The Bridge is Love

Today is our wedding anniversary. Fifty years today we stood before the altar in a Baptist Church in Louisville, Kentucky and said, “I do.” There was ten inches of snow on the ground. It was cold, very cold. A lot of people couldn’t get to the church because of the weather. But we drove away in my little Green Plymouth across the Ohio River to Indiana. We stayed that first night in some motel close because we were afraid the roads would be too bad to get to our honeymoon destination: French Lick, Indiana. Quite a honeymoon it was—two nights and three days. Meals included. Some time ago I ran across the receipt from that trip—I think that honeymoon cost us: $58.00 and some cents. (Tips not included.)

She was finishing the University of Louisville and I was ending my work at Louisville Baptist Seminary. We had dated for three years—mostly by bus and some friend’s car because I had no car. She was studying piano with Dwight Anderson the best teacher at the school. He loved her and thought she showed great promise. When he heard she was getting married to a Baptist preacher he exploded: “You can’t do that. You’ll throw your life away. You’ll forget your music and end up in some place like Anniston, Alabama!” Well, we never made it to Anniston but there some days I wish we had been that fortunate.

Our first church was on a side road in Philpot, Kentucky in western Kentucky. Neither one of us had lived in the country—so this was quite an experience. The Church was 75 years old and had never had a full-time preacher. They had used Seminary students through the years. And so, green and young and totally inexperienced, I became their first full-time Pastor at the age of 25. Gayle was 21. I call those years my internship. Maybe it was our marriage’s internship, too. It was a hard time. Little money. Not quite knowing what I was doing as pastor or husband. Two years later our first child came: a redheaded girl. And so to the task of being husband and wife and pastor and wise we added a new responsibility: parents.

After three and a half years we moved to Southside Virginia in the middle of very rich tobacco country and where our second child was born: a boy. I was learning a little more about church, Gayle was learning a lot about parenting and putting up with a still-young insecure husband-pastor whose ups and downs must have been a helluva ride for my wife. But she held on and helped me. In the middle of a dark time after my father died I remember a book that I read during that period. It was called Love is a Bridge. And later when I wrote my first book I dedicated it to: "Dear Gayle who has taught me best: The bridge really is love. "

I don’t want to bore you with our ministerial journey. Georgetown, Kentucky. Clemson, South Carolina, Memphis, Tennessee and then my last church in Birmingham. She stayed with me. She put up with a lot from me and churches and just having to pack and move and pack and move and pack and move.

She never loved the spotlight. In fact she never wanted a big to-do made over her. And yet at out retirement party one of our friends stood and said, “Gayle Lovette has always been my role model because she always was herself.” What a woman. She never put on airs or fitted into anyone else’s mold. She was just herself, comfortable in her own skin and has one of the healthiest self-images I know. After retirement she has followed me through seven interims. Several of these we lived away from home and going back and forth was hard for her. Yet—she stood by me.

And so—here we are fifty years later. Time sure does fly when you are having fun and when you’re not having fun. She’s a great Mother. Both of our kids have done well thanks mostly to a mother that was as good as any mother could be. Our daughter a great teacher and a good mother of two girls. Life has not always been easy for her—has it been for any of us? But she has hung in there and we are very proud of her and the girls. Our son an artist-businessman has also done well. He has found his way, too—and for all these we are very grateful.

We took an Anniversary trip in October with her twin sister, Gwyn and husband Joe. It was a River cruise on the Danube River from Budapest to Prague and was wonderful. We planned on going back to French Lick this week where we had our honeymoon. But the weather is as bad there as it was then—and so we will wait a little while.

Friends of ours were getting married weeks ago. They are about our age and have found one another after losses and grief and we rejoice in their starting over. They said they wanted to write their own vows and wondered if I had any suggestions. I sent them the words that follow.

One of favorite all-time writers is the western writer Wallace Stegner. He taught writing at Stanford for years and was a mentor for Wendell Berry and a great many others. One of his later books is called, The Spectator Bird. It is the story of old love. This couple was been married for a long time. As with most of us there were fits and starts and ups and downs and hard days and good times. And so Stegner wrote about this couple. These are his words that I sent to my friends getting married:

“It is something, it could be everything

to have found a fellow bird

with whom you can sit among the rafters

while the drinking

and boasting

and reciting

go on below;

A fellow bird whom you can look after

and find bugs and seeds for;

One who will patch your bruises

and straighten your ruffled feathers

and mourn over your hurts

when you accidentally fly into something

you can’t handle.”

I chose these words because they are as true of my feelings as anything I know.

Don't Wait 'Till Thanksgiving

I want to recommend a good book that I have bumped into lately. You wouldn’t call the book brilliant or earthshaking—but it set me to thinking about my own life. Isn’t that the mark of a good book?

365 Thank Yous was written by John Kralik. John Kralik is a lawyer who found his life in shambles a couple of years ago. It seemed that everything that could go wrong in a person’s life John was experiencing. He was struggling through a painful and complicated second divorce. He had two grown children that he had little contact with and third younger child that he was afraid the same thing would happen with her. His business had tanked because so many of his clients were just not paying in the economic downturn. He was living in a lousy apartment that was cold in the winter and hot in the summer. He was overweight and had just broken up with his girl friend. Nothing he tried seemed to work.

He began to wonder if there wasn’t something he could do in the approaching New Year that could make his lousy life better. His ex-girl friend sent him a note one day thanking him for the things she had appreciated about him. He was so moved by this note that he started to write notes of his own. He decided that he would try to write one thank-you note to someone every day of the year.

At first he kept hoping something dramatic would happen. Maybe his life would turn around and everything would be fine. That didn’t really happen to start with, but John kept at his note writing. His thank-yous were not long---usually not more than four or five lines. He wrote them by hand because he wanted them to be personal.

He wrote to loved ones—his boys that were grown. He wrote business associates and friends that had made a difference in his life. Some he had not seen for a long time. As he opened his eyes and looked around him he slowly realized that he had been showed with a great many blessings that he had just ignored.

This is really a book about gratitude. There is no quick fix here—as if there ever was. This is simply the story of a man in deep trouble that found by changing the lenses through which he looked at life completely changed him. Some of the folk he wrote to had never received a thank-you note from anyone. He discovered that a great many of us feel unappreciated and are starved for simple affirmation.

This book has forced me to think of so many along the way that have made a difference in my life. At the end of the book he did not ride off into the sunset happy and smiling—but his life was forever different because of this simple word he had forgotten. Thanks.

It reminds me of Raymond Carver’s poem, “Gravy.” Carver was a great writer but was an alcoholic that lost about everything that mattered. But the last years of his life he turned things around with the loving help of a woman. I think Carver knew he was dying of lung cancer when he wrote these moving words. They are some of my favorites.

No other word will do.

For that’s what it was. Gravy.

Gravy, these past ten years.

Alive, sober, working, loving and

being loved by a good woman. Eleven years

ago he was told he had six months to live

at the rate he was going. And he was going

nowhere but down. So he changed his ways

somehow. He quit drinking! And the rest?

After that it was all gravy, every minute

of it, up to and including when he was told about,

well, some things that were breaking down and
building up inside his head. “Don’t weep for me,”
He said to his friends. I’m a lucky man. I
‘‘I've had ten years longer than I or anyone
expected. Pure gravy. And don’t forget it.”
             --from A Path to the Waterfall

Reynolds Price--A Profile in Courage

I heard it first on NPR Friday. Reynolds Price, age 77 had died. Reynolds Price was one of my favorite writers. He could take our language and make it sing. He wrote a multitude of books but the book I remember best was his autobiographical account of what happened to him some twenty-plus years ago. The Doctors discovered an eight-inch malignant tumor wrapped around his spinal column just below the neck. After a series of operations and radiation treatments Mr. Price was left paralyzed from the waist down. Doctors told his brother in 1984 he might live eighteen months. He died January 22 of this year.

After the removal of the tumor he was left with unremitting pain. He tried many remedies but it was hypnosis therapy, which, though not resolving the pain, helped him to begin to manage his life. So he told the story of that hard and winding journey of pain and recovery in the book, A Whole New Life. Through the years I have quoted from that book in sermons many times and recommended the book to many people. It tells is story of his (his words) inch-by-inch journey back from the edge of death to a new life as a different person.

Toward the end of that book he tells what he has learned.

“1. You’re in your present calamity alone, far as this goes. If you want a way out, then dig it yourself, if there turns out to be any trace of a way. Nobody—least of all a doctor—can rescue you now, not from the deeps of your own mind, not once they’ve stitched your gaping wound waiting to give you everything on Earth but your main want, which is simply the person you used to be.

2. Generous people—true practical saints, some of them boring as root canals—are waiting to give you everything on Earth but your main want, which is simply the person you used to be.

3. But you’re not that person now. Who’ll you be tomorrow? And who do you propose to be from here to the grave, which may be hours or decades down the road?”

Price was a deeply religious man without a trace of piousity. He said that verse in Deuteronomy helped turn him around: “I have you life and death, choose life.” And he did just that. He made a commitment, hard though it was, to find a whole new life. And he did.

Since his surgery he wrote many books. He won the National Book Critics Circle prize for his novel, Kate Vaiden. He has been praised as our one of our finest authors. An hour-long documentary on his life was viewed on national television. Besides writing he also taught writing and the poetry of Milton at Duke University.

I love A Whole New Life because it is a book of hope for all of us. It is a book of second chances and future possibilities. The book tells us that our lives really are in our hands. Reynolds Price was a man of prayer and he said “that one hard night" he asked God, “What now?” And the answer came back plain and clear: “ More." And in the light of that vision he has found his way.

He ends that book with these words:

"I’ve long since weaned myself from all drugs but a small dose of antidepressant, an aspirin to thin my blood, an occasional scotch or a good red wine and a simply acid to brace my bladder against infection. I write six days a week, long days that often run till bedtime; and the books are different from what came before in more than age. I sleep long nights with few hard dreams, and now I’ve outlived both of my parents. Even my handwriting looks very little like the script of the man I was in June of ’84. Cranky as it is, it’s taller, more legible, with more air and stride. It comes down the arm of a grateful man.”

Life is hard for many people. We lose those we love. Life takes a wrong turn we did not expect nor want. People disappoint us . When we look into the mirror we know that we have disappointed ourselves. Yet—any of us despite the burdens we carry can find the way if we choose. Reynolds helped me understand this powerful truth and this is why I have passed his book to so many people. Reynolds Price—You have fought an incredibly good fight—rest in peace.

A Semi-Hooray for Governor Bentley

Through the years we Alabamians have often said, “Thank God for Mississippi.” Well, yesterday it was our turn. I am sure Mississippi and a host of others must have said, “Thank God for Alabama.” Why? Our barely sworn-in Governor moved over to the Dexter Avenue Church of Martin Luther King fame and dropped a bombshell. Are you sitting down?

This is what he said, “Now I will have to say that, if we don’t have the same daddy, we’re not brothers and sisters. So anybody here today who has not accepted Jesus Christ as their savior, I’m telling you, you’re not my brother and you’re not my sister, and I want to be you brother.”


Reaction was swift in coming. Just a few hours before Governor Bentley had placed his hand on the Bible and declared, “I’m going to be the Governor of all Alabamians.” Then a media storm descended. Jewish folk, Muslims, Christians who know better. Atheists and every other stripe of faith were in an uproar. Do you have to be a Christian to be recognized as a first-class citizen in Alabama?

This Baptist was shame-faced with the new Governor’s first response, “I was speaking as an evangelical Christian who is as Baptist to other Baptists. We use some terminology that other people of other religions may not at all times understand.” Well, this Baptist preacher is ashamed of such a statement. In a state and world as divided as ours we need leaders to learn to say all distinctly. Government should recognize everyone is to be on the same footing. Oh, I know this is idealism—but it is our standard and goal. Governor, not all Baptists would dare use that terminology.


Well, thank goodness that is not the end of the story. As the phones started ringing in Montgomery and the pundits started speaking and writing across the county, Governor Bentley had his eyes opened. Not everybody in Alabama is Baptist, and not everybody is a Christian. Some of our folk don’t believe anything and others believe it all.


This was his response, “What I would like to do is apologize. I would like to say to anyone who heard those words and felt disenfranchised; I want to say I’m sorry. If you’re not a person who can say that you are sorry, you’re not a very good leader." He continued, “I want to tell people I am sorry if I offended anyone in any way."



It takes a mighty big man to scrape the egg off his face. And our new Governor has done just that. Maybe this is a teachable moment when he realizes he is to be Governor of all and not part. Maybe in the long run this will be good for our state. We usually only talk to our own kind. That circle is never big enough for any of us. Governor, I appreciate the apology and I hope every body will drop this issue and move on. We didn’t elect a Pastor when we chose Governor Bentley—we elected a Governor. We don’t need evangelizing from the State House—we can do that in the church. But we do need somebody to work hard on a new Constitution and finally put to bed that old threadbare 1901 moth-eaten document. And we need somebody as Governor that will do something about the corruption that is only a stone’s throw from the place Governor Bentley was inaugurated.


As I read that apology I could not help but think of Sarah Palin and if...

(You might want to read Joey Kennedy's good article about Governor Bentley. He's Op Ed Editor on Sunday for The Birmingham News.)
http://blog.al.com/jkennedy/2011/01/joey_kennedy_gov_bentley_apolo.html

Daybreak in Alabama and the Whole Country

"When I get to be a composer

I'm gonna write me some music about

Daybreak in Alabama

And I'm gonna put the purtiest songs in it

Rising out of the ground like a swamp mist

And falling out of heaven like soft dew.

I'm gonna put some tall tall trees in it

And the scent of pine needles

And the smell of red clay after rain

And long red necks

And poppy color faces

And big brown arms

And the field daisy eyes

Of black and white black

white black people

And I'm gonna put white hands

And black hands and brown and yellow hands

And red clay earth

hands in it

Touching everybody with kind fingers

And touching each other natural as dew

In that dawn of music when I

Get to be a composer

And write about daybreak

In  Alabama."

   --Langston Hughes, The Collected Poems

(Several years ago I wrote this piece for The Birmingham (AL) News editorial page on the week-end of Martin Luther King’s birthday. Even though this article is directed toward Alabama I thought it might say something to other folk in other states. This strange talk by the birthers and the bitterness that President Obama’s election has unearthed—says to me that we still have a long way to go.)

As a life-long Southerner, my first experience in race relations came late. I was sixteen years old and living in Columbus, Georgia. Our family did not have a car, so I rode the city bus practically everywhere I went.

On one of those bus trips downtown, the bus stopped and a black woman got on. She moved toward the back and found a seat. A few stops later a man got on and also moved toward the back of the bus. All the seats were taken and there was no place for him to sit down. He glared at the black woman sitting behind me. He kept staring while she looked at her hands in her lap. "Nigger," he said, "I need to sit down." She didn't move. Using that same ugly word a second time, he said, "Why don't you get back there where you belong--I want to sit down." The bus got very quiet. No one said a word. But something I had not felt before boiled up inside me. As a shy sixteen year old I could take it no longer. "Mister," I said, "if you would talk to her like a human being, she might get up and move." He turned his rage toward me. "Nigger lover," he spat out. Everybody turned and looked at me. The bus driver said, "Enough of that." The bus moved on toward town.

The woman got up, moved out of the man's way and he plopped down in her seat. She stood up, holding on to the bus strap until the next stop. The woman got off the bus. As the bus pulled away I looked out the bus window and saw her standing there with her head down, looking sad.

That day was the beginning of a long journey in understanding something of injustice. I had taken the black and white drinking fountains for granted. I had never wondered why all my classmates and teachers were all white. I never asked why only Caucasian folk attended my church or lived in my neighborhood. I did not know there were no African-American bus drivers or policeman or store clerks. Neither did I know that black soldiers at Fort Benning were kept in separate barracks and could not mix with the white soldiers. Later I would learn that blacks and whites were paid different salaries for the same work and that people of color far outweigh white folk in our prisons and on death row.

The old racist that day on the bus taught me a powerful lesson. For the first time in my life I had bumped into inequity and unfairness on a personal level. I knew something was terribly wrong that day on the bus though I could not easily put it into words.

We have come a long way since my bus ride that day in the early fifties. The progress that we have made racially has been enormous. We could not have made it without the great King and those thousands and thousands of foot soldiers that put their very lives on the line. The Birmingham community is filled with hundreds of those mostly nameless heroes.

Despite our progress we still have a long way to go. We have a bloated state Constitution that is filled with inequity and disparity on every page. Sunday may still be the most segregated hour of the week. For all of our diversity talk, we see little evidence of its influence in many segments of our daily lives. There are counties in this state whose mortality rate of infants is as low as many third-world countries. We still have not discovered a way to give a quality education to most of our children. The state of Alabama still ranks near the bottom of too many state lists.

As we celebrate Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday let us remember the way we were in the fifties. Let us never forget the dark pages of our history. Let us celebrate the enormous progress that we have made. But let us recommit ourselves to Langston Hughes’ vision called "daybreak in Alabama." It is an old and a good dream. A state and a nation where all find a place at the table and what every single citizen finds on that table is good indeed.

(If you drive to Five Points in downtown  Birmingham you will find this statue. Surrounded by bars, restaurants, homeless people and churches in the center of it all you will find a man kneeling in prayer. A Presbyterian minister in Birmingham, he was known throughout the city for his love for Birmingham. He gave away almost everything he had--he never let those in need go lacking. And so, after his death the city of Birmingham erected this moving statue of Brother Bryan praying for Birmingham.)

A Sermon for the Third Week after the Epiphany

"My friend and I have built a wall
  Between us thick and wide;
The stones of it are laid in scorn
  And plastered high with pride.

We talk across the stubborn stones
  So arrogantly tall--
Only we cannot touch our hands
  Since we have built the wall."
     --Elizabeth Morrow

Paul writes in this week’s lectionary text: “I appeal to you that all of you be in agreement and there be no divisions among you.” (I Cor.1. I0-13) Was he writing to Corinth or was he writing to us? He continues: “It has been reported to me that there are quarrels among you.” Was he writing to Corinth or was he writing to us?


Charles Talbert, a very fine New Testament scholar, has said that this is the centerpiece of his correspondence to Corinth. I wonder if, of all the words Paul wrote, perhaps they speak to the heart of our time, too.Lack of agreements. Divisions. Quarrels. We know them well. My daughter, who teaches the third grade, says 75% of those in her classroom come from broken homes. And she says the parents have no idea the sad stories of their lives they bring to class. We know it at every level of society. From a Committee meeting of the PTA, to denominational struggles all the way to Washington there is a power struggle going on. And looking out on today’s scene it seems that the common good has been lost in the shuffle of special interests and private causes. But beyond our borders there is a world out there. We can point in any direction from Haiti to Afghanistan and everywhere in between and the pain is palpable.

We’ve heard a lot of talk a bout Bi-partisanship. But we know it is a word and not a reality. One political leader spoke to a member of the opposition party recently and said, “We’ll be happy to work with anyone who agrees with us.” We know about lack of agreement, about divisions, about quarrels. We don’t have to look at Washington we don’t even have to leave church. We have no unearthly idea how to handle conflict. And the Church today is broken and fragmented. Pick any issue and you can stir up a pretty good fight. Interpretation of the Bible. Abortion. Education. Gay rights. Welfare reform. Church-state issues. Multiculturalism. Worship. Women’s concerns. We have called them: culture wars. We know about lack of agreement. Division. Quarrels. It is an uncivil world and the church in Corinth was not part of the solution. They were contributors to the problem. But let me ask you: was Paul talking about Corinth or was he talking about us?

If verses ten through thirteen of that first chapter form the heart of the letter then perhaps we can find some help for these quarrels, these divisions, this lack of agreement. I appeal to you, he said. I beseech you. I urge you—one translation says. It is an old word, appeal. It is used over one hundred times in the New Testament. It means, literally, to call to one’s side. Would you come over here? I’d like to talk to you. Not an over/under conversation. But let’s have a heart-to-heart. I’m worried and I want to talk to you about it.
So their old former Pastor gives them three words of advice. Christian civility in an uncivil world. Was he talking about Corinth or us?

AGREEMENT

First, he says, Now I appeal to you…that all of you be in agreement. He pleads with them to speak the same language. You remember the Tower of Babel in Genesis. God confused the languages and no one could understand one another. That’s where we are. It is an onomatopoetic term. Babel…babel…babel. Now agreement does not mean to all sound alike, to look alike, all dress alike. But it does mean to hear one another. It does mean to respect one another. It does mean to genuinely care for another.

Can’t you just see the Samaritan stopping to help the wounded, bleeding man? Before I help you, he says I must ask you some questions. The man looks up, through bleary, blood-covered eyes: “Yes” he says. “What is your stand on abortion?” The poor bleeding man just blinks. “Whom did you vote for President?” “Do you have a job—or are you on welfare?” The man slips away while the questions are being asked. Do these questions determine the quality of our help?

Agreement is harmony. Agreement is not singing in unison. Same notes, same sound. What kind of a choir would it is if all were sopranos or all basses? Cecil Sherman, long time Pastor, had some trouble once in a church he served. And so he illustrated where they were. He has a soloist to sing and while she sang the choir talked and laughed and chatted. Nobody listened. Nobody asked them to sing a solo. Then the Director asked the choir to sing. Half sang. The other half didn’t like the music so they just sat there with folded arms and pursed lips. Half the choir was up and half was down. And then the Director was getting desperate. He asked the entire choir to sing. And they did. About four different songs. They all sang their favorite songs at the same time. And it was a mess. It hurt your ears. Pandemonium. And then the Director began to plead: I beseech you…let’s sing together. And this time they all sang the same song. There were altos and basses and tenors and sopranos and it was beautiful. It was harmonious. Not all alike. Not even the same. But a commitment to the music. Paul said: I appeal to you. Be in agreement. Was he talking about Corinth or was he talking about us?

NO DIVISIONS

I appeal to you that there be no divisions among you. The word is schism. One translation says that you do no allow yourselves to be split up into parties. That you do not split up into factions. That there will be no cliques in your church. Was he talking about Corinth or was he talking about us? The word schizophrenia comes from this Greek word, schismata. It means to split apart. Words from deeds. Sometimes what we say over here is not what we say over there. There is a vast difference. We call it talking out of both sides of your mouth.

Don’t you have someone in your family with whom you have nothing whatsoever in common? Maybe you disagree on everything politically. Maybe theologically. Maybe it is just a matter of taste. You love country music and they love opera. You are crazy about barbecue and they love sushi. But it’s like to different worlds. Two different worldviews colliding. And yet you drive 500 miles to see them Christmas Day. And you love them and care for them—and they you. How is this possible? Well, you know them. You understand their hang-ups—and they yours. And even though there are some subjects you have to tiptoe around—there are no divisions or splits or gaps really. And you wouldn’t think of talking out of both sides of your mouth about them. Why? There are no divisions about the real thing. I appeal to you, Paul, said that there be no divisions. Was he talking about Corinth or you and me?

UNITED

He says: I appeal to you that you be united in the same mind and same purpose. All together—you should achieve a unity. This united is a medical term. It means to set a bone. And if you don’t set it you will be crippled for the rest of your life. Sometimes it means to put a joint back in place. But the real definition I like is that of mending nets. Take, he said, the torn, tattered nets and stitch them together back together.


When Jesus first called his first disciples they were kneeling by the sea. They were fishermen. And they were mending their nets. As they dragged the nets in they noticed the tears and the holes made by rocks and stumps and the years and the elements. They were patching the torn nets. For the nets would be of no use whatsoever without that mending. The fish would just slip through.

Be united. Paul said. Was he talking about Corinth or us? Jesus called them from catching fish to the catching of men and women and children, too. They wouldn’t do that with broken nets. And that was what the mending was all about.

John Killinger once invited his congregation to play a little game. He said: Think of five people in this church you would choose, if you had the power, to dismiss to other churches. Maybe you would choose someone because they were meanest, ugliest, most cantankerous church members you know. They are always hurting somebody’s feelings or stirring up trouble or standing in the way of progress. And then he said: What a terrible thing to even suggest in a sermon that we invite others to leave. But then he said: Now think of the five people you would hate most to lose from our church fellowship. Perhaps they are the people who always make you feel good when you meet them. Maybe they are always positive and uplifting in their attitudes. Maybe they are the people who attract others to join our fellowship and always open to new ideas and willing to risk new experiences for the good of the church. And then Killinger said: Have you made your two lists? Good. Then you are ready for the next step. Think about all the other people here playing the game with you. Imagine whether would be on one of their two lists. If you were on one, which list would it be? How does one avoid being on the wrong list?


Paul said: “Now I appeal to you, brothers and sisters, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you be in agreement and that there be no divisions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and the same purpose.”Don’t you wonder if Paul was talking about Corinth or was he talking about you and me? I wonder. I really wonder.

(When Coventry Cathedral was bombed by the Germans in the Second World War--nothing was left of the church but a bombed out shell. The people of Coventry decided to rebuild next to the bombed out site. They left what remained of the old church for all to see and remember that painful time.The sculptured piece in the above photograph stands in the ruins of the old Cathedral as a powerful testimony to reconciliation.)

A Time to Ponder

The horror of the shooting in Arizona ought to force us all to stop and think. Not only is Representative Gabrielle Giffords fighting for her life. 19 people were shot. One of Representative aids was killed. Arizona's Chief Federal Judge was killed. A little nine-year old girl born on September 11 was killed. 6 people were killed in all.

We are all shocked by this violent act. This is not the time to ask where her protectors? Or where the protectors for the other 18 persons that were shot. This is not even the time to get on the anti-gun bandwagon as much as I despise too many guns in too many hands. This is not the time to wage any kind of campaign. It is the time to ponder what kind of a people are we really. The political climate the last few years has gotten worse and worse. The stridency of so many voices drowns out reason. The fear of where we are going economically has seemed to make people crazy. It is time to tone down the attacks by radio and other forms of the media. Some of those that scream Constitution as if it were the Bible seem to have forgotten that the document was written to help us find our way together. Osama Ben Laden must be sitting in his cave laughing as we spit and claw and scream and hate one another.

Most folk are not like the man with that gun in Arizona. We are decent people and most of us want the same things for ourselves and for those around us. And yet we live in a climate which gets more and more toxic.

The best word I have read on this subject was written before the shooting. It came in my mail just this week from the Collegeville Institute for Ecumenical and Cultural Research. The publication of that group is called Bearings for the Life of Faith. The first article in the Autumn/Winter 2010 issue is by Parker J. Palmer. It is called "The Heart of Politics." He says ours is really heart trouble. And he writes that you can't have politics without addressing the political heart today. Read this article for yourself and ponder where we are. We've been over this violent, chaotic road many times before. When someone is public life, particularly is shot we stop and ponder and usually go back to business as usual. This could be a teachable moment for all of us. We need to learn that words matter terribly. Read Parker Palmer's article and ponder where we are and where we will end up. http://collegevilleinstitute.org/assets/bearings/winter/index.html