coming soon

This week's email from N T Wright seeks to enroll me in a class about responsibly preaching on current events, social issues, instead of standing on the sidelines - - as most of us do for fear of offending contributors who think religion and politics don't mix unless it affirms their viewpoint. People want to hear what they are already certain of. In many churches, stirring up things is a way for the preacher to get fired. Most of us are afraid to share the Bible and other Church and Religious and Theological knowledge we worked so hard on in seminary, lest we anger the literalist fundamentalists in our congregations. Slightly braver than some, in my Time I tried to at least use my Sunday school platform to help openminded adults out of kindergarten Sunday school.

Current events, social issues.

Transparency, released to the public and some may wish to view the Tyre Nichols videos. Not me, life as it is has sufficient stress, I have loved ones of my own about whose safety I am constantly frantic and my fearful imagination is anguish enough, I do not need to watch as someone's young son is beaten to death by uniformed bullies who regard themselves as untouchable authority. Stuff of parents' nightmares.

This is the way it has always been, and but for the videos, they would have got away with it, reporting Reckless Driving, Violent Resistance, Grabbing for their Firearms, Breaking Free, Trying to Escape. Beat the everlIving hell out of him. Fear: life in America for every Black male.

The only reason Cities are not burning this Time is because all five policemen were Black, which transitions the situation from racism to the unmentionable: the police vocation itself attracts a certain personality, a predisposition to violence and bullying that enjoys hurting people and relishes the exempt authority to so. Last year it caused outcries for "defunding the police", an extreme, nonsensical notion that is a danger to public safety. Somehow, the aggressive bullies need to be identified and screened out more vigorously in the hiring process without eliminating applicants who are able, fit, courageous and decent. I do not have an answer, and I'm inclined to think there's not one.

All this so obviously "goes without saying," yet, how to attract career-minded candidates when studies show that policemen who hesitate are more likely to be killed on duty than those who are assertive. Assertive v. Aggressive.

It gets personal. Within the church setting, in group discussions, people who knew my background have "set me at naught" as the hymn verse has it, dismissed my politically incorrect opinions because I have "a military mind." I've always denied it, but I have examined myself. Sixty years ago when I was in my twenties, I was an enthusiastic young naval officer and Navy-sponsored MBA student at the University of Michigan, where many of my classmates eagerly anticipated being hired as management trainees into steady careers in the automobile industry. It seems arrogant to me now, but I remember looking on them with disdain, that life in the service of my country was nobler than middle management life in the middle floors of a high-rise executive office building somewhere in Detroit. They, on the other hand, had no admiration for the military, and we never let ourselves stand out by wearing the Navy uniform to class.

Protesting that I did not have "a military mind" never convinced anyone. IDK.

Indeed, I once knew an Episcopal priest who had been a military police officer, seeing his eyes gleam as he told about beating the hell out of drunken sailors.

Evil is not illusive, it is alive and well. It comes with being human, the wicked witch clinging to the lamp post as we pop into Narnia. Let the reader understand.

And yet, some are called to be policemen, Navy Seals, and Army rangers and some are called to be accountants, pastors, and undertakers. Some are angels, some are sadists and child molesters, some are saviors.

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Sunday morning breakfast: soft-scrambled cheese eggs sprinkled with mushroom bits, black coffee, heart pills, and pan-fried bacon. Interesting bacon: now and then we like to drive out to Bill's to grocery shop, if we are going to or from Tyndall, we stop at the Grocery Outlet on Tyndall Parkway in Callaway, this Time we drove the underconstruction nightmare that in my Time was a grassy dirt road from St Andrews through rural countryside and past two dairies to Lynn Haven. A two-lane path into a six-lane highway?

Linda shops with a list. Me, I grab a grocery cart because I need a walker, and roam. It's at Bill's that I find my oyster sauce and my liverwurst. This trip I spotted bacon on special: just over two dollars per 16 ounce pound, maybe $2.40. Nowadays bacon is nine dollars per 12 ounce pound. In my Time bacon was 69¢ and there was no such thing as a 12 ounce pound, nomesane? I bought a package. Fries up decent: crispy, not too thin, juicy, salty. Heart healthy, eh?

We can't wait for our new Grocery Outlet to open here in St Andrews. Walking distance. The building's painted and the parking lot is paved and inviting. Coming soon.

Happy Sunday!

RSF&PTL