20/9, 21/9, 24
Exodus 21 28/29, 22-18, 22-20

Being a mean guy at times, here’s an old story. In a small Southern town, waiting for the bus to New Orleans, Sam is all dressed up: his best suit, shoes shined, dress shirt and tie, and carrying his Bible in his hand.

A friend asks where he is going. Sam answers, “N’awlins. I’ll drink in the Bourbon Street saloons where the strippers take off all their clothes; there’s all-night parties; and where the pretty girls make a living off guys like me.”

“But Sam, why are you carrying a Bible?”

Sam: “Oh, I thought I might stay over Sunday.”

In the New Testament, I do not find any passages where Jesus condemns homosexuality. John M. Swomley, Professor Emeritus of Social Ethics, St. Paul School of Theology, calls attention to a statement ascribed to Jesus where he is discussing the coming of the Kingdom, and how some will be saved and some will not. I happen to believe we cannot be certain that Jesus said what he is credited with saying in all the Gospels. But if I were a believer in divine inerrancy, how would I deal with Luke 17:34: “I say unto you, in that night there shall be two men on one bed; the one shall be taken, and the other shall be left.”

There is no indication that Jesus condemned men sleeping together. Jesus (or the source of that verse) had an appropriate opportunity to forbid homosexuality, but he does not.

In criticizing the action of Georgia Southern Baptists, it is only fair that I state my own position (or bias, if you will).

I am a Life Member of our Unitarian Universalist Ministers’ Association. I have colleagues who are gay, who are lesbian, who are bi-sexual; some serving churches of substantial size or historic note. Our Association has an Office for Gay and Lesbian Concerns.

Like so many of my colleagues, I have officiated at same sex commitment services; and strongly feel that union ceremonies of loving partners merit legal sanction so that such ceremonies can be lawful marriages with all the rights and privileges pertaining thereto.

John Stuart Mill (1806-1873) stated, “Mankind have outgrown old institutions and have not yet acquired new ones.” He wrote that in 1831; it could be said today.

Shakespeare The Medic

2010-06-01T07:35:00.000-04:00

January 8, 1999

Some of you on the Musings list know how my mother used folk remedies, some of them strange, to say the least. When I was a lad, I cut my finger almost to the bone. I was bleeding profusely. She went down into the cellar, collected cobwebs, put them on the cut, and then bandaged the finger. The flow of blood stopped rather quickly; and the cut healed without infection.

My mother’s parents, my grandparents, were Swedish immigrants. For many years I assumed that the cobwebs were a remedy she learned from her parents and their native culture.

I have just been re-reading parts of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” and was astonished when Bottom, in conversation with the Elves, Peablossom, Cob, Moth and Mustardseed, says to Cobweb:

“I shall desire you of more acquaintance, good Master Cobweb, if I cut my finger, I shall make bold with you.” (Act III, Sc. 1)

Shakespeare probably wrote the “Dream” about 404 years ago. He obviously knew of the clotting and healing properties of cobwebs in having Bottom speak as he did to the Elve. Maybe Will’s mother used the method on him. (All boys get cuts.)

So if an immigrant Swedish family knew this remedy, and it was known in England four centuries ago, how widespread was that knowledge? Throughout Europe? the World? Older than recorded history? Who knows!!

What about many other folk remedies: certain herbs, leaves, roots? With all the research and development in the laboratories of the pharmaceutical companies, are we overlooking what the “old folks” know? I’m not going to get into the “alternative medicine” issue; I don’t know enough. However, ancient skills and wisdom need examination, not scorn or derision.

And, as I read Shakespeare, as I do again and again, I shall try to be alert to instances of “the Medic.”

Introduction To Musings X

2010-05-25T08:26:00.000-04:00

SEASON’S GREETINGS 1999
Thanksgiving – Advent – St. Lucy’s Day – Solstice – Christmas – New Year’s – Hanukkah – Twelfth Night – Kwanzaa

As you can plainly see, since June, due to the generosity of John and Renee, I’ve had a Dell computer. I am much slower learning than today’s bright boys and girls, but I keep at it, including, as you will see, trying different type fonts. E-mail address: CJWinFL@aol.com.

This tenth year of Musings comes to you with my strong wish that this has been a good year for you and yours; and that 2000 (Y2K as they say) will be a year of health and happiness.

My health seems stable, with the continued help of physicians and prescriptions. On October 26, I had a pacemaker installed to assist my lagging heart. I have often wondered whether I would see the year 2000. Now there is a good chance I will.

Through the years, in these little essays, I have included events in my personal history. Members of the family like these inclusions. I still have much regret that I know so little about the early lives of my parents. So I share my own, writing about events remembered of my “green years”, even when recollection is painful. (Perhaps in one Musing, Al or Rose might speculate that I am trying to exorcise traumatic specters of my boyhood).

Be that as it may, I raise a glass to you all – Skoal!

Random Paragraphs

2010-05-25T07:47:00.001-04:00

October-November 1998

Clipped from Readers’ Digest (? years ago)
MUSICAL COMEDY:

Radio Stations WQXR-AM and -FM in New York distributed a flyer listing the following quotes from grade-school essays on classical music:

Refrain means don't do it. In music its the part you better not sing.

Handel was half German, half Italian and half English. He was rather large.

Beethoven wrote music even though he was deaf. He was so deaf he wrote loud music.

Henry Purcell is a well-known composer few people have heard of.

Aaron Copland is a contemporary composer. It is unusual to be contemporary. Most composers do not live until they are dead.

Music sung by two people at the same time is called a duel.

I know what a sextet is, but I’d rather not say.

Caruso was at first an Italian. Then someone heard his voice and said he would go a long way. And so he came to America.

Formula for Failure: For many years I have been an observer, sometimes participant in the stability and potential of church congregations. Apart from demographic and other factors which cannot be ignored, I have noticed three conditions which prevail in a congregation skidding down the road to fossil inertia or dissolution:

1) An intense loyalty to YESTERDAY,
2) Irrelevant nit-picking or determined ignorance TODAY, and
3) No Vision of TOMORROW.

Midrash: There is a Midrash tale of the ancient wicked cities of Sodom and Gomorrah which has similarities to the Greek myth of the Procrustean bed. When a traveler arrived, he was placed in an iron bed in the public square. If the man was too short for the bed, his legs and body would be violently stretched until he matched the length of the bed. A tall man would have his legs amputated until he fitted the length of the bed. The rabbis labeled this sin in Sodom and Gomorrah as the sin of conformity. There the wrong-headed citizens insisted that everyone think as they did and act as they did. There could be no differences in Sodom and Gomorrah – no differences of worship or belief or action. That is why these cities were doomed to destruction. (RABBINIC STORIES, William Silverman)

THE ODOR OF SANCTITY:

Edward Gibbon in his DECLINE AND FALL writes of Sylvania, sister of the tyrant, Rufinus (A.D. 396). Sylvania, “who passed her life at Jerusalem, is famous in monastic history. The studious virgin had diligently, and even repeatedly, perused the commentators on the Bible, Origen, Gregory, Basil, etc. to the amount of five million lines. At the age of three score she could boast that she had never washed her hands, face or any part of her whole body, except the tips of her fingers to receive the communion.”

Whew! Sylvania was no role model for “cleanliness is next to godliness.” When she chose to devote her life to solitary, monastic study, she found a way to ensure her privacy and protect her virginity, fer sure.

CHURCH WELCOME MAT: Anne Johnson, in her column “Flotsam and Jetsam” in the Pelican Press, writes: “An Episcopal priest in Maryland has an unusual advertising campaign with a Renaissance-style picture of Jesus’ crucifixion and the message: ‘Of course people with pierced body parts are welcome in our church.’”

My contrarian attitude would query this clergyman, “Does that mean I am LESS welcome if I do not have a ring on my nose, on my tongue, or to my belly-button or some other body-piercing decoration?” Would there be any merit points for a Mennonite black straw hat and untrimmed chin whiskers? Or a tattoo depicting Salome dancing for Herod?

KEEP AT IT!

“This I learned from the shadow of a tree
Which to and fro did sway upon a wall:
Our shadow-selves, our influence may fall
Where we can never be.”

[Editor’s note: CJW credits this poem to A.E. Hausman; however, a search of Google books reveals that this poem is first credited to A. E. Hamilton, in THE UNITARIAN, February 1908. Again, later, as Anna E. Hamilton, in the American Journal of Clinical Medicine, 1923.]

The new employee stood before the paper shredder looking confused. “Need some help?” a secretary walking by, asked.

“Yes,” he replied, “how does this thing work?” “Simple,” she said, taking the fat report from his hand and feeding it into the shredder.

“Thanks, but where do the copies come out?”

ACCEPTANCE:

Act II, Sc. 2, Caesar to Calpurnia,

“Cowards die many times before their deaths;
The valiant never taste of death but once.
Of all the wonders that I yet have heard,
It seems to me most strange that men should fear;
Seeing that death, a necessary end,
Will come when it will come.”

Stranger Than Fiction

2010-05-25T07:15:00.000-04:00

October 21, 1998

Walter LeFeber, in his book THE AMERICAN AGE, described some of the proposed activities of the C.I.A. to overthrow Fidel Castro. If the author was not a respected historian, one could conclude that he took imaginative trips.

The C.I.A., in its covert war, planned to kill Castro. How? One plan (p. 560) was to give Castro exploding cigars! Another plan: “Spread word in Cuba that the Lord’s Second Coming was about to occur, but the Lord hated Castro. On the day of the Lord’s supposed appearance, a U.S. submarine would surface along the coast, set off fireworks, and so frighten Cubans who would then overthrow Castro. One C.I.A. agent labeled the plan ‘Elimination by Illumination.’”

If what LeFeber wrote is true, or largely true, C.I.A. could be an acronym for Congenital Idiots Association. Or, alternatively, [the C.I.A. could serve as] scriptwriters for slapstick comedies.

Herald Of Joy

2010-05-24T14:58:00.000-04:00

September 16, 1998

“Silence is the perfectest
herald of joy; I were but little happy,
if I could say how much.”
- Claudio, Much Ado About Nothing, Act II, Sc. 1

There are times when the noises of our living fray the edges of my patience. At the movies, the “coming attractions” have the sound so turned up that the shouts, shots and explosions hurt the ears, as well as solidifying my determination that that movie I will never see. On the TV, the ever-present commercials frequently have the sound so revved up that I immediately push the “mute” button. This year, the news and talk shows have been incessant in speculations and smarmy gossip, dissecting every word and emotion uttered and expressed by President Clinton.

Just now, I started the cassette of the Simon and Garfunkel classic, “The Sound of Silence,” but frustratingly discovered the tape had broken. However, I found a relevant paragraph in a review of MONK, by De Wilde: (The Economist, April 11th):

“According to a jazz joke of the late 50s, two hipsters were at a nightclub absorbed in a quartet session led by the pianist-composer, Thelonious Monk. When When Monk’s turn came for a solo, he sat motionless at the keyboard, staring into space as the rhythm section thundered away. One hipster protested, ‘Hey man, he didn’t play anything,’ to which the other replied in awed tones, ‘Yeah, but just imagine what he was thinking.’”

The review goes on to comment, “Monk was indeed given to prolonged silences on any occasion, social or musical, interspersed with utterances brilliant, gnomic, idiosyncratic.”

By the way, I have found a way to watch baseball on TV. I turn off the TV sound, put a disc on the CD player, and combine the game with Bach or Grieg or whatever music I fancy. After all, when one attends a baseball game, the experience is visual; and the sounds are not the constant chatter of play-by-play and “color,” but rather the sharp crack when ball meets bat, the clump of cleats as the base runner dashes from second to third, the thud of the baseball hitting the left-field wall at Fenway.

Back in the days when there was a jukebox in every saloon, diner and ice cream parlor, it was said that some of these music boxes had a slot, where, for the coin, one could purchase three minutes of silence. I can not recall any personal experience of such a juke-box, but what a wonder-full idea! Have you ever been to a cocktail party and devoutly wished you could purchase three minutes of silence?

Ralph Waldo Emerson, on a tour of the United Kingdom and Europe, met Thomas Carlyle, as well as Wordsworth and Coleridge. According to the story, he made an evening call on Carlyle:

“He called on Carlyle one evening and was given a pipe, while his host took one for himself. They sat together smoking in perfect silence until bedtime, and on parting shook hands most cordially, congratulating each other on the fruitful time they had enjoyed together.”

If you are fortunate, as I am, there is a person, or there are persons, with whom you can be in each other’s presence and be silent, and feel no need for extraneous, nervous chit-chat.

In 1956, the poet John Holmes delivered the Phi Beta Kappa poem at Harvard, “The Eleventh Commandment.” That commandment is LISTEN. The poem is long, but here are a few lines:

“And shining, Moses went down.
He read from the tablet the last word: Listen.
Those who were to be the new world heard the law,
And Moses began again with the first word: Listen ...”

Here in the quiet of my 8th floor apartment I know the balm of silence. The world is not shut out. The street noise from Tamiami Trail is muffled; the refrigerator motor kicks in regularly; occasionally, subdued corridor sounds; the telephone will beep. But the silence is also listening to one’s inner deeps. Silence is a “herald of joy.”

Blow Wind

2010-05-23T10:52:00.001-04:00

August 28, 1998

“... blow wind, swell billow and swim bark!
The storm is up, and all is on the hazard.”

Cassius, JULIUS CAESAR, Act V, Sc. 1

As Hurricane Bonnie approached the North Carolina and Virginia coasts, I was reminded of an ancient and a modern happening, both of which illustrate the nonsense and malice which now and then (too often) characterize the heated pronouncements of some Christian and other religious leaders.

Edward Gibbon describes a violent and destructive earthquake on July 21, A.D. 365, which caused havoc in the Mediterranean area. The sea retreated, killing innumerable fish as well as stranding vessels in the mud. When the sea surge returned, boats were stranded as much as two miles inland. In Alexandria, Egypt, fifty thousand people lost their lives in the inundation. (THE HISTORY OF THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE, Vol. I, Ch. xxvi, p. 1023 ff)

[Regarding the] Christian bishops of the time, Gibbon goes on to write that “these most sagacious divines pronounced that the establishment of heresy tended to produce an earthquake; or that a deluge was the inevitable consequence of the progress of sin and error.”

We can never know if anyone of that time asked these “inspired” clergy:

“What about your believers who perished with your so-called heretics?”

“What kind of God would have so little power of discrimination?”

In 1998, the wealthy Christian evangelist and TV promoter of his variety of religion, Pat Robertson, made an angry pronouncement. Robertson was incensed, asserting that Orlando Florida could be struck with hurricanes, earthquakes, and possibly a meteor because gay groups were permitted to display rainbow flags during an event at Disney World. Thousands of gay men and women celebrate “Gay Days”, a privately sponsored event at Disney World.

Earlier this year, a series of tornadoes swept Central Florida, causing much property damage and, I think, about twenty-eight fatalities. The most severe damage seemed to have occurred in Kissimmee, a town near both Orlando and the Disney complexes. Robertson asserted that these catastrophes were God’s way of punishing the Disney company not only for “Gay Days”, but also because the Disney company maintains a policy of non-discrimination in hiring and benefits.

Robertson’s diatribes would be hilarious if it were not for the influence of his TV network broadcasting ignorance and engendering hatred.

No tornadoes or fires touched the Disney complexes, people or programs. Why not? Why punish others for what Disney and the Orlando City Council are alleged to be guilty? Does Robertson’s God have such poor aim?

As this is being written, Bonnie is deluging Virginia Beach and Norfolk, Virginia. Is it ironic that Robertson’s headquarters is located [there].

The tectonic forces which cause earthquakes, the climatic conditions which create hurricanes, tornadoes, and floods were functioning billions of years before human life evolved on this planet. The processes were not altered because we humans appeared. We know, or should know, that caution and preparedness are ingredients for dealing with natural forces and mitigating their effects. There have been and there always will be catastrophes without limit which will exert a high cost in human life and suffering. That is the cost of living on this planet. Where would you rather live? Mars? The Moon? Perpetually orbiting in a space capsule?

Accepting that, however, Gibbon writes cogently, “the historian may content himself with an observation, which seems justified by experience, that man has much more to fear from the passions of his fellow-creatures, than from the convulsions of the elements. The mischievous effects of an earthquake, or deluge, or hurricane, or the eruption of a volcano, bear a very inconsiderable proportion to the ordinary calamities of war.”

Gibbon died more than 200 years ago. The 19th and 20th century wars have amply verified his statement. World War II cost 50 million lives, not to speak of World War I, Korea, Vietnam, and the horrors of the tribal wars in Africa.

To live in a Paradise may be a comforting fantasy. However, reality proclaims, “Here we live on this planet, Earth. Let’s do our best to contend, to accept, to help, to change for the better, or at least muddle through.”

As Cassius said to Brutus (Act I, Sc. 2),

“Men at some time are masters of their fates:
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves, that we are underlings.”

Pistol Packing Preacher

2010-05-22T08:41:00.001-04:00

July 17, 1998

Today’s Sarasota Herald Tribune carried this news under the headline, “Kentucky legalizes pistols in the pulpit”: the Kentucky General Assembly amended a 1996 law which allowed state residents with permits to carry concealed weapons, but banned them from schools, government buildings and houses of worship. The change made it legal for ministers and church officials to carry weapons inside houses of worship if they have concealed weapons permits.

One of the advocates of the change was “Willie Ramsay, a preacher at the Somerset Church of Christ (who) argued that churches are robbery targets because of the offerings they collect.”

If Willie is a Shakespeare fan, perhaps he found some sanction in Henry IV (Part I, Sc. II), where Hotspur proclaims:

“Now for our consciences the arms are fair
When the intent of bearing them is just.”

There is much disagreement in Kentucky about this new law; many oppose it and will seek repeal of the amendment.

This news story sparked my speculations as it would any veteran preacher. Did I ever need to carry a gun in the pulpit? That never occurred to me, although in a novel I read years ago, CIMARRON, by Edna Ferber, I recall that the Yancey Cravat, brandished his six-shooter when a heckler was interrupting Yancey’s sermon in a tent filled with frontier people.

I have always been aware that ministers never receive unanimous endorsement for their sermons. At least I never did. My story is not that much different from most others. At times we create boredom, encounter disagreement, engender dislike, even stir hatred. But, carry a 357 Magnum or a Beretta into the pulpit!! No thanks, I think not. I wouldn’t even know the proper etiquette for wearing the gun belt and holster inside or outside the clerical robe.

Perhaps there is cause for some fear. When I read Edward Gibbon’s description of early Christian preachers in the age of Constantine, maybe so. (THE HISTORY OF THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE, Vol. I, Ch. XX, p. 763):

“...The preachers recommended the practice of the social duties; but they exalted the perfection of monastic virtue, which is painful to the individual and useless to mankind. Their charitable exhortations betrayed a secret wish that the clergy might be permitted to manage the wealth of the faithful for the benefit of the poor. The most sublime representations of the attributes and laws of the Deity were sullied by an idle mixture of metaphysical subtleties, puerile rites, and fictitious miracles: and they expatiated, with the most fervent zeal, on the religious merit of hating the adversaries, and obeying the ministers of the church.”

There are a few preachers, still, who match Gibbon’s scathing description, but fortunately there are not many (I hope). More accurate in today's world, perhaps, is the following quote (source unknown):

“Some pastors employ the same strategy that Herman Hickman employed when he was head football coach at Yale in his relations with alumni – keep them sullen but not mutinous.”

However, such an attitude, notwithstanding the witty Herman Hickman, leads to what in our shop is termed, “negotiated resignations.” (The old “Heave-Ho” but stated politely euphemistic.)

But, pistol packing preachers, I think not – abas, avaunt, no way.

High School Senior

2010-05-21T08:12:00.001-04:00

June 27, 1998

“To business that we love we rise betime,
And go to’t with delight.”

Antony, Antony and Cleopatra,
Act IV Sc. 4

About ten days ago, when son John was videotaping and interviewing me, one of his questions punched the ATM buttons of my memory bank. I mentioned that I had been released from all classes the last half of my senior year at Everett High School.

In high school I was enrolled in the Commercial Course, I learned the skills of typing, shorthand, business forms and correspondence, double-entry bookkeeping, adding and calculating machines, etc. What I missed were certain courses in the College Preparatory division, particularly algebra and geometry.

I was in the Commercial Course partly from choice and partly from advice of aunts and uncles who emphasized that with my father dead, there was no way I could think of college because I needed to go to work full-time as soon as possible. Furthermore, as Uncle John Granstrom said to me, with my grandfather nodding approval, “Girls need college, not the boys. A man can always pick up a shovel and find laborer’s work, but a woman needs a college education if her husband should die.” They probably had the economic plight of my widowed mother in mind. I don’t believe that careers for women per se mattered to them or even occurred to them.

This advice was given years before the Great Depression, so these well-meaning relatives did not know that there was to be economic disaster with few laborers’ jobs to be had until the New Deal of the FDR years brought the WPA, the CCC and other measures. Thanks to the “commercial” courses, I had jobs all through the depression.

However, there was a reckoning when I went to St. Lawrence University in the 1940s. I was admitted on probation until I acquired high school credits for algebra and geometry. I went to Canton High School to qualify in these subjects. I surmise I was something like the little girl in the clip-art below:

[Editor’s note: cartoon girl with speech bubble, saying “Plato was a thinker who died in the year 347 and wasn’t born until 427. He thought out how to do this.”]

I still recall the strangeness and discomfort of that experience. I was old enough to be the parent of the high school sophomores in class with me. I may have been older than the teacher. It was a great relief to finish that requirement.

I have a good memory of the work/study program of Everett High School, January to July, 1929. In the Commercial Course there was opportunity for a few students to skip the last half of the school year and work in business. Those chosen had to have excellent marks, of course; and I was one of those qualified and chosen.

So I reported to the Milk St., Boston, office of Percy Gleason, a Certified Public Accountant. He had a woman assistant whose name I forget. She and I worked the outer office and Mr. Gleason had the inner office. The duties were not difficult: typing, correspondence, reports, tax returns, adding and checking columns of figures, filing, etc.

Most rewarding of all, I was paid $14 a week. The fares on the “Elevated” were not much, so I had more dollars than I had previously delivering groceries afternoons and Saturdays.

I did miss out on Senior social life – parties, the Senior Picnic at Norumbega Park on the Charles River (canoes, eating, dancing, necking), the Senior Prom, etc. But I wouldn’t have been participating anyway. I had some regrets about missing that part of high school life, but there were many of us in that graduating class of about 450 who for various reason did not take part in Senior social activities.

Another benefit of working for Percy Gleason, I was able to buy a new blue-serge suit, black shoes, white shirt for graduation.

The experience of this high school senior was not the usual one, but my regrets were minor and the benefits of that working experience were major. The most important lesson, perhaps, can be put in a sentence, “When you are on the job, arrive on time or before, work diligently, and stay until five PM.”

Humiliation Can Be A Two Way Street

2010-05-20T08:29:00.000-04:00

June 22, 1998

“Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, sense, affections, passions; fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, heal’d by the same means, warm’d and cool’d by the same winter and summer, as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die? And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge? If we are like you in the rest, we will resemble you in that....”

THE MERCHANT OF VENICE, Act III, Sc. 1

From the time of the First Crusade when Christians who didn’t go to the Holy Land stayed home and killed Jews, to the genocidal slaughters at Auschwitz and other death camps, the most repulsive blot on centuries of European Christian “civilization” has been anti-Semitism. 2,000 years of tragedy and suffering because one is Jewish is almost beyond comprehension. In re-telling another story of how Christians can hate, it must be noted that anti-Semitism was not limited to Roman Catholics. There has been much Protestant anti-Semitism, including the key Reformer, Martin Luther.

Some months ago, the Vatican issued a somewhat tepid, understated acknowledgment of the anti-Semitic acts and pronouncements through the centuries. Then I came across one of the lesser known, and less genocidal, acts.

My source is a comprehensive history of the Papacy, SAINTS AND SINNERS, A HISTORY OF THE POPES, by Eamon Duffy, who is a Roman Catholic church historian.

Pope Leo XII (Annibale della Genga), whose tenure was from 1823 to 1829, was elected because the majority of Cardinals wanted stronger spiritual leadership. Leo XII was puritanical and conservative. Apparently he believed people should get no joy from life. People playing games on Sundays and feast days could be jailed. Applause and encores in the theater were forbidden on the grounds that Leo “and his advisers thought they provided the occasion for display of seditious political feeling.” Women were forbidden to wear tight-fitting dresses.

Jewish people, as historically usual, became scapegoats and victims – confined to ghettos with walls and locked gates. They were not allowed to own real estate.

In addition, they were persecuted in a most reprehensible manner. “Three hundred Roman Jews were required to attend special Christian sermons every week and the hiring of Christian proxies was forbidden.”

I am not a trained educator, but I know enough about learning to be convinced that such coerced attendance is a method least likely to have any effect. My belief is that it was deliberately planned to be an insulting, humiliating experience.

There is a surprise ending, however—a forerunner to the way O. Henry would develop his short stories.

The successor to Leo XII was Gregory XVI (Dom Mauro Cappelari), 1831-1846.

In the political ferment which eventually led to Italy as a nation, Pope Gregory XVI spent enormous sums resisting the Carbonari and “Young Italy” movement led by Mazzini. At the time of Gregory’s death, the debt owed by the Papal States was sixty million scudi. (According to the dictionary, a “scudi” was a monetary unit of a gold or silver coin).

Where would the Pope go to get a loan of that magnitude? Here’s the “O. Henry” twist: He went to the famous banking family, the Rothchilds, who were guess what, Jewish!! So perforce, restrictions and persecutions of the Jewish people in Rome had to be lightened and mitigated.

I have the fond hope that the Vatican hierarchy were thoroughly discomfited and humiliated to go hat in hand to plead for that loan.

Were We Grateful?

2010-05-19T13:00:00.000-04:00

April 25, 1998

The loom of history weaves strange and unpredictable patterns. Different threads must be interwoven to understand consequences. If you live west of the Mississippi, you might not be in the United States had it not been for Toussaint L’Ouverture. If you are in the river cargo business on the Mississippi, you might have to pay custom duties to another country if President Thomas Jefferson had not ignored the Constitution and his own principles and expediently embraced opportunity. If Napoleon’s plans had not been totally frustrated, you might be speaking French when you celebrate Mardi Gras in New Orleans. If it had not been for rebellious slaves in Haiti, the United States might be comprised of the 26 States east of the Mississippi River. I thought of a paragraph in a letter received the other day from my grandson, Carl A., who was commenting on “chaos theory”: “Chaos is interesting in that it may outline some of the boundaries of what humans can know. The Butterfly Effect, in miniature: a butterfly flaps its wings in Tokyo, causing small air currents that, through a complex chain reaction, lead to a thunderstorm in New York. Such is a succinct example of why weather prediction is, and always will be, generally unreliable past a couple days.”

I believe that history has, sometimes, parallels to nature, particularly akin to weather causes and predictions. In this summary of events, 1801-1803, I am following closely Herbert Agar, THE PRICE OF UNION. Most historians would not differ substantially from his recounting of events. The quotations from Henry Adams and Thomas Jefferson are from Agar’s text.

Napoleon wanted the French Empire restored to its former position of strength on the North American continent. In 1801, his brother Lucian obtained a treaty from Spain which ceded Louisiana to France. Napoleon agreed to preliminary articles of peace with Great Britain, freeing his troops for a Louisiana invasion.

Then the focus shifted to the Caribbean, the island of San Domingo (today’s Haiti), where French commercial interests were central. Napoleon needed a base for troop support for his anticipated conquest of Louisiana. Of the 600,000 inhabitants of the island, 500,000 were Negro slaves (I am using “Negro” because then it was the common term). Under the leadership of a remarkable man, Toussaint L’Ouverture, the slaves revolted at the time of the French Revolution. Whites were massacred. But during the Revolution, the French National Assembly abolished slavery. Toussaint became a General of the Republic; and ruled San Domingo, convinced and asserting that it was a sovereign State. When Napoleon came to power in France, Toussaint refused to obey his edicts.

In 1801, Napoleon dispatched a large army commanded by General LeClerc (his brother in-law) to defeat Toussaint and to re-institute slavery. The plan was for General LeClerc, after subduing the island, would lead his 36,000 man army to conquer Louisiana.

The danger was recognized in our young nation. President Jefferson wrote to Livingstone, the American minister in Paris:

“It (the cession of Louisiana to France) completely reverses all the political relations of the United States .... There is on the globe one single spot the possessor of which is our natural and habitual enemy. It is New Orleans, through which the produce of the territory must pass to market.... The day that France takes possession of New Orleans... we must marry ourselves to the British fleet and nation.”

In January, 1803, Jefferson sent James Monroe to join Livingstone in Paris, with orders to buy New Orleans. Jefferson had no constitutional authority or congressional sanction for this action. But, seemingly, he believed there were times when one “must arise above principle.”

Meanwhile, the French were doing badly in San Domingo. Brigades meant for Louisiana were being destroyed by the Negroes of San Domingo. Although Toussaint was captured and died in French captivity, the savage war continued. Napoleon experiencing overwhelming losses in his forces, and seeing no prospect of victory, told Talleyrand to sell the whole territory of Louisiana.

Thus, on April 30, Louisiana was purchased by the United States for $11,250,000, plus an additional sum to subsidize debts owed by France to American citizens.

Henry Adams wrote, “The prejudice of race alone blinded the American people to the debt they owed to the desperate courage of five hundred thousand Haytian Negroes who would not be enslaved.”

Historical events are less subtle than a butterfly wing in Tokyo, but frequently unpredictable. History has a way of surprising even the most assured and astute of predictors. There is a “law of unintended consequences.”

Shakespeare has King Henry IV say to Warwick:

“O God! that one might read the book of fate,
And see the revolution of the times
Make mountains level, and the continent,
Weary of solid firmness, melt itself
Into the sea! and, other times, to see
The beachy girdle of the ocean
Too wide for Neptune’s hips; how chances mock,
And changes fill the cup of alteration
With divers liquors!”

(KING HENRY IV, Part 2, Act 3, Sc. i)

Once Upon A Time

2010-05-18T08:43:00.003-04:00

April 15, 1998

Stories are told to children long before they begin their ABCs. Adults respond to stories and learn from them, too. The story teller is more ancient than the formal historian. The Bard antedates the essayist. A lecture on moral principles is less pungent than a pertinent parable; a fable less distasteful than moralistic exhortations. When Hamlet (Act II, Sc. ii) ends a monologue:

“... the play’s the thing
Wherein I’ll catch the conscience of the King.”

he was emphasizing the power of a story.

So, in this Musing, two stories represent wisdom in living. No explanations or conclusions, just stories or parables.

I – Muddy Road

Two Buddhist Monks, Tanzan and Ekido were once traveling together down a muddy road. A heavy rain was still falling.

Coming around a bend, they met a lovely girl in a silk kimono and sash, unable to cross the intersection. “Come on, girl,” said Tanzan at once. Lifting her in his arms, he carried her over the mud.

Ekido did not speak until that night when they reached a lodging temple. Then he could no longer restrain himself. “We monks don’t go near females,” he told Tanzan, “especially not young and lovely ones. It is dangerous. Why did you do that?”

“I left the girl there,” said Tanzan, “are you still carrying her?”

II – Jade Student

This is the story of a man who wanted to start a jade collection. He was a rich man, but didn’t want to be cheated, so he determined to seek instruction in jade grading from the most famous connoisseur in the world. Through a friend he was introduced to an expert on jade, and learned that the course consisted of twelve lessons and would cost a thousand dollars. “That’s all right,” he said, “How do the lessons go?”

“You come here every week for one hour, and in twelve weeks you will know how to evaluate jade,” the teacher responded.

Each week the man went for his lesson, and each week his teacher placed a different piece of jade in in his hand and walked from the room. That was all. At the end of the eleventh lesson, the student was so angry he complained bitterly to the friend who had arranged the lessons. “You led me astray. You let me think this man was really an expert and look what what I’ve got for my pains – eleven hours of holding a stupid piece of jade in my hand.”

Together they went to the twelfth lesson. Again the jade expert simply put a piece of jade in the hands of his pupil and walked out of the room.

“You see?” said the pupil to his friend, “not only has he wasted my time and money for the first eleven hours, but to add insult to injury, in the last hour he gives me a fake piece of jade.”

(I have lost the source of these stories so I am unable to give proper credit. )

A Winter’s Tale

2010-05-17T13:42:00.001-04:00

March 18, 1998

(With apologies to Will S)

FIRE AND ICE
“Some say the world will end in fire.
Some say in ice.
From what I’ve tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.”
- Robert Frost

“Abide the change of time
Quake in the present winter’s state and wish
That warmer days would come.”

(Posthumus, CYMBELINE, Act II, Sc. iv)

I do not believe I could ever be persuaded to live in a wintry climate again. Here on the Gulf Coast, it is a cold snap when the temperature dips to the fifties. I put on a sweater or jacket when most guys around here are in their shirtsleeves.

This sensitivity or distaste for chilly weather may have been engendered by the years I lived in St. Lawrence County or Rochester, N.Y. But an event in my childhood may have also etched on my bones this affection for warmth and dislike of cold.

I was probably eleven years old, I recollect, because my father was still living. As I may have mentioned in other writings, I was somewhat of a roamer as a child; and often enough went off by myself.

One very cold winter day, well below freezing, I was in the Mt. Hood reservation, a county or state area with a lovely pond. The pond was frozen over. I walked out on the ice and broke through, soaking myself up to the neck.

Climbing out, drenched, I made the couple miles back home. I was chilled to the bone. My clothes froze on me. When I reached home, my mother stood by me at the kitchen range as I painfully shed my clothes. I still have some sort of trace auditory memory of the crunching sound as my frozen clothes hit the floor.

Put to bed with wrapped, heated flatirons at my feet, thoroughly blanketed, I knew the blessing of warmth.

However, the next morning, I could not move my legs. My mother called Dr. Listernick, unusual for her as she had not much faith in the medical profession. He came. (House calls were not that unusual then). I have no recollection of what he prescribed, but in a couple of days I was up and a bout, seemingly with no after-effects. “He gave you strong medicine,” my mother said later, “And that’s why you do not have rheumatic fever.” I believe that was her diagnosis, not Dr. Listernick’s.

Thus, as Phil Harris used to sing, “And that’s what I like about the South.”

P.S. That pond at Mt. Hood is the setting for a subsequent musing, “A Summer Reverie.”

Mysterian

2010-05-16T14:46:00.000-04:00

January 7, 1998

Don’t bother to look up that title in the dictionary – it’s not there. I believe I have coined a word to describe my cosmic theology. In a prior Musing several years ago, I quoted J.B.S. Haldane: “Now my suspicion is that the Universe is not only queerer than we suppose, but queerer than we CAN suppose.”

This venture into that line of thought was sparked by Annie Dillard, writing in the January 1998 “Harper’s”. I tip my hat to Annie Dillard, because she composed an essay based on statistics which is both fascinating and a trigger for one’s speculations.

Consider this paragraph in her essay:

“Ten years ago we thought there were two galaxies for each of us alive. Lately, since we loosed the Hubble Space Telescope, we have revised our figures. There are nine galaxies for each of us. Each galaxy harbors an average of 100 billion suns. In our galaxy, the Milky Way, there are sixty-nine suns for each person alive. The Hubble shows, says a report, that the Universe ‘is at least 15 billion years old.’ Two galaxies, nine galaxies, sixty-nine suns, 100 billion suns ....”

Read that again being aware that there are nearly 5 billion persons on this planet. 9 galaxies for every one of us, each galaxy with 100 BILLION SUNS. In our galaxy, the Milky Way, sixty-nine suns for each person alive!! These stellar findings stun my ability to comprehend.

Or, to quote physicists Kasner and Newman about a near-at-hand object: “Our efforts to grasp the number of electrons that pass through the filament of an ordinary fifty-watt light bulb in one minute equals the number of drops of water that flow over Niagara Falls in a century.” (CLEOPATRA’S NOSE, Daniel Boorstin).

Can you grasp THAT?

In the face of such overwhelming Numbers, Forces, Distances, where is there a slot for a Zeus? An Allah? A Yahveh? A Christian Trinity? I know that believers will testify that God exists and we are his children. For them it is a leap of faith and a comforting belief. I have no quarrel with them except that I cannot say “Yes” when my mind says “No.”

But the events in the Universe seem to refute any idea of a God “who holds moral relations with man,” to use the old phrase. Annie Dillard calls attention to April 30, 1991, when a series of waves drowned 138,000 people. Quoting her again:

“Two million children die a year from diarrhea, and 800,000 from measles. Do we blink? ... The flu epidemic of 1918 killed 21 or 22 million people.”

Every year, sometimes every month, there is a “natural disaster” that kills multitudes of persons.

For years I have been a Humanist Unitarian Universalist. I hold that all philosophies, theologies, credos, catechisms are human interpretations of human experience. I believe that reason can prevail over revelation, although it does not seem to most of the time. I believe that the problems of humankind will be solved by human persons or they won’t be solved at all; that we need to recognize that all humans deserve respect and dignity; and that our never-ending task is to reach for universal brotherhood/sisterhood and all that is implied in that goal.

But I cannot fit a cosmic theology into the human scheme. The Universe is too astounding, awesome, for any rational speculation or logical conclusions. Therefore I am a Mysterian.

Whatever this Universe is and the causes of its Dynamisms, Force, Time/Space enigmas are a deepening mystery. As Annie Dillard’s article brings home, the more we discover, the greater the mystery. Nothing convinces me that there can be a final or even tentative answer to “why?” Why is there such an amazing Universe? What is it we are trying to comprehend? Why is there anything at all? Thus, I think of myself as a Mysterian. As Ray Bradbury wrote, “We are an impossibility in an impossible Universe.” In a lighter vein, Woody Allen observed, “I’m astounded by people who want to ‘know’ the Universe when it’s hard enough to find your way around Chinatown.”

So as a Mysterian I will never know what the Universe is or why, but I’m here on a planet where there is truth, beauty and goodness as well as the contradictions and prostitutions of those values. While standing in awe of the cosmic mystery, this planet is our world, our home. Embrace it, value it, improve it, and share.

Introduction To Musings IX

2010-05-16T14:44:00.001-04:00

December, 1998

I am somewhat astonished that I have continued these MUSINGS for nine years. 1998 has been a better year, medically, than 1997. An August check-up showed no re-occurrence of cancer; [I] feel o.k., low energy.

If I have filled in some gaps in knowledge of the family and about relatives, that makes the effort worthwhile. More than that, I am amply rewarded if I have encouraged anyone in the family or among my close friends to follow the trail of their own ideas: that is, what are the implications? What may be the result or unintended consequences? Who has benefited or will benefit? What can I believe? What must I do?

One of the paragraphs I mull over from time to time is the conclusion of Albert Camus’ essay, “The Artist And His Time,” where he wrote (not degenderized):

“Great ideas, it has been said, come into the world as gently as doves. Perhaps then, if we listen attentively, we shall hear, amid the uproar of empires and nations, a faint flutter of wings, the gentle stirring of life and hope. Some say that this hope lies in a nation; others in a man. I believe rather that it is awakened, revived, nourished by millions of solitary individuals whose deeds and works every day negate frontiers and the crudest implications of history. As a result, there shines forth fleetingly the ever threatened truth that each and every man, on the foundations of his own sufferings and joys, builds for all.”

That is a message for whatever religious tradition you celebrate at the Winter Solstice. Bless you all!!!

Grandfather W

The Dangers And Hopes Of Universalism

2010-05-16T11:51:00.001-04:00

February 22, 1998
Sarasota

I want to discuss this subject with you, but first you need to know my bias. I have been a Unitarian Universalist 37 years since consolidation of the two denominations. Before that I was a Unitarian for 4 years, two of which I was unaware, being an infant from birth to 2; and two years as a layman in a struggling little Unitarian church in Massachusetts. I was 45 years a Universalist, as a boy, as a layman, as a minister.

I’m particularly conscious of this today as we celebrate Helen Harwood’s 100th birthday, because her father was the teacher who was the strongest influence in my adult life. John Murray Atwood was Dean of the Universalist theological school at St. Lawrence University. I was fortunate enough to be one of his students.

He was a superb teacher. When I was there he taught theology, Greek, and parliamentary law; other years he taught Biblical languages and literature and sociology of religion. But more than his scholarship, he was generous, forgiving and wise. I will never forget how he accepted a student who had been expelled from Tufts; he believed in giving a second chance. That student was a friend of mine. We traveled together to Canton for the interview with the Dean. [CJW note: he accepted me – unpromising ... + so to speak here I am]

Helen, you know and I know that your father was one of the most admired and trusted leaders of Universalism in the 1st half of the Twentieth Century.

Thus, as some of you describe yourself as Unitarian, not Unitarian Universalist, so too, I am sometimes neglectful and identify myself as Universalist because Universalism has characterized so many years of my life and thought. Furthermore, Universalist is a much more accurate description of my personal religious philosophy.

First, I want to make a brief summary of Universalism as a theological position. Then, present instances where Universalism was a bad idea. Then outline its theological evolution in the 20th century which incorporates hope for our human venture in this world where so much intolerance, war, and misery have occurred.

Universalism was a simple theological foundation for belief, even though it was disturbing and heretical to the other religions. God was too good to damn any of his creatures to Hell forever. God must at least be as kind and loving as the worst parent; and what parent would consent and send a child to burn in hell forever? In other words all souls would be saved.

In prior years, after that brief explanation, I would be asked, “What do Universalists believe?” I would answer usually in this fashion: Universalists do not believe alike in many ways. We differ. The proper question is, “How do Universalists arrive at their beliefs?” From where I stood, and stand, one can assume that there is acceptance of tested truth accumulated and continuously refined and amended by the historian, the geologist, biologist, astronomer, physicist, social scientist, practitioners of other learned professions. The Universalist believes reason to be a guide and validates propositions through experience and experiment. All theologies are interpretations of experience, not
divine revelations. The worth and dignity of all persons as the highest values. The Universalist looks with hope, still, on the nature and destiny of the human venture in spite of calamitous and cruel events.

But there are dangers; and sometimes Universalism can be a bad idea. What is bad about Universalism? When it is coerced. In a recent book, THE CURSE OF CAIN by Regina Schwartz, the author states the case succinctly: “Universalism comes in different shapes, as an ideal of genuine tolerance, as an effort to protect universal rights and as a kind of imperialism that insists we are all one and that demands an obliteration of differences.”

Universalism is bad when it is an imperialism. The major religions of Western culture have such a history, and a bloody, cruel, and intolerant history it is. Catholic means universal. In many centuries the Catholic church was coercive – believe with us or be damned. There were the persecutions and tortures of the Inquisition, the hypocrisy and the bloodshed of the Crusades. Mass killings of heretics was praiseworthy.

Protestants were hardly more generous. Len Peck’s fine and scholarly sermon on Servetus was a pertinent reminder. In England under Henry VIII, Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth I, the Protestants and Catholics took turns persecuting, torturing and killing each other.

Much of this found sanction in words attributed to Jesus, although most scholars say the verse was a late addition to the gospel by the early church (Matthew 28/19) “Go therefore and MAKE disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father [and] of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.”

In Islam’s early centuries, the followers of Mohammed forcibly converted the peoples where their militant warriors invaded.

Even the religion of the Hebrews came to a Universalism which was imperialistic. They invaded Canaan, not their land, killing and slaughtering.

Look at Deuteronomy 7/5: “...you must utterly destroy them; you shall make no covenant with them, and show no mercy to them. . . .you shall break down their altars and dash in pieces their pillars and burn their graven images.”

Even the splendid and poetic Universalism found in Micah and Isaiah has the aroma of imperialism, “Come to the house of Jacob’s God; and he may instruct us in his ways....” Y’all come, but you MUST worship OUR God.

When the Puritans came to this country and seized land and got rid of the Indians, the natives, they justified it by the biblical example of the Hebrews seizing Canaan, showing no mercy to the people who lived there.

A Universalism that is THEM against US is bad. An imperialistic Universalism of any variety will never create a world that is free and fair.

Why, then, did some of us become Universalist ministers? In the 20th century, much of it within my personal memory and experience, theological Universalism had lost much of its power. Most of the mainline Christian churches had quit preaching Hell and brimstone. (The revival of fundamentalism, particularly in the Southern states, in recent decades would hardly have been predictable in the first half of this century.)

There was not much agitation among us over the growth of scientific thought, including evolution theories. The higher criticism of the Bible made both Unitarians and Universalists aware that scripture was not the inerrant word of God, but rather the religious literature of Judaism and Christianity. Heaven and Hell become referred to more as allegory or metaphor than reality. When we experienced frustration or problems, we would say, “That’s the Hell of it.” Right? Years ago, a Christian minister defined Hell this way, “the self-defeating nature of the egocentric life.” That’s a long way from burning in hell forever or Dante’s vivid images.

In my experience, Universalism went through many of the same conflicts and controversies as Unitarian in the first half of this century. We experienced the same conflict between theism and humanism as did the Unitarians. We each debated whether or not we were a Christian denomination. Fortunately, tolerance and acceptance prevailed. Helen’s father, defending the freedom clause in Universalist principles, wrote “Not that a man may do as he pleases, but that he may be true to the vision HE has gained on the Sinai HE has climbed.”

So some of us became Universalist ministers in the 30s and 40s, not because of the “No Hell” Universalism, although some felt the old beliefs still relevant. Rather, it seemed to some of that Universalism was the BIG IDEA; the worth and dignity of every person had become the main plank in our religious platform. Not that we expected that millions of Christians, Jews, Moslems, Buddhists would become Universalists. Rather, respect for the rights of others demanded that we acknowledge, advocate and protect the right of all persons to choose the faith that would sustain them. That was the Big Idea. Imperialism of any kind was the Bad Idea.

Before I close, a word of explanation: Some may have heard of Billy Sunday. 80 or more years ago, he was a popular, evangelistic preacher, the Jerry Falwell or Jimmy Swaggart of his day. When 100,000 dollars is referred to, it would probably be a million today.

Dr. Levi Moore Powers, from 1913 to 1919, was minister of our Gloucester Universalist Church and one of the noted preachers of his day – courageous and unafraid to criticize establishment forces. 80 or more years ago he was preaching on the need for a national health insurance plan; he defended the right of workers to organize and strike, he was an advocate of the League of Nations. In a sermon preached about 1919, he said, “The only adequate faith is that which will make the world brotherly, and that is a genuine belief that we are brothers, all children of a Father who has no favorites. Billy Sunday says that belief in the Universal Brotherhood of Man is ‘bosh’ and ‘tommyrot’ and those who live by the faith that Billy Sunday preaches reward their faithful servant by giving him fifty or one hundred thousand dollars a year for proclaiming his ungodly gospel.

“But we have not so learned Christ. There is an Eastern proverb which says, ‘I met a hundred men on the road to Delhi and they were all my brothers.’ That old heathen was more of a Christian than Billy Sunday. Universalism teaches that every man we meet on our journey from the cradle to the stars is our brother, and when we are big enough to understand our own faith, and great enough to live it, the future will be ours.”

I am not a Christian theist as was Levi Powers. Today we use more gender-free language. After all, he spoke those words more than 78 years ago. Yet, if we too sensed more deeply and proclaimed more fearlessly that every man, woman, and child we meet on our journey from the cradle to the stars is our brother or sister, and when we are big enough to understand our own faith and great enough to live it, the future may not be ours, but it will be the way, and perhaps the only way, as we join millions of others of whatever faith who share the dream, that this pained, conflicted world may be saved from destroying itself in a Hell of human making.

Hurrah!!

2010-05-14T12:38:00.000-04:00

October 14, 1997

Yesterday afternoon, sipping my two ounces of Grant’s Scotch, I reflected that two months had elapsed since surgery at Sarasota Memorial Hospital. Then, by co-incidence, or what a Jungian might name synchronicity, I was re-reading a page in the 1959 “Lenten Manual” compiled by Robert Cope, a friend and colleague I have not seen for many years.

Bob printed a quote from the late Irish playwright, Sean O’Casey, from “Sunset and Evening Star”:

“Even here, even now, when the sun had set and the evening star was chastely touching the bosom of the night, there were things to say, things to do. A drink first! What would he drink to – the past, the present, the future? To all of them! He would drink to the life that embraced the three of them! Here, the whitened hair, desires failing, strength ebbing out of him, with the sun gone down, and with only the serenity and the calm warning of the evening star left to him, he drank to life, to all it had been, to what it was, to what it would be. Hurrah!”

So I drank to that. More importantly, I toasted the Fabulous Five (California, Arizona, Oregon, Virginia, Sarasota) who have done so much to ease the burdens of recovery. You know who you are. MY enduring gratitude is much deeper than I can ever express in words.

Then I read in the current (10/13) NEW YORKER, “... America in the nineties has produced a new demographic category – the Old Old, over 85.” I am now one of the Old Old. The article points out that this is the fastest growing age group. Being radical in religion, liberal in politics, slow of foot, this is the first time I have ever been in the fastest anything.

Perhaps this is a somewhat dubious distinction because we of this category are keenly aware that “every winding river winds at last to the sea.” More emphatically, however, there are those of us of the Old Old whose perceptions are sharpened and thankfulness increased. We meet the nights and greet the days with quiet thankfulness that we can laugh with the jokers and weep with the grieving; that we know and are known; that we love and are loved.

HURRAH!

About English

2010-05-14T12:25:00.000-04:00

October 1, 1997

This doggerel appeared in “The Jeffersonian”, our newsletter.

I was reminded how difficult our Swedish forebears must have found our language.

We’ll begin with box, and the plural is boxes,
But the plural of ox should be oxen, not oxes.
Then one fowl is goose, but two are called geese,
Yet the plural of moose should never be meese.
You may find a lone mouse or a whole lot of mice,
But the plural of house is houses, not hice.
If the plural of man is always called men,
Why shouldn’t the plural of pan be pen?
The cow in the plural may be cows or kine,
But the plural of vow is vows, not vine.
And I speak of a foot, and you show me your feet,
But I give a boot... would a pair be beet?
If one is a tooth, and a whole set is teeth,
Why shouldn’t the plural of booth be beeth?
If the singular is this, and the plural is these,
Why shouldn’t the plural of kiss be kese?
Then one may be that, and three be those,
Yet the plural of hat would never be hose.
We speak of a brother, and also of brethren,
But though we say mother, we never say methren.
The masculine pronouns are he, his and him,
But imagine the feminine she, shis, and shim.
So our English, I think you will agree,
Is the trickiest language you ever did see.