On Using the Right Word

Ignorance is not stupidity.  I am wholly ignorant (but not stupid) when it comes to dealing with mechanical things.  I lack knowledge, information, and understanding about how an automobile engine works and have not the slightest idea of what to do when the engine won’t start.  I take my vehicle to a mechanic, that is, someone who does have knowledge, information, and understanding about that kind of thing.  If you call me “ignorant” in regard to mechanical things I would not be offended or insulted.  I recognize my lack of knowledge in this area.  If you called me an “ignoramus” (synonyms include words like idiot, dunce, moron, or simpleton) I might take offense, because that word implies that I am unable to learn anything about mechanical things.  You would be implying by the use of that word that I am stupid rather than ignorant.

I have learned how to jump start a car battery—in fact, I recently installed a new battery in my lawn mower (but only after getting advice and instructions from a mechanic as to just how to do it).  One of the benefits of YouTube are the “How To” presentations. I recently installed a new rack in our dishwasher by watching a YouTube video.  It works!  I can learn how to do things that I am currently ignorant about.

Geniuses are ignorant of all sorts of things, but they are not stupid.  They just don’t have the knowledge or information needed to know about or to accomplish certain tasks.  

The word “stupid” means that one lacks the intellectual capacity to learn, to know, to understand, and to do.  Do you see the difference in the use of these two words?  An ignorant person has the intellectual capacity to learn, to know, and to be informed, but just hasn’t gotten around to it.  

It has been reported that only 3% of the American people have read the Mueller Report.  That means that 97% of the American people are ignorant about what that report actually contains.  It doesn’t mean they are stupid.  It simply means that they have not taken the time to peruse that information. They do not know what the report says, just as I am ignorant about my vehicle’s engine.  They are ignorant of it, but not stupid, because they have the intellectual capacity to read it and know what it says.  They just haven’t done so. If that is the case, then 97% of the people ought to admit ignorance in that regard.

Yorkminster speaks with architecture rather
than words.

Trashing the Truth

The “rule of law” cannot work or function without the truth.  Just as the human body cannot function without a heart, so the “rule of law” cannot function without its heart—the existence of a thing called truth. I find myself in agreement with a Conservative who writes:   “Law and order cannot coexist with condoned falsehood….Any nation or culture that comes to granting license to lying has initiated its own death warrant.”  Where the writer and I disagree is in who we think is telling the lies, or trashing the truth.

The writer sees the trashing of truth emanating from “the practitioners of the ideology which is now popularly referred to as ‘liberalism.’”  He immediately equates liberalism to Marxism, socialism and communism, suggesting that they all “proceed from the same brood house.”  With this declaration, the writer himself,  begins to trash the truth, because his statement is blatantly false.

Liberalism (a political and moral philosophy) came into being long before Marxism or communism.   It arrived in the Age of Enlightenment (17th & 18th centuries). It espoused  replacing the norms of hereditary privilege, state religion, absolute monarchy, the divine right of kings and the “traditional conservatism” of the time with representative democracy and the rule of law.  Without the emergence of Liberalism, the American Revolution would probably not have taken place, nor would the Constitution have been written in the way that it was.  You can check this understanding of Liberalism out for yourself in any history book for there is much more to be said about it than I can possibly say here.  

It was Liberalism that sought and established a nation that prized important individual freedoms (freedom of speech, freedom of association); an independent judiciary and public trial by jury, and has advocated gender and racial equality.  Let’s not trash the truth.  Liberalism is a political and moral philosophy just as Conservatism is a political and moral philosophy.  It is not Marxist or communism, or even socialism.  That labeling just doesn’t fit the historical facts.  It trashes the truth.

The Teaching or The Teacher?

There is not much that was new in the teachings of Christianity.  From the Hammurabi Code to the Ten Commandments, from Socrates and Plato, and from many other sources, similar teachings had already been introduced in the world.  What was new was Christ himself!  And that’s the great stumbling block for many of us as C. S. Lewis pointed out in his book, Mere Christianity:

“I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him:  ‘I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept His claim to be God.’  That is the one thing we must not say.  A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher.  He would either be a lunatic—on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg—or else he would be the Devil of Hell.  You must make your choice.  Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse.  You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God.  But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher.  He has not left that open to us.  He did not intend to.”

I guess that means that the chief point of the story given us in the gospels is not the teachings so much as  the Person of Jesus.  According to Genesis 6:1-4, we are all sons and daughters of God.  Lewis writes that there is a “Christ-life” in each of us.  Does the mean that we all have the potential to become as fully human ( sons and daughters of God) as Jesus?

The last iris of the season

Once Upon A Time

Once upon a time, many years ago, there were three small rural churches of the same denomination located about 1.5 miles apart.  The congregations were very small and had great difficulty financially to maintain their little houses of worship, let alone pay a minister.  In order to solve their pastoral problem the three churches pooled their meager financial resources and shared the same minister.  Each Sunday, the minister traveled to one church for a 9:30 service, drove one and a half miles to the next one to conduct worship at 10:30 and then drove another mile and a half for the 11:30 worship service at the third church.

There is historical precedent for this practice.  In the days before the automobile the minister traveled by horseback from church to church.  The circuit rider would be at one church every other Sunday or perhaps conduct one service in the morning at one church and an evening service at another.  It takes a while for a horse to travel a mile and a half. With the advent of the automobile, however, all three churches could have their own service every Sunday morning.

Each Sunday as the three congregations gathered for worship at their respective time and place, they fervently prayed for the scattered sheep of the Good Shepherd; that every schism might be done away; that there might be one fold and one shepherd.  

Once upon a time, many years ago, there were three fairly large churches of the same (almost the same) denomination, each located on their own corner of a busy intersection in a small city.  One church was African-American (Methodist); one was called the Methodist Protestant Church and the third was called the Methodist Episcopal Church. Unlike the three small rural churches each of these had their own pastor. And because they had their own pastor they could gather for worship at any time.  All three chose 11 o’clock on Sunday morning.  

Again, there is historical precedent for this special 11 o’clock hour.  It was established years before to allow the farmers time to finish their morning milking and other chores, hitch up their team of horses and make it to the church on time.

Each Sunday these three churches gathered at 11 o’clock.  For years the congregations fervently prayed, each on its own corner, for the scattered sheep of the Good Shepherd; that every schism might be done away; that there might be one fold and one shepherd.

But year after year, in both cases, nothing came of their prayers.  Three small rural churches, a mile and a half a part, still pray today for one fold and one shepherd—a mile and a half apart.  The three churches (African-American Methodist, Methodist Protestant and Methodist Episcopal) each on their own corner in a growing city still gather at 11 o’clock and still to this day pray for the scattered sheep of Christ; that every schism might be done away; that there might be one fold and one shepherd.

And the clock ticks on in Prague...

Compulsory Conscription: Remembering “The Draft”

Today the U.S. Selective Service System is a contingency conscription plan; all male-at-birth citizens between the ages of 18 and 25 are required to register so that conscription can take place if needed.  Conscription was and is known as the military draft—and the draft has been used by the federal government in five conflicts:  the American Revolution, the Civil War, World War I, World War II, and the Cold War (including the Korean and Vietnam War).  Conscription, the draft, came to an end in 1973 when the U.S. Armed Forces moved to an all-volunteer force.

When I graduated from high school in 1960 at age 17 and went searching for a job, every potential employer would say something to the effect:  “Go get your military obligation out of the way and then come back.”  They knew it was very likely that I would be drafted at age 18, unless I happened to be a farmer or a college student.  Many young men enlisted in the Navy or the Air Force to avoid being drafted into the Army.  My brother enlisted in the Navy; I enlisted in the Air Force, as many others did rather than wait around to be conscripted, that is, drafted.

Most of those who enlisted had little interest in the military. But it wasn’t a matter of interest or  choice—it was a matter of the draft.   It wasn’t about being “patriotic” or responding to a poster that said “Uncle Sam Needs You.”  It was “join up” or get “called up.”  From 1940 to 1973, during peacetime and periods of conflict, young men were drafted to fill vacancies in the Armed Forces that could not be filled by volunteers.  There were few volunteers back then, other than those who “signed up” only because they knew the draft would get them sooner or later—and the draft filled the remaining void.

In the World War II era 38.8% of U.S. servicemen (and all servicewomen) were volunteers.  Draftees made up 61.2% (11,535,000 men).  I do not have the figures for the Vietnam War, but my suspicion is that the percentage of draftees was far greater than those who volunteered.

Compulsory conscription, the draft, had a profound effect on many“ back in the day.”  In fact, the draft, or the threat of the draft, changed the course of my life’s journey.  

Today there are roughly 20 million U.S. veterans. They represent 10% of the total U.S. adult population.  How many were drafted, I wonder?  How many enlisted because of the draft?  In 1968 there were 3.5 million men (and women) on military active duty during the draft period.  There are 1.3 million on active duty (less than 1% of all U.S. adults) in today’s all-volunteer force.  

Those who volunteer and those who were
drafted faithfully served their country.

"The Longest Day"

The movie “The Longest Day,” (based on Cornelius Ryan’s 1959 book by the same title) came out in 1962. The black and white film won two Academy Awards and was nominated for three others.  A colorized VHS version was released in 1994, the 50th anniversary of the D-Day landings at Normandy.  Today, June 6, 2019,  marks the 75th anniversary of that landing.  I was only a one-year-old when Operation Overlord took place.

It is difficult to grasp the enormity of the event.  Five thousand landing and assault craft, 289 escorts, 277 minesweepers, and 160,000 troops crossed the English Channel that day.  By the end of June 1944 nearly 875,000 men had disembarked at Normandy.  I read somewhere that 85% of the troops in the landing and assault craft had never been in combat before that moment.  Allied casualties on that first day (D-Day) were at least 10,000, while the Germans lost 4,000 to 9,000 men.  Civilian casualties were estimated at 3,000.  It was indeed the “longest day” and it remains the largest seaborne invasion in history.  I pray there will never be another long day like D-Day ever again!

D-Day was just the beginning, not the end, of the Allied assault to liberate German-occupied France and eventually western Europe from Nazi control. It took six more days, after June 6th, just to gain control of the five beachheads included in the massive operation plan.  It took almost another year (May 8, 1945) before Germany’s unconditional surrender and the end of the war in Europe.  The war in the Pacific did not end until August of that year.

All of my life, from my birth till now, there has been war: WW II, the Korean Conflict, the Viet Nam war and currently the enduring conflicts in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, and countless others. Will wars never cease? 

On this 75th anniversary of the horror that was D-Day, I hope the world will avoid glorifying war today. Let us only honor those who were forced to endure them and remember all who lost their lives because of war.  Perhaps in honoring them and remembering them and the tremendous cost of D-Day, we will come to our senses and sing together:

I’m gonna lay down my sword and shield

Down by the riverside

I’m gonna study, study war no more.

….

I’m gonna lay down my heavy load

Down by the riverside

I ain’t gonna study war no more.

The Adventure of Friendship

There are many things I prize—but at the top of the list is the adventure and the sacrament of friendship—because this is rarer and more precious that all the rest. (hal)

Yesterday my friend Bill and I were able to visit again after many months.  I was reminded after he left of this blog which I wrote in 2015 after another visit Bill and I had back then.

Friendship is an adventure.  It is also a sacrament (an outward and visible sign of an inward invisible grace).  William Ferrar Renzulli and I have been friends since 1971.  We were young, handsome, thin, had hair, and were “full of piss and vinegar” (rowdy, boisterous full of youthful energy) back then.  The expression in quotes above was used by John Steinbeck in his novel, “In Dubious Battle” (1936) and it fits Bill and me as we were back then.  We were on the threshold of our vocations, he in medicine and I in ministry.  Our parents were still living then and we were young husbands and fathers, eager to be the best we could be in both those roles.  We were altruistic and naive.  We had no awareness at that time of how life could and would tumble in, or if we did have an inkling, we paid it no mind.  We had the world by its tail!

Forty-eight years have passed since first we met.  We are no longer young, our “good looks” have taken on the marks of maturity, our thinness then is no longer, and we still have a little hair (at least I do) on our heads.  Our parents are deceased, our children have grown up and have children of their own.  We are both grandfathers now.

I wish there were space to tell of the many exploits and adventures Bill and I have shared in friendship (and some I would not tell even if there were space to do so).  Bill fulfilled his calling in medicine and also his calling to be an artist.  I fulfilled my calling in ministry within the church, as an Air Force chaplain and developed some new forms of ministry through the Yokefellow Movement.  We have been successful, I suppose, in the eyes of the world.  But more importantly, we have through thick and thin, through turmoil and joy, in trouble and in peace, in rocky places and in smooth, walked together on the adventurous path of friendship.

There are many things I prize—but at the top of the list is the adventure and the sacrament of friendship—because this is rarer and more precious than all the rest.