Sunday Morning Chimes
Three Church bells ring in Philo,
The Catholic Mass is first,
The Presbyterians
Are next, then Martin
Luther takes his stand.
The steeples point like preachers
To blue sky up above
But storms will soon be coming
If we don’t act with love
And follow that sweet dove.
Yes, Jesus is our teacher,
We hear his bell ring true,
you sound and I am singing
You speak and I speak, too.
Bells ring for me and you.
Wednesday evening three old friends from Texas, Arizona, and northern Illinois descended on the Shoemaker home in Urbana, IL to sing their own semi-humorous re-write of the traditional Epiphany hymn We Three Kings. They concluded by presenting gold, frankincense, and myrrh to our mutual friend Steve Shoemaker. There’s a video of the trio on Steve’s FaceBook page for those want to watch and sing along. Steve, diagnosed with terminal cancer, is feeling remarkably well – even got up to make oatmeal for the guys the next morning!
EPIPHANY 2016
A Tribute to the Rev. Dr. Steve Shoemaker (Harry Lee Strong)
(Tune: Three Kings of Orient; John Henry Hopkins, 1857)
We three friends from north, south, and west
Gather here as your grateful guests.
Pardon our singing – gifts we are bringing,
Just hoping not to be pests.
O … Husband, father, poet, bard:
How we loathe your journey hard!
If we could, you know we would
Make this damn disease retard!
It’s so good to see you again
Here at home on your Illinois plain,
Still with humor, despite tumors,
Teaching to die is to gain.
O … Talk show host and scholar bright:
Few compete with your great height!
On the air and through your care,
Keepin’ Faith both day and night.
Only God can possibly know
How many lives you’ve enabled to grow:
Words and actions, breaking down factions,
Allowing your light to show.
O … Classmate, preacher, prophet bold:
No respect do we withhold!
From our coffers we now offer
Frankincense and myrrh and gold.
It’s dark and drear on the way
to Bethlehem where relatives
abound with rooms to spare
to welcome our coming.
Why are the lights all out,
the doors locked, the knocks
unanswered, no candles lit for
us from out of town?
Has news of the coming illegitimate
child scared them off, driven them
way inside bolted doors named fear
and blame and shame?
Has the buzz been mean, the
relatives praying to stay clean
of bedsheets soiled of a bastard
birth and bloody after-birth?
Have the men in town gathered
stones and the women
shrunk back from mid-wifing
Mary’s child into life?
A flop house on the other side
of town welcomes us with fires
outside the barn for black
sheep guests from Nazareth.
A BIBLICAL FATHER-SON STORY: ZECHARIAH & JOHN THE BAPTIST
Ever wondered why John comes out of nowhere with a fiery message?
He has a bone to pick. Why? With whom? What’s his story?
The Eastern Orthodox Christian tradition preserves a story about John’s father, Zechariah, a Temple priest, sending his wife, Elizabeth, and their son, John, into hiding. Zechariah hides his son to protect him from Herod’s “Slaughter of the Innocents” by which all males below the age of two were to be killed following rumors of a newly-born king, a threat to Herod’s rule.
According to the story told by The Infancy Gospel of James [the mid-Second Century C.E.], John and Elizabeth remain in hiding – far away from their husband and father, Zechariah – until John is five or six years old when Zechariah risks visiting their hiding place. The result is the brutal murder of Zechariah by Herod’s soldiers.
As the son of a Temple priest, John descended from the priestly lineage of Aaron. John was destined to be a Temple priest. Father-son dynamics become more difficult when the father is a public religious figure. Zechariah’s son sounds like an angry preacher’s kid.
When [John] saw the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to be baptized, he said to them, "You brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit that befits repentance, and do not presume to say to yourselves 'We have Abraham as our father ....'" (Mt. 3:7-9a).
The Pharisees were lay people with a more liberal religious bent than the Sadducees. The Sadducees were Temple authorities and Temple supporters, the folks who aligned themselves with John’s father Zechariah and a conservative reading of the Torah. The Pharisees and the Sadducees were in conflict during the time of John and Jesus. Only the Pharisees survived the later destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple in the Roman-Jewish War of 70 C.E.
By the time the Gospels are written, the Temple had been destroyed. So we have the Temple priests and their supporters, the Sadducees, and John the Baptist in the Gospel of Matthew scolding both the Pharisees, who will carry on their tradition without accepting one of their likely members, Jesus of Nazareth, as the awaited Anointed One (Messiah), and the Sadducees who have disappeared into history.
Whether the Orthodox tradition and The Infancy Gospel of James are taken as historical fact or mythic truth, John’s real fight was with his father and the Sadducees who had compromised Jewish identity and integrity by their accommodations to Rome.
John is certain, bold, and in-your-face. His father, Zechariah, according to Matthew’s Gospel, had doubted the news of John’s conception. As a result of his doubt, Zechariah was struck dumb. He remained unable to speak until Elizabeth had named their son ‘John’, at which point his mouth was opened. “Yes,” said Zecahariah, “his name is John.”
Zechariah had been a doubter; John was no doubter. Zechariah sent John into hiding. The John who returned from safety was no hider. John became a shouter who minced no words. Far from Jerusalem and the Temple, out in untamed space by the Jordan River, he took his stand for the return of his people from the false choice of the pious laity (the Pharisees) and his father’s priestly class (the Sadducees): “You brood of vipers!”
Baby vipers were said to eat their mother’s stomachs. Israel was the Mother whom the Pharisees and Sadducees were eating from the inside out.
John wanted nothing to do with the killing of his Mother or with those who had killed his father. In the interest of protecting his Mother from the vipers, he had run from the Temple into the wilderness, returning to the place where his Mother, Israel, had been born after the Exodus. He did not go into the wilderness to hide. He went out to rescue his Mother from being eaten by her children. When the vipers arrived, he shouted in ways his mute father never did. Yet, in the end he died by the same hands as his father when Herod delivered his head to Salome on a platter.
Like father, like son. His younger cousin Jesus carried on.
Dear Ruby,
Barclay and I loved playing with you yesterday. I think you enjoyed it too!
You and Barclay aren’t old enough to understand all the things I know. Both of you are only two-and-a-half years old. But, from the looks of yesterday’s play time, you both enjoy life more than Grandpa. Watching you and Barclay do his tricks was such fun! “Barclay, sit!” “Barclay, down.” “Leave it.” “Roll over.”
But I’m getting ahead of myself. You don’t know all that stuff. You don’t know what an alpha dog is, or a Commander-in-Chief, or Chairwoman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff or President. You’ll learn all that stuff soon enough, and, if this were the world I would like for you, there wouldn’t be any Commanders-in-Chiefs, or Joint Chiefs of Staff. There would be grandchildren like you and Cavalier King Charles Spaniels like Barclay who play together with moms and dads, grandmas and grandpas without worrying about the reasons we have Commanders-in-Chief and Chairwomen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Watching the two of you yesterday made me think about how much of what I know I wish I could un-learn. My head and heart are crammed full of things that don’t belong there, like the time your Great Uncle Bob drank the Drano and had to be rushed to the hospital to have his stomach pumped.
Drano container – POISON
Older people your Uncle Bob and me have drunk the poison of thinking we’re smarter and better than dogs and cats, and trees and birds and blue skies and clouds and rivers and ponds and oceans. We drank the poison. I hope you’ll grow up remembering your play time with Barclay whenever the can of Drano sits on the back of the toilet.
I go to the toilet a lot more these days. You’re still wearing diapers. If you’re lucky you’ll learn from Barclay what my generation never learned: never poop in your own kennel. The world, the planet, is your kennel, Ruby! This whole wide world. We need to take care of it. Enjoy it. Not be mean to it or hurt it.
As you get older, remember how you and Barclay looked right in each other’s eyes and smiled. Remember the love. If you do, the world will be a better place than the one I’m passing on to you. And, when I pass on, remember that our big wonderful kennel doesn’t go anywhere. It just keeps going long after we’ve been here. Be nice to it. Be nice to yourself. Keep playing, and, please, don’t swallow the Drano!
Love you,
Grandpa Stewart
Three gifts are mentioned in the story of the Three Kings, aka the Wise men, and the Magi: gold, frankincense, and myrrh.
Moments ago, on Epiphany, three seminary friends arrived at Steve and Nadja Shoemaker’s home on the prairie near Urbana, Illinois. It’d be a stretch to call Harry, Bob, and Don the Three Kings or the Wise Men. More like three wise guys, not from the East, but from the West and North – Corsicana, Texas; Prescott, Arizona; and Highland Park, Illinois – bringing a lighter touch to Steve, the patient with the terminal diagnosis of pancreatic cancer.
Harry, the musician among them, will lead them in his own freshly-written lyrics to the tune of the Epiphany hymn “We Three Kings” – a trio of bass and baritone voices – bringing laughter to the room Kay and I can hear all the way in Minnesota.
Many years ago, a similar thing happened in New York City where Episcopal lay theologian William (Bill) Stringfellow was in Surgical Intensive Care following near fatal pancreatic surgery.
Entering the room following the surgery, Stringfellow’s close friend Bishop James A. Pike exclaimed, “Well, I’m a bishop. I should do something!” He promptly disappeared. Moments later he returned with Bill’s attending nurse and a large bottle of petroleum jelly. He consecrated the jelly, declaring to the nurse with typical Pike humor that “this substance has now been set apart for uses other than those ordinary and familiar for Vaseline.”
“Taking a thumbful of this freshly made urgent, he came to the bedside and anointed me,” wrote Stringfellow, “signing my forehead with the cross, and saying:
“‘I anoint you in the name of God; beseeching the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all your pain and sickness of body being put to flight, the blessing of health may be restored to you. Amen.'” [William Stringfellow, A Second Birthday, Doubleday & Company, 1970]
The bishop’s prayer of unction for the sick was near verbatim from The Book of Common Prayer of the Episcopal Church.
When the surgeon told the patient that his recovery was spectacular, Stringfellow replied, “That doesn’t surprise me at all. I was anointed by Bishop Pike! – what else would you expect?”
This Day of Epiphany, I hope the Three Wise Men, Steve and Nadja may enjoy the same fellowship, humor, and prayer all these years later. They bring no gold, frankincense or myrrh, but everyone in the Urbana gathering tonight knows that when the end is in sight, only the frankincense, the myrrh, and telling stories only dear friends call tell are appropriate. The third gift – gold – no longer matters, if it ever did!
Ever wondered what an authentic disciple of Jesus might look like in 2016 following a year of deadly gun violence? Today is Epiphany when Christians celebrate the manifestation of Christ to the gentiles, remembering the Wise Men who presented their gifts to the Prince of Peace.
President Obama, Jan. 5, 2016
The Psalter Reading for Epiphany: Psalm 72:1,2,7-14 (NRSV)
Give the king your justice, O God, and your righteousness to a king’s son.
May he judge your people with righteousness, and your poor with justice.
In his days may righteousness flourish and peace abound, until the moon is no more.
May the kings of Tarshish and of the isles render him tribute, may the kings of Sheba and Seba bring gifts.
May all kings fall down before him, all nations give him service.
For he delivers the needy when they call, the poor and those who have no helper.
He has pity on the weak and the needy, and saves the lives of the needy.
From oppression and violence he redeems their life; and precious is their blood in his sight.
after christmas the tree puked
needles the cat even ignored ornaments
the smudgy guilty fingerprints
enhanced the window glass
about two feet up with proof
of candy eaten frosting licked
from fingers and dog nose prints
mixed in for the seurat effect
while good people slept the sleep
of the over-indulged oblivious to the
recent refugees while focusing
on their personal holy family
Detail from Seurat’s La Parade de Cirque (1889), showing the contrasting dots of paint used in Pointillism, Metropolitan Museum of Art
NOTE: I, Gordon, not as well educated as Steve, had to look up ‘seurat’. Click HERE for information on George Seurat, the 19th Century painter known for introducing chromoluminarism and pointillism. and to get the drift of Steve’s upbeat poem. Though not feeling well these days, as noted elsewhere on Views from the Edge and on his CaringBridge page, Steve continues to amaze with his sardonic sense of humor in the face of the eventual eulogy.
Today three close mutual seminary friends from Texas, Arizona, and Illinois meet at Chicago’s Midway Airport and drive to Urbana for a short visit with Steve, Nadja, and their confused dog, Blazer. Blessings and peace to Don Dempsey, Bob Young, Harry Strong, Steve, Nadja, and Blazer.
“Vote: the instrument and symbol of a freeman’s power to make a fool of himself and a wreck of his country.” —Ambrose Bierce, The Devil’s Dictionary
“Everything is changing. People are taking their comedians seriously and the politicians as a joke.” —Will Rogers
“That’s it! You people have stood in my way long enough. I’m going to clown college!” Homer Simpson.
“It takes two to lie: one to lie and one to listen” Homer Simpson.
“It’s not easy to juggle a pregnant wife and a troubled child, but somehow I managed to fit in eight hours of TV a day.” Homer Simpson.
“When will I learn? The answers to life’s problems aren’t at the bottom of a bottle, they’re on TV!” – Homer Simpson.
Bart: “Grandpa, why don’t you tell a story?” Lisa: “Yeah Grandpa, you lived a long and interesting life.” Grandpa: “That’s a lie and you know it” Grandpa Abraham Simpson [Loser]
“Life is just one crushing defeat after another until you just wish Flanders was dead” – Homer Simpson on his religious neighbor Ned Flanders.
I need your help. I’m taking a refresher course called Blogging 101.
Views from the Edge is the name of this site. Fine. I’m sticking with it. But what about a “tag line”?
Since “Views from the Edge” doesn’t say what the blog is about, the tag line is important to give the reader a better clue to the nature of the site.
One member of the webinar suggested something like “Looking at public life and the assumptions that shape it”.
I’ve also thought about using the Amish rocking chair as a tag line to indicate a slower, more thoughtful look at the world. Or adapting Kosuke Koyama’s observation that God is a three-mile-an-hour God – walking at the normal speed of a human walking. I confess! I’m stumped!!!
ALL SUGGESTIONS ARE WELCOME.
Thanks for considering,
Gordon
Views from the Edge 