MOVIES, CINEMAS AND 'PICTURE SHOWS'

     We decided to do something today that is out of the ordinary for us . . . we went to a movie.  And the one that we  selected is somewhat controversial with mixed reviews.  Is it a 'true story' or 'based on a true story'?  (The academic historian in me knows that there is quite a difference. )

     One of my throw away lines when asked about the last movie that I have seen is "Gone With the Wind".  There is a nearby cinema which we have patronized less frequently than in earlier times.  When we pass it, my wife will say, on cue , 
"What is that building there?". And, on cue, I will reply that I think is is a skating rink.

    "The movies are great medicine. Thank you, Thomas Edison for giving us 'The Best Years of our Lives' " . . . so sang the Statler Brothers in The Movies.  I am unsure why we now attend less frequently.  Was not always so.  Guess I could claim in part the fact that there is no theater in our home town.  'Once upon a time' almost every small town had at least one. In the town where I grew up, the building burned one Sunday afternoon in 1954.  Fire trucks came from even as far away as Raleigh . . . 15 or so miles.  The town where I now live lost its downtown movie house by fire many years ago.  And the 'Drive In Movie' out on the By-pass gave way to 'progress' many years ago.

     Strange as it may seem to some who are accustomed to paying today's admission and concession prices, I have vivid memories of using my full 25 cents allowance for admission (10 cents), a box of popcorn (another dime) and a drink (a nickel).  Now that I qualify for 'Senior Rates', I am amazed at  what that can do to a portrait of Andrew Jackson ($20 bill) .
Maybe therein lies at least a clue for the decrease in 'going to the show' (as it was once called).  Doesn't make sense (almost an unintended pun) in that that we spend comparable sums for other entertainments, as well as for 'eating out'.

    Just this week, I saw a video clip on YouTube that had a segment with one of my boyhood heroes, Gene Autry.
He and Roy and Hoppy always wore  white hats.  These days, I like: Baseball stories such as Trouble with the Curve; Humor and Comedy; Historically- based such as Unbroken; and, while the last title does not fit, I usually prefer 'light hearted' stories, where the 'good guys' still win. 

   And the  previews shown today were an unending stream of egregious murder, mayhem, and other forms of chaos.  Perhaps it has to do in part with the fact that I hear ample hurt, strife, conflict, etc in my office that I want entertainment  at the movie.  In that the last two movies we have seen have been 'intense', when we left the theater this evening, my wife  commented that our next one needs to be a 'Chick Flick'. Uncertain of the precise definition of that genre, I still almost agreed.

    An often heard comment is  'the movie is not as good as the book'.  Each time that I hear that statement, I remember that when  Cecil B. DeMille's  blockbuster The Ten Commandments was released, someone asked my fraternity brother, Bob Little, if he planned to see it.  He answered, "No. I read the book."   Maybe that's part of my reason . . . while not all good movies have gone with the wind,  I frequently prefer reading  a book to much that is now on the 'silver screen'.
           Satchel

    

IMPORTANT BOOKS THAT I HAVE MET

         At the end of a counseling session last week, a client asked if I would think about and list for him the "five most influential books" that I have read.  Quite a request but it piqued my interest and curiosity.  Part of that is easy . . . for reasons long since forgotten, in 1961, I began keeping a list of books that I had completed. (No, I plead innocent to any insinuations of  Obsessive Compulsive tendencies.) So, I located the list and that is when the request became a challenge.

      I made two columns ... fiction and non-fiction ... and began identifying 'nominees'.  There are more of the latter than the former.
And, the fiction was easier. ( I probably might have created a third section...historical fiction ... and therein included the writings of my fraternity brother, Charles F. Price, who writes eloquently.)  And, in that category would also go McKinley Kantor's Andersonville which I read as a college freshman and likely influenced my decision to major in History.  

    For fiction, I have enjoyed several of John Steinbeck and Reynolds Price's books.  I have 'benefitted' from reading: All Quiet on the Western Front; Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman; Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five; Pat Conroy's Prince of Tides; and Ferroll Sams's trilogy: Run With the Horsemen; The Whisper of the River; and When All the World Was Young.

    But for now, I want to reflect on the non-fiction titles.  I quickly made three sub-categories: First tier, Second tier, and 'fun'.  Here, my various professions likely have influenced several choices but personal predilections have also had their 'say-so'.  So far, I have been unable  to choose a 'top five'.  While I am pretty certain of the top  two, there are others that cannot be eliminated.  "The Envelope, please". . .   Runners - Up include Charles Wells, Dear Old Man: Letters to Myself on Growing Old; David Halberstam, The Teammates: Portraits of a Friendship; Gail Sheehy, Passages: Predictable Crises of Adult Life; Martin Marty, A Cry of Absence; Father Thomas Keating's Open Mind, Open Heart; and various titles by Frederick Beuchner and Barbara Brown Taylor.

    In second place but not by far, because as I have noted elsewhere in these posts, I annually reread Parker Palmer's Let Your Life Speak: Finding the Voice of True Vocation.

    Marcus Borg died this week.  As a member of the Jesus Seminar, he was often vilified as 'Liberal' by more-'orthodox' and conservative Christians.  I first became aware of him and his writing in 1996 when he addressed the Council of Ministers at a nearby college.  My friend gave me a copy of Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time. Since then, I have re-read it several times, as well as reading several of his more recent writings. On two subsequent occasions, I heard him preach at Wake Forest University and  attended another lecture at High Point University. For some time, I had known that there were Understandings and Interpretations of Christianity that were at variance with my own but was unclear as to how to articulate these.  While there are points of differing understanding, because of him and his written and spoken words, I now without apology consider myself 'Christian'.

     Some time back, a client frequently railed against Borg and other "Liberals".  As a psychotherapist, my ministry is not 'evangelism' in the sense of trying to proselytize persons to my beliefs.  However, in the spirit of encouraging her be less judgmental and stereotyping, without identifying the speaker, I played Borg's YouTube sermon, What's Christianity.  After she indicated that she concurred with everything the speaker had said, I told her it was Borg.  Imagine her surprise.

    I have absolutely no interest nor intention to engage in theological debate in this space.  I am grateful that I encountered Dr. Borg and for his assistance in Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time.

     Satchel

FALLOW GROUND

    "I had reached the point that I had nothing to say and no great desire to say it," a then prominent Episcopal priest wrote me in the 1960's while on his vacation.  Many who write, preach, teach, and others who rely on their creative 'juices'  fall upon fallow ground from time to time.  

   Farmers know about fallow ground. .  . land that has been used and now for a season is plowed but nothing is planted.  Well, the muses of creativity sometimes go into hiding and 'the well is dry'.

   My younger brother writes a weekly column for our local newspaper.  Perhaps because I have known him for 60+ years and because I have been reading his material for almost 30 of those years, I frequently can tell when he is 'on' and when he just is grinding it out.  When he is 'good', he is very good . . . like the time that he won a North Carolina Press Association First Place Award for his story of Aunt Bea's funeral. (She of the Andy Griffith Show renown and who retired to our hometown.)  The funeral was by invitation and he was not an invitee.  How did he do it? As an ordained minister, he has conducted numerous funerals; he knew something of her 
story, and he talked with the priest who led the rites. Plus, I am convinced that somewhere along the way, he kissed the Blarney Stone.  Even so, he acknowledges that on occasion, he hits a fallow patch.

   'Papa' Ernest Hemingway when asked the secret of successful writing replied something to the effect of having the seat of one's garment adhere to the seat of a chair for extended periods of time.  (But is he not reputed to have written while standing? I digress.)

    I have come to enjoy . . . the word is too mild . . . writing blog posts.  Sometimes, topics will almost present themselves; at other times, there is nothing.  Gratefully, unlike Hemingway, I do not rely upon my prose for a livelihood.  Still, it is more than a bit frustrating to want to write, but creativity does not respond well to coercion.  As I wrote that last sentence, I remembered a term paper that I wrote for Professor Waldo Beach at Duke Divinity School in the Spring of 1963.  Though my grade was an acceptable "B", he sized it up well with his comment : "Signs of haste and imminent deadline".

    Perhaps the moral of this musing might be along the lines of  "What's the hurry? There's no deadline."  But, then, maybe my brother will tell me where to find the Blarney Stone.

    Satchel

A VOICE FROM THE PAST . . .

       Last night I heard a 'voice from the past'.  Amazing, isn't it , what technological 'gadgets' can provide.  The 'voice' that I heard was that of my Mentor and Academic Father, the late Reverend Doctor Harrell F. Beck.  In the Spring semester of 1961, I enrolled in his course "Hebrew Wisdom Literature" at Boston University School of Theology.  Easily the most academically challenging and gratifying class that I took during my year there, I remain proud of the "A" that was earned.  And while his status as a scholar was impressive, what most endeared him was his human warmth and 'approachability'.  (Harrell's scholarly credentials and achievements can be viewed at www.Facebook.com/HarrellBeck. The site was set up by some of his proteges as a way of remembering and continuing his legacy.)

    Well into that semester, I knew that I was "in the wrong pew, in the wrong church, at the wrong time in my life."  And while I hardly had vocational clarity (after all, I was 23 years old -- Time to 'get on with it' !), I felt that to leave school would have been a betrayal to many who had supported my matriculation.  Hardly knowing the man but sensing his integrity, I made a lunch appointment with Dr. Beck.  He listened carefully, then expressed his opinion that I was not being remiss but rather was attempting to be honest and find my way.  How liberating; how affirming!

    From May, 1961 when I departed Boston until Harrell's death in December ,1987, we saw each face to face perhaps on a half dozen or so occasions.  The most memorable of those visits occurred in the Summer of 1985 when he preached at my installation as Minister of a North Carolina congregation.  (God does have a sense of humor !)  Beyond the memory of those times together, I have a thick file of the correspondence we maintained over those years.
His letters abounded with humor, wisdom, encouragement, affection, and his humanity.

                                (With Harrell Beck, Summer, 1985)

     In late November, 1987, I wrote to him extensively about the vicissitudes of life as a parish minister and still seeking (at age 49, after an extensive tenure as college professor) the vocational path of fulfillment.  His response was, as usual, supportive and encouraging: "I am sure you have talents and gifts that are not being used and I think it is important to be specific about one or two of those and see that they are brought into use."

     I bemoaned that he was soon to depart for Hong Kong where he would again have a teaching appointment.  He responded: "I too lament the fact that we meet so seldom. . . . At least we can write.  We can be present to each other without either geographic presence or writing, but both of the latter are much better.  . . . Surely heaven is a place for the fullness of relationship."  Before that day ended, Harrell was dead from acute myocardial infarction.

    After his death, I learned of this prayer he had written:
   
  "I'd like to be a flower in the garden of God.  I'd like to take my
chances in the wind and the rain, in the storm and the sunshine. I'd like to be planted  among a variety of species in the midst of an assortment of colors--and sizes--and shapes; and to grow among the lilies and the lilacs, the crocuses and the chrysanthemums, the poppies and the  pansies, and yes even the dandelions.  I want to be part of an absolute riot of color and beauty.

    Pray God I might last long enough to blossom. And, then, Lord, early if you want to, late if you can, I want you to pick me.  And if I must be alone in a solitary vase, I'll take it.  I'd rather be in a bouquet. But could I be something beautiful, Lord, and placed on your table at somebody's covenantal mement, when they're bringing their child or when they're burying their beloved or when they are sealing a vow? That could be joy enough, God, but could I ask one more thing?  Could it be possible that someone would say, 'That reminds me of a flower I once saw, a rose in Sharon, a lily of the valley, who was once picked by God and gave up his life --to add beauty and significance to the lives of others.' "

    Last night, he was much on my mind and I did a Google search, and that is where I heard his voice.  There are two of his lectures on 
'SoundTheology.org/speaker/speaker-beck-harrell' . I heard just one of them  . . . 'Escape to Reality', apparently addressed to a group of United Methodist Ministers in Spokane, Washington, at an unspecified date.   It's a tad long . . . about an hour . . . but most substantive.

   I was delighted to hear his voice again with his depth of insight and faith and his warmth of  expression.  I invite you to listen.

     Satchel