As I age and work on myself to raise my personal self-awareness, to see and monitor my selfishness and greed as a normal human being, the thing that bothers me most about Christianity as it has evolved from the fear control exercised by the Church as a blot of the Dark Ages, is the element for whom Christianity's central appeal is the bloody egocentric "Christ came to suffer, bleed and die on the cross for my sins" and the notion that if I claim Christ as my personal savior I'll be "as sure for heaven as if I were already there" therefore no worries if I don't make it home from church this morning.  I love singing the good old hymn "Nothing but the blood of Jesus" more than anyone, and I sing it loud and raucous, with both hands in the air, fists clenched in conviction; but this confession about myself no longer surprises me, nor likely surprises anyone who has ever known me. Yet, this my confession ongoingly challenges my confidence in what I ...

  IDK, but someone will discern as well as I or better, this old hymn surfacing this morning and persisting, allusive and elusive. Music does that now and then, stirs memories, hopes and dreams, and hangs on in the consciousness, distracting, disrupting. This hymn has not been in our hymnal for some forty years, in biblical language, a very long time: By cool Siloam's shady rill How fair the lily grows; How sweet the breath, beneath the hill, Of Sharon's dewy rose. Lo! such the child, whose early feet The paths of peace have trod, Whose secret heart, with influence sweet Is upward drawn to God. By cool Siloam's shady rill The lily must decay; The rose that blooms beneath the hill, Must shortly fade away. And soon, too soon, the wintry hour Of man's maturer age Will shake the soul with sorrow's power And stormy passions rage. O, thou, who givest life and breath, We seek thy grace alone. In childhood, manhood, age and death, To keep us still thine own.  In heart, mind...

  Now and then, from Time to Time as this morning, I check the blog "When Belief Dies" of Sam, a man raised literalist inerrantist pentecostal fundamentalist. Sam, who lives with his wife and children in the North of England, writes on the thesis "My goal is to honestly share my story in a way that makes people think about why they believe what they believe."  Thinking about exactly that, what I believe and why, is part of my own life as well, evidently based in my resistance to authority, which comes from working for my father in his seafood business early in my life, age nine through seventeen, and in his printing plant summer 1955 when I was nineteen and about to enter my junior year at UnivFlorida. I cannot stand, will not abide, anyone telling me what to do, and it flows over into challenging others telling me what to think, believe.  Steve Jobs caught my respect and ratified my perspective the year he told a graduating class "Don't be trapped by dogma...

  G reat Scripture this morning, really good stuff, all in the Bulletin, I hope you read it. In “covid liturgy” we've been reading only one bible lesson, plus the gospel - - Tradition is that if we celebrate Holy Communion we have a gospel reading. But just because worship is cut short, that’s no reason you can’t read and enjoy all of it yourself. Our good old Sunday School bible story for today is from First Samuel 17, David as a shepherd boy when he first comes to the attention of king Saul. Young, cocky, full of himself, David slays Goliath and is instantly  a hero of Israel. Saul’s son Jonathan is spellbound by David, and they become inseparable. King Saul makes David a leader of armies, field marshal, generalissimo at, what?, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen? In time, David is so admired by the people that Saul jealously turns against him. As king, Saul is incompetent, the pressure too great, he’s losing it.  Just as there are two different Creation Stories and two differe...

  It's our first Juneteenth national legal holiday. Until recent years I'd never been aware, but it's meaningful and commemorative, and I'm happy for people to have it. What will develop for it for future observance remains to become.  When I was a boy, two cherished observances were George Washington's Birthday and Abraham Lincoln's Birthday, both in February, since cut to one ignominious Presidents' Day, I think to make room for MLK Day. For one, we cut out, pasted and put together on "construction paper" George's silhouette and cherry trees and the hatchet size axe that in national Heilsgeschichte he used to cut them down. For Abe, same composition, his silhouette in tall black hats, red black and white art posted above the blackboards 'round the wall. It was a Time when February was a most welcome month after the long post-Christmas nightmare month back in school, plus Valentine's Day lifted February high, higher, highest. I never h...

  Not to stretch it and say "innocent", but it seems like I always show up surprised, having no idea what's going on.  Music, I miss all the good and bad stuff that everyone around me catches. I always have, no doubt in part because I like quiet, I don't work or walk or rest or drive or sleep or  ride with music going on around me; my pervasive thoughts and mind are bothersome enough.  Theater, films, I don't go or watch. Popular television shows either, don't ask me if I agree with the Emmy awards or the Oscar nominations, I have no idea, never heard of any of it. If CFB picks back up in earnest for the Fall 2021 football season, I'll go there for the Gators and Blue and the SEC and whoever's playing Ohio State. Also, for FSU now that Caroline's there, a rising sophomore, makes Papa a Seminole and I have, and proudly wear for her, a Garnet and Gold hat.  Otherwise, now and then I surface and realize I'm totally oblivious. Black Lives Matter, t...

  Got my phone on, always try to remember to have it on when Linda goes out by car just in case she needs to call me. Limited help possibilities though, my car has been in the shop, for, Monday will be four weeks, to sort out what's making it miss sporadically. Year model 2006, my third one exactly like it, color medium silver gray, the first one bought new for Linda's seventieth birthday. This one is a V8 and the other two had V6 engines, it's over fifteen years old but just turned over 70k miles. A c ross between a station wagon and an SUV, i t's kind of Papa's baby, all dimensions seem tailored to me, especially height for getting in and out, sit down, swing my legs in, and close the door.  I've had it five years and driven it 15k miles. Recently have just driven it at most fifteen miles a week, maybe fifty miles a month, between 7H and HNEC. Sam's or TAFB for gasoline now and then. Back and forth between here and Walton County those ten months of exile d...