Back From Vacation

It's nice to spend a week away from the Internet and my various current preoccupations, what with the religious freedom issue, the race relations, the whole Confederate Flag stuff and the business about immigration and migration of populations. So, I spent the last week in and around Harpers Ferry, WV, where John Brown made his stand, and where a patch of territory changed hands between Union and Confederacy a handful of times, and also visited the Antietam battlefield, the site of one of the bloodiest battles of the Civil War.

Well, on the upside, I did get unplugged from Twitter and all television news programs. So my immersion in history was kind of pure, in the sense that I wasn't engaging with the news cycles. So I missed things like Rick Perry's withdrawal from the 2016 contest (I had a bit of thought he'd do better this time around, not being looped up on pain killers from the back surgery, but no. Once bitten, I guess supporters are twice shy.)

Instead of absorbing news and blogs and the 24/7 noise, I did a lot of walking around Harpers Ferry, Loudon Co,. VA and Jefferson Co., WV, and took in the historical offerings of the National Park Service, which has painstakingly kept history in this region alive. It is a hilly region, and everything, though in walking distance, was uphill both ways. I want to give a shout-out to The Light Horse, which is a brilliant area B&B and an excellent place to stay if you ever get the chance. It's very well situated and pleasantly appointed with tasteful and well-kept antique furnishings--and you get a damn good breakfast there. It happens to be walking distance (if you are a tolerable walker) to both the Bolivar Battlefield site and the Historic Harpers Ferry area. (There is also a liquor store like a block away, and a pizzeria two blocks past it). Also, out of six nights, we ate at the very good Canal House Café three times. They don't have a liquor license, but are BYOB. What kept us coming back? Brilliant food. "The General" is a generous slice of meatloaf with a delicious red sauce--very recommended. I also had the "Blue Ridge" and "Triple Crown"--very tasty variations on the ham and cheese and the BLT sandwiches, respectively. Their farm-to-table concept focuses on fresh ingredients and concentrates on the food being of great quality--and they deliver. For openers, be sure to have one of their soups (you can't miss) and order a side of bread. Even if you aren't a big bread fan, the bread is awesome, with honey and salt-added natural butter. It's just damn decadent. We ate indoors, but outdoor dining is also available. They have organic teas and some nice microbrewed sodas on offer.

Moments of Amazing and Short-Lived Grace

Let's talk now, honest people, about how short and contentious our moments of revelation are, and how they collapse under the weight of our ponderous human frailty--no wait. Let's don't. The song "Amazing Grace" is a beautiful song about turning over one's life through a thunderbolt of awareness of what one is now and what one wishes to be.

The author of that song was a slaver who was saved and became an abolitionist. That song is an autobiography of a turning point in a life. But more than that, it is a song about getting awakened. The people who lost their lives June 17th were awake in their faith. That song has been sung at many a Christian burial, and played beautifully by that least-loved of instruments, the bagpipes, at the funerals of soldiers, cops, and firefighters. It's a song we associate with the hope that this awake life was well-lived and that this soul comes finally home.

But let's not get too much overtaken with that song, although in that instant our President went and took us all to church. Let's consider the eulogy that he delivered for Pastor Clementa Pinckney about the arc of history within the Black church:

The Problem of Cheap Grace and the Duggar Defenders

Religion as a form of moral instruction has been a regular irritation of mine. I've written about the apologists who defended the Catholic Church in the face of the claims of widespread sexual abuse of children. In my mind, religion isn't worth a straw if, instead of relieving human misery, which we have enough of as limited and mortal beings with the ability to hurt ourselves and one another, it becomes an engine of human misery, driving people to be more inclined to wronging and harming others.

The defenders of Josh Duggar seem to me to be in the same vein. When confronted with the staggeringly wrong idea that if evolution is true, then somehow molesting one's sisters is ok, it's kind of hard to accept that people "guided" by religion have any idea what morality is at all. I am a product of evolution, and I would certainly not find that my being molested would be acceptable to me--and I would therefore not find it acceptable for others to be molested. The idea of reciprocity in this manner is called "the Golden Rule". Most major spiritual moral systems came up with something very like it. I find it hard to believe that a person supposedly educated in theology is unaware of this concept.  But I can easily find that someone who just has an economic axe to grind against evolution will bullshit on the subject. Because why worry about bearing false witness when mad creationist park scrilla is on the line? Eric Hovind is a little G in his world. He figures that the Big G in the sky will have his back.

So take the screed of Michael Seewald, the father-in-law of one of Josh Duggar's sisters, for what it is in invoking "grace". 

So, what is the ultimate answer? The answer is what Josh found and millions like him. He found forgiveness and cleansing from Jesus Christ. There are many of you that are reading these words right now having had thoughts and deeds no better than what Josh had and did. You are a sinner. You are a sinner by birth and choice. It is because of that corruption that is common to all that you have violated God’s holy commandments.