This was sent by email at 1:51 A.M. today. 🙂
“AWAKE”
How do dreams of females differ
from the dreams of males? Is there less
violence, sex, and guilt? Or far more
children, infants, nursing? How does
pure biology control our
fantasy? Can Internet ads,
TV, product placement, billboards,
radio commercials sour
and infiltrate midnight madness?
Maybe it was just the pickles…
– June 13, 201 – Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL
Poet and guilt-free friend
AWAKE
I do not want to be awake. I wish,
instead my racing mind would shift into
a neutral gear, spin to a stop, rehash
no more today/tomorrow/yesterday.
I meditate, I take slow breaths, I say
the very first prayers that I ever knew…
I try to sing myself a lullaby,
but silently, so not to wake nearby
a gently sleeping soul who has it seems
a clear conscience and peaceful dreams.
– Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL, sent by email to Editor @12:25 a.m., June 11, 2013
EDITOR’S NOTE: Albert Camus said, “A guilty conscience needs to confess. A work of art is a confession.”
Thanks you, Steve, for the art.
Verse — by Steve Shoemaker
We lug heavy bags of birdseed
from store to car to garage
steel storage can to feeders.
We keep squirrels away.
We watch the birds feast.
We fertilize and water and prune
the young fruit trees in the orchard
and see blossoms, then growing fruit.
Cherries are loved by birds and us.
Let birds eat seeds–nets mean pies.
Socrates, The Louvre
– Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL, May 18, 2013
“Chosen”
I had been told that I was one of three
whose name was given to the President
from whom she would choose the new Chapel Dean.
While waiting, I went to a grand event
in the huge gothic Chapel I might rule.
A bird flew in while the Bible was read,
and I was shown to be a prideful fool when
pigeon poop fell SPLAT upon my head…-Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL
Editor’s Note: This really happened. The windows of the grand Gothic Chapel were open when the bird of paradise flew in.
“When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with humility comes wisdom.” – Proverbs 11:2) BTW, Steve did not get to rule the Chapel. The President appointed one of the three who had not been anointed by the pigeon.
e. e. cummings
Tomorrow six old friends meet in Chicago for “the Gathering, 2013”. This is the 12th such gathering.
“2”
to
(y
ou
and
i)
ge
th
er
ne
ss– ss (steve shoemaker)
New grand daughter Ruby
Fetal position Ruby, born early, 5 lbs. 7 ounces
The above letter appeared publicly online today, Saturday, May 25 2013.
Usually our sins are less egregious and are such that we never do anything to make right our wrong. Which is what prompts this post.
Apologies to my friend Steve, the author of the poem in the Views from the Edge’s most recent post (“Beyond Fundamentalism”) for misprinting the title of his poem. Strange how our eyes are conditioned to see what we expect to read. Knowing Steve’s background, I didn’t expect to see the word ‘conversion’, so my eyes read it as ‘conversATion’. Here it is again under the correct title. And, Steve, this is the last I want to hear about this! 🙂 What are friends for if not to forgive by the wider, deeper, more than fact truth that knocked the Apostle Paul off his horse?
CONVERSION AT SEMINARY
Four years Wheaton College tried
to make a fundamentalist
Christianity the first
and last thought on my searching mind.
Then a liberal McCormick
Dean Filson took a chance on me–
I learned Bible truth could be
much wider, deeper, than mere fact:
changing this world was our call!
From civil rights to stopping war,
social justice cried for more
of faithful love, that holy force
learned by the Apostle Paul
when Jesus knocked him off his horse.
– Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL, May 25, 2013
The influence of New Testament scholar Floyd Filson
Four years Wheaton College tried
to make a fundamentalist
Christianity the first
and last thought on my searching mind.
Then a liberal McCormick
Dean Filson took a chance on me–
I learned Bible truth could be
much wider, deeper, than mere fact:
changing this world was our call!
From civil rights to stopping war,
social justice cried for more
of faithful love, that holy force
learned by the Apostle Paul
when Jesus knocked him off his horse.
– Steve Shoemaker, Urbana, IL, May 25, 2013
Dean Floyd V. Filson was an internationally renowned New Testament scholar. A prolific writer, Filson published his own original New Testament commentaries and articles in scholarly journal, but he did not operate in a silo. He collaborated with co-authors and co-editors Oscar Cullman, G. Ernest Wright, and other world-class scholars. He also translated Rudolph Otto’s The Kingdom of God and the Son of Man, a book which, like Otto’s The Idea of the Holy represented a landmark shift in the understanding of God and of Jesus’s own consciousness. But more than a scholar, at least for the likes of Steve, was his unfailing kindness and belief in us. If he was aware of his stature in the world of academia, it was never apparent in the classroom or in his office. He was the definition of Christian humility. A ready smile, gentleness, respect for others, and a hearty “Good Morning!” were his signatures.
Monday six McCormick grads on whom Dean Filson took a chance will gather at the seminary for our annual Gathering. Steve and Don Dempsey were Class of ’68; Wayne Boulton, Harry Strong, Bob Young and I were the Class of ’67.
The Gathering minus Steve
Years ago four of us cut Professor Boling’s Hebrew class to take our homiletics (i.e., preaching) professor, Herb King, to the Opening Day Cubs game at Wrigley Field. We were VERY serious students!
In preparation for this year’s annual gathering, we’ve been reading John Sexton’s marvelous book, Baseball as a Road to God: Seeing Beyond the Game, and we’ll return to Wrigley Field where two of the Old Dogs’ hearts are perpetually broken. Steve Shoemaker, one of the Old Dogs, sent this to us this morning.
Seminary Reunion
Here we would each learn to preach
a sermon–going from the Greek,
Hebrew, to the common speech
of folks today. Here we would seek
answers to all questions: old,
or new, conundrums from a child,
screams of pain from a grey head
that’s waiting for a grave. Reviled
scorned, by former college friends
who now run businesses, our mild
Biblical response pretends
to follow One who like a lamb
went to the slaughter. We damn
ourselves in not forgiving them.
This year we lost one of the original seven old friends, Dale Hartwig, who grew old too soon and faster than the rest of us. John Sexton reminds us of the difference between beginnings and endings, and the need for a vantage point:
“While the teams and players on the field may change each autumn, the game’s evocative power is continuous. Opening Day in the spring and the World Series in the fall are the bookends of baseball’s liturgical time…. Vantage point is critical.”
– Baseball as a Road to God: Seeing Beyond the Game, Penguin Group, NY, NY, 2013.
Everyone should be so blessed as to have friends like these and a vantage point of continuing thanksgiving.
Views from the Edge 