The 'subtle' is dead

OK, I can't not comment on Fr. Blazon's remarks from Fifth Business that I promised in my last post I wouldn't comment on.

Remember his words (or go to the last post to get the whole story) Blazon quotes Einstein, who said, "God is subtle, but he is not cruel"

The problem in America these days is subtlety is mostly non-existent. There are no subtleties in our public discourse. There is the Left and the Right. There is Liberal and Conservative. There is Yea and Nay and nothing in between.

There is 'political correctness' and what Donald Trump says. There is no nuance, no 'ironic but toward the truth', no middle ground.

We are locked in a battle that is 'my way or the highway' all around.

We need subtlety in how we talk about things with each other.

All we have is 'cruelty'.

How cruel of those congressmen who didn't go to the Pope's address because they knew he would mention climate change and immigration.

How cruel of Jeb Bush to say of the slaughter in Oregon, "Things happen."

How cruel of The Donald to say that if he's president he'll 'send back' any of the migrants from Syria who come here.

How cruel of the Congress to invent an investigation against Planned Parenthood--an agency that gives health care to mostly poor women--based on lies.

How cruel of the Speaker of the House in waiting to admit that the whole Benghazi investigation was to damage Hillary Clinton. (Oh, wait, that was 'the truth'--it was the made-up 8 committees to invent that a tragedy was a conspiracy was what was cruel.)

I could go on but since most everything would be about Republicans, I should stop lest you think I'm a Democrat.

The moral is, where is the subtlety in our public life? Where is the nuance? Where is the irony? Where is the complexity and the confusion?

Everyone is so sure of themselves and their views--me too, by the way.

I long for a public discourse full of actually grappling with issues rather than taking a side and standing by your position no matter what.

I long for subtlety and nuance and complexity.

I can't find it in the way we shout at each other.

But I need it. I do.

The Old Man's Puzzle

I want to share with you a short passage from Robertson Davies novel, Fifth Business. An elderly French Jesuit named Blazon is talking to a Canadian teacher and writer named Dunstan Ramsey. Ramsey has just asked Blazon how he can be a holy man after just having consumed a whole chicken and a whole bottle of wine at dinner. Blazon then replies. Listen:

“Listen, Ramezay, have you heard what Einstein says?—Einstein, the great scientist, not some Jesuit like old Blazon. He says: ‘God is subtle, but He is not cruel.’ There is some sound Jewish wisdom for your muddled Protestant mind. Try to understand the subtlety, and stop whimpering about the cruelty. Maybe God wants you for something special….

“….I am quite a wise old bird but I am no desert hermit who can only prophesy when his guts are knotted in hunger….I am deep in the old man’s puzzle, trying to link the wisdom of the body with the wisdom of the spirit until the two are one….you cannot divide spirit from body without anguish and destruction.”

“I am deep in the old man’s puzzle,” Father Blazon said, “trying to link the wisdom of the body with the wisdom of the spirit until the two are one.”

I'm not even going to comment on that. Just sharing it is enough.

 

ok, I feel ready

I put in a lot of time today on the Gospel of Philip. I feel ready to lead it without faking it.

It's amazing how much you forget when you're not looking when you're 68. I've taught the Gospel of Philip before, a couple of years ago, and probably didn't need this much prep.

I'm 68. Just writing that, without saying it out loud, shakes me to my core, the very center of my being.

How can I be this old? How can I have a son who is 40 and a daughter who is 37? A wife 65.  And granddaughters 9 and 6 almost? How did this happen? How does so much time pass?

My mind and heart and soul feels like they're approaching 35. My body, on the other hand, knows there are several decades more to take in mind.

When I wrote "68" up above, a part or me said, "wait, that must be 58", but I'm on social security and medicare and have been for 6 years.

How did I get this old? Back in my pseuto-Hippie days, I thought I would live fast, love hard, die young and leave a beautiful memory. I didn't think I'd make it to 50, much less 60 and being 19 months from 70 is like crazy!!!

Time flies when you're having fun.

I guess that's it. Not as bad as it could be: 'time flies when you're miserable.'

I've over reached

So, I'm in the midst of a ten session class about the so-called Gnostic Christians and the literature from Nag Hammadi in Egypt discovered in 1945.

I've done 5 session classes about it before, but, looking forward to 7 more Fridays, I realize I'm over my head.

I know more about the so-called Gnostic Christian writings than 98% of the people in the world. But to do 10 hour and a half classes I need to know more than 99.5% of the people in the world. I'll spend about four hours tomorrow getting ready for the Gospel of Philip.

Over my head is not something I like. I like to be 'way  ahead of the norm'. That's the way I operate best, being at the top of my game.

When I'm not, I'm a wreck.

Which what I am, not being totally on top of the Gospel of Philip like I'd like to be.

Oh, I could fake it. I'm good at 'faking it' and have a lot of times. But this isn't one of those times.

I'll put in the hours tomorrow and be passing for brilliant, since no one else in the room knows more that 15% of the people in the world know about the so-called Gnostic Christians.

But I don't want to 'fake it', though I could.

I'll put in the time tomorrow and give them my best on Friday.

All I want to do, all of the time, give folks 'my best'.

That's what they deserve.

Next time I teach it will be a five week course about something I know enough about to do 10 weeks. That's what folks deserve. What we all deserve.

More than enough.

Created in the image and likeness of God, we deserve, always and forever, more than enough.

Just like that.

on roller skates, no less

My friend, Charles, who is a retired Geology professor and one of the most brilliant people I know, sent me a U-tube link to two German? Dutch? girls, very lovely, roller skating around a huge room with most people at picnic tables but others in rows above, playing accordions, of all things, and singing in some language that sounds vaguely German but could be anything Scandinavian.

First of all: accordions. I had several members of my mother's family who played them--badly or well, I couldn't tell you since the whole instrument is only slightly lower on the "annoying scale" than bag-pipes. Plus they played them in evangelical churches to accompany hymns above bagpipes on the 'annoying scale'.

Second, roller-skates. I've never done them and never will. Weak ankles and all that, but it always seemed to me to be a rather nonsensical way to get around. Like what to do with stairs? I see many roller skaters on the Canal and most of them are middle aged me with too many cushions and huge helmets who go so far from left to right and right to left that you have to get off the path to pass them, especially with a dog. They should have considered treadmills or bridge.

Finally, who goes somewhere to watch this and pays (I'm sure) money for the privilege?  And there were hundreds of people there.

The, after 'finally', I noticed U-Tube had lots of other video of the same two young women, lovely and kind and wonderful I'm sure, singing and playing accordions and roller skating.

Maybe it's a 'thing' somewhere. But not here, where I'm sitting.

And my biggest question is why is this brilliant, scholarly man who knows about 12 times more stuff than I even begin to know, watching U-Tube at all? And if he is watching it, why girls on roller skates playing accordions and singing?

Charles, ever heard of Huffington Post????

John Boehner and the future of politics

So, during the Pope's address, John Boehner, who invited Francis to speak, cried more than even usual.

And the next day he got up and, after his prayers (and I believe that!) decided, "why am I doing this?" and quit as Speaker of the House and a member of Congress.

I went to Stop-and-Shop in Cheshire today and outside the door where people try to raise money, there was a table of used books and cupcakes and four young men and a banner that said, "Young Republicans of Cheshire High School".

I ignored them on the way in and would have on the way out except one of them, an Asian kid, said, "want to look at the books". And I said, hard-hearted as it was, "my heart is broken that their are 'young' Republicans...." And I meant it, even though at their age I was a fan of Barry Goldwater until he suggested selling the Tennessee Valley Authority that made our electricity in southern West Virginia and over several states, remarkably cheaper for a whole lot of Appalachians who didn't have much money.

Hopefully, in my way of looking at it, they'll grow out of it too. Just listen to the debates, young Republicans.....

Boehner, as much as I didn't like him, made a lot more sense that the Tea Party nuts in Congress. Boehner actually still believed in compromise and making deals. He, more or less, held the Republicans in line. Without him, who knows, total chaos in the House? Not beyond reason.

This ''my way or the highway" attitude of the most Conservative Republicans can make the already unacceptable grid-lock in the government even worse.

But then, if that happened, by the time those young men at Stop and Shop could vote, maybe Americans will come to their senses and put the Democrats back in charge.

I know I've written this before--that I'm a Yellow Dog Democrat. If Pope Francis, as much as I admire him, was running as a Republican against a Democrat who was a Yellow Dog, the Lab would get my vote.

Maybe I was unkind to those 'young Republicans'. But maybe they, like those finally fed up the Speaker of the House, don't care a fig about a Democrat's broken heart. Who knows?

I actually admire Boehner's faith and his values. After the Pope told the Congress that we must find ways to talk and solve problems in spite of disagreement, several bills came up in the house that threatened to shut down the federal government again.

I think John Boehner just said, "enough already". I can bless him for that. I just don't know what the fallout of his absence will be.....

Yogi, who else?

Yogi Berra died at 90. A good chunk of years to live and live well.

Yogi was so much a part of my childhood--along with Whitey and Mickey and Bobby and Elston and Rodger and Moose and Andy and all the other Yankees of the 50's and 60's.

My father was a Yankee fan because before shipping off to Europe for WW II someone gave him a ticket to a Dodger/Yankee World Series game and he decided whichever team won the first and only major league game he ever saw in person would be his 'team'. And the Yankees won.

So, I grew up in the mountains of West Virginia, unaccountably rooting for the New York Yankees. Always. And still do.

Yogi was the best of them all. Always good for a quote: "It's not over 'til it's over"; "Baseball is 90% mental and the other half is physical"; "It's hard to get a conversation started since everyone's talkin'".

On and one he went, saying one ridiculously true thing after another. And being one of the best guys who ever knelt down behind home plate, called pitches and caught them.

I  have two favorite memories of Yogi. One was from 1955 (or was it 1956? I'm awash in linear time) when he ran out and jumped into Don Larson's arms after the only perfect game in a World Series. The other was (I'll leave you to supply the year....1960, maybe) when Bill Mazeroski hit a home run over the left field fence and Yogi, playing left field, trotted back and back and looked up as the World Series was won by Pittsburgh.

And he always showed up for 'old-timers' games and said something in his interview that was priceless--ridiculous and true, always.

I hope Heaven has a baseball diamond. That's what I hope.

Farewell, Yogi, you filled my life up to overflowing.....