On Memorial Day we stop and remember. At least most of us.

Everywhere I go I bump into them. 

They almost all look alike.

Members of the same club.

Old. 

Faces weatherbeaten lined. 

Tired. 

In the grocery store pushing a cart.  

Sitting on a bench smoking a cigarette.  

Here and there at a ball game. 

Shuffling in to see some doctor. 

They’ve lost a lot. 

They don’t say much. 

Usually they ignore the questions we ask about the war. 

Yes, they’ve lost a lot. 

Buddies over there. 

Limbs and sometimes minds. 

Health. 

All the years that could have been.

Sometimes wives and children. 

Not like it used to be. 

They ache. 

They don’t cry much. 

But they feel—oh, how they feel. 

So now let us raise a salute.

Let us praise all the unknown guys 

with the crumpled hats. 

That say veteran.

--Roger Lovette / rogerlovette.blogspot.com

 

Let's Talk About Trans

 

I aways liked the slogan: “It’s a great day in South Carolina.” But I am beginning to have second thoughts.  Not all people in our state can say: “It’s a great day in South Carolina.  Why? So many people seem to be left out. Dreamers, poor folk, gays, blacks, immigrants or just non-whites. 

Yet a last week a headline on Transgender folk in the local newspaper has given me pause. The State Legislators are trying to pass bills that would deny Trans people full rights and privileges in SC. The headline read: “Upstate Families Face Anxiety, Exit Plans.” This fear seems to be spreading to almost every state. 

Transgender means “a person whose gender identity does not correspond with the sex registered at birth.”  Which means that people are confused about their sexual identity. Some males feel more like female than male. The same can be said of females. All over the country young people and their families are struggling with this term transgender. 

Couples have told me very early on they knew sons or daughters were different. Their child’s sexual identity gravitated to the opposite sex. They see themselves as not the male or female they find on their birth certificate. Many are involved in transition, meaning they are receiving treatments to change their sex. 

Like so many others I do not understand this problem. Yet over 1.6 million identify themselves as transgender. This is a threat to legislators and ordinary citizens. 14 states prohibit transgender people from employment. 13 states protest the protection of transgenders and refuse them housing. 

There are 3,500 transgender youths (13-17) in our state. 18 bills in SC have been introduced attacking  transgenders. Their stated purpose is to stamp out health care for those in transition, changes in birth certification, adoption rights, use of bathrooms and sports teams. 

These bills would ban any instruction of expressions of gender diversity in the classroom. This is followed with the banning of books that even mention the term, trans. One Florida provision allows Social Services to scoop children from their homes if their parents give their under-age children access to gender-affirming care. Some parents are seriously considering moving out of the state to protect their children from hatred and harsh and unfair treatment. Others not understanding weep for their children.

The American Academy of Pediatrics revealed alarming rates of attempted suicide among transgender youth. 1.8 million L GBTQ youths (13-24) consider suicide every year.

The climate the parents and their trans children encounter enormous resistance. Just think your child comes home and tells you they are not the sex you thought they were. Imagine the struggle these parents feel in unlearning values they have always held. Shifting these gears is far from easy. And then there is the difficulty in dealing with their relatives and friends. 

Many people charge these parents with indoctrinating their children to transgender. Teachers are warned to not mention this subject. Many churches teach these children are an abomination and live in sin. They say that God’s laws have been broken.

What we need:

1) Bills to protect all our children. Every child needs a safe place. 

2) Parents need encouragement and support as they struggle with all their issues.

 3) We need Legislators that are willing to sit down and listen to parents and their

 children as they tell their stories.

4) Every person and family dealing with these issues should seek counseling in this serious matter.
 

5) Churches and other faith groups should welcome all people. No Qualification. 

There are a multitude of references in the New Testament on the defense of children. “Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes “ me. If any of you put a stumbling block before one of these little ones who believe in me, if would be better for you if a great millstone were fastened around your neck, and you were drowned in  the depths of the sea.” (Matthew 18. 6.)

6) We also need to ponder the words of the 14th Amendment in our Constitution: “All persons or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens  of the United States  and the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall the State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”

I close these remarks with the eloquent words of Wendell Berry:

“Though you have done nothing shameful,

they will want you to be ashamed.

They will want you to kneel and weep

and say you should have been like them.

And once you say you are ashamed,

reading the page they hold out to you,

then such light as you have made

in your history will leave you.”

--Roger Lovette / rogerlovette.blogspot.com

Pentecost--Then and Now

When I read Pentecost story of the birth of the church there were no stained glass disciples. There were no great throngs singing something like the Hallelujah Chorus. No. Maybe that Pentecost birth was much like ours. Like mine maybe. Coming into the world in a four-room house to parents who barely finished the eighth grade and lived from small paycheck to paycheck.  Folks like us—weak-kneed disciples who on and off again tended that little fire that began that first day with the rushing wind.

Nobody knew where it would go or what would mean. And nobody would know back then that even though there would be whoredoms and Laodiceas and sermons and terrible actions that would smudge his name. Through the years pilgrims of all ages keep shuffling in to confess and cry and have lumps in their throats and whisper: "Help me! Help me!" They and we leave over and over with a hope strong and sometimes weak—but still hanging on that kindly light despite the ever flickering gloom. Nothing that the world could throw at them or us would stick.

And from that day only God knew that stubborn spirit would endure and sometimes be as wonderful as that fiery day when it all began. Crosses everywhere. Prayers even in funerals and weddings and dull-grey days. And rosaries and  shame and fury. And it came to all. All flesh the book called it. And languages from all over the world. And the wind would blow and still blows and nothing could stop it' power.

Looking back we marvel at the courage and love and commitment that kept them going. So in these strange days Pentecost is still celebrated. Because even with all the unfairness and the hatred  and injustice that Promised Spirit still comes. And it isn’t because of anything we do—but like rain on a parched-dry field it comes and all is touched. No wonder Jesus said: “I will not be here but I will send my Spirit." And we look back on that first day and look now on our difficult days and we will be glad because it is far from over. For that Spirit is hard to understand but it still comes. Even here…especially here.

Lift up your hearts

We lift them up to the Lord.

--Roger Lovette/ rogerlovette.blogspot.com

Rod Davis - A Memory and a Eulogy

 

(I was asked to give the Eulogy at the Memorial Service for Rod Davis in Birmingham, May 14 but I could not go. There was no other place I would ever be. So I wrote out this Eulogy and it was to be read at the Service today at the Baptist Church of the Covenant, Birmingham.)

Rod Davis - A Memory

May 14, 2023

Marhy Oliver writes: 

“Someone I loved once gave me 

a box full of darkness

It took me years to understand

that this, too, was a gift.”

And here we are family, friends, colleagues, and more—much more.

And today crowded into this room are so, so many holders of our boxes full of darkness. 

Rod was 86 when he died. And his last four years were hard, hard indeed. This brilliant friend left us much too soon. And today we come to remember not that sad leave taking—but the gift, the amazing gift that we all find in our own box full of darkness.

Not darkness, really. Even in our own hard grief. But more. Light. Incredible light that streamed through the days of Rod Davis. I met him first at Howard College in 1954. He was one year behind me. I have tried to remember how it all started. I do remember he invited me up to his house in Horton, Alabama. I remember sitting in his bedroom and he asked , “Do you know the poet, T.S. Eliot?” I didn’t. He said, “Let me read you something that comes his ‘Choruses from the Rock.’” These words were written in 1930.

“Remember the faith that took men from home

At the call of a wandering preacher. 

Our ages an age of moderate virtue

And of moderate vice

When men will not lay down the Cross

 because they will never assume it.

Yet nothing is impossible, nothing

To men of faith and conviction.

Let us therefore make perfect our will.

O God, help us.”

And so I was hooked. He opened so many doors. Which led to more doors, and more doors. Martin Luther King’s, Stride Toward Freedom. Bonhoeffer’s, The Cost of Discipleship, Frederick Buechner—whom I had never heard of. Thomas Wolfe’s, You Can’t Go Home Again. And so many more. Thank you Rod for opening that magical door that has never closed.

And what he did for me he has done for so many. His brothers, Phil and Gayron and his nieces and nephews. Eric, dear Eric and so very many others in this crowded room and beyond. We have all sloshed through the darkness of many things but Rod, Dr. Davis, Dean Davis helped us so many of us see the light which no darkness can ever put out. 

I went to Seminary in Louisville but he went North. Yale and Ridgefield and Boston and New York and then back, years later to Birmingham. Dr. Hull called one day and asked: “What would you think of Roderick Davis as Dean here at Samford?" And I said, “Oh, that would be great if you could get him.” And so he came bringing with him a breath of fresh air and the students and faculty loved him. Yes, in time, he did become a legend. And on his retirement in 2001 his colleagues honored him with the J. Roderick Davis Lecture series which has brought scholars and public intellectuals from all over to the campus.

When I was considering coming to this church as Pastor, he called  and said, “If you come I will join your church.” And he did and like so many other things, Rod made a difference here. And he was a strong supporter of every Pastor. 

I could talk all day about this friend mine. And if you had the chance so, so many of you could stand and tell your own Rod Davis story for we all have them.

I want to tell you story which may seem like a diversion but bear with me.  One of my mentors was Carlyle Marney, a great Baptist preacher. He served for years at the First Baptist of Austin Texas. And once a week he would meet with a group of minister-colleagues for breakfast. And one day he left that church to serve as Minister of the Myers Park Baptist Church in Charlotte. And one morning in Austin at breakfast one of the waitresses asked that group. “I have not seen Dr. Marney down here for a long time. Is he still down at the church?” Those gathered around the table looked at each other and one preacher spoke up and said, “Oh, yes Dr. Marney is still down at the church.”

And as I think of Rod I would say he’s still here. In the hearts of his family. In the hearts of all those from place to place where he worked and taught. And at this University and others. And he is still at this church. And person after person here could say: Yes, he is still here.”

Let us, we grievers, lift up not only our prayers of thanksgiving for Rod. But let us also lift up his family and what a gift he must have been to you and Lynn and to us all. In the first sermon Jesus ever gave he said, “I have come to heal the brokenhearted.” And he also said, “Blessed are those that mourn for they shall be comforted.”This box of darkness is only part of this story. But we remember Rod Davis and light…incredible light.

I want to close with a Benediction that comes from Dostoyevsky’s, The Brothers Karamazof:

 “What keeps me going is that I believe like a child that suffering will be healed and made up for, that in the world’s finale something  so great will come to pass that it is going to suffice for all our hearts, for the comforting of all our sorrows, for the atonement of all the crimes of humanity. And I want to be there when suddenly everyone understands what it is all been for.”

--Roger Lovette / rogerlovette.blogspot.com

Mother's Day--My Favorite Memory

(This picture takes me back to my favorite Mama story. This piece has been published in several                newspapers and has appeared on my blog. Every time I see this photograph I remember so many things 

    about my Mother. As you read I hope your own memories of your Mother come back again.)

One of he pictures in my study is a photograph of two red Gerbera daisies. One is in full bloom and the other is just beginning to open. The photograph looks like it must have been a sunshiny day. The flower’s foliage is lush and green. Occasionally someone will pick up the picture and ask, “Why do you have a picture of these two flowers on your desk?” And I answer with a story.

The memory goes back more than twenty five years. Coming home from a two-week trip I began to catch up on the news with my wife. She had traveled south while I studied up north. On her way home she had stopped by my Mother’s house in Georgia and learned she was in the hospital. In her eighties, Mother’s trips to the hospital were coming closer together.

“Oh, by the way,” my wife said, “your Mother sent you some flowers. Gerber daisies, she called them. Her favorite.  Just before she got sick she said that she found two plants at a good price. She instructed me to go by her house when I left the hospital, get the daisies, be very careful with them and bring them home to you.” We were moving soon and she told my wife, “Don’t plant them now. Take the daisies with you to Memphis and plant them in your new yard.”

When I talked to my mother on the telephone she wanted to know about the daisies. “Give them plenty of water. Keep them out of full sun until you plant them and take them with you to Memphis. Now don’t put them in that moving van—you put them in your car.” That was our last conversation. She died less than a week later.

Weeks later we moved to Tennessee. One of the last things I did as we closed up our house was to put the daisies in my car. On a Sunday morning I planted the green daisy plants in the Tennessee soil in our new side yard. It was a painful planting. Grief came surging back. As I mulched the flowers I remember praying, “Dear God, let them live. Let them live.”  It was late August.

My birthday fell on a Saturday in October that year. As I went to get the newspaper I was dumb founded by what I saw. One of the daisies had the prettiest red bloom and another bud was barely opening. I don’t know much about this flower except October is very late for a Gerbera daisy to bloom. I charged into the house and told my wife, “You won’t believe what’s outside. One of my mother’s daisies is blooming on my birthday!”

It was her final gift of so many others she had given me through the years. Even after her death, the long arm of her love touches me still. That photograph reminds me of that birthday morning.

Frost came early that year. The flowers wilted. I hoped the daisies would live through the winter—but Gerbera daisies don’t usually survive the winter cold. The next spring the flowers never came up. But this I know: that daisy bloomed on my birthday. The flowers did their work in a hard time. And even after all these years, on this Mother’s Day I look at that picture and smile. Grace, stubborn grace, comes in the strangest of ways. I told my friend this was why I keep this picture of that red daisy on my desk.

                   (My son drew this picture of his grandmother years ago. As I look at it--I remember Mama.)

--Roger Lovette / rogrlovette.blogspot.com