Good Friday was April 15 in 1960. I was 12 years old. It was the custom in our family, and in the families of most of our neighbors, that the hours between noon and 3:00 were so sacred that we were not allowed to listen to the radio or have the television on or even to talk to one another. Silence was to be observed. The sacred silence.
Our parish church was about a mile and a half away. We attended the Good Friday liturgy together as a family. My mother brought my sister, who was 10 years old, and myself to church. Dad met us from work. The Good Friday services ended about a half hour early. Dad headed back to work and mom had to stay back as a member of the Altar Society, to clean the church. Mom told me to walk my sister home reminding us to remain silent.
I vividly remember the walk home. It was as if the whole world had gone silent. I recall that it was warm and windy. There was almost no traffic as we walked along the sidewalk beside Kelly Rd. Papers blew down the street. Everything was closed. Merit Drugs, Chatham Village Market, Bidigare Hardware and even Kelly's Bar were closed. The parking lots were empty. Carol and I were the only ones about. We walked in silence and waited for three o'clock.
Marty Haugen, a Catholic composer once wrote, "For you, O lord, my soul in stillness waits. Truly my hope is in you." That day it was as if the whole world waited in silence.
There are days that I miss that kind of sacred silence. I can turn off the music, silence the BlackBerry and even put the dog outside for an hour a day but it is still not silent. Planes still take off from the nearby airport. Traffic moves down Dixie Hwy. around the clock. Dumpsters are emptied behind the school. There really isn't any silence. Even on Good Friday things really never go quiet. I miss that.
There are some good spiritual reasons for silence. Unless we quiet down, we can never hear God, never hear hope as it is voiced in our hearts.
There are also some good common sense reasons for silence also. We are bombarded with noise and, while we can't silence the airplanes of garbage trucks, we can dial down the sounds that we create. All those devices that surround us have power buttons. They can be turned off. We can silence our own words and listen. When I silence the noise, I also find that I walk more slowly. I sit in the chair or on the porch longer. When I silence the noise my other senses are heightened and the sky is much more beautiful. When I silence the noise I find that I begin to wonder about the world around me more and more.
Today is Good Friday, 2011. While I wont be walking my sister home from church, I do hope that I can tap into that sacred silence that I remember so clearly from years ago.
Friday, April 22, 2011
Saturday, April 16, 2011
Awe Come On Now. Grow Up!
There is something to be said about politics the old way. I mean, back in the day of smoke filled rooms, deals, cash under the table, and horse trading, things got accomplished and we didn't have to see how it was done. Sure it was immoral at times. Sure it was probably illegal too but the main thing was that we didn't have to watch. Ignorance was bliss, sometimes. All of these behind the scenes maneuvering did manage to get us Social Security Act, the Voting Rights Act, the Peace Corp, anti-poverty legislation, desegregation of schools, and on and on and on. Tip O'Neill could sit with Ronald Reagan or Bob Dole and work things out. In public they were on opposite sides of the fence but they got stuff done!
Transparency can be a two-edged sword. On the one hand, transparency can reveal the immoral or illegal goings-on by our elected officials. It can be a means of teaching how the law making process goes on. On the other hand, transparency leads to idiots on parade.
During these times of a 24 hour news cycle when every word and outspoken thought is recorded and replayed, the idiots seem to have the stage. In Texas, state Representative Leo Berman is proposing legislation to prevent the state of Texas from adopting sharia law like Dearborn, MI. "It’s being done in Dearborn, Mich., right now. It’s being done in Dearborn, Mich., because of a large population of Middle Easterners. And the judges in Dearborn are using and allowing to be used Sharia law," Berman said to a panel of Texas legislators. An idiot! Where did he get his information? "I heard it on a radio station here on my way in to the Capitol one day," Berman said Monday in an interview. "I don’t know Dearborn, Michigan but I heard it (Sharia is accepted law there) on the radio. Isn’t that true?"
On the right, idiots with microphones and willing vidiographers scream that President Obama is a Kenyan born Mau Mau. On the left, idiots are screaming that republicans want to enslave women, destroy all unions, and destroy our democracy by turning everything over to Wall Street oligarchs. Come on now!
Representatives and senators stand in front of the capitol and contradict each other on everything. "Social Security is destroying the economy." "Social Security makes money." "They want to destroy Medicare and kill old people." "They want to bankrupt our grandchildren." "Bomb Libya! No! Wait a minute! Don't bomb Libya. No, wait..." "Our Founding Fathers eliminated slavery." "The sun rises in the east." "No it doesn't." It seems to go on and on. If no one can agree on the simplest of facts, how can anything be accomplished?
Can't we have a little civility and I don't mean just saying "my friend" or "my esteemed colleague" before denying every word the other said? Is it possible to agree on anything? Aren't any facts true and if so can't we watch someone go on Fox or MSNBC and admit it? Must everything that the opposition say be demonized? I get really tired of the name calling. Can't we just do all of this behind closed doors with Cuban cigars and Bourbon and branch water like they used to do?
It seems that many of us are intent on electing idiots to do the people's business. That's our choice. Somehow, however, it seems that somethings get accomplished. I just don't want to watch it anymore. Transparency doesn't seem to be improving the quality of our representatives or our dialogue. It just puts it in front of us all the time. If that is the case, then I don't want to see it. Close the doors. Pour the drinks. Light up the stogies and get to work.
Transparency can be a two-edged sword. On the one hand, transparency can reveal the immoral or illegal goings-on by our elected officials. It can be a means of teaching how the law making process goes on. On the other hand, transparency leads to idiots on parade.
During these times of a 24 hour news cycle when every word and outspoken thought is recorded and replayed, the idiots seem to have the stage. In Texas, state Representative Leo Berman is proposing legislation to prevent the state of Texas from adopting sharia law like Dearborn, MI. "It’s being done in Dearborn, Mich., right now. It’s being done in Dearborn, Mich., because of a large population of Middle Easterners. And the judges in Dearborn are using and allowing to be used Sharia law," Berman said to a panel of Texas legislators. An idiot! Where did he get his information? "I heard it on a radio station here on my way in to the Capitol one day," Berman said Monday in an interview. "I don’t know Dearborn, Michigan but I heard it (Sharia is accepted law there) on the radio. Isn’t that true?"
On the right, idiots with microphones and willing vidiographers scream that President Obama is a Kenyan born Mau Mau. On the left, idiots are screaming that republicans want to enslave women, destroy all unions, and destroy our democracy by turning everything over to Wall Street oligarchs. Come on now!
Representatives and senators stand in front of the capitol and contradict each other on everything. "Social Security is destroying the economy." "Social Security makes money." "They want to destroy Medicare and kill old people." "They want to bankrupt our grandchildren." "Bomb Libya! No! Wait a minute! Don't bomb Libya. No, wait..." "Our Founding Fathers eliminated slavery." "The sun rises in the east." "No it doesn't." It seems to go on and on. If no one can agree on the simplest of facts, how can anything be accomplished?
Can't we have a little civility and I don't mean just saying "my friend" or "my esteemed colleague" before denying every word the other said? Is it possible to agree on anything? Aren't any facts true and if so can't we watch someone go on Fox or MSNBC and admit it? Must everything that the opposition say be demonized? I get really tired of the name calling. Can't we just do all of this behind closed doors with Cuban cigars and Bourbon and branch water like they used to do?
It seems that many of us are intent on electing idiots to do the people's business. That's our choice. Somehow, however, it seems that somethings get accomplished. I just don't want to watch it anymore. Transparency doesn't seem to be improving the quality of our representatives or our dialogue. It just puts it in front of us all the time. If that is the case, then I don't want to see it. Close the doors. Pour the drinks. Light up the stogies and get to work.
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