Sunday, October 17, 2010
Maintenance Issues at home
During the past couple of months we've had to deal with (1) a water shortage and (2) deck rot. We experienced drought during much of the summer and early fall which caused the water level in our spring to drop to a very low level. We had to haul in water for over a month -- all of September, plus -- but heavy rain in early October filled it again. Meanwhile three chipmunks managed to get in the spring and drown, and had to be pulled out. So we're not drinking from it yet, but have plenty for washing, etc. At the same time we have been aware of some soft spots in our deck. Our friend Tom Goldschmid helped us take down the metal roofing under the deck so we could get a good look at the joists. Fortunately they are basically solid! Just two spots that for some reason have rot just on the top of the joist. We can "sister" those two joists and solve the problem. Meanwhile I did a power wash of the entire deck, above and from underneath, and next week will treat everything with wood preservative. So I'm hoping to extend the life of the deck. When the deck was rebuilt ten or so years ago, I did not use pressure-treated joists because at that time, they contained arsenic and I wanted to avoid using that kind of toxic chemical. I understand that pressure-treated wood today may be more "green."
The Shirley Harris at Wellesley Project
Shirley Harris in 1950
+++++++++
I started a wonderful project about a month ago. It came about as the result of running across an archive of letters that Shirley (Katie's grandmother, who passed away in 1998) wrote home to her parents when she went off to college at Wellesley, fall of 1950, sixty years ago this fall. When I learned from Katie that she wished she could get more "snail mail" I got the idea of sending her annotated copies of Shirley's letters home. It's turned out to be a fascinating project for me, and I think Katie is really enjoying it too. Shirley was amazingly prolific in writing letters (or post cards) home. She wrote on average once a week, sometimes more. They are full of information about her courses, her dates, college life, her roommate, lectures and concerts, etc. I'm sending Katie a photocopy of the original letter, but in addition I am transcribing each letter and footnoting it to provide background information and explanations of allusions to people, places, things, etc. I'm sending them each at the time Shirley sent them originally. So far I've sent four and am up to October 15th. If I am given the time to complete this project I hope to turn it into a book. It should be a wonderful window into the life of an amazing woman as well as a glimpse of college life in the 1950s. Here's a sample of one of the letters:++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
October 3, 1950
Dear Folks:
We’ve been enjoying the lamp and the rugs very much and the jelly from Aunt Grace too. (1) I bought some crackers and cheese and when I over-slept this morning and missed breakfast, it came in very handy.
I’ve started my fall sport and enjoy it to the utmost. It is tennis, and I feel I’m really improving my game. (2) I have it on Monday and Friday afternoon.
I checked on train schedules and I can get a train from
Framingham to Schnectedy (sic) on Friday at 2:33 which arrives in Schnectedy at 7:02 which is very convenient only it means that I must skip not only two of my Saturday classes, but also two of my Friday classes. These classes include Soc, Latin, English Lit and Botany. There is also a train leaving Framingham at 3:36 or so and arrives after 8:30. but I feel that that is too late. What is your opinion? If I am taking the 2:33 I must reserve a seat so please tell me which I should do as soon as possible. (3)
I sent my laundry bag today and I’d appreciate it if you would include anything of interest in the advance when you send it back. (4) Oh, incidentally Pop, how’s about my miraculous Giants? (5) I never dreamed that they’d end up where they were. I was overjoyed.
Let me know about any further details of the wedding. I can’t think of anything else except will you please fill out the enclosed form and send it to me.
See you at the wedding,
Lots of love. Shirley
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
2. There was a period of our lives when Shirley and I played tennis fairly regularly in the summertime. This was when we went to the A-frame, a summer camp we built in Dummerston in 1960-62, near where we live now. Our neighbors, the Baldwins, had a tennis court, and we played tennis there (and occasionally on courts in other places). Shirley had one maddening ability in tennis – she almost always managed to return the ball. Maybe not gracefully or with speed, but she just got it back over the net, again and again!
3. Since Shirley says, “see you at the wedding” at the end of this letter, this discussion of trains to Schenectady must be about her going to a wedding, and the only person whose wedding could take her away from classes, and be in Schenectady, would be her brother, Ladd. Ladd worked for the General Electric Company in Schenectady. (Shirley’s father worked for GE also, all his life, as Administrative Assistant to the President of GE. He worked for three presidents in that capacity. He worked in the corporate office in New York City).
This wedding ended up being cancelled. I don’t know who the woman was, or why it was cancelled. I remember Shirley telling me once that Ladd was in love with a girl who was a Catholic, and that her parents “broke up” that relationship (i.e., they didn’t approve of it and I guess Ladd honored their feelings). I don’t know if this is that girl or not. It is a sad story, and I think that Shirley’s parents came to regret very much that they broke it up, because the woman Ladd ended up marrying – sort of on the rebound from this break-up, as I recall – was not the right person and they were pretty miserable. Ladd died in 1960 at the age of 39 – he was given hepatitis by an osteopathic physician who was giving him vitamin shots with an unsterilized needle, and the disease proved fatal. His three children were very young. I’ve sort of kept in touch with them. These are, again, your first cousins once removed– Robbie, Patty Ann, and Jim. Robbie’s son, also named Ladd, was married a few years ago and I went to the wedding. Jim lives in Haddonfield, NJ and has a boy, Matthew, by his second wife (whose name is also Patty, I think). Patty Ann is in Port St. Lucie, Florida, and Robbie is in NJ somewhere I think. Patty Ann has a son, Josh (I don’t know where he is) and Ladd, Jr. has a sister Kelly. (I remember one time we visited Rob and his wife Maureen (now divorced) and we watched a video of Kelly, who was starring in a high school production of Annie. Don’t know if she has kept up her interest in musical theater or not. These are all your second cousins.
Shirley idolized her brother, and she grieved his untimely death all her life. Writing this inspires me to see if I can reach Jim and find out where all these folks are today.
4. Those were the days when you sent your laundry home from college for your mom to wash, dry, fold, and send back!! Imagine that! I did the same when I was in college – at least at first. I think by the end of my freshman year I was doing my own. It was cheap – as I recall, it cost just $1 or so to mail a laundry case – they made special cases just for that purpose. When Shirley says, “send back anything of interest in the advance” she is referring, I’m sure, to the Staten Island Advance, the local newspaper. She was probably interested in news clippings about her classmates at Curtiss High School, or her church, the Brighton Heights Reformed Church, or anything of general interest about events or changes or controversies in the community.
5. The New York Giants were a major league baseball team (now based in San Francisco, a move made in 1957). One of their star hitters, Bobby Thompson, graduated from Curtis High School on Staten Island about 8 years before Shirley did, and that may have been one reason why the Giants were her favorites. I’m not sure why she is so excited about them in the Fall of 1950 – so far as I can find out, they finished in third place at the end of the regular season, and they didn’t win the pennant and certainly not the World Series. But in 1948, Leo Durocher had moved from the Brooklyn Dodgers to become the Giants manager, and by 1950, they were on the way up. They ended the season just 3 games behind the Dodgers, which was pretty good. Now the 1951 season – that’s another story (but you’ll have to wait till next year to hear about that!).
Trip to Columbia, MO
I'm in Columbia for my granddaughter, Katie's 19th birthday, which was yesterday. This is a big weekend for Ellen and me - Ellen is at her 50th High School Reunion in Swarthmore, PA and I am here in Columbia. She dropped me off at Bradley airport Friday morning and will pick me up there Monday evening when I return, so I didn't have to leave a car there. We had a lovely day yesterday. I got to hear Katie's description of her first two months at college, at Southeast Missouri State University (SEMO) in Cape Girardeau. She loves her classes, she likes being at SEMO, but Cape Girardeau is both boring and conservative. That it is the home of Rush Limbaugh sort of says it all I guess. She said that if she sees another "Don't blame me, I voted for John McCain" bumper sticker, she'll scream. So I don't know what that means for her long-term survival at SEMO. Meanwhile, her schedule is Ballet, Jazz Dance, Theater Appreciation, Acting, a UI100 Seminar called "Creativity," (which she described as teaching you what the University wants you to learn), Rehearse in Product (the whole theater department gets together and has discussions), and Algebra. Philip Edgecombe is her prof for Ballet, Jazz Dance and Theater Appreciation - fortunately she likes him a lot. In her second semester she will have the opportunity to add Voice and be involved in some choral groups. She likes the people, she has friends, she likes her courses, the food is pretty good, she likes her roommate. I guess that is not too bad for a start. We'll see how things unfold.
After that we picked up Rose Shay, Rob's 92 year old mother who now lives in a nursing home nearby, and we went to an unusual event -- a Roasted Chestnut Festival! Held near Boonville, MO at the Mizzou Ag Dept. Field Station, it showcased the wine and nut growers of Missouri. There were many booths where you could sample wine, various nuts (e.g., hickory, black walnut and chestnut), and could also sit down and have a lunch of elk or bison burgers. It was pretty interesting and the roasted chestnuts dipped in olive and garlic were delicious. Rose was in a wheel chair which we managed to maneuver around the grounds. She's a trooper.
After that we regrouped at home and then went to the University Club for a delicious birthday dinner. The food and wine are excellent, Katie and her dad had a four-course lobster dinner, I had tasty crab cakes and salad and a delicious fig tart. After that we went to Rose's room and Katie opened presents. In the evening, with Katie's help, I downloaded and set up Skype. Now we can communicate by sight as well as sound. I hope we can figure out a way to do that with Paul, Jenny and Max in Wyoming. That would make the distance seem much less great.
In between I've been reading Gershom Scholem's Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism which I first read in the 1960s in grad school and for some reason felt drawn to pick up again. It is fascinating to read again because it resonates in completely new ways now. It relates to the conversations I've been having with my son John on meditation, it relates to what I'm learning about Quaker mysticism through Ellen, and it relates in a big way to a world I know nothing about -- warrior video games -- which it turns out owe a great deal to the Qabbalah. Thus for example the ten Sefiroth of the Qabbalah, the emanations from the Divine Being that form the material and spiritual world of time and space, have been morphed into a warrior called Sephiroth who I guess is really huge in Final Fantasy 7. Who would have known?
After that we picked up Rose Shay, Rob's 92 year old mother who now lives in a nursing home nearby, and we went to an unusual event -- a Roasted Chestnut Festival! Held near Boonville, MO at the Mizzou Ag Dept. Field Station, it showcased the wine and nut growers of Missouri. There were many booths where you could sample wine, various nuts (e.g., hickory, black walnut and chestnut), and could also sit down and have a lunch of elk or bison burgers. It was pretty interesting and the roasted chestnuts dipped in olive and garlic were delicious. Rose was in a wheel chair which we managed to maneuver around the grounds. She's a trooper.
After that we regrouped at home and then went to the University Club for a delicious birthday dinner. The food and wine are excellent, Katie and her dad had a four-course lobster dinner, I had tasty crab cakes and salad and a delicious fig tart. After that we went to Rose's room and Katie opened presents. In the evening, with Katie's help, I downloaded and set up Skype. Now we can communicate by sight as well as sound. I hope we can figure out a way to do that with Paul, Jenny and Max in Wyoming. That would make the distance seem much less great.
In between I've been reading Gershom Scholem's Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism which I first read in the 1960s in grad school and for some reason felt drawn to pick up again. It is fascinating to read again because it resonates in completely new ways now. It relates to the conversations I've been having with my son John on meditation, it relates to what I'm learning about Quaker mysticism through Ellen, and it relates in a big way to a world I know nothing about -- warrior video games -- which it turns out owe a great deal to the Qabbalah. Thus for example the ten Sefiroth of the Qabbalah, the emanations from the Divine Being that form the material and spiritual world of time and space, have been morphed into a warrior called Sephiroth who I guess is really huge in Final Fantasy 7. Who would have known?
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
A Tolles Family Visit to Weathersfield, VT
On Saturday, September 11, 2010, Ellen Tolles (b. November 15, 1942, Philadelphia, PA) made a return visit to Weathersfield to look further into her Tolles family roots. She was accompanied by her sister, Katie Tolles (b. May 7, 1949, Philadelphia, PA), Katie’s partner, Savanna Ouelette, and Ellen’s husband, the Rev. Larrimore Crockett. Ellen and Katie’s brother, James (b. November 21, 1944, Philadelphia, PA), who lives in Maine, was unable to be present on this occasion, but hopes to make a visit in the future. These three siblings are the children of Frederick Barnes Tolles (b. April 18, 1915, Nashua, NH; d. April 18, 1975, Wallingford, PA). F. B. Tolles was an eminent historian of colonial Quaker history and Director of the Friends Historical Library at Swarthmore College, PA).
Before meeting Edith Hunter (an amazing 90-year-old who is the town historian) at 2:00pm, the party visited the Plain Cemetery, which Ellen and Larrimore had visited on Sept. 3rd (but which Katie had never seen), where Henry Tolles 2nd (1783-1849), and Clark Tolles (1758-1832), Ellen and Katie’s ggg grandfather and gggg grandfather, respectively, are buried, with their wives. The main purpose of today’s visit was to go to the Tolles Cemetery to see the graves of Capt. Henry Tolles [IV] (b. August 2, 1736, New Haven, CT; died May 5, 1810, Weathersfield, VT), and his wife, Hannah Clark, their ggggg grandfather and grandmother.[1] They met Edith a little after 2pm and she led them up Goulden Ridge Road to the entrance point to the Tolles Cemetery.
The Tolles Cemetery is currently on land belonging to the Dale Gurney and Gene Limlaw family, who operate a horse farm there. Accessing the cemetery involves going under a chain onto an old road which the town of Weathersfield “threw up” decades ago, now a lovely grassy lane (an area which in olden times was a broad, open, training ground for the militia, now overgrown), and then going through a gate into a paddock, and then across the paddock to another gate, and finally through a third gate into the cemetery. Edith had made the necessary arrangements for this “trespass” with the owners. There were at least a half-dozen horses curious about this invasion of their turf, and they quickly came and surrounded the party, but they proved to be very friendly horses, and the party regretted not having picked up a few pockets full of apple drops, which they had passed on the old road, to thank the horses for their friendly greeting. Once inside the Tolles Cemetery, Edith took her ease on a convenient rock (this was perhaps her longest walking tour since her hip replacement in March), while the others searched out the headstones. The stones in the nearer end of the cemetery proved to be members of the Dart family (some of whom intermarried with the Tolles), but at the farther end, they found what they were seeking: the graves of Capt. Henry Tolles and his wife Hannah. They were saddened to discover that the headstone has split in half, with the top half now sitting in front of (and obscuring) the bottom half. Perhaps that can be repaired.
Capt. Henry Tolles was one of the earliest settlers of Weathersfield, coming with his large family in 1780. He was an extensive landowner, owning at one time over 1200 acres in Weathersfield, and was also a town leader, holding several town offices and serving on several committees, the most important of which was the one which determined the site of the first meeting house, and built that meeting house, the parsonage and settled the first pastor, the Rev. Dan Foster (all on land deeded the town by Capt. Henry Tolles). Ellen and Katie had had no previous inkling of their connection with this distinguished early citizen of Weathersfield. You can imagine their excitement in finding his grave site and learning about him from the extensive holdings at the Weathersfield Historical Society Library, which was the next stop after the Tolles Cemetery.
At the Library, the party perused the large “Tolles” file, containing, inter alia a detailed narrative about Capt. Henry Tolles written by the meticulous Weathersfield historian, Raymond Beardslee (a resident Congregational minister in the earlier part of the 20th century); looked through (and ultimately purchased) copies of John L. Hurd’s 2 vol. Weathersfield Century One and Two (1978), and E.W. Butterfield’s A Record of Inhabitants (1940/1990); and peppered Edith with many questions, for which she usually had an immediate answer. Larrimore (who has himself authored a 450p. history of the Guilford (VT) Congregational Church), made photographic copies of many pages of the files, and averred that he would like to return and settle into the Library for a few days of browsing, study and research. With the coming of winter, that will probably have to wait until next spring. In gratitude for her gracious assistance, Ellen presented Edith with a copy of Frederick Barnes Tolles’ book Meeting House and Counting House, The Quaker Merchants of Colonial Philadelphia 1682-1763 (W.W. Norton & Co., 1963). The Tolles party can now look forward to weeks of assimilating all the information about their ancestors which they obtained in this brief but productive visit, and undoubtedly will return to track down new leads and hunt for an old Tolles family cellar hole or two. Many thanks to Edith Hunter and to the Weathersfield Historical Society for their excellent assistance and record-keeping.
[1] The line from Capt. Henry Tolles [IV] to Ellen, Katie and James Tolles is Henry Tolles [IV] to Clark Tolles to Henry Tolles 2nd, to Horace Clark Tolles to Henry Joel Tolles to James Ulysses Tolles to Frederick Barnes Tolles, their father.
Before meeting Edith Hunter (an amazing 90-year-old who is the town historian) at 2:00pm, the party visited the Plain Cemetery, which Ellen and Larrimore had visited on Sept. 3rd (but which Katie had never seen), where Henry Tolles 2nd (1783-1849), and Clark Tolles (1758-1832), Ellen and Katie’s ggg grandfather and gggg grandfather, respectively, are buried, with their wives. The main purpose of today’s visit was to go to the Tolles Cemetery to see the graves of Capt. Henry Tolles [IV] (b. August 2, 1736, New Haven, CT; died May 5, 1810, Weathersfield, VT), and his wife, Hannah Clark, their ggggg grandfather and grandmother.[1] They met Edith a little after 2pm and she led them up Goulden Ridge Road to the entrance point to the Tolles Cemetery.
The Tolles Cemetery is currently on land belonging to the Dale Gurney and Gene Limlaw family, who operate a horse farm there. Accessing the cemetery involves going under a chain onto an old road which the town of Weathersfield “threw up” decades ago, now a lovely grassy lane (an area which in olden times was a broad, open, training ground for the militia, now overgrown), and then going through a gate into a paddock, and then across the paddock to another gate, and finally through a third gate into the cemetery. Edith had made the necessary arrangements for this “trespass” with the owners. There were at least a half-dozen horses curious about this invasion of their turf, and they quickly came and surrounded the party, but they proved to be very friendly horses, and the party regretted not having picked up a few pockets full of apple drops, which they had passed on the old road, to thank the horses for their friendly greeting. Once inside the Tolles Cemetery, Edith took her ease on a convenient rock (this was perhaps her longest walking tour since her hip replacement in March), while the others searched out the headstones. The stones in the nearer end of the cemetery proved to be members of the Dart family (some of whom intermarried with the Tolles), but at the farther end, they found what they were seeking: the graves of Capt. Henry Tolles and his wife Hannah. They were saddened to discover that the headstone has split in half, with the top half now sitting in front of (and obscuring) the bottom half. Perhaps that can be repaired.
Capt. Henry Tolles was one of the earliest settlers of Weathersfield, coming with his large family in 1780. He was an extensive landowner, owning at one time over 1200 acres in Weathersfield, and was also a town leader, holding several town offices and serving on several committees, the most important of which was the one which determined the site of the first meeting house, and built that meeting house, the parsonage and settled the first pastor, the Rev. Dan Foster (all on land deeded the town by Capt. Henry Tolles). Ellen and Katie had had no previous inkling of their connection with this distinguished early citizen of Weathersfield. You can imagine their excitement in finding his grave site and learning about him from the extensive holdings at the Weathersfield Historical Society Library, which was the next stop after the Tolles Cemetery.
At the Library, the party perused the large “Tolles” file, containing, inter alia a detailed narrative about Capt. Henry Tolles written by the meticulous Weathersfield historian, Raymond Beardslee (a resident Congregational minister in the earlier part of the 20th century); looked through (and ultimately purchased) copies of John L. Hurd’s 2 vol. Weathersfield Century One and Two (1978), and E.W. Butterfield’s A Record of Inhabitants (1940/1990); and peppered Edith with many questions, for which she usually had an immediate answer. Larrimore (who has himself authored a 450p. history of the Guilford (VT) Congregational Church), made photographic copies of many pages of the files, and averred that he would like to return and settle into the Library for a few days of browsing, study and research. With the coming of winter, that will probably have to wait until next spring. In gratitude for her gracious assistance, Ellen presented Edith with a copy of Frederick Barnes Tolles’ book Meeting House and Counting House, The Quaker Merchants of Colonial Philadelphia 1682-1763 (W.W. Norton & Co., 1963). The Tolles party can now look forward to weeks of assimilating all the information about their ancestors which they obtained in this brief but productive visit, and undoubtedly will return to track down new leads and hunt for an old Tolles family cellar hole or two. Many thanks to Edith Hunter and to the Weathersfield Historical Society for their excellent assistance and record-keeping.
[1] The line from Capt. Henry Tolles [IV] to Ellen, Katie and James Tolles is Henry Tolles [IV] to Clark Tolles to Henry Tolles 2nd, to Horace Clark Tolles to Henry Joel Tolles to James Ulysses Tolles to Frederick Barnes Tolles, their father.
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
History of the Blanche Moyse Chorale
I've just published a history of the Blanche Moyse Chorale, titled More than Thirty Years of Glorious Sound. It is essentially a survey of every concert the Chorale has given from 1976 to the present -- when, where, what and who. Introductory articles by me and Calvin Farwell, the first president of the Chorale, provide background information and an overview. Appendices include reminiscences and tributes from Chorale members, past and present; a list of all works performed; a list of venues; and a roster of all members past and present. It's 116 pages all told.
I have been a Chorale member for 35 years. In that time, under the demanding and inspired direction of Blanche Moyse, the Chorale became one of the best amateur chorales in the country. I am not alone in feeling that singing under Blanche is one of the most important experiences of my life. We regularly sang Bach Cantatas every July in the Marlboro Music Festival, from 1977-2004, and also performed all the major choral works of Bach every fall in the New England Bach Festival. We also developed an extensive a cappella repertoire, covering five centuries, usually performed in the spring. In those 30 plus years we gave over 170 performances of the works of over 66 composers in 45 venues in six states, including two concerts in Carnegie Hall. We are still performing, now under the direction of Mary Westbrook-Geha. Blanche retired in 2005, and is over 100 years old! What a wonderful legacy!
I've finished Scopes Retried and will soon post my thoughts. It has got me thinking, that's for sure.
I'm planning a film discussion series on our addiction to oil with the Dummerston Congregational Church. We'll be looking at Robert Flaherty's Louisiana Story- a 1948 film with a whole new resonance today after the Gulf oil spill, and I hope to include also an LSU documentary Revisiting Louisiana Story which recontextualizes Flaherty's film. Flaherty, of course, was a resident of Dummerston. I never knew him, but knew his wife and daughters. Stay tuned for dates.
We're experiencing a fairly severe drought here in Dummerston. Our spring is down to dangerously low levels and we have been conserving water with fairly draconian measures -- no clothes washing, infrequent showers, flushing only with waste water from doing the dishes, etc.
Not sure what we'll do if it goes down below the intake pipe.
My granddaughter, Katie, seems to be having a good start to her college career at Southeast Missouri State Univ. She is into Theater and Music and seems very enthusiastic and excited about classes and opportunities. She auditioned for a major show, Blood Wedding, and got a call-back. We're rooting for her.
I have a new grand-niece, Maeve Grace, 8 lbs 11 oz, out in Illinois. Congrats to her parents, Rachael and Brendan Costello.
Monday I sang with the Hallowell Singers at a funeral and committal service, and I got to sing as a solo a song by Pete Seeger I had not known before: To My Old Brown Earth. It's a beautiful, simple song. You can find it on YouTube.
That's all for now.
I have been a Chorale member for 35 years. In that time, under the demanding and inspired direction of Blanche Moyse, the Chorale became one of the best amateur chorales in the country. I am not alone in feeling that singing under Blanche is one of the most important experiences of my life. We regularly sang Bach Cantatas every July in the Marlboro Music Festival, from 1977-2004, and also performed all the major choral works of Bach every fall in the New England Bach Festival. We also developed an extensive a cappella repertoire, covering five centuries, usually performed in the spring. In those 30 plus years we gave over 170 performances of the works of over 66 composers in 45 venues in six states, including two concerts in Carnegie Hall. We are still performing, now under the direction of Mary Westbrook-Geha. Blanche retired in 2005, and is over 100 years old! What a wonderful legacy!
I've finished Scopes Retried and will soon post my thoughts. It has got me thinking, that's for sure.
I'm planning a film discussion series on our addiction to oil with the Dummerston Congregational Church. We'll be looking at Robert Flaherty's Louisiana Story- a 1948 film with a whole new resonance today after the Gulf oil spill, and I hope to include also an LSU documentary Revisiting Louisiana Story which recontextualizes Flaherty's film. Flaherty, of course, was a resident of Dummerston. I never knew him, but knew his wife and daughters. Stay tuned for dates.
We're experiencing a fairly severe drought here in Dummerston. Our spring is down to dangerously low levels and we have been conserving water with fairly draconian measures -- no clothes washing, infrequent showers, flushing only with waste water from doing the dishes, etc.
Not sure what we'll do if it goes down below the intake pipe.
My granddaughter, Katie, seems to be having a good start to her college career at Southeast Missouri State Univ. She is into Theater and Music and seems very enthusiastic and excited about classes and opportunities. She auditioned for a major show, Blood Wedding, and got a call-back. We're rooting for her.
I have a new grand-niece, Maeve Grace, 8 lbs 11 oz, out in Illinois. Congrats to her parents, Rachael and Brendan Costello.
Monday I sang with the Hallowell Singers at a funeral and committal service, and I got to sing as a solo a song by Pete Seeger I had not known before: To My Old Brown Earth. It's a beautiful, simple song. You can find it on YouTube.
That's all for now.
Friday, August 13, 2010
Creation and Evolution
I’ve been reading a book titled Scopes Retried by Stephen Bartholomew, Jr. (2010 BelieversPress). It was given to me by a friend at the Guilford Community Church. It was written by her brother, who is a fundamentalist Christian. She wants me to read it and then meet with her and get my take on it. She has an intuitive feeling that her brother’s beliefs are “diametrically opposite” to hers, but she isn’t sure how to articulate that, especially with him. She loves her brother, but I gather that he is not an easy person to carry on a discussion with about religion without getting into a heated argument. So far I’ve read about 75 pages of the book. I’m trying to keep an open mind on it, but it isn’t easy. It is ostensibly a novel, but as a novel, it is awful. The characters in it are puppets, mouthpieces for the author’s point of view, two-dimensional cardboard figures, caricatures – you name it. The setting is a Madison, NH high school. So far, the main characters are:
The students:
Jennifer, a home-schooled, born-again Christian and fairly militant pro- creationist, anti-evolution spokesperson
David, a thoughtful friend of Jennifer who is struggling with the issue of creationism vs. evolution
Mike, another thoughtful struggler
Josh, a very bright sceptic who thinks creationists are stupid
Several others
Their parents: especially
Gary Newton, David’s father, who goes to the Episcopal Church, and
Michelle, David’s mother, who goes to Grace Bible Church, thus
setting up a potential conflict for David (and in his parents’ marriage)
Tom Lawton, Mike’s dad, who is a member of the School Board – a college biology major who runs a software company and who is passionate about birds (he is a distant relative of Audubon) and favorably disposed to the notion of intelligent design – i.e., a “scientist” who is skeptical of the claims of evolutionary theory.
Their teachers:
Mr. Potter, a science teacher who, of course, believes in evolution, and in whose class the whole issue of creationism vs. evolution is playing out, and who is willing at least to engage students like Jennifer in discussion
Barbara Henrickson, another science teacher who is more scornful of the whole creationist movement.
Two pastors:
Paul Hopkins, youth leader at Grace Bible Church and firm believer in biblical inerrancy, who holds meetings in which he seems to engage the students in discussion, and encourage them to express their views, but is in fact not willing to tolerate any belief system contrary to his own – and slyly manipulates them to turn them against anyone who doesn’t share his views, especially:
Pastor John Strong, the local Episcopal priest, who holds a view the author dubs “theistic evolution,” i.e., an attempt to hold Christian faith and evolutionary theory together in some sort of creative tension, but who I suspect is being set up to be the anti-Christ.
I thought at first the author might be attempting something more nuanced in presenting these characters. E.g., he described Mr. Potter on page 1 as “a good teacher who genuinely cared about his students.” But after 75 pages, I’m afraid I was wrong. The good guys all have white hats and the bad guys have black hats. I have some bad intuitions about where he will take all this. We’ll see.
The “action” so far involves the students doing research, mainly on the Internet, into both creationism and evolutionary theory, trying to sort out the various arguments pro and con on both views. So far, the main points being brought forward are (1) the idea that bird feathers could have evolved from lizard’s scales (as evolutionists seem to claim) is ridiculous on the face of it; (2) mutation, which is essential to the notion of evolutionary progress, has never actually been known to bring forth anything “new” or better; (3) there appears to be a plot to keep some scientific evidence favorable to creationists out of high school text books even though it is all over the Internet (e.g., there’s nothing in textbooks about a world-wide flood like that described in the story of Noah, but the Internet provides lots of “evidence” that such a flood did in fact take place) and (4) “theistic evolution” is an oxymoron – God can’t have anything to do with evolution and still be God.
Since this novel has cardboard characters who are mouthpieces for arguments, an assessment of it comes down to the arguments themselves. Here, I’ll confess, I’m not much of an expert. I have a pretty average grasp of the scientific arguments for or against evolutionary theory. I think I come to this whole issue with some basic assumptions: (1) “Evolution” is a paradigm, a mental construct, that tries to makes sense of a wide range of empirical evidence like fossils, DNA, etc. Evolution is itself not a “fact,” but a theory that tries to make sense of the facts. There are presumably other possible theories which could make some kind of sense of the facts. It isn’t clear to me yet whether creationists dispute the facts (i.e. what about fossils, or carbon dating), or whether they accept the facts but are trying to fit them into the Genesis account of creation. (My guess is that they dispute the facts). (2) I have gotten from somewhere the notion of “elegance,” i.e., that some theories are more elegant than others; e.g., Einstein’s theories are more elegant than Newton’s. It would be possible to “explain” the universe using Newtonian theory, but it would be inefficient, ugly, cumbersome, and leave a lot unexplained. Similarly, it would be possible to “explain” the universe using Genesis as a literal truth, but it would require a lot of highly contorted explanations (like, e.g., that God created fossils when he created the universe 6000 years ago, burying them in the ground intentionally in order to “test” humans and more or less coerce them to have to choose between the Bible and a “godless” alternative. With God, all things are possible! But would you want to worship a God who would do something like that? (3) I am attracted to the notion of intelligent design. I too find it incredible that intricate organs like the eye could have evolved through random mutation and natural selection (if that is what evolutionary theory claims – I need to bone up on this. I strongly suspect that the author is creating a straw man in his presentation of evolutionary theory, but I’m not sure). So I am sympathetic with some of the creationist views. (4) However, I approach this issue with the notion that scientific language and biblical language can’t really be placed on the same level in an effort to determine which is “true.” “Truth” is a pretty slippery concept in this context. I have a sort of vague Wittgensteinian idea that there is a lot that can’t be “said.” “Reality” is mostly mysterious, it is beyond our ability to “name” it. The Bible tries in one way to point to reality, and science tries in another way to do the same thing. They both have something to be said for them, and both are inadequate. I don’t think this is the author’s view. He wants to have a knock-down, drag out fight and declare a winner – THE BIBLE! I think he has very little tolerance for ambiguity, maybe none at all. (5) This book is essentially (I think) a diatribe against the policy prevalent in many public schools against allowing creationism to be taught alongside evolution as an alternate explanation of the world. I think the author is probably against “separation of church and state,” as a fundamental Constitutional principle. I suspect that the title, Scopes Retried, reflects his desire to rewrite history, to undo the effects of the original Scopes Trial, and to create a fantasy nation where Christian law prevails. We’ll see! It is a hard book to read, but I’m sort of interested to see how he will develop the plot (to the extent that there is one), and where he will come out at the end.
The students:
Jennifer, a home-schooled, born-again Christian and fairly militant pro- creationist, anti-evolution spokesperson
David, a thoughtful friend of Jennifer who is struggling with the issue of creationism vs. evolution
Mike, another thoughtful struggler
Josh, a very bright sceptic who thinks creationists are stupid
Several others
Their parents: especially
Gary Newton, David’s father, who goes to the Episcopal Church, and
Michelle, David’s mother, who goes to Grace Bible Church, thus
setting up a potential conflict for David (and in his parents’ marriage)
Tom Lawton, Mike’s dad, who is a member of the School Board – a college biology major who runs a software company and who is passionate about birds (he is a distant relative of Audubon) and favorably disposed to the notion of intelligent design – i.e., a “scientist” who is skeptical of the claims of evolutionary theory.
Their teachers:
Mr. Potter, a science teacher who, of course, believes in evolution, and in whose class the whole issue of creationism vs. evolution is playing out, and who is willing at least to engage students like Jennifer in discussion
Barbara Henrickson, another science teacher who is more scornful of the whole creationist movement.
Two pastors:
Paul Hopkins, youth leader at Grace Bible Church and firm believer in biblical inerrancy, who holds meetings in which he seems to engage the students in discussion, and encourage them to express their views, but is in fact not willing to tolerate any belief system contrary to his own – and slyly manipulates them to turn them against anyone who doesn’t share his views, especially:
Pastor John Strong, the local Episcopal priest, who holds a view the author dubs “theistic evolution,” i.e., an attempt to hold Christian faith and evolutionary theory together in some sort of creative tension, but who I suspect is being set up to be the anti-Christ.
I thought at first the author might be attempting something more nuanced in presenting these characters. E.g., he described Mr. Potter on page 1 as “a good teacher who genuinely cared about his students.” But after 75 pages, I’m afraid I was wrong. The good guys all have white hats and the bad guys have black hats. I have some bad intuitions about where he will take all this. We’ll see.
The “action” so far involves the students doing research, mainly on the Internet, into both creationism and evolutionary theory, trying to sort out the various arguments pro and con on both views. So far, the main points being brought forward are (1) the idea that bird feathers could have evolved from lizard’s scales (as evolutionists seem to claim) is ridiculous on the face of it; (2) mutation, which is essential to the notion of evolutionary progress, has never actually been known to bring forth anything “new” or better; (3) there appears to be a plot to keep some scientific evidence favorable to creationists out of high school text books even though it is all over the Internet (e.g., there’s nothing in textbooks about a world-wide flood like that described in the story of Noah, but the Internet provides lots of “evidence” that such a flood did in fact take place) and (4) “theistic evolution” is an oxymoron – God can’t have anything to do with evolution and still be God.
Since this novel has cardboard characters who are mouthpieces for arguments, an assessment of it comes down to the arguments themselves. Here, I’ll confess, I’m not much of an expert. I have a pretty average grasp of the scientific arguments for or against evolutionary theory. I think I come to this whole issue with some basic assumptions: (1) “Evolution” is a paradigm, a mental construct, that tries to makes sense of a wide range of empirical evidence like fossils, DNA, etc. Evolution is itself not a “fact,” but a theory that tries to make sense of the facts. There are presumably other possible theories which could make some kind of sense of the facts. It isn’t clear to me yet whether creationists dispute the facts (i.e. what about fossils, or carbon dating), or whether they accept the facts but are trying to fit them into the Genesis account of creation. (My guess is that they dispute the facts). (2) I have gotten from somewhere the notion of “elegance,” i.e., that some theories are more elegant than others; e.g., Einstein’s theories are more elegant than Newton’s. It would be possible to “explain” the universe using Newtonian theory, but it would be inefficient, ugly, cumbersome, and leave a lot unexplained. Similarly, it would be possible to “explain” the universe using Genesis as a literal truth, but it would require a lot of highly contorted explanations (like, e.g., that God created fossils when he created the universe 6000 years ago, burying them in the ground intentionally in order to “test” humans and more or less coerce them to have to choose between the Bible and a “godless” alternative. With God, all things are possible! But would you want to worship a God who would do something like that? (3) I am attracted to the notion of intelligent design. I too find it incredible that intricate organs like the eye could have evolved through random mutation and natural selection (if that is what evolutionary theory claims – I need to bone up on this. I strongly suspect that the author is creating a straw man in his presentation of evolutionary theory, but I’m not sure). So I am sympathetic with some of the creationist views. (4) However, I approach this issue with the notion that scientific language and biblical language can’t really be placed on the same level in an effort to determine which is “true.” “Truth” is a pretty slippery concept in this context. I have a sort of vague Wittgensteinian idea that there is a lot that can’t be “said.” “Reality” is mostly mysterious, it is beyond our ability to “name” it. The Bible tries in one way to point to reality, and science tries in another way to do the same thing. They both have something to be said for them, and both are inadequate. I don’t think this is the author’s view. He wants to have a knock-down, drag out fight and declare a winner – THE BIBLE! I think he has very little tolerance for ambiguity, maybe none at all. (5) This book is essentially (I think) a diatribe against the policy prevalent in many public schools against allowing creationism to be taught alongside evolution as an alternate explanation of the world. I think the author is probably against “separation of church and state,” as a fundamental Constitutional principle. I suspect that the title, Scopes Retried, reflects his desire to rewrite history, to undo the effects of the original Scopes Trial, and to create a fantasy nation where Christian law prevails. We’ll see! It is a hard book to read, but I’m sort of interested to see how he will develop the plot (to the extent that there is one), and where he will come out at the end.
Thursday, July 29, 2010
Weathersfield Congregational Church Service
Here is a service I led at the Weathersfield Congregational Church, VT on July 25th:
First Congregational Church of Wethersfield, Vermont
July 25, 2010
Organ Prelude
Welcome and opening words:
Read Mary Oliver’s Imagine from Evidence, p. 63
I don’t care for adjectives, yet the world
fills me with them.
And even beyond what I see, I imagine more.
Seeing, for example, with understanding,
or with acceptance and humility and
without understanding,
into the heart of the bristly, locked-in worm
just as it’s becoming what we call the luna,
that green tissue-winged, strange, graceful
fluttering thing.
Will death allow such transportation of the eye?
Will we see then into the breaking open
of the kernel of corn?
the sprout plunging upward through the damp clod
and into the sun?
Well, we will all find out, each of us.
And what would we be, beyond the yardstick,
beyond supper and dollars,
if we were not filled with such wondering?
Opening Hymn: #370 O - God of Earth and Altar
.
Announcements
Scripture Readings:
Deuteronomy 32:35-43:
35 Vengeance is mine, and recompense, for the time when their foot shall slip; because the day of their calamity is at hand, their doom comes swiftly. 36 Indeed the Lord will vindicate his people, have compassion on his servants, when he sees that their power is gone, neither bond nor free remaining. 37 Then he will say: Where are their gods, the rock in which they took refuge, 38 who ate the fat of their sacrifices, and drank the wine of their libations? Let them rise up and help you, let them be your protection! 39 See now that I, even I, am he; there is no god besides me. I kill and I make alive; I wound and I heal; and no one can deliver from my hand. 40 For I lift up my hand to heaven, and swear: As I live forever, 41 when I whet my flashing sword, and my hand takes hold on judgment; I will take vengeance on my adversaries, and will repay those who hate me. 42 I will make my arrows drunk with blood, and my sword shall devour flesh— with the blood of the slain and the captives, from the long-haired enemy. 43 Praise, O heavens,
Judges 7: 1 Then Jerubbaal (that is, Gideon) and all the troops that were with him rose early and encamped beside the spring of Harod; and the camp of Midian was north of them, below the hill of Moreh, in the valley. 2 The Lord said to Gideon, "The troops with you are too many for me to give the Midianites into their hand. Israel would only take the credit away from me, saying, "My own hand has delivered me.' 3 Now therefore proclaim this in the hearing of the troops, "Whoever is fearful and trembling, let him return home.' " Thus Gideon sifted them out; twenty-two thousand returned, and ten thousand remained. 4 Then the Lord said to Gideon, "The troops are still too many; take them down to the water and I will sift them out for you there. When I say, "This one shall go with you,' he shall go with you; and when I say, "This one shall not go with you,' he shall not go." 5 So he brought the troops down to the water; and the Lord said to Gideon, "All those who lap the water with their tongues, as a dog laps, you shall put to one side; all those who kneel down to drink, putting their hands to their mouths, you shall put to the other side." 6 The number of those that lapped was three hundred; but all the rest of the troops knelt down to drink water. 7 Then the Lord said to Gideon, "With the three hundred that lapped I will deliver you, and give the Midianites into your hand. Let all the others go to their homes." 8 So he took the jars of the troops from their hands, and their trumpets; and he sent all the rest of Israel back to their own tents, but retained the three hundred. The camp of Midian was below him in the valley. 9 That same night the Lord said to him, "Get up, attack the camp; for I have given it into your hand. 15. Gideon …. worshiped… and he returned to the camp of Israel, and said, "Get up; for the Lord has given the army of Midian into your hand." 16 After he divided the three hundred men into three companies, and put trumpets into the hands of all of them, and empty jars, with torches inside the jars, 17 he said to them, "Look at me, and do the same; when I come to the outskirts of the camp, do as I do. 18 When I blow the trumpet, I and all who are with me, then you also blow the trumpets around the whole camp, and shout, "For the Lord and for Gideon!' " 19 So Gideon and the hundred who were with him came to the outskirts of the camp at the beginning of the middle watch, when they had just set the watch; and they blew the trumpets and smashed the jars that were in their hands. 20 So the three companies blew the trumpets and broke the jars, holding in their left hands the torches, and in their right hands the trumpets to blow; and they cried, "A sword for the Lord and for Gideon!" 21 Every man stood in his place all around the camp, and all the men in camp ran; they cried out and fled. 22 When they blew the three hundred trumpets, the Lord set every man's sword against his fellow and against all the army.
Hebrews 13:1-3
1 Let mutual love continue. 2 Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it. 3 Remember those who are in bonds, as though you were in bonds with them; those who are being tortured, as though you yourselves were being tortured.
Sermon: The Summer of My Disconcertion
(disconcertion: to be thrown into confusion; to be unsettled).
This is not really a sermon. It’s more of a sharing of what’s been happening in my heart and spirit this summer. A kind of confession, I guess, but one which I hope will provide you food for thought.
I’d like to start with a little quiz on American History. The answer to all the following questions is the same person. If you think you know the answer, raise your hand, but don’t say anything out loud.
1. What person, profoundly shaped by his Calvinist, Puritan faith, who grew up in a Congregational Church, and who as a young man publicly professed in that church his opposition to slavery, became one of the most important and influential anti-slavery leaders in the U.S.?
2. Who was one of the first white persons in U.S. history not only to believe deeply in the full equality of the races but also to put into practice that belief in his daily life – by welcoming African-Americans into his home and sharing his table with them as equals, respecting their intelligence and leadership qualities as equals, and supporting them for positions of highest office in what he hoped would be a multi-racial society and government?
3. Who did Frederick Douglas, the great African-American leader, call, “our noblest American hero, one whose name stands for all that is desirable in government, noble in life, orderly and beautiful in society,” and said – “While I myself lived for black folks, he died for black folks.”
4. Who did Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau regard as not only one of our greatest American patriots, greater even than Washington, but on a level of moral and spiritual authority and greatness with Jesus Christ?
5. Of whom does a modern scholar say, “He killed slavery, sparked the Civil War and Seeded Civil Rights?”
6. Whose martyrdom became the inspiration for a song which was sung by the Union armies as they marched into battle, a song which repeats his name?
Answer: John Brown.
Sing:
John Brown's body lies a-mouldering in the grave,
John Brown's body lies a-mouldering in the grave,
But his soul goes marching on.
Chorus:
Glory, glory, hallelujah, :|
Glory, glory, hallelujah,
His soul goes marching on.
He's gone to be a soldier in the Army of the Lord,
He's gone to be a soldier in the Army of the Lord,
His soul goes marching on.
Chorus:
John Brown died that the slaves might be free,
John Brown died that the slaves might be free,
His soul goes marching on.
Chorus:
Last fall was the 150th anniversary of John Brown’s raid on Harper’s Ferry, VA, and his subsequent execution by hanging, on December 2, 1859. Brown’s plan was to seize the federal arsenal in Harpers Ferry, and with his small band of abolitionists, both white and black, free the slaves in the area, flee with them into the mountains and create a base community there, from which they could conduct guerilla warfare which would provoke widespread rebellion of slaves throughout the South leading eventually to the end of slavery and the ultimate incorporation of all freed slaves into a multi-racial society in which all would be truly equal. It was a breathtakingly utopian vision which, unfortunately for John Brown, had some fatal flaws. Most immediately, for a variety of reasons, one of which was his compassion for the hostages he had taken in the raid, he lingered too long at the arsenal, and was captured. A larger flaw was that he had over-estimated the readiness of slaves to take up arms and rebel against their masters on a moment’s notice, especially at the instigation of a white man. So he was tried, convicted of treason, inciting rebellion, and murder, and hanged. During the period between his arrest and his hanging, he spoke frequently in his prison cell with family, friends and reporters, and his calm dignity, deep faith and willingness to die for his beliefs impressed many, even his enemies. He was vilified as the incarnation of evil in the slave-holding south, and crowned as a hero and saint in the North. Emerson said he would “make the gallows as glorious as the cross,” and a later black reformer, W.E.B. DuBois, called Brown “the white American who had come closest to touching the real souls of black folk.” Unlike many of his fellow abolitionists, who were opposed to slavery but believed that blacks were inferior to whites and could never live side by side with whites in a free and equal society, Brown actually created and lived in biracial communities which practiced equality.
The 150th anniversary, with its many symposia, celebrations, re-enactments, etc. passed by me unawares – maybe because I was recuperating from knee surgery and otherwise preoccupied. But earlier this summer Ellen and I happened to be driving by Harpers Ferry National Historic Park, toward the beginning of a two-month-long car-trip that took us to family and friends all the way to the west coast and back, and we said, “let’s stop.” It was late, the visitor’s center was about to close, but there was time to discover in the bookstore a 500-page biography of John Brown on sale for $10. Never one to pass by a good book bargain I bought it and read it. I was fascinated by Brown’s life and stunned by my own ignorance of it. How could I be so ignorant of the significance of the life of so important a figure in American history, and a fellow-Congregationalist to boot? Had I missed something? Is John Brown listed among the famous UCCers of the past and I just hadn’t noticed? (Answer: no, you won’t find any mention of John Brown on the UCC website).
I was reading the life of John Brown during May – and of course, all the while I was reading, oil was spewing into the Gulf of Mexico from the Deepwater Horizon blowout. That oil gusher cast a pall over our entire trip, not least of all because we were using so much gasoline. I couldn’t help but make some connections. John Brown was confronting the great evil of his time: slavery. He was passionate in his opposition to slavery and the fundamental system that supported it. Here today I was confronted with another great evil, but of a very different kind: an evil that was taking life wantonly, rendering much of the Gulf of Mexico and its shores poisonous, devastating life at every level and destroying a way of life for tens of thousands of people. But if one wanted to strike a blow against this evil, where did one aim?
The more I learned about John Brown, the more I think I came to understand why we don’t know more about him: he is a very controversial figure in a way that strikes at the very core of our fears: he was a religious fanatic and a terrorist. He was a Congregational version of Osama bin Laden. Moreover he has become an inspiration to groups like the Army of God, the militant anti-abortion group that, among other things, nurtured Scott Roeder’s vigilante murder of abortion physician, Dr. George Tiller in Wichita, KS in May of 2009. Three years before the raid on Harpers ferry, John Brown led a group of anti-slavery men in a raid in Pottawattamie, KS in which they pulled five pro-slavery men from their homes, took them into the woods and murdered them, an event that came to be known as the Pottawattamie Massacre. The arguments that John Brown used to justify those murders are very similar to those that violent, militant anti-abortionists have used in our time to justify the murder of doctors who perform abortions: the cause is a righteous one, it is a holy war against a great evil which cannot be overcome by ordinary, legal, pacificist means.
John Brown drew upon an old and powerful tradition which has its roots in the Old Testament. We heard read this morning a couple of examples of that tradition. John Brown believed from an early age that he had been called and chosen by God to be a Gideon in the cause of racial justice, a warrior who would not hesitate to use the sword if necessary, to end the great and terrible evil of slavery. To fully appreciate Brown’s beliefs, you have to appreciate what was happening in this country in his time. Slavery was not just socially entrenched, it was seen to be rooted in the Constitution, approved by the founders of the nation like Washington and Jefferson, upheld by the Congress in Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 (which required federal marshals to arrest an alleged runaway slave and return him or her to his or her master, and upheld by the Supreme Court in decisions like the Dred Scott Decision of 1857, that ruled that slaves were not protected by the Constitution, could never be citizens of the United States, could not sue in court and that as private property, slaves could not be taken away from their owners without due process. Brown was scornful of his fellow abolitionists who were all talk, but no action. He believed that slavery was so deeply entrenched politically, legally socially and religiously in this country, that only an act of violence that would strike fear into the hearts of slave-owners could begin to dislodge it. He saw himself as called by God to strike that blow. Read Deut 32:39-42 again.
Now there is a great deal to admire in John Brown. He was way ahead of his time in his commitment to racial equality and the full humanity and potential of every human being regardless of their race or gender (he was, by the way, also an advocate for women’s rights). He was a deeply religious man who was willing to suffer and die for his beliefs; he was compassionate, especially toward the down-trodden. He took seriously and literally the words of Hebrews 13: “remember those who are in bonds as though you were in bonds with them, and those who are being tortured as though you yourselves were being tortured.” Surely we need to have that kind of empathy!
Perhaps by now you can understand why I called this talk “The Summer of My Disconcertment” – forgive the bad pun and the obscure allusion to Shakespeare’s and Steinbeck’s “The winter of our discontent.” It’s disconcerting to realize that someone you are disposed to admire because he devoted his entire life to ridding the world of an evil you despise has become a hero to those whose beliefs and actions you feel are despicable. It’s disconcerting to be appalled by an event in the Gulf that you feel is a great evil and to realize as you’re driving along visiting family and friends that you’re part of the problem. It’s disconcerting to visit a quiet shrine in North Elba, NY, as Ellen and I did few days ago, where John Brown is buried and where he lived for a time in an interracial community, and realize that on the other side of the world our nation is engaged in two wars fighting enemies whose mind-set and methods of operation are very similar to this man who is being celebrated and honored here. It’s disconcerting to want to enlist in the good fight for the preservation of life on this planet and not know where to begin because, as Pogo said, “we have met the enemy and he is us.”
Let me throw one more element into this ragout of disconcertion. There is another John in my life. My son John is a marine naturalist who is devoted to a life of meditation. He sees a deep connection between the outer world of violence against nature and the inner world of constant mental chatter, on the one hand, and between an outer world of peaceful harmony among all creatures and an inner world of silence on the other hand. And I think he sees a causal connection. The constant chatter in our minds in all its many manifestations, and our deep attachment to that chatter, essentially causes the disharmony in the outer world – things like that oil gusher. Conversely, if we could as the human species find and dwell in the silence which is also always inside us but which we have mostly drowned out with our mental chatter, if we could dwell in that inner silence, then we would see in a new way as Mary Oliver speaks in her poem, “see with understanding, or with acceptance and humility and without understanding, into the heart of the bristly, locked-in worm just as it’s becoming what we call the luna, that green tissue-winged, strange, graceful, fluttering thing” – and when we could see in that new way, that would ultimately heal the outer world. We would be in harmony with all living creatures.
I think he’s on to something. Woven through this summer has been that realization: that just may be what it will take to transform ourselves and the world. So simple. And so difficult. It’s disconcerting to realize that my own son may have put his finger right on the problem and opened a path to its solution and I may be too old and stuck in my ways to be able to follow him. But then again, maybe I’m not! We’ll see!
Amen!
Introduce this hymn: I chose 3 stirring hymns for this service. I wonder if we can we sing this hymn ironically? Think of it in a completely different way – a spiritual war that is not a war at all but the very opposite of war? Let’s try.
Hymn: #291- March On, O Soul, with Strength
Prayers. Ask for prayer requests
Almighty God of the morning, of sunlight on water, of morning doves and daisies, who has refreshed the earth with dew and darkness, refresh our hearts and make us new. The unchanging mountains speak to us of you, as does the surface of the sea; the fragile wings of insects bear witness to you, as do the claws of a tiger. We learn from you the visions of prophets and the passions of saints. And yet you do ever remain a hidden source, a mystery. We praise you for what we know and we stand in wonder before your secret depths. In a world where wounds come partly by accident and partly by intention, help us to see if there are any injuries we might have inflicted. Help us to let go of any injuries we feel we may have received from another, forgiving as Christ forgave, lest in our rancor with the past we betray the possibility of the present. O God, be ever present with us here this day; when the times get tough, may we know that you are with us. Over against the summer sounds of tractors in the meadows, dogs barking, chain saws, mowers on the lawn, and at night the hoot of the owl, we lift our hymns of praise to you. Through the noise of cars passing and trucks changing gears, the shouts of children and the roar of motorcycles, we send forth a silent prayer of our deepest longings…. ( from Be Present Here, the prayers of +Shirley Harris Crockett).
Hymn: #399 – Once to Every Man and Nation
Closing Words: A Singular and Cheerful Life, in Mary Oliver, Evidence, , p. 71
The singular and cheerful life
of any flower
in anyone’s garden
or any still unowned field—
if there are any—
catches me
by the heart,
by its color,
by its obedience
to the holiest of laws:
be alive
until you are not.
Ragweed,
Pale violet bull thistle,
Morning glories curling
through the field corn;
and those princes of everything green –
the grasses
of which there are truly
an unaccountable company,
each
on ts singular stem
striving
to rise and ripen.
What, in the earth world,
is there not to be amazed by
and to be steadied by
and to cherish?
Oh, my dear heart,
my own dear heart,
full of hesitations,
questions, choice of directions,
look at the world.
Behold the morning glory,
the meanest flower, the ragweed, the thistle.
Look at the grass.
Organ Postlude
First Congregational Church of Wethersfield, Vermont
July 25, 2010
Organ Prelude
Welcome and opening words:
Read Mary Oliver’s Imagine from Evidence, p. 63
I don’t care for adjectives, yet the world
fills me with them.
And even beyond what I see, I imagine more.
Seeing, for example, with understanding,
or with acceptance and humility and
without understanding,
into the heart of the bristly, locked-in worm
just as it’s becoming what we call the luna,
that green tissue-winged, strange, graceful
fluttering thing.
Will death allow such transportation of the eye?
Will we see then into the breaking open
of the kernel of corn?
the sprout plunging upward through the damp clod
and into the sun?
Well, we will all find out, each of us.
And what would we be, beyond the yardstick,
beyond supper and dollars,
if we were not filled with such wondering?
Opening Hymn: #370 O - God of Earth and Altar
.
Announcements
Scripture Readings:
Deuteronomy 32:35-43:
35 Vengeance is mine, and recompense, for the time when their foot shall slip; because the day of their calamity is at hand, their doom comes swiftly. 36 Indeed the Lord will vindicate his people, have compassion on his servants, when he sees that their power is gone, neither bond nor free remaining. 37 Then he will say: Where are their gods, the rock in which they took refuge, 38 who ate the fat of their sacrifices, and drank the wine of their libations? Let them rise up and help you, let them be your protection! 39 See now that I, even I, am he; there is no god besides me. I kill and I make alive; I wound and I heal; and no one can deliver from my hand. 40 For I lift up my hand to heaven, and swear: As I live forever, 41 when I whet my flashing sword, and my hand takes hold on judgment; I will take vengeance on my adversaries, and will repay those who hate me. 42 I will make my arrows drunk with blood, and my sword shall devour flesh— with the blood of the slain and the captives, from the long-haired enemy. 43 Praise, O heavens,
Judges 7: 1 Then Jerubbaal (that is, Gideon) and all the troops that were with him rose early and encamped beside the spring of Harod; and the camp of Midian was north of them, below the hill of Moreh, in the valley. 2 The Lord said to Gideon, "The troops with you are too many for me to give the Midianites into their hand. Israel would only take the credit away from me, saying, "My own hand has delivered me.' 3 Now therefore proclaim this in the hearing of the troops, "Whoever is fearful and trembling, let him return home.' " Thus Gideon sifted them out; twenty-two thousand returned, and ten thousand remained. 4 Then the Lord said to Gideon, "The troops are still too many; take them down to the water and I will sift them out for you there. When I say, "This one shall go with you,' he shall go with you; and when I say, "This one shall not go with you,' he shall not go." 5 So he brought the troops down to the water; and the Lord said to Gideon, "All those who lap the water with their tongues, as a dog laps, you shall put to one side; all those who kneel down to drink, putting their hands to their mouths, you shall put to the other side." 6 The number of those that lapped was three hundred; but all the rest of the troops knelt down to drink water. 7 Then the Lord said to Gideon, "With the three hundred that lapped I will deliver you, and give the Midianites into your hand. Let all the others go to their homes." 8 So he took the jars of the troops from their hands, and their trumpets; and he sent all the rest of Israel back to their own tents, but retained the three hundred. The camp of Midian was below him in the valley. 9 That same night the Lord said to him, "Get up, attack the camp; for I have given it into your hand. 15. Gideon …. worshiped… and he returned to the camp of Israel, and said, "Get up; for the Lord has given the army of Midian into your hand." 16 After he divided the three hundred men into three companies, and put trumpets into the hands of all of them, and empty jars, with torches inside the jars, 17 he said to them, "Look at me, and do the same; when I come to the outskirts of the camp, do as I do. 18 When I blow the trumpet, I and all who are with me, then you also blow the trumpets around the whole camp, and shout, "For the Lord and for Gideon!' " 19 So Gideon and the hundred who were with him came to the outskirts of the camp at the beginning of the middle watch, when they had just set the watch; and they blew the trumpets and smashed the jars that were in their hands. 20 So the three companies blew the trumpets and broke the jars, holding in their left hands the torches, and in their right hands the trumpets to blow; and they cried, "A sword for the Lord and for Gideon!" 21 Every man stood in his place all around the camp, and all the men in camp ran; they cried out and fled. 22 When they blew the three hundred trumpets, the Lord set every man's sword against his fellow and against all the army.
Hebrews 13:1-3
1 Let mutual love continue. 2 Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it. 3 Remember those who are in bonds, as though you were in bonds with them; those who are being tortured, as though you yourselves were being tortured.
Sermon: The Summer of My Disconcertion
(disconcertion: to be thrown into confusion; to be unsettled).
This is not really a sermon. It’s more of a sharing of what’s been happening in my heart and spirit this summer. A kind of confession, I guess, but one which I hope will provide you food for thought.
I’d like to start with a little quiz on American History. The answer to all the following questions is the same person. If you think you know the answer, raise your hand, but don’t say anything out loud.
1. What person, profoundly shaped by his Calvinist, Puritan faith, who grew up in a Congregational Church, and who as a young man publicly professed in that church his opposition to slavery, became one of the most important and influential anti-slavery leaders in the U.S.?
2. Who was one of the first white persons in U.S. history not only to believe deeply in the full equality of the races but also to put into practice that belief in his daily life – by welcoming African-Americans into his home and sharing his table with them as equals, respecting their intelligence and leadership qualities as equals, and supporting them for positions of highest office in what he hoped would be a multi-racial society and government?
3. Who did Frederick Douglas, the great African-American leader, call, “our noblest American hero, one whose name stands for all that is desirable in government, noble in life, orderly and beautiful in society,” and said – “While I myself lived for black folks, he died for black folks.”
4. Who did Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau regard as not only one of our greatest American patriots, greater even than Washington, but on a level of moral and spiritual authority and greatness with Jesus Christ?
5. Of whom does a modern scholar say, “He killed slavery, sparked the Civil War and Seeded Civil Rights?”
6. Whose martyrdom became the inspiration for a song which was sung by the Union armies as they marched into battle, a song which repeats his name?
Answer: John Brown.
Sing:
John Brown's body lies a-mouldering in the grave,
John Brown's body lies a-mouldering in the grave,
But his soul goes marching on.
Chorus:
Glory, glory, hallelujah, :|
Glory, glory, hallelujah,
His soul goes marching on.
He's gone to be a soldier in the Army of the Lord,
He's gone to be a soldier in the Army of the Lord,
His soul goes marching on.
Chorus:
John Brown died that the slaves might be free,
John Brown died that the slaves might be free,
His soul goes marching on.
Chorus:
Last fall was the 150th anniversary of John Brown’s raid on Harper’s Ferry, VA, and his subsequent execution by hanging, on December 2, 1859. Brown’s plan was to seize the federal arsenal in Harpers Ferry, and with his small band of abolitionists, both white and black, free the slaves in the area, flee with them into the mountains and create a base community there, from which they could conduct guerilla warfare which would provoke widespread rebellion of slaves throughout the South leading eventually to the end of slavery and the ultimate incorporation of all freed slaves into a multi-racial society in which all would be truly equal. It was a breathtakingly utopian vision which, unfortunately for John Brown, had some fatal flaws. Most immediately, for a variety of reasons, one of which was his compassion for the hostages he had taken in the raid, he lingered too long at the arsenal, and was captured. A larger flaw was that he had over-estimated the readiness of slaves to take up arms and rebel against their masters on a moment’s notice, especially at the instigation of a white man. So he was tried, convicted of treason, inciting rebellion, and murder, and hanged. During the period between his arrest and his hanging, he spoke frequently in his prison cell with family, friends and reporters, and his calm dignity, deep faith and willingness to die for his beliefs impressed many, even his enemies. He was vilified as the incarnation of evil in the slave-holding south, and crowned as a hero and saint in the North. Emerson said he would “make the gallows as glorious as the cross,” and a later black reformer, W.E.B. DuBois, called Brown “the white American who had come closest to touching the real souls of black folk.” Unlike many of his fellow abolitionists, who were opposed to slavery but believed that blacks were inferior to whites and could never live side by side with whites in a free and equal society, Brown actually created and lived in biracial communities which practiced equality.
The 150th anniversary, with its many symposia, celebrations, re-enactments, etc. passed by me unawares – maybe because I was recuperating from knee surgery and otherwise preoccupied. But earlier this summer Ellen and I happened to be driving by Harpers Ferry National Historic Park, toward the beginning of a two-month-long car-trip that took us to family and friends all the way to the west coast and back, and we said, “let’s stop.” It was late, the visitor’s center was about to close, but there was time to discover in the bookstore a 500-page biography of John Brown on sale for $10. Never one to pass by a good book bargain I bought it and read it. I was fascinated by Brown’s life and stunned by my own ignorance of it. How could I be so ignorant of the significance of the life of so important a figure in American history, and a fellow-Congregationalist to boot? Had I missed something? Is John Brown listed among the famous UCCers of the past and I just hadn’t noticed? (Answer: no, you won’t find any mention of John Brown on the UCC website).
I was reading the life of John Brown during May – and of course, all the while I was reading, oil was spewing into the Gulf of Mexico from the Deepwater Horizon blowout. That oil gusher cast a pall over our entire trip, not least of all because we were using so much gasoline. I couldn’t help but make some connections. John Brown was confronting the great evil of his time: slavery. He was passionate in his opposition to slavery and the fundamental system that supported it. Here today I was confronted with another great evil, but of a very different kind: an evil that was taking life wantonly, rendering much of the Gulf of Mexico and its shores poisonous, devastating life at every level and destroying a way of life for tens of thousands of people. But if one wanted to strike a blow against this evil, where did one aim?
The more I learned about John Brown, the more I think I came to understand why we don’t know more about him: he is a very controversial figure in a way that strikes at the very core of our fears: he was a religious fanatic and a terrorist. He was a Congregational version of Osama bin Laden. Moreover he has become an inspiration to groups like the Army of God, the militant anti-abortion group that, among other things, nurtured Scott Roeder’s vigilante murder of abortion physician, Dr. George Tiller in Wichita, KS in May of 2009. Three years before the raid on Harpers ferry, John Brown led a group of anti-slavery men in a raid in Pottawattamie, KS in which they pulled five pro-slavery men from their homes, took them into the woods and murdered them, an event that came to be known as the Pottawattamie Massacre. The arguments that John Brown used to justify those murders are very similar to those that violent, militant anti-abortionists have used in our time to justify the murder of doctors who perform abortions: the cause is a righteous one, it is a holy war against a great evil which cannot be overcome by ordinary, legal, pacificist means.
John Brown drew upon an old and powerful tradition which has its roots in the Old Testament. We heard read this morning a couple of examples of that tradition. John Brown believed from an early age that he had been called and chosen by God to be a Gideon in the cause of racial justice, a warrior who would not hesitate to use the sword if necessary, to end the great and terrible evil of slavery. To fully appreciate Brown’s beliefs, you have to appreciate what was happening in this country in his time. Slavery was not just socially entrenched, it was seen to be rooted in the Constitution, approved by the founders of the nation like Washington and Jefferson, upheld by the Congress in Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 (which required federal marshals to arrest an alleged runaway slave and return him or her to his or her master, and upheld by the Supreme Court in decisions like the Dred Scott Decision of 1857, that ruled that slaves were not protected by the Constitution, could never be citizens of the United States, could not sue in court and that as private property, slaves could not be taken away from their owners without due process. Brown was scornful of his fellow abolitionists who were all talk, but no action. He believed that slavery was so deeply entrenched politically, legally socially and religiously in this country, that only an act of violence that would strike fear into the hearts of slave-owners could begin to dislodge it. He saw himself as called by God to strike that blow. Read Deut 32:39-42 again.
Now there is a great deal to admire in John Brown. He was way ahead of his time in his commitment to racial equality and the full humanity and potential of every human being regardless of their race or gender (he was, by the way, also an advocate for women’s rights). He was a deeply religious man who was willing to suffer and die for his beliefs; he was compassionate, especially toward the down-trodden. He took seriously and literally the words of Hebrews 13: “remember those who are in bonds as though you were in bonds with them, and those who are being tortured as though you yourselves were being tortured.” Surely we need to have that kind of empathy!
Perhaps by now you can understand why I called this talk “The Summer of My Disconcertment” – forgive the bad pun and the obscure allusion to Shakespeare’s and Steinbeck’s “The winter of our discontent.” It’s disconcerting to realize that someone you are disposed to admire because he devoted his entire life to ridding the world of an evil you despise has become a hero to those whose beliefs and actions you feel are despicable. It’s disconcerting to be appalled by an event in the Gulf that you feel is a great evil and to realize as you’re driving along visiting family and friends that you’re part of the problem. It’s disconcerting to visit a quiet shrine in North Elba, NY, as Ellen and I did few days ago, where John Brown is buried and where he lived for a time in an interracial community, and realize that on the other side of the world our nation is engaged in two wars fighting enemies whose mind-set and methods of operation are very similar to this man who is being celebrated and honored here. It’s disconcerting to want to enlist in the good fight for the preservation of life on this planet and not know where to begin because, as Pogo said, “we have met the enemy and he is us.”
Let me throw one more element into this ragout of disconcertion. There is another John in my life. My son John is a marine naturalist who is devoted to a life of meditation. He sees a deep connection between the outer world of violence against nature and the inner world of constant mental chatter, on the one hand, and between an outer world of peaceful harmony among all creatures and an inner world of silence on the other hand. And I think he sees a causal connection. The constant chatter in our minds in all its many manifestations, and our deep attachment to that chatter, essentially causes the disharmony in the outer world – things like that oil gusher. Conversely, if we could as the human species find and dwell in the silence which is also always inside us but which we have mostly drowned out with our mental chatter, if we could dwell in that inner silence, then we would see in a new way as Mary Oliver speaks in her poem, “see with understanding, or with acceptance and humility and without understanding, into the heart of the bristly, locked-in worm just as it’s becoming what we call the luna, that green tissue-winged, strange, graceful, fluttering thing” – and when we could see in that new way, that would ultimately heal the outer world. We would be in harmony with all living creatures.
I think he’s on to something. Woven through this summer has been that realization: that just may be what it will take to transform ourselves and the world. So simple. And so difficult. It’s disconcerting to realize that my own son may have put his finger right on the problem and opened a path to its solution and I may be too old and stuck in my ways to be able to follow him. But then again, maybe I’m not! We’ll see!
Amen!
Introduce this hymn: I chose 3 stirring hymns for this service. I wonder if we can we sing this hymn ironically? Think of it in a completely different way – a spiritual war that is not a war at all but the very opposite of war? Let’s try.
Hymn: #291- March On, O Soul, with Strength
Prayers. Ask for prayer requests
Almighty God of the morning, of sunlight on water, of morning doves and daisies, who has refreshed the earth with dew and darkness, refresh our hearts and make us new. The unchanging mountains speak to us of you, as does the surface of the sea; the fragile wings of insects bear witness to you, as do the claws of a tiger. We learn from you the visions of prophets and the passions of saints. And yet you do ever remain a hidden source, a mystery. We praise you for what we know and we stand in wonder before your secret depths. In a world where wounds come partly by accident and partly by intention, help us to see if there are any injuries we might have inflicted. Help us to let go of any injuries we feel we may have received from another, forgiving as Christ forgave, lest in our rancor with the past we betray the possibility of the present. O God, be ever present with us here this day; when the times get tough, may we know that you are with us. Over against the summer sounds of tractors in the meadows, dogs barking, chain saws, mowers on the lawn, and at night the hoot of the owl, we lift our hymns of praise to you. Through the noise of cars passing and trucks changing gears, the shouts of children and the roar of motorcycles, we send forth a silent prayer of our deepest longings…. ( from Be Present Here, the prayers of +Shirley Harris Crockett).
Hymn: #399 – Once to Every Man and Nation
Closing Words: A Singular and Cheerful Life, in Mary Oliver, Evidence, , p. 71
The singular and cheerful life
of any flower
in anyone’s garden
or any still unowned field—
if there are any—
catches me
by the heart,
by its color,
by its obedience
to the holiest of laws:
be alive
until you are not.
Ragweed,
Pale violet bull thistle,
Morning glories curling
through the field corn;
and those princes of everything green –
the grasses
of which there are truly
an unaccountable company,
each
on ts singular stem
striving
to rise and ripen.
What, in the earth world,
is there not to be amazed by
and to be steadied by
and to cherish?
Oh, my dear heart,
my own dear heart,
full of hesitations,
questions, choice of directions,
look at the world.
Behold the morning glory,
the meanest flower, the ragweed, the thistle.
Look at the grass.
Organ Postlude
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