"The Grave is Eloquent"

That was something that I recently saw on a nineteenth century grave marker in Leominster, MA.  The grave marker commemorates the death, in 1836, of a 4-year old girl named Susan.  The marker doesn't tell much of Susan, just the date and that her family felt compelled to inscribe her stone with "The grave is eloquent."

"The grave is eloquent."

Were they devastated by her death, and saw the hopeless silence of the earth the telling state?

Was she the victim of lingering pain, and the grave the peace she was released to?

Were they Christian, and saw the expressed hope of Christ's empty tomb as their prayer for reunion at the resurrection?

"The grave is eloquent."

We don't know much about Susan, just her age at passing, where she was interred and that someone thought that more than just the dates were called for, but chose to ponder other than her brief life here.

"The grave is eloquent."

This is what Susan's family, those responsible for her in death, as in life, felt was right. 

Right for her. 

Right for them.

Today, there is controversy over the burial of a 21st century person.  One Tamerlan Tsarnaev.

There were protests outside the funeral home that accepted Tsarnaev as soon as the location was made public.

Calls for burning the ashes and spreading them randomly.

Calls for burial at sea.

Statements from civic leaders that he should not be buried "here," for almost any value of "here" in the U.S.

The funeral director has inquired all across the country, but the answer is always "not here."

Very little thought is given to what would feel right for the family. 

Those who knew the little boy Tamerlan when he was aged four years. 

Who saw him grow. 

Who sent him to school. 

Who took him to worship.

Who saw the evidence of his crime, and the evidence of his death, on television.

I have always been an American.  Usually I've been proud of that.  Not always, but usually.

This is not a time I'm altogether proud of my nation.

I'm ashamed that both the candidates for U.S. Senate for Massachusetts have said "Not here" instead of  "we grieve with all the families."

This isn't about scoring points in some game of pandering to the bigotry of hate.

Funerals aren't really for the dead, they're for the living.  Those left behind.

We need to have compassion for those families who have lost.

All the families. For all the victims.

Compassion, and mercy, are not weakness, but strength.

The mother of this boy thinks she may want to take the boy back to Russia, where he grew up.  His uncle thinks that he should be buried here, as Tamerlan Tsarnaev made the Unites States his home for 10 years.

By the time you read this, the decision may have been made, and the body interred.

But where, and how, will be a telling sign for us all, as a nation.

A sign of our strength, our compassion, our mercy.

"The grave is eloquent"

Thomas' Faith

I recently was part of a small group that re-affirmed baptismal vows.

As part of that process, we met with the Bishop of our Diocese.  One of the things he asked us all, was to think on what Biblical story  we found most resonant for us.

Some found the resurrection at the tomb most important, others the story of Lazarus,  others still the parable of the Good Samaritan.

I realized that I really hadn't thought on what would be the most telling for me.

As I thought, the story that crystallizes my faith is that of Doubting Thomas.

Like many of the stories and parables in the New Testament,  this story can be viewed on many lights.  One of the advantages of a non-literal Bible tradition is that one can explore these different levels, and  we can view each of those as valid for discussion and contemplation.

The most common illumination of this story is the faith of the people who had not seen the visitation, yet still believed in the resurrection, unlike Thomas, who said "Show me."

What I find important in this tale is the circumstances involved.

In many cases, if one expresses doubt in The Faith, one is chastised or shunned.

Or the doubts force the doubter away, as they feel they have no place with those they may break from.

In this case, however, the week after the visitation that Thomas missed, he again met with the other disciples.

Those who had seen did not tell Thomas to go away because he did not believe, but welcomed him as their brother still.

Thomas himself did not cut himself from that community, either because he did not know where else to go, or he still hungered for the validation, at least second-hand, of his prior faith, or he still hungered for that faith itself.

When the Savior appeared again, He offered Thomas the chance to feel for himself the wounds, in order to prove the reality.  This was not done in spite or rebuke, but to show Thomas that he was still loved and wanted as a part of Christ's family, and that any proof would be offered gladly.

As someone was was unchurched for quite a while, this story, along with the parable of the prodigal son, speaks to me dearly, as reaffirmation that those who leave will be welcomed anew, with celebration and love.

Stones of Remembrance and Five Victims

I'm a Christian. 

One of the bedrock tenets of Christianity is forgiveness.

Asking forgiveness for our own deeds; giving our own forgiveness for deeds done against us; praying for forgiveness from G/d for all who trespass.

This forgiveness does not mean that those who transgress are not to held accountable for their actions. It means that any accounting be done for justice and mercy, not retribution and vengeance.

Since the bombing at the Boston Marathon I've been trying to pray, sincerely, for forgiveness for those responsible.

Being a lifetime Bostonian, someone who occasionally stood in the crowd to see the finishers, this crime has relevance for me. It has especial resonance because, when I worked for the old John Hancock Insurance company, I worked as a volunteer on, and around, the finish line of the race.  

I wanted to pray for that forgiveness, but kept feeling for vengeance. Once the two brothers were identified it was even harder to ask for that forgiveness.

This bombing was not an unimaginable act, for it was conceived and acted upon. But it was heinous, hateful, odious, abominable, totally reprehensible.  More so, parochially,  since it was my birth city.  Now I had faces to see as those responsible.
   
And I wanted so, as a Christian, to pray for that forgiveness. But what I kept feeling for was that revenge.

In the "modern" Christian churches that embrace it, the rite of Confirmation, by those who have attained "the age of reason," the corporal purpose is a conscious reaffirmation of one's membership in the church, and the responsibilities that entails. (We'll leave for another day the theological underpinnings).

At my church, during this past Saturday night's meeting with our pastor, the candidates for Confirmation & their sponsors made a small memorial table up in the sanctuary for the 3 people killed by blast at the Marathon finish line and the MIT policeman shot and killed by the bombers.

At regular services on Sunday all were asked to place a pebble  on the table with the memorial, instead of flowers, in the tradition of the Jewish Stones of Remembrance.

One of the sponsors told that, as part of the group's prayers after setting up the table, they struck a bell 4 times, once for each victim. However, once the bell was struck only a glancing blow and did not ring true, so had to be struck again.  She said one of the teenage candidates told her that it was a reminder that there were five victims killed as a result of this tragedy, not four.

That teenager had grasped the essence of her responsibility as a Christian, to forgive.  Something I had found so hard to do. That fifth person was also of G/d's family, as are all of us.

That desire for vengeance is still in me.

But now, I hope, I can truly pray for forgiveness.

I'm a Christian

"Be Ye Not Afraid" (Deut. 1:29)

Yesterday (April 17, 2013) the national Parliament of New Zealand had a final vote on their Definition of Marriage bill, which passed on a vote of 77 to 44.  This makes NZ the 13th nation to legalize marriage equality.

This may still be overturned by citizen referendum.  However, from the {admittedly small) number of New Zealand citizens I know, it would not be at all certain that anything even close to an overturn would occur.

One of the MPs, Maurice Williams gave a wonderful (and lighthearted) speech in support of the bill.

A telling quote, that can be heard all around this country as well, from those favoring equality in marriage rights was: "I give a promise to those people who are opposed to this bill right now... the sun will still rise tomorrow, your teenage daughter will still argue back with you as if she knows everything, your mortgage will not grow, you will not have skin disease or rashes or toads in your bed."

Just as, here in Massachusetts, the legions of Hades have not come forth from the Sumner or Ted Williams tunnels, nor has the State House dome collapsed from divine retribution.

Here, from the magic of YouTube, is that MP's speech.  And he closed his address with the above paraphrase from the book of Deuteronomy.

"Be ye not afraid"
 

But For The Grace

We are all G/d's children.

 There is an old saw: "There, but for the Grace of G/d, go I." 

The usual accepted meaning is that there are, for all but the select few, always those who are worse off: in material wealth or physical or spiritual health. 

 What I'd rather think is that, as we have been granted that sufficiency of that Grace, it is beholden on us to pass it forward - if we received it once, whether that Grace will be replenished or not is immaterial. 

Recently, some members of the Episcopal congregation where I am welcomed worked, as part of their outreach and witnessing, assisting the regular members of the Worcester Fellowship on their Sunday lunch and worship, held on Worcester Common ("Worship at 1 PM Sundays, Rain or Shine"). 

This fellowship group gives lunch, socks, fruit and bread to anyone who comes, poor, "genteel" or homeless, no questions asked. Followed by a non-specific Christian service, with no requirement to participate, listen or even stay. The only requirement is that, if you are hunger, you partake.  Either of the bag lunch or the service.  Or both.   Wherever your hunger is.

For our congregation, it was a "field trip" for the candidates for Confirmation and those of us considering reaffirmation of our Baptismal covenant. I've helped in such occasions before, but for for quite a while, and usually in a much more secular context. 

Among the persons the fellowship serves are the gamut of what our modern society either ignores, lets slip through the strands of the "safety net" or outright rejects. I've heard, again and again, that it's "their own fault," or "their own decision" to be in the straits they are. 

"They're homeless by choice."  

"He's just too lazy to get a job"

"She's just crazy"

"If she's a runaway she can always just swallow her pride and go back home"

 "If she can't work 'cause she can't afford child-care she shouldn't have had those kids"

"It's not *my* fault he went to prison and now can't find work"

 And if you hear it often enough, you begin to believe, and you are willing to harden your heart. After all, we can't save everybody, now can we? There are just so many of them.

But. 

Once we see these people, how can we, any of us, whether Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Zoroastrian or atheist, not help? 

The man who received his seven miracles that changed his life, the woman who was afraid that she didn't "deserve" to have a pastry while in line for a sandwich, or the father with his deaf daughter who couldn't contain herself when offered a second doughnut hole?

How can we not at least offer that help, as best we can? 

The despair is that we, as individuals, can make such a small difference. 

But.

As individuals we don't have to work alone.  Together we can work miracles.  Yeah, they may be small, itty-bitty miracles, but get enough small ones and maybe the light gets a little brighter for the rest.

 Many people come to working with the people we should remember through their churches, and move to political awareness or action from that springboard.  I kind of got it backwards.  My upbringing as a "left behind" Roman Catholic (and extremely "lapsed" as well) informed my choices as a "progressive" after I grew out of the childhood of "conservatism," and my re-entry to the active Christian community was that progressive bent helping me to find the spirituality, and recognition of faith again.

But.  But.

This is arguably the richest nation in the world.  How do we even tolerate that programs like soup kitchens and food banks or bag lunches on the Common are needed?

Oh, right.  I forgot.  "It's their own fault."

Thoughts On Life, Memory and Mind

Recently I've been thinking about Daniel Keyes' short story and novel, Flowers for Algernon.

Briefly, this story follows, through first-person journal entries, a test subject for an experiment in surgical procedures to raise "intelligence" in human subjects.  The test subject and journal author, Charlie Gordon, experiences a rise in comprehension and ability from severely handicapped, to genius-level, and a subsequent fall.

This is an important work for the genre, raising questions about the nature of intelligence, informed consent, personal dignity, and personal rights of the handicapped.  (It's also one of the few examples I can think of where a short story has been successfully expanded to full novel length)

  This entry, however, is not about the story itself, but about one aspect of Charlie's perception of his fall from the heights the surgery had propelled his mind.  Charlie does not remember the heights that his mind had attained, and remarks that he had been told that he was "smart."

Several decades ago a friend of mine, a fellow software engineer, began suffering symptoms of now is recognized as Early-onset Alzheimer's. He was in his mid/late-forties when he started to be more forgetful, his work performance suffered, his anxiety and depression (a per-existing condition) increased markedly, and his life started to fall apart around him.   There was some delay before any kind of a meaningful diagnosis was found - the thought was that it was his existing medication for depression that was causing the issues, not a separate organic cause.  He and his wife had had only one child, who was by this time grown and on his own.

Because of their financial situation, his wife was able to quit her job and become his primary caregiver, which is a task I certainly did not envy her.  The progress of his decline was fairly rapid, barely 7 years from the time he started to be noticeably disorganized to when he could no longer reliably bathe himself or use the toilet. Along the way he, of course, lost his job, and they had to turn to pricey private medical insurance to defray costs after his COBRA eligibility ran out.  It was probably 3 years before a diagnosis of Alzheimer's Disease was finalized.  On one way it was a relief, as he was feeling that he was going losing his mind.  Unfortunately, in a different, but very real sense, that was exactly what was happening.

And, unlike Charlie Gordon, he knew what he had lost, and could feel it slipping away from him, week by week and day by day.   He knew that he could do certain things, and could no longer perform those tasks.  He lost the ability to play the piano or read music, and would sit at the keyboard trying to puzzle out simple tunes.  He knew that he had had a good career, and that he was mo longer able to work, and being someone who had grown up in a time when men were assumed to be the ones being the primary breadwinner, that ate away at him.  He even attempted to take his own life, before even that ability was lost to him.

His frustration and depression turned to rage, usually directed against his wife and son, and then he didn't even recognize them for who they were, mistaking them for siblings or his parents, or even not recognizing them at all.

When he finally passed on, about 5 years after the definitive diagnosis of AD, his wife had finally had to pass his care on to an institution, and she was actually, after a  fashion, relieved.  Before someone gets all up on a high horse about that, remember that, during all this time, she stayed by him, even though the person she had married, who was the father of her child, who had been the other side of their married life was gone.  Gone for years, as the AD took him away from her.  She still loved and cared for him, but it was the love and care for her family member, because her husband, her life mate was no longer in that earthly shell.  And now, at last, she could mourn the man who has passed, who had actually passed years before that shell ceased.

I honestly don't know how I would hold up if I were in that situation, knowing that ability was slipping away, and that there was no chance to reverse, or even halt, that progress.  It just seems to be the cruelest  disease of all for that aspect.

I would hope I could face it with what dignity I could muster.  But I really don't know.  And I pray that I never have to face that question.

Why are the GOP House members so afraid of Elizabeth Warren?

There is a saying that has been attributed to trial lawyers, to the effect that you don't ask a question unless you know the answer -- Something that the GOP members of the Oversight Subcommittee on TARP and Financial Services that is investigating the establishment of the CFPB should have kept in mind.

During a recent hearing of the oversight committee when they were questioning Elizabeth Warren.
From trying to claim that Warren and the CFPB had overstepped their brief by advising other entities than the Treasury department and the President.

The problem there was that, much previously, the CFPB had already sent a letter to Congress stating the extent of advising that they had done, at the direct order of the secretary of the Treasury.

Another GOP House member tried to imply that Warren had set up inflated salaries for staffers, yet those salary levels had been actually set by Congress, and the pay scales were in line with the salaries set up for the *other* bank regulatory agencies.

There were other "misunderstandings" about the length of the appointed officials terms (Warren had to point out that five year terms for head of the bank regulatory agencies is common, not the one year that the House member implied was the norm); about some claims that the CFPB would have exemption from oversight because they would be unique in not having to be funded by annual appropriations, yet no banking regulator is so bound. It was pointed out, by Ms Warren, that the long-standing practice is that banking regulators' budgets are paid for by fees charged against the entities that they regulate, so that the agencies are somewhat insulated from the political process, thus preserving some degree of independence. Unlike other bank regulatory agencies, the CFPB budget is capped at $600M a year, so that the agency may need to go to congress, and get involved in the political process, if it is determined that the annual budget may need to exceed that level -- which no other bank regulatory agency has to do.

One of the members was trying to grill Warren as to why none of the complaints that the CFPB would be responsible for have been made public, when the agency is not yet accepting complaints. That house member kept on trying to get Warren to commit to statements on confidentiality of complaints, even though the regulations and procedures are from from being fully developed, never mind approved. (The impression I got there was that the Representative wanted to make sure that complaints that were not acted upon would be made known to the banks or financial institutions involved, in detail - again, my feeling is so that those consumers who might complain or employees be potential whistle-blowers be made available for harassment by those same financial institutions)

Even a dispute over when Ms Warren would be able to leave the hearing, which resulted in the GOP subcommittee chair calling Ms. Warren a liar about what was scheduled. Interestingly, another minority witness has blogged that he had not even been informed about changes in scheduling, but the majority witnesses had been so informed. That following of that dispute is one that has a life of its own in the news cycle, with some Members of the House, from both parties, apologizing to Prof. Warren.

If you think I'm being too harsh in my characterization of the GOP House members in the subcommittee, view the video. Please.

From where I sit, if Elizabeth Warren makes these GOP members so nervous that they feel so bound to block her appointment to this agency, with no real reason except that she might be effective, that it looks like she really is the right person to head the agency, as well as the right person to build it.