No More Mr. Nice Guy

The restaurant was great, but the entry ramp was ridiculously, dangerously, idiotically steep. I got in and out just fine. But without my friends around me and my power wheels under me, I would have been waiting outside with a disgruntled knot of manual wheelchair users and those who couldn’t walk up the stairs or the ramp. I sent a letter of complaint.

Dear Restaurant Owner:

My group ate at your restaurant yesterday afternoon. Your food is uncommonly good. Everything looked as good as it smelled. Your waitress was attentive, and extremely helpful to me, helping to rearrange chairs so that I could get from the accessible door to my table. Unfortunately, your “accessible” door is the least accessible ramp and door that I have seen. On the plus side, I can tell you that the door is wide enough; for the minus side, I have a list.

1. Your ramp is too steep.
People using manual wheelchairs have to rely on their own strength or have to bring helpers to roll up your ramp. In either case, your steep ramp is a danger to everyone who uses it. Getting into a restaurant should not be an extreme sport. Neither should leaving a restaurant. Going down the ramp presents a whole new set of extreme problems. My power wheelchair got me in. Not everyone has such a wonderful tool. Of course, I’m not the only kind of disabled person. I can’t imagine that anyone who has difficulty climbing stairs being able to safely use your ridiculous ramp.

2. Your ramp is too narrow, and the 90° turn on the tiny landing is way too tight.
I was able to get in, yes. But my chair can turn within its own radius. In a chair that needed a wide circle to turn there is no way I could ever have gotten in. Further, there is nowhere for anyone to stand safely to hold the door open — in or out. Coming in, someone has to assume a precarious position, leaning way out the door with the arm fully extended. And going out, it is frankly impossible for anyone to hold the door on that tiny landing and the narrow ramp.

3. Your side door is just unfriendly.
Your “accessible” door cannot be opened from the outside. A disabled person would have no choice but to bring a helper, or beg passers-by to alert the management. This does not constitute equal access.
I can’t believe that the building code in Bridgewater would permit a ramp so far out of federal ADA accessibility guidelines to be built in their town.

I love to eat good food; your restaurant makes it well. I sometimes need help; your staff is wonderfully helpful. You have tried to provide access; but useless access is no access at all.

Sincerely,
Great Garlu

If, after reading the title of this entry, you ask “What’s not nice about this new you?” I just hasten to add that I didn’t say that it would be No More Mr. Polite Guy¹. No, what’s not nice is that I didn’t couch this as a friendly note, as if the two of us could just work this out to everyone’s satisfaction. I am not waiting for friendly or otherwise reply before inviting the local Superintendent of Code Enforcement in for a visit to this otherwise fine establishment. If this doesn’t get any action, I contact the mayor’s office, the fire commissioner, the town council — you get my drift.

The New Disabled — We Are Everywhere You Want to Be^©

. Or we will be. Look for us at a previously-inaccessible place near you.

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1. Click here to see what “No More Mr. Polite Guy” might look like….
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A Human Being Is a Terrible Thing to Waste

100% of Famous Dead French Existentialists Surveyed Agree

“I’m not going to kill anyone. I’m going to prevent a child from being born…

It sounded as though there existed somewhere a completed child awaiting the hour to come out into the open, into the sunlight, and Mathieu was barring its passage. And, indeed, that was more or less the fact: there was a tiny human creature, conscious, furtive, deceitful, and pathetic, with a white skin, and wide ears, and tiny birthmarks, and all manner of distinctive signs such as are stamped on passports, a little man who would never run about the streets with one foot on the pavement and the other in the gutter; eyes, green like Mathieu’s or black like Marcelle’s, which would never see the vitreous skies of winter, nor the sea, nor any human face, hands that would never touch the snow, nor the flesh of women, nor the bark of trees: an embodiment of the world, ensanguined, luminous, sullen, passionate, sinister, full of hopes, an image populous with houses and gardens, tall delightful girls, and horrible insects; and a pin would pierce it and explode it like a toy balloon.”

– Jean-Paul Sartre,

The Age of Reason (translated by Eric Sutton)

A Truly Wonderful Christian Flag

2010-02-20

Dear Christian,

thank you for sending me the Web link to the Christian Flag. I found it quite thought-provoking. So I was thinking about it, and feel that you already have one. All the symbolism you need is readily available.

Imagine a city surrounded by tall, strong walls. It stands on a high, forested plateau overlooking the plain. There is a low hill outside the city wall, far from the abodes of the elite. Here’s where the Roman occupation government puts its enemies to death. Romans call it Calvary; the native Jews call it Golgotha, The Place of the Skull. To be near it is an assault on the senses. The air is full of the stink of death and blood-soaked earth, full of cries of pain and weeping. Here, you can see them, the most wretched on Earth. People forced to pass that way cannot bear to see their suffering, and look away. None want to stay and experience the end of the course of human justice. And this end is the bitterest that human ingenuity can make it.

A man hangs on one of these crosses, just another criminal like the ones crucified to his left and right. His name is Jesus, a Jewish teacher from Nazareth, in Galilee. He is innocent of any crime. But he is not just innocent — he is the Christ, the Lamb of God, willing to give his blessed life to save a world so sinful and depraved as to think up a punishment like crucifixion. Through Jesus’ sacrifice and resurrection, God turned hopelessness to hope; fear to confidence, and utter loss to stunning victory. It isn’t a worldly symbol — it isn’t even an object. Those who hate it will never be able to capture, cut down or defile it. Those who hate you for its sake cannot shame or defile you, for you have filled yourself with it. Out of this image, this faith, arises the living water Jesus promised: the spiritual water that brings eternal life. And from you too, now, it rises as a fountain. Its source is Christ, and him crucified.

Here is your flag, Christian — always hold it fast to you. It’s not a proper flag, as such things are judged. See, it has only the color of Jesus’ blood, shed for you. But I assure you, dear Christian, that this color don’t run.

Your brother in Christ,
Paul A.

Handicap-Access Consultants — Hire a Bunch!

Dear Mark,
It is good for anyone to have a reason to work outside, but the opportunities for people using wheelchairs to do so can be limited. It is an exciting and wonderful thing you and your group are doing — designing a handicap-accessible community garden

I would be happy to serve as a disability consultant, checking out the accessibility of a garden in progress.but I firmly believe that in designing an accessible community garden, you need more than one disabled consultant. Rather, you need a whole team of consultants, say, one who walks with a walker, and one who uses a manual wheelchair, and one who uses a power wheelchair, etc.. It is crucial to involve this wide variety of disabled in the design phase of a project intended to benefit them.

To anyone else who is designing any handicap accessible place, I ask them to remember that each disabled person is as unique as any other person. life, as disabled or not, shapes each one’s perception of our world and creates unique perspectives. The problem comes in because each person’s experience of disability is often itself unique. In a group of people all with wildly different perceptions of the world, one will see problems that another one doesn’t.

This insight comes courtesy of the renovation of the physical therapy entrance at JFK Johnson Hospital.

A long time ago, I used to walk into the physical therapy department there with almost no trouble at all, because everything from the parking lot to the sidewalks to the entrance were very reasonably flat and level. It stands to reason that the renovation project would keep these advantages at that entrance of the hospital.

Unfortunately, it seemed reason and taken a backseat during the renovation. Most of what I described as benefits have been renovated out of existence. The entrance was down the hill from the parking lot now. The sidewalk concrete had been replaced with decorative brick, and mirrored the attractive little hills they had built to catch the eye. Nothing was flat, nothing was level, and the brick always threatened to trip me.

I complained about the new difficulty and everyone agreed with me, but they told it had been designed and tested by the hospital director, who himself was disabled enough that he tested the sidewalks while using his scooter. I thought that was a pretty idiotic way of testing sidewalks intended to be used by people with mobility problems. This made me imagine a slew of disabled, each with a different way of getting around, ranging around to report on a new place’s accessibility.

So thanks again! I hope you’ll give me a call soon.
Your friend,
The Great Green Garlu

Is it only the good who die young?

Only the good die young. You hear it all the time when someone dies too young. Sometimes a celebrity of great beauty and talent, maybe a humanitarian, or maybe someone you know who you just feel deserved better from life. But the proverb is totally inadequate. We need a new one.

“Thy Church, Oh God in Every Age” is hymn number 589 in the United Methodist hymnal. It is set to a tune called “Dickinson College”, and has the distinction of being the only tune in the book written in 5/4 time. It is not very well-known, and I was mentioning it to T ____. He told me that afterward, playing the hymn at the piano, he was thunderstruck to discover that the tune was written by someone he had once known — Lee Hastings Bristol, Jr., the third president of Westminster Choir College. Bristol belonged to the Bristol-Myers pharmaceutical family. He gave up his career in the family business to pursue his first love, music. T ____ knew him all too briefly, starting when he entered the college in the autumn of 1969. He was, as T ____ recollects, a musical genius and wonderful, kindly person. He used to entertain guests by playing for them the entire score of one of his beloved Gilbert and Sullivan operettas, playing piano and singing all the lead roles, to the delight of said guests, I feel compelled to add. T ____ always found him an interesting and engaging conversationalist, and met him for the last time in 1975, when they happened to be going to the same seminar. Bristol died unexpectedly at the age of 56, from a rare kidney ailment.

Think about that, and then imagine the death of the most ornery cuss on earth, a man whom everyone would tell you was hard to handle. But a human is always more than just one thing. Ask his mother, ask his brothers or his friends, ask those who loved him. Before you’re done, someone will tell you how much good there was in that man, and how he will be sorely missed.

Think about Mattie Stepanek, a small boy who suffered from a neuro-muscular disease so life-threatening that the doctor told his mother there was no hope for him. For such a small child, he was an excellent poet. Here’s one:

The job of the poet
Is to leave stains of the storms
Yet echo laughter of the light
That is seen from the soul. . . .
The job of the poet
Is to . . . capture
And to spirit and to script
The pulse of life.

He was 14 years old when he died, but not before his first collection of poetry, Heartsongs, was published, and became a New York Times bestseller. That was before the other five books, and his collection of poetry about world peace became bestsellers. There was his success as an inspirational speaker. After his death, he inspired a large number of his friends and neighbors to create the Mattie J.T. Stepanek Foundation.

My grandmother grew up in New York City downtown on Mott Street. You can see where the tenement her family lived in used to be — it’s now the police station down there. Her father came from Naples and warned her never to marry a Sicilian or a Calabrese. She married my grandfather who was from Calabria, anyway. She met him at work, where he was in charge of the factory that made cloth flowers to decorate women’s clothing. They had a family and lived in Queens. She lived with my family for many years, always “accidentally” making too much lunch for her to eat by herself and asking if we would like to have some. We didn’t need potato chips to snack on — we had simple, plain and excellent Italian home cooking. She lived to hold her first great-grandchild, and died at the age of 94. I would’ve liked my younger daughter to have met her,

Think of anyone you loved who has died. You miss them, whether or not they made great contributions to society, or small ones, or any contributions but the ones that meant something to you. Wouldn’t you have liked another day with them, or another month, or another year, or 10?

We need a new proverb to replace “only the good die young”. Let me propose this one:

Everyone Dies Too Young.

A Sad and Pathetic Parody That Only Highlights the World’s Brokenness And Persistent Sadness

My friend Bill writes that he is tired of the ridiculous persistence of reporting on Tiger Woods. I say that Tiger has, of late, made it somewhat difficult for people to hear him described as a “real stand-up guy” without expecting that a penis joke is in the offing. Bill says it’s time for the story to just go away. From this, I got an idea for a song parody based on a 1995 hit from British boy band Take That.

(please click here to see the original video)

Elin’s Song (Gone for Good)

I guess now it’s time for me to give up.
I feel it’s time.
Broken picture of you beside me,
In the trash is where I put your coffee cup. (oh yeah)
Got a fist of pure emotion,
Got a head of shattered dreams,
Gotta leave it, gotta leave it all behind now.

Whatever you said, whatever you did, don’ wanna hear it.
I just want you gone for good.
(don’t want you back, don’t want you back, I want you gone for good)
Stop showing your face, find a hiding place and just stay there,
’cause I want you gone for good.
(don’t want you back, don’t want you back, I want you gone for good)

Unaware and uninformed I figured out the story
It wasn’t good
Still in the corner of my mind I knew it couldn’t be our story
But that was not to be
In the twist of separation
you excelled at being free
Wasn’t there a little room inside for me?

Whatever you said, whatever you did, don’ wanna hear it.
I just want you gone for good.
(don’t want you back, don’t want you back, I want you gone for good)
Stop showing your face, find a hiding place and just stay there,
’cause I want you gone for good.
(don’t want you back, don’t want you back, I want you gone for good)

We can’t be together, this time it’s forever.
No more fighting, for my love, we’ll never be
So complete in our love –
It will never be recovered again.

Whatever you said, whatever you did, don’ wanna hear it.
I just want you gone for good.
(don’t want you back, don’t want you back, I want you gone for good)
Stop showing your face, find a hiding place and just stay there,
’cause I want you gone for good.
(don’t want you back, don’t want you back, I want you gone for good)

Oh, yeah
I guess now it’s time
that you were gone for good

Did you enjoy that? My original idea was that the parody would be from the viewpoint of a person like Bill, who was just sick and tired of the whole thing. But as I read the lyrics, I realized that it would be more effective if it were from Tiger’ s wife’s perspective. Sometimes my subconscious seems to know what it’s doing, but I just didn’t imagine that it would cause me to write such a sad and pathetic parody that only highlights the world’s brokenness and persistent sadness. Yes, it’s kind of funny until you imagine Tiger and Elin as real people who may lose everything they have together.

So now that I have thrown a wet blanket over the whole proceeding and possibly spoiled any fun you might’ve got out of this, I offer my condolences for the state of our world.

(They say that comedians are people who joke around because they dislike the sad state of the world. So sue me, I’m a comedian.)

A reading from the Holy Gospel according to Matthew, Chapter 6, verses 25 through 34

First, a reading from the Holy Gospel according to Matthew, Chapter 6, verses 25-27.

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink, or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly father feeds them. Are you not more valuable than they? Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?”

At this time, please pray with me Psalm 19, verse 14:
May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing in your sight, O LORD, my Rock and my Redeemer.
Amen.

Do you think Jesus’ speaking style would have made him sound stilted and academic, the way that what you just read sounds? I don’t think so. Jesus was the son of a carpenter, after all, and a plain man who grew up in a small town, learning his trade from his father. For this reason, I’ve tried to strip off the stilted, academic polish on these words of his, translating them into plain, colloquial American.

Now we have a different reading from the Holy Gospel according to Matthew, Chapter 6, verses 25- 34.

“… I’ve got to tell you that you shouldn’t worry about your life and what you eat or drink, or about your body and what you wear. Isn’t your life more important than food? Isn’t your body more important than clothes? Look at the birds up in the sky. They don’t plant seeds or harvest anything, or build barns to keep it in, and even so your father up in heaven feeds them. Aren’t you more valuable than they are? Can any of you add one lousy hour to your life by worrying about it?

And why’re you worrying about clothes? Look at the lilies growing in that field over there. They don’t work for a living. They don’t have any clothes, but not even Solomon in all his glory was as beautiful as one of them. If that’s how God dresses the grass, that’s here today and gone tomorrow, don’t you think he’ll clothe you? Yeah you, with only a little faith! So stop worrying, and don’t say “What’re we gonna eat, and what’re we gonna drink, and what’re we gonna wear?” Everybody’s always running around looking for these things, and your father up in heaven knows you need’em, too. So first, look for his kingdom and his righteousness, and he’ll give all these things to you, too. And don’t worry about tomorrow — just let it worry about itself. There’s too much trouble every day already.”

It reads like the plain speaking of a plain man, a man whom the conventional, the secular, the learned, and the intellectual disdain, this carpenter from East Podunk, Galilee, for God’s sake, who, while surrounded by the dregs of society, has the nerve to lecture his betters about the will of God.

I hope that it reads like that, and if it does, then thank God as I say unto you, ¹
Amen…and…Amen!

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¹ Stilted and academic Is okay for me, because I am an expert. I caution you, however, not to try this at home.

5 Cool Hymns from the Wilds of the United Methodist 1982 Hymnal

586 Let My People Seek Their Freedom
(see text and tune)
Words: T. Herbert O’Driscoll, 1971
Music: EBENEZER — Thomas J. Williams, 1890

Both my teenage daughters agree that “Ebenezer” is the coolest-sounding tune in the book. I agree. Two musical elements, a long note and a triplet, play together to create a rolling rhythm which gives the hymn an almost martial air. You could march to it, sure, but all the rhythm requires of one is a brisk, purposeful walk, perhaps the walk of the Christian soldier, or the confident tread of the Israelites leaving Egypt. Even as I sing it, I can’t help but feel that exciting things are going on somewhere.

589 The Church of Christ, in Every Age
( see correct text but with wrong tune)
Words: Fred Pratt Green, 1969
Music: DICKINSON COLLEGE — Lee Hastings Bristol, Jr., 1962

This tune is in the rare time signature of 5/4. It’s as if I’m falling headlong into the music as I listen. It’s like a petite piece of Polka crashing into the Waltz. Nevertheless, it does have its charms. It seemed without equilibrium, with one measure tumbling into the next, rhythmically disorienting. But now, with a sense of excitement, I anticipate all of its tottering dance¹. This hymn that has no place to rest brings to mind the Son of Man and His restless, striving Church, which God renews and resurrects in every age. The lyric is a rare modern lyric that seems timeless, less anchored to a particular place and time. Unlike a protest song, which often ages to senility even while you’re singing it, it won’t become obsolete as soon as times, and their battles, change.

605 Wash, O God, Our Sons and Daughters
(see text and tune)
Words: Ruth Duck, 1987
Music: BEACH SPRING — attributed to B. F. White, 1844; harmonized by Ronald A. Nelson, 1978

This should be the winner of Best Pairing of a Very Modern Lyric with a Mid-19th Century Tune. Ruth Duck’s lyric sounds as fresh today as it did in 1987, and I daresay will sound as fresh in 2087 as it does today.

606 Come, Let Us Use the Grace Divine
(see text and tune)
Words: Charles Wesley, 1762
Music: KINGSFOLD — English melody; arranged by Ralph Vaughan Williams, 1906

This one is arranged from an old English melody by the great Ralph Vaughan Williams² . I love the modal sound in this hymn, and I also love its resemblance to one of the themes in Vaughan Williams’ orchestral work, “Folk Songs from Somerset”.

627 O The Depth of Love Divine
(see text and tune)
Words: Charles Wesley, 1745
Music: STOOKEY — Carlton R. Young, 1986

This last is a serious contender in the category Best Pairing of a Mid-18th Century Poem with a Modern Tune. It is unmetered, the better to fit Wesley’s words, and for me, the music adds significance to the question asked within the lyric: How is it necessary, or even possible that bread and wine convey to us the body of Christ and the grace of God?

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¹ My wife says I ought to try and get out of the house more often.
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² When considering British choral music, Vaughan Williams is as inescapable as death and taxes, but is far better-liked.
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A Satisfying Job to Do

This is a meditation on a sermon by the Rev. Dr. Anthony J. Godlefski, pastor of Montgomery United Methodist Church in Skillman, New Jersey. I consider him to be world-class as a minister, preacher, organist, choir director, friend and all-around mensch. In other words, a blessedly nice guy.

In his sermon “A Satisfying Job to Do” , Dr. Godlefski quoted Luke 1:76:

And you, child, shall be called the prophet of the Most High, for you will go before the Lord, to prepare the way.

From this, he derives a simple yet satisfying job that every Christian, no matter his condition of life or wealth can do: to prepare the way for the Lord. To quote Dr. Godlefski:

We need to take away obstacles and blockages so that people would feel welcome and accepted whenever they come here [to church]. We need to reach out to those who have not been touched by the love of the Lord, because we have this precious gift, and we can do it. Take a moment and close your eyes and think about the people who prepared the way of the Lord for you. Who were they? Who were those wonderful people?

Later, I decided to remember some of the people in my life, who, known or unknown to themselves, had made “the crooked straight and the rough places plain” for me. Here’s what I came up with after only a half-hour’s reflection…

My grandma, Mary, who always said her rosary, and most days sat with it always within reach. She taught us that faithfulness was not a function of whether one was sitting in church on Sunday morning.

My parents, who sent my sister and me to church at St. Matthias, where we learned about the Christian faith, made our First Communions and were confirmed in good time. Our parents had some serious reasons not to go back to church, but they kept them to themselves. They took care not to poison us against it. That is just one more reason to thank God for them.

Father Ed, the adviser to St. Matthias’ youth folk group, a group of junior high school and high school students who provided the singing and guitar music at the Saturday evening Mass. There was no wall, no unbridgeable gap between him and us. The whole group of us teens often went down to the seminar room where he actually did advise us. He even went with us on our excursions to the ice cream parlor at Rutgers Plaza. We were as silly and rowdy as people of that age could be, but he saw fit not to dampen our spirits. He treated us like real persons, and we came to understand that despite his clerical collar, he was a real person, too.

Father Joe, who at first we knew as Deacon Joe, who invited the folk group to sing at his ordination in Long Branch, NJ. He often worked with the folk group, and was part of our lives and we of his as he dedicated that life in eternal service to God and his people. He taught us that such dedication was a possibility even for ourselves.

My parents again, who after a long time away from the Church, became members of St. John the Evangelist in New Brunswick, NJ, showing us that even if you had been away a long time, there was still a pathway back to faith.

Reverend José, pastor at St. John’s, who helped bring them back. He was a Franciscan, which explained why he wore sandals even in the snowy winter. He made sure that the Spanish-speaking people living around the church knew that it was their church home, too. He had a great heart full of love for all people of the world. When a huge earthquake killed thousands of people in Nicaragua, he celebrated a Mass for those who were suffering there, changing what was to be a festive day into a day of mourning in spite of how it incensed the Altar Guild. He taught us that we should be about love and not about punishment or even over-much about formality.

Dr. Bob, who, when I decided to return to the Church, advised me on what church might best suit me. One of the places he directed me to was the United Methodist Church, due to its long tradition of freedom of thought. It was the first one I tried and I felt so at home that I didn’t bother going anywhere else. He called himself a “recovering Evangelical”, and ran the “Heretics Anonymous” discussion group. By that time, he had become a Baptist and was intending to go to school for eventual ordination. He taught me that there was the possibility of finding peace at a new church.

Pastor Kay, who shook my hand at Allerton United Methodist Church when I unknowingly chose Palm Sunday as the day I decided to return to the church. Eventually, she told me about her vision of Jesus she had had while sitting with her sleeping father in his hospital room. He had appeared to literally step out of a strange shimmery area in one corner of the room. From this I learned that even someone who was not any sort of ascetic or mystic or hermit might have a face-to-face encounter with the living God.

Clifford, who occupied the bed next to mine in my hospital room last month. He taught me three things: firstly, he had seen me reading my Gideon Bible and got an idea that perhaps “someone” wanted him in the hospital until he should read the whole New Testament. He told me he had always prayed for guidance in the name of Jesus. He wasn’t a churchgoer, so he often had questions about what he read, so I kept reading ahead of him just in case he had a question I could answer. The first thing I learned was that by just reading a Bible, someone like me could be a witness for Christ;

secondly, he also made me realize just how much of the Bible I know, and how passionate I am about it;

finally, when I was feeling depressed, he tried to make sure that I understood just how many blessings I had had in my life. Now I can count them all the better. Thank you for all these things, my brother.

Janice, who on Thanksgiving day, brought slices of her homemade sweet potato pie and her faith to me and Clifford in our hospital room. When we were hungry she gave us to eat. She was also an excellent apologist, paging backward and forward through her Bible to give proofs of Christ as we understand him.

Abiba, who is a tech at the hospital, and loves Jesus more than anyone I know, confessing her Lord joyfully and unabashedly. Perhaps one reason is because the still, small voice literally saved her life in her homeland. She told me how one of the soldiers, from one side of the war or the other, stuck the business end of a rifle up against her chin. Then she told me that she heard a quiet voice say to her: “Grab the soldiers gun barrel…”, so she did. She struggled with the soldier and managed to keep that business end away from her long enough for the other side’s soldiers forced the vicious soldier to run away, leaving his rifle in her hands. From her, I learned about the importance of listening to that still, small voice. She had quite a few friends who got the “rifle-in-the-neck” treatment. She was the only survivor.

There is a song by Dan Fogelberg, containing the line “his gentle means of sculpting souls took me years to understand”. It made me think of Rev. Godlefski. He is a positively-directed Titan on my list of preparers of the way. I don’t think I will ever be able to recount all the things that he has taught me about our faith and about our Christ. He truly is a mensch.

Finally, that one person who shall remain nameless. Lately I think of a line from a song John Denver wrote, dedicated to his uncle, a person for whom “love was just the way to live and die”. This is the one person who taught me most that love is not an illusion.

It says in Philippians 4:8 that when we see things that are true, noble, right, lovely, admirable, excellent or praiseworthy, that we should think about these things. Today I’m thinking about you, my preparers of the way, and I want to thank you. For you and for all the others whom I did not write about, I pray God open the floodgates of blessings in your lives. Amen.

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For those unfamiliar with the Yiddish language, the word means “person”, but is said about a person who is, as Leo Rosten defined in his classic book, “The Joys of Yiddish”:

“Someone to admire and emulate, someone of noble character. The key to being ‘a real mensch’ is nothing less than character, rectitude, dignity, a sense of what is right, responsible, decorous.”

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Want to read more on how to be a mensch? Just click:

Kawasaki, Guy. “How to Be a Mensch.” How to Change the World 11 Feb 2006

The Joyful Antithesis of the Gray Times of the World

Since the concert at St. Joe’s has ended, Christmas is officially over for the SLC. We enter what we call our hibernation season, wherein we will have to keep Christmas in our hearts. After that, we’ll have to keep it until September, while much of the rest of the world — like a rough beast slouching away from Bethlehem — returns to business as usual.

I hope that we in the Starlite Chorale know it — that business as usual is a spiritually empty, although necessary pursuit — as we wait in joyful hope for a chance once again to gather together and proclaim its antithesis, its opposite — the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ. We’ve got that joy, joy, joy, joy, down in the heart that I pray will remain and sustain us through the gray times of the world.
(Here, the tone of my words now compel me to add a couple more.)
Amen, and amen!

.