A Case for Human Beings

Posted on December 30, 2014 by John Coleman

A couple weeks ago an email from Mount Saint Benedict Monastery landed in the morning:

Sister Phyllis Weaver went to her Eternal Reward last night (Monday) around 9:00PM following a very brief illness. She was surrounded by her family and a number of Community members. S. Phyllis touched the lives and hearts of many through her years of ministry in education and hospitality.

Posted on the wall of my room in the monastery’s guest wing.

Until a few years ago, Phyllis was the sister I called to reserve a room or hermitage. When my daughter and son, now grown, were going through terrible times, I crawled to the Mount for sanity. The place was—and still is—life! Phyllis was at the center for me, greeting me when I arrived and checking on me unobtrusively when we saw each other after worship or lunch. Near the end of her call as Hospitality Coordinator, Phyllis’ shuffle gave way to an electric scooter—no padding left on the soles of her feet, she explained, just bone and skin.

In retirement, Phyllis’ prayed for retreatants. I needed her petitions for their intention if nothing else and appreciated them as I rested like a crimson bruise in the light of the chapel’s stained-glass windows.

A lamp in the chapel at Mount Saint Benedict Monastery.

Kids often outgrow problems. Most bruises fade. But Phyllis’ and her sisters’ gift during some raw years has grown in me and taken on more color than I can say: “Let my life be about loving people, one brother or sister at a time, moment by moment.”

If only I could be my own answer to this prayer. The best I can do some days is draw a meager smile from the deep well of mercy I’ve been granted. Still, Phyllis extended to me love based on the conviction that the Creator’s Spirit dwells within all people and nothing in daily life is more sacred than that moment when a person needs love in one of its countless forms and another person provides love gladly. “Let me recognize the Ultimate in you,” I say, “and may you find love in my eyes.” My namaste is ragged. If it gives warmth, it comes from a cold and broken hallelujah.

I do trust the Divine Mystery to lead us to security eventually, but for now, I feel the cold of a world order in which being human doesn’t count for much. As massacres and fiascos make a disturbing media racket, people–individual dwellings for the Ultimate–lose life quietly, invisibly. Society’s eye evaluates humans, and, increasingly, we are expected to defend our personal cog on the rim of an imposing, impersonal wheel.

I’m talking about progress. E. B. White first drew my attention to the crooked assumption that the best way to improve life is to nudge human beings out of the picture. In a 1955 New Yorker essay, White grumbled that the telephone company “saddled us with dials and deprived us of our beloved operators, who used to know where everybody was and just what to do about everything.” Good thing he passed in 1985, before call waiting and voice mail joined our cultural lexicon.

E. B. White holding his dachshund Minnie (Credit: Wikipedia).

I don’t think there was a religious bone in White’s body, but he and Sister Phyllis probably would have hit it off. She was all about taking care of pilgrims, and he wrote, “All that I hope to say in books, all that I ever hope to say, is that I love the world.” You can’t read one paragraph of E. B. White without recognizing that his world was human beings and animals. He was against whatever threatened either one.

In the last month I’ve heard stories that worry me. Andy, as White’s friends called him, would bristle. And I’m not sure, but Phyllis might have just shaken her head and returned to praying for retreatants.

–A December 14, 2014, New York Times article by Claire Cain Miller opens with a troubling trinity: “A machine that administers sedatives recently began treating patients at a Seattle hospital. At a Silicon Valley hotel, a bellhop robot delivers items to people’s rooms. Last spring, a software algorithm wrote a breaking news article about an earthquake that The Los Angeles Times published.” If somebody is going to sedate me, I want to look ‘em in the eye. And some of my friends are print journalists, a profession already in decline. I’m not sure what an algorithm is, but it’s a scab compared to Jennie, Gerry, and Erica.

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A robot or young bellhop Vince Plover? I prefer the kid, even if I have to tip him. (Credit: Wikimedia Commons)

–Also from Miller’s article: “Ad sales agents and pilots are two jobs that the Bureau of Labor Statistics projects will decline in number over the next decade. Flying a plane is largely automated today and will become more so.” As a jittery flyer, I don’t want my plane piloted entirely by computers. They fail without warning, constantly leave the backdoor unlocked, and refuse to accept reason.

–NPR ran a story about computer chips being implanted in grape vines. This technology can take the guesswork—or artistry, depending on your point of view—out of watering and harvesting. When a commentator claimed that the chips’ grapes made better wine than the winemaker’s, I thought of poor Paul Bunyan being surpassed by a chainsaw.

Cabernet Sauvignon at the Coleman dining room table: I would love to meet the winemaker.

–A couple of weeks ago NPR’s Marketplace reported on the sale of PetSmart to a private-equity firm. Amidst the chatter somebody commented that Walmart-type stores cut into PetSmart’s business by carrying lots of pet supplies. At once my White-ian fears took hold. How long will it be before you can accommodate all of life’s needs at a single destination? Get your Airedale bathed and groomed while your SUV gets snow tires put on. Pick up General Tso’s chicken for supper. Have cataracts removed and touch base with your life coach. Yes, I’m being silly, but a voice in the ear of my heart warns me that herding every specialty under one roof managed by one entity could make transactions more uniform and less personal.

Maybe I’m wrong, but for fun I just Googled “shoe repair erie pennsylvania” and discovered that in my hometown proper, one shoe repair shop survives. The idea to check came when I saw that Dom Bruno’s Shoe Repair in Little Italy had closed. Ten years ago I took a pair of black wingtips to Dom, who resoled them for $45. Sounds like a lot, but those refreshed throwbacks remain my only pair of black dress shoes.

“Where have all Dom Brunos gone, long time passing?” The thin, corner shoe repair shop that healed my wingtips.

The only grainy evidence that Dom Bruno ever had a shop on Brown Avenue–a cardboard poster.

According to Google, M. A. Krug and Son is now my only option, unless I want to drive fifteen miles west to Nick’s Shoe Repair in Girard. My wingtips need attention, and I wish for a redundancy of shoe repair shops in Erie, Pennsylvania–and at least one mom-and-pop corner store in every neighborhood.

Good and faithful servants: seams splitting in a few places, soles wearing, gnarly inserts

On the way to Sister Phyllis’ viewing, I made a sad discovery. Unless somebody is tending shoes beneath an inconspicuous shingle, Erie, home of around 200,000 feet, is bereft of cobblers.

Google is wrong. Mr. Krug no longer repairs shoes. Stereo equipment, old albums, and silly signs now fill his shop.

Posted by the entrance: Mr. Krug had a gruff sense of humor?

Across Peach Street from Krug’s place, another dead shoe repair shop. Seriously?

How long had the business been closed? Long enough for ink to run.

Matt’s machinery sleeps behind dusty windows. Goodbye to a vocation.

Actually, I’m not all that bugged about my wingtips being S.O.L. I’ll get a new pair. The trouble is, I’ve lost track of Dom Bruno, and it might have been nice to meet Mr. Krug and ask which kin started the shop in 1895. And anybody who makes a sign like Matt’s is bound to be good for a laugh or two.

Bottom line: the world’s best hope for health and gladness isn’t the robot, but the bellhop. There’s no way the former can look into a stranger’s eyes and recognize that a special word of kindness is needed. The latter not only carries luggage, but can also lighten a burden.

I might not be able to tell which wine was made by person or machine or which news story was written by an algorithm or a friend, but none of that matters. I want to be a Sister Phyllis receiving flawed, unpredictable, expensive human guests into the safety of my presence. I want to be an Andy White, betting my money and heart on women and men creating and mending the world over and over, messing up and starting again.

Sanity: a nap in a monastery room as Sister Phyllis prays for you

When I reached the Mount and looked down at Phyllis, I was sobered. She didn’t look herself at all. Her face was oddly tanned, her hair flattened. But I’ve seen enough dear ones in coffins to give an interior shrug.

Before long Prioress Anne Wambach said hello and took my hand. At once I understood that my reason for paying respects to Phyllis wasn’t to honor the dead, but to receive life. Our conversation took less than a minute. I don’t remember what I said, but the idea was that Phyllis made me feel welcome. Clearly, Anne had heard this dozens of times already. She told me that Phyllis had done well until the end: a couple of falls, morphine, and confusion. Death came within a week.

No Benedictine is forgotten. Every single sister matters.

Phyllis hadn’t suffered long; this gave me comfort. Anne took my hand and looked into my eyes; this gave me not only comfort, but a truth to live by. No software can estimate the value of a handshake or predict what healing and wisdom can result when two persons look into each others’ eyes.

Thanks, Anne. Thanks, Phyllis and Andy. I have my personal orders within the world order. I’m bound to mess it up, but I’ll try: take strangers by the hand, John, and see the Great Mystery in their eyes.

To My Grandson, Who “Settles in My Low Places”

Posted on October 17, 2014 by John Coleman

Blogger’s warning: yes, this is another schmaltzy letter to my grandson. If you’ve had enough of the sentimental grandpa schtick, get away from here, quickly.

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Cole and Layla: nappers’ companions!

Dear Cole:

In the first chapter of the book I wrote for you I included a quote by Kahlil Gibran: “Joy and sorrow are inseparable. Together they come and when one sits alone with you, remember that the other is asleep on your bed.” Well, joyful boy, you have come to sit alone with me this morning.

Sister Joan Chittister shares the right words from the Tao to describe what your ten-month-old self has done for me:

The best people are like water

They benefit all things,

And do not compete with them.

They settle in low places,

One with nature, one with Tao.

That’s it, Cole. You “settle in [my] low places.” You’re way too young to live out the fullness of the Tao, but you’re off to a good start. Months before pronunciation fully descends upon your lips, you find your Gramps’ dry river beds and parched earth and make them live again.

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Cole, you don’t have to smile or get a gold medal in the Cute Olympics. Just stand there and be yourself. That’s more than enough for me.

Blame your mother for this observation and sentimental letter, which I trust her to print and slip into your memory book. (Copy that, Elena?) She sends your photographs out to family and friends, and the world gushes. This morning your face caught me at a vulnerable moment and ran into a place in my soul that must have gone cracked and sunbaked. At once, leaves and blossoms spread wide and tall.

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Hey, Cole, thanks for showing up this morning.

The thought that came to me after I swallowed back tears was how much I’m looking forward to talking with you. These days I’m mostly talking to you. I love saying pretty much what’s on my mind in the moment. But, little paisano, when you get a bit older, you and I are going to do some talking together. When I was writing your book I got into the habit of saving things up to chat with you about–that’s what the whole thing was about. Now that you’ve shown up and we’re having lots of preliminary, mostly one-sided, conversations, I find myself stumbling on things we’ll have to chew on in the future. (Just a note: you and I growling at each other is a hoot for now, but there’s room for growth.) Here are a couple of thoughts we can fuss with:

Dear Reader, pick the caption: “Dag nabbit, they forgot my extra side of chipotle mayo.” “What you talkin bout, Willis?” Or “I’m going to audition for the role of Wilford Brimley’s Mini Me, and I’d like to talk to you about diabeetus. Wait, where did I put my walrus mustache?”

1. This first one is more a find than a discussion topic, but I have to share. Preface: I make it a habit not to use my smart phone while in the bathroom, but there are exceptions to every rule. A few days ago I attended a clergy meeting at the Riverside Inn in Cambridge Springs, Pennsylvania. It’s a charming, rambling old place, so I shouldn’t have been surprised at the sophistication of the scribblings on the bathroom stall. Be prepared, Cole, most of the time men’s room literature begins with “Here I sit, brokenhearted . . . ” or “For a good time call . . . .” Riverside Inn patrons are a thoughtful lot–evidence provided below as captured by my iPhone:

Lousy quality photograph: “Today is another day where [sic] we can sit back and reflect on what happens in life.” I presume the sitting doesn’t refer to the throne at hand.

No clue what these shapes are about, but below them is a riddle: “Everyone has it. What does everyone have but nobody can lose it?” Read to the end, Cole, and I’ll tell you.

2. After washing my hands, I headed back to that meeting and enjoyed a lecture by one of my old seminary professors, Dr. Brad Binau. He mentioned that he resists the assumption that multitasking is good. I’m really looking forward to thinking this one over with you because in a dozen years tending to multiple tasks simultaneously will not only be normal, but expected. I agree with Dr. Binau, but this is probably just me being an old fart. You might have the chance to teach me and open my mind. Can’t wait.

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You know what grown ups have forgotten: sweaty, little boy sneakers are yummy! Help me to be young again, buster.

3. Some smart adults are saying that school children should no longer be taught cursive handwriting. By the time you read this, you might not even know what I’m talking about. Old fart thinking out loud again: lots of times I don’t really know what I’ve learned until years after somebody teaches me the lesson.

Learning to write cursive taught me how to practice, slow down, and be patient. If you want, we could work on cursive together. Mine is rusty. (Photograph courtesy of Mark Fischer’s Facebook page)

4. I’m busy today. I have to drive to Columbiana, Ohio, about two hours away, for a wedding rehearsal, then turn around and drive two hours back home. Tomorrow I have to officiate at the wedding, so I’ll do the same thing. Why not stay over night? The road time makes sense, but it’s a long story. Trust me. Anyway, as I was walking into Starbucks this morning, I said, “Hey, how’s it going?” to the guy emptying the trash. (The least we human beings can do is lay a smile and a “hello” on each other.) The trash guy–I should know his name–took my question seriously and told me about almost throwing up this morning and being late for work. His description went on for a while, and the gravity of coffee and writing pulled me away from him. That’s when I caught myself. This guy has bosses and co-workers chomping on his ass, and his job is emptying trash cans and picking up litter and slop. No dishonor in this work whatsoever, but I imagine his childhood dreams didn’t involve him wearing a rain suit and tending garbage. So, could I quit stepping away from him as if to say, “I don’t have time for you”? Could I face him for five minutes, give him my full attention as he has his say with the world, and witness this life? He’s one of God’s beloved, after all. So, I stood there and listened until he turned away from me to get back to work.

One of the few photographs of you crying, Cole. Some people do lots of this for their whole lives. If you look at them and smile, they might feel a little bit better.

Please listen, Cole, because this is very important. I didn’t share this story so you would think Gramps is a swell guy. The thing is, some people walk through this life without a grandchild who will “settle in their low places” or without anybody at all. I don’t know that this is true of the trash guy, but since it could be, maybe for a couple of pitiful minutes I could offer a little rain for his cracked earth. I hope we get the chance to talk about this. Better yet, when you get a little older, we’ll go “out and about,” as your Grandma Kathy says, and “settle in low places” wherever we find them.

5. A couple days ago I stopped at your house for lunch. We talked as we always do. Layla looked so longingly at my sandwich she may have been trying to hypnotize it. I fed you bite after tiny bite of noodles in an Alfredo sauce.

“Sandwich, you are getting very sleepy. Come to Layla.”

Hugging you goodbye, I thought of how your mother used to fall asleep in my lap and how, on rare occasion, I managed to carry her gently to bed without her waking up and lie down next to her for a nap. She fit into a low place of sorts, the hollow of my body curled around her. Oh, best buddy, I hope once or twice to know again with you that joy of a siesta. I wouldn’t even have to fall asleep. Listening to you breath and watching your assertive little nostrils and fine eyelashes would grow hyacinths and sunflowers in the thirsty places of your Gramps’ soul.

No low places here, Cole, only mountaintops.

I have more ideas but no more time today. Should I write you another book?

Love,

Gramps

P. S. The answer to the riddle is supposedly “your shadow.” I thought of this but disregarded it because in the dark or on a cloudy day, you might not have a shadow. Reminder: some riddles are lousy.

An Apology to President George W. Bush

Posted on September 17, 2014 by John Coleman

Dear President Bush:

I write to apologize. Your presidency was an awfully long eight years for me, but I read a newspaper column today that made me stop, think, and admit something to myself: From 2001 to 2009, I seldom looked at you with compassionate eyes. Instead, I allowed myself to sink into the mud of political frustration and rancor that has only gotten worse since you left office.

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“A second plane has hit the second tower. America is under attack.” Still, you read The Pet Goat to the children so they wouldn’t be alarmed. Thank you. (Credit: Wikipedia)

The column that prompts my letter is by Cokie and Steve Roberts, “What Clinton, Bush can teach us about leadership.” You and President Clinton, the Roberts report, are starting the Presidential Leadership Scholars Program, and “part of [your] mission is to demonstrate that Washington does not have to be a cesspool of toxic partisanship.” I get the impression that you and President Clinton are comparing the political climate of your presidencies with that of President Obama and trying to push us out of the muddy cesspool that is only getting more toxic. And, the Roberts note, the libraries of Lyndon Johnson and your father are joining with you in this effort.

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What would our country look like if your faces in this photograph reflected Washington’s modus operandi: good spirits and mutual kind regard and respect? Please help us to get there. (Credit: Wikipedia)

A photograph from the program’s launch shows you and President Clinton sharing a hearty laugh. More from the column: “By [Bush’s and Clinton’s] presence and performance, they embodied a key dimension of effective leadership. They showed that political rivals do not have to be personal enemies. In fact, they can actually like each other, trust each other, cooperate with each other. And they can do so while disagreeing on basic issues.” Oh, my Lord, may it be so. Please know that I’m sending prayers and every good wish your way for success.

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You look like a man giving a genuine hug–to hurricane victims in Biloxi on September 2, 2005. (Credit: Wikipedia)

I’m pretty sure this spirit of collegiality and cooperation was alive and well in you during your presidency, and occasionally it would occur to me that your job was daunting, your challenges staggering. The trouble is, that sympathetic sentiment never made the southward journey from my head to my heart. Of course, now I watch the guy I voted for trying to get anything at all done, and sadness rests in my chest. I get it. For some time now, governing has been exceedingly difficult and often impossible. We’re stuck in mud. So I feel sad for you retroactively. Forgive me for being late.

Lots of us didn’t care much for what we considered too much grin and swagger. I’ll speak only for myself: I was being petty. (Credit: Wikimedia Commons)

I should mention that during your years in office my next-door-neighbor and I agreed you would be a great guy to have a beer with. It’s strange, even with my passionate opinions about all that occurred on your watch, I would rather talk to you about incidentals. For example, your gaffs are legendary. My favorite is from 2002: “There’s an old saying in Tennessee I know it’s in Texas, probably in Tennessee that says, fool me once, shame on shame on you. Fool me you can’t get fooled again.” As I read this, I laugh, but honestly, there’s no edge to it. My old frustration has softened. George W. Bush was President, but he was also a guy with a microphone in his face for hours each day. So I probably should cut him a break.

Express yourself, Mr. President. Why not? (Credit: LyleLanley99 on reddit.com)

I also recently saw one of your paintings, the one with your feet—those are your feet, correct?—sticking out of bathwater. Again, I’m laughing, but if you were here with me this morning, you would understand at once that it comes from a loving place. You’re a fellow human being, and when you were in the Oval Office, I routinely forgot that.

The Roberts mentioned something about you in their report that I wish I had known years ago. “And during Bush’s tenure, Clinton revealed, the president would call his predecessor on a regular basis and ask for his advice.” I can see now your humanity more clearly. A man who would paint his feet in the bathtub would have no qualms about calling the guy who worked the previous shift for help.

So, Mr. President, please accept my apology. It’s not fair to bemoan the intolerance and anger in Washington when I’m a willing participant. This letter may never reach you. If by chance it does, receive my good wishes for your Presidential Leadership Scholars Program and my thanks for what I now believe to be your sincere efforts to do what you thought best for our country.

Peace and blessings,

John Coleman

A Sad Bird Looked Back at Mary

Posted on March 8, 2014 by John Coleman

Mary Birdsong, my photographer/writer friend, has a fierce love for . . . well . . . birds. She, Erie Times-News features writer Jennie Geisler, and I met Friday morning at Starbucks and covered a lot of territory: skunks, writing (of course), the assault on laws protecting endangered species, birds, tuna casserole, and more.

Mary, Jennie, and I all made tuna casserole recently. A harmonic comfort food convergence during a long winter? This one is Mary’s. (Credit: Mary Birdsong)

We laughed a lot, but Mary was swimming upstream. In recent days she’d rescued an injured red-necked grebe, took all the right steps to give it a chance at survival, and returned it to the water. When she checked on it the next day, it was floating. Damn.

This red-necked grebe looked good, but didn’t make it. Watch out for that beak! (Credit: Mary Birdsong)

As Mary talked, I remembered the story of a man who traveled to Calcutta to volunteer with Mother Teresa. He presented himself to the future saint, who took him out to the streets, where they came upon a destitute man curled up on the ground. She asked the new volunteer to pick up the man. As he did so, he found that the man had lain so long in the same position that his skin was stuck to the pavement. As the volunteer held the dying man, Mother Theresa said, “The body of Christ.”

Terrible—and lovely! The story is redemptive only because of the denouement: the man, who left skin behind, died surrounded by love and care. Not alone. Not forgotten.

“You’re the Mother Theresa of birds,” I told Mary. That’s much of what Teresa of Calcutta did. She and her sisters gave the forgotten gentle deaths.

I didn’t blame Mary for being down. Her last three rescues didn’t make it: the grebe, a herring gull, and a turkey vulture, whose story she shared on her blog. Here’s an excerpt:

Sitting on the ground, unable to fly, was a young Turkey Vulture, with some white down still visible on its back and sides. It was huddled at the base of a tree, obviously injured and barely moving around. I called Tamarack Wildlife Rehabilitation and Education Center, they agreed to take it and with their help I hatched a plan for catching it. Anne Desarro, a park naturalist generously agreed to help and soon arrived with gloves and tarps for securing the bird. I had a box in the back of my truck. After several attempts, we eventually cornered the bird and I wrapped it in the tarp. It calmed down in my arms. It felt much lighter than anticipated. In the process of the catch we both discovered that its injuries were far worse than we first thought; most of its right wing was missing. We both knew that Tamarack would probably have to euthanize it due to the severity of its injuries, but we agreed that I should still take it.

A turkey vulture, soon to be granted a peaceful end. (Credit: Mary Birdsong)

We put it in the ready box, secured the lid and I headed out for Tamarack. When I arrived, the rehabber on duty agreed when I explained the injuries. They deftly and gently prepared the bird for its last.

The rehabber asked if I wanted to stay. I learned many years ago that I should always stay at moments like this. I had a cat named Buster who was one of my greatest delights. He developed cancer and at the tender age of three needed to be put down. Thinking that I could not bear it, I elected to not be in the room with him when they injected that shot. I still regret that decision and will always feel that I abandoned him at his most vulnerable moment. And I learned that love is not selfish.

I said yes and reached out, putting my hand on the vulture’s chest. It was breathing hard. Slowly, though, it became more shallow. Eventually its chest stopped moving. The room was quiet and filled with respect for such a magnificent bird that did not get to live very long. Eventually, the rehabber said to an intern, “you can let go of its legs now.”

As I re-read Mary’s account, I’m alone at home on Saturday. The only sounds here are a warm hiss and crack from the fireplace and Watson making old dog smacking noises with his mouth. I read again: “They deftly and gently prepared the bird for its last.” “My hand on the vulture’s chest.” “Love is not selfish.”

Am I morose for receiving these words as a gift? In my particular vocation I see lots of lasts, so when a mindful, loving, gentle death reveals itself, I close my eyes, breathe in and breathe out. How many earthly endings look like a crushed beer can by a dusty curb? This vulture died with a reverent sister blessing its chest. My joy is gray, but it’s joy all the same.

Joy can be gray. Presque Isle on Lake Erie. (Credit: Mary Birdsong)

Since coffee yesterday, a detail about that red-necked grebe has kept returning. Mary found the bird on a driveway late at night. Who knows why it was there? She said birds sometimes mistake concrete for water. She also said that a grebe can poke out your eye with one swift stab, which is why she approached it from behind. As she drew close, the bird looked back at her—no strength for defense.

The grebe looked at Mary.

On a winter night, a wounded grebe glanced over its wing at Mary. The image won’t leave my grateful imagination alone. Maybe it’s just me, but world news lands heavily on my heart. (I understand that we—the United States—have flown fighter jets to Ukraine to say hello to Putin. Sigh.) The grebe died, but that’s not the point.

All the birds Mary tries to help can end up floating or put down, but each one is still saved. When Mary and her fellow birders tend the healthy and rescue the languishing, they lay a tender hand on creation’s shoulder. This isn’t poetry! When the grebe looked at Mary and she looked back, the planet saw and whispered, “Thank you, bird. Bless you, sister.” I’m sure of it.

Grateful for a dying grebe and a woman connecting? A vast planet? Absolutely! (Credit: Wikimedia Commons)

A Prayer for Philip Seymour Hoffman, Justin Bieber, and a Child in a Fire

Posted on February 4, 2014 by John Coleman

Philip Seymour Hoffman (Credit: Wikipedia)

I was settling in for my Sunday afternoon ministerial nap with a little channel surfing, and there it was on CNN: Philip Seymour Hoffman found dead in his bathroom; heroin in apartment; needle in his arm. I hollered downstairs for son Micah, a former addict. He sat on the bed at my feet, said, “Oh, no!” and put his face in his hands.

I let a minute pass. “Would he have known what was happening to him?”

“No,” Micah said. “He would’ve passed out right away. He died in a couple minutes.” Clean for over eighteen months, Micah would know.

Heroin has been in the news in Pennsylvania, New York, and Ohio lately—maybe beyond, I don’t know. Some sinister entrepreneurs came up with the idea of mixing fentanyl with heroin. The problem: fentanyl is 10 to 100 times stronger than heroin. One recent batch from Allegheny County in southwest Pennsylvania contained 50% fentanyl. Good night!

People are dying, and Hoffman himself appears to have overdosed on that sketchy brew. Maybe because Micah’s a fan, this average-looking-at-best actor is taking up spiritual room in me today. He was at the top of his game, most likely in great shape financially, but there was an ache in him somewhere. At least I imagine this was so. I bet most of us have pain burrowed down so far inside that nothing much can reach it.

Justin Bieber (Credit: Wikipedia)

Without knowing it, Hoffman foreshadowed the difficulties of another troubled celebrity in a 2006 60 Minutes interview. He may as well have been talking about Justin Bieber, who at that time was probably up close to the mirror, searching for his first whisker. Hoffman said,

I always think, God, I have so much empathy for these young actors that are 19 and all of a sudden they’re beautiful and famous and rich — I’m like, ‘My God, I’d be dead’ — 19, beautiful, famous and rich, that would be it, you know … I think back at that time and think if I had the money, that kind of money.

Ironic, of course: Hoffman’s dead anyway. During Micah’s first months of sobriety, he mentioned that eventually shooting up wasn’t any fun. Life was just about getting ahold of drugs so he wouldn’t feel like crap. I wonder if that’s how it was with Philip Seymour Hoffman.

And what’s Justin Bieber thinking? Beautiful and famous and rich, he’s apparently shaking his groove thing at the edge of the abyss; that is if the news is accurate. Fast cars, booze, some weed. Who knows? Is Bieber going through too much, too fast, too young? Nineteen year olds can be explosive to start with. Whatever his deal, I’d say from my spectator’s distance that inner-peace isn’t part of the package.

What must it be like to have over 200,000 citizens sign a petition calling for you to be deported? My friend Mark posted an insightful defense of the Canadian heartthrob on Facebook a couple days ago:

I’m about tired of people crushing Justin Beiber. Get all your jokes out now. Ha ha ha. No, I don’t have a thing for teenage boys. Are you done? Good. I may be over sensitive to the abuse put on the kid because one of my girls loves him. She is crestfallen every time she hears bad press and even more devastated with the ensuing public dismantling. I love her. So when she hurts, I hurt. I don’t like his music and he’s made some absolutely stupid decisions. HE’S 19! Who among us didn’t do stupid stuff at 19? Okay, take 19 year old you and add, say, 10 million dollars. Holy Crap! Now factor in that everybody with a camera wants to take a picture of you. If you’re doing something wrong, even better. Multiply that by the fact that nobody ever told the kid “no”. He was their meal ticket. They had to keep him happy, no supervision makes a happy teen. All this, and he has screaming hoards of women of all ages wanting to, um, get with him. It’s just math people. He’s going to be a little screwed up.

Daughter Elena holding grandson Cole. Proposal: What if I try to hold the world and everybody in it with this tenderness and joy? I want to try.

I don’t know if Bieber was never told “no,” but Mark’s got it right. If anything, the kid deserves our understanding. It’s easy to condemn Philip Seymour Hoffman’s junkie death and Justin Bieber’s dumb-ass choices, but only if addiction’s never had you by the throat or your post-pubescent brain has never told you the evil-twin lies: “You’re always right, and you’re invincible.”

Credit: corbisimages.com

The last thing Hoffman and Bieber need is my judgment. What they need is all the compassion I can muster. (And it ain’t easy with the latter’s chronically raised eyebrows and extravagant fitteds.) In fact, that’s what every corner of creation needs: my compassion.

Each week I spend hours in contemplative prayer, and you’d think heroin addicts and crazy kids would barge in on my silence and demand my attention. Sometimes this happens, but Hoffman, Bieber, and company are more likely to visit me at an inconvenient moment. On Sunday mornings, just before the congregation receives Holy Communion, we sing the Agnus Dei, the Lamb of God. The last words are “grant us peace.” We sing it three sweet times: “Grant us peace. Grant us peace. Grant us peace.”

Grant us peace! (Credit: Lew Robertson / Corbis)

I stand still and pray quietly: “Grant us peace!” I have just a few seconds; if I don’t start distributing the bread, people will think I’ve fallen asleep on my feet. Ah well. Philip Seymour Hoffman will arrive next Sunday, and I’ll sing, “Grant him peace.” Justin Bieber, too: “Grant him peace.” The four-year-old Erie girl who died in a house fire yesterday will appear: “Grant her peace.” And the firefighters who tried to save her: “Grant them peace.”

“Grant us peace.” Part of me wants to stand still in my alb and stole long after the congregation has gone home and sing: “Peace!” Peace for the wealthy and poor with needles stuck in their veins. Peace for the invincible. Peace for saints and sinners everywhere. Peace and healing to that hidden place in all of us, that dark corner where tears reside.

All are welcome in this prayer. Are you suffering? Are you alone to blame? Are you dead, gone into Mystery? Can you hear me? Show up in my spirit. I’ll sing your lovely name to God.

The Sacrament of Trying on Boots

Posted on November 19, 2013 by John Coleman

Yes, yes, I know: Mother Teresa was accused of financial impropriety and of accepting contributions for her ministry to the poor from questionable sources. Her defense was that the poor were more important than the motives or morals of benefactors.

Mother Teresa of Calcutta (Credit: Wikipedia)

Say what you will, I love Mother Teresa. She was a saint—or will be soon enough. Two of her quotations guide my thinking. Friend Michelle had the first printed and framed for me as a gift: “I would rather make mistakes in kindness and compassion than work miracles in unkindness and hardness.” I keep these words on the wall in front of my desk. The second quote is just as powerful: “There should be less talk; a preaching point is not a meeting point. What do you do then? Take a broom and clean someone’s house. That says enough.”

Amen

Underneath all of Pastor John’s patience and compassion is selfishness. I don’t like to sweep floors, not even my own, and I covet time. Andrew Marvell’s lines often haunt me: “But at my back I always hear, / Time’s winged chariot hurrying near.”

For reasons I don’t understand, Mother Teresa’s words have visited me lately to remind me that her broom is a metaphor and many days my most useful, loving action is invisible, inconspicuous, known only to a person or two and a gray sky or a lonely afternoon.

A couple days ago a friend—let’s call him Gene—asked if I’d take him to buy a new pair of winter boots. He laughed as he told me about one sole of his old pair flopping around like a drunk’s tongue as he walked home. Finally he gave up, took off the wounded boot, and hobbled up his gravel driveway, one socked foot wet and tender.

Some glue might have fixed Gene’s boot, but oh well.

So I picked Gene up, and within fifteen minutes he was trying on boots. One problem: health issues render him listless sometimes; tying his shoes or buckling a seatbelt can be exhausting. Though it was a bad day, Gene, as always, was aware of my time. He tried to hurry, but our footwear errand had him sagging to the Walmart floor. Every movement was a labor: tugging the wad of tissue paper from the toe of the boot; unraveling the laces and flipping down the tongue; and—my Lord—pulling on the boot.

After watching for a minute, I said, “I got you, Gene.” So I helped him find the right size, get the boots out of the box and onto his feet, each time pulling up his weary white socks, and watched silently as he did test runs. He tried on four pairs, finally settling on ones without laces, like cowboy boots with chunky treads and generous toes.

The second pair into this process it occurred to me—breathing, shamatha—that helping Gene in, ugh, Walmart, was sacred. He droops from the effort of taking money out of his wallet, and all he needs to make his life significantly easier is somebody to take forty-five minutes and spot him as he buys boots that won’t rub a sore on his ankle.

I also knew that Gene needed more than new boots. He needed to know that I wasn’t impatient or annoyed. So I put my hand his arm and said, “How about I help you get that on?” And, “Don’t worry, Gene. I’m not in a hurry.” And, in the case of a pair with a dozen eyelets, “Hmm. You’ll be an hour getting into these. By the time you get them tied, you’ll be too tired to go anywhere.” Like I said, Gene and I are friends. We had a good laugh.

Prescription for joy. (Credit: corbisimages.com)

A couple minutes after I dropped him back off at home, my cell phone’s Sherwood Forest ringtone sounded. It was Gene, but since I was driving, his call went to voicemail. The message: “I just wanted to say thanks again for helping me, John. See you.”

Mother Teresa also said, “We cannot do great things on this earth, only small things with great love.” I’m not sharing Gene’s and my excursion because I’m a great guy. I’m a normal guy with the usual human portion of self-absorption, a guy with an aversion to brooms, but I got lucky. In a moment of potential frustration I was blessed with a visitation of the Spirit.

You’re holding gladness in your hands, little sister. (Credit: corbisimages.com)

A friend’s boots broke down. We got him a new pair. We did it together with love. I close my eyes, breathe, and days later the sacrament of trying on boots still cradles my soul. This is gladness.

Getting Past Reptilian, Waiting for Grateful

Posted on September 20, 2013 by John Coleman

In a week or two I may be grateful for yesterday, but this morning I feel beaten up. Grateful: I reached a new level of understanding my personal call as a world citizen. Beaten up: several brushes with reptilian anger. That’s ungenerous, I guess. Reptiles are people, too.

Keep your nasty tongue off my book. (Credit: http://www.corbisimages.com)

Brush #1 didn’t have much effect on me, other than starting the day on a rancorous note. I rarely read book reviews, mostly because mine have been crappy, but while sipping coffee and warming to my writing hour, I checked out Michiko Kakutani’s assessment of Norman Rush’s novel Subtle Bodies. Why would the New York Times publish such a slaughter? Kakutani went after Rush like Hannibal Lector sliced up that poor jail guard in Silence of the Lambs: the lovely aria of Bach’s “Goldberg Variations” playing as a blood-smeared Anthony Hopkins basks in his kill. I’ve never read Norman Rush and never heard of Michiko Kakutani, but it’s hard to imagine a novel that deserves komodo dragon treatment like this:

“an eye-rollingly awful read”
“Readers given to writing comments in their books are likely to find themselves repeatedly scrawling words like ‘narcissistic,’ ‘ridiculous,’ ‘irritating’ and ‘pretentious’ in the margins.”
Adjectives employed: “cloying”; “claustrophobic”; “totally annoying”; “insufferable”; “flimsy”; “tiresome”; “solipsistic”

I ate the author with fava beans and a nice Chianti. Anthony Hopkins as Hannibal Lecter (Credit: Wikipedia)

Geez! As you might expect, writers don’t cozy up to such savagery. Jonathan Franzen has called Kakutani “the stupidest person in New York” and “an international embarrassment.” Ha. Take that! A nasty book review is no skin off my nose, but when I left Starbucks and headed off to church work, I wasn’t thinking, “Ah, how sweet the morning air is.”

And how may I assist you today? Statue of Cyclops at the Natural History Museum in London (Credit: Wikipedia)

Cut to late afternoon for brush #2: Micah called to report that at long last he received a response to repeated phone messages about fines associated with his drug-related felony conviction. In short, the kid’s been trying to set up a payment plan and eating weeks and week of courthouse static. Far from apologizing for failing to get back to Micah, the Cyclops who finally called ripped him a new one in loud, deep mumbles. I have only my son’s word to go on, but it sounded to me like a verbal Rodney King ass-whipping–this for someone who’s been clean for over a year, following all the rules with bowels aquiver, and holding down a full-time job.

$%&*@! I don’t remember the last time I’d been so enraged. The evening was a controlled train wreck as I strained through a meeting and a short worship service and washed the day down with a couple of splashes from an econo-box of burgundy. (By the way, for a fun piece on capitalizing wine names, check out this by William Safire.)

This morning, my prayer was like a car out of alignment. I’d written a letter to the local probation office—probably never to be sent—to drain off some of my anger yesterday afternoon, but my prayer a few hours ago kept pulling toward the conversation I’d like have with the Cyclops. I’ve named him this, by the way, because he didn’t have the courtesy to identify himself when he called.

Much as I’m uncomfortable with anger, it’s not all bad. The late Christopher Hitchens once said in an interview that he found hate to be a wonderfully motivating force for his writing. Upset people can accomplish a lot. But now for my gratefulness: anger is not my calling; it’s not what I have to contribute as a planetary resident; though fury is having its way with me now, I know what I ought to be about. In the flawed silence of prayer, the Spirit helped me learn a couple of things: 1.) I’m not going to deny the rage residing in my chest, which has me gulping in cleansing breaths. 2.) I consume my earthly share of oxygen, avocados, fossil fuel, and beverages for a single reason: to regard everybody and everything with loving eyes. That’s it. That’s the ball game.

I’d like to place an order for twenty-seven Phyllis Dillers, please. (Credit: Allan Warren)

Of course, I specialize in messing up this calling. Naming my son’s caller the Cyclops is a failure, but I’m still operating out of my own reptilian brain. I want to let out a rant against the guy from probation like Chevy Chases’ tirade against his boss in “Christmas Vacation.” I want to give him a turbo purple nurple, a burlap wedgie, a swirly in a ballpark toilet after One Dollar Succotash and Sauerkraut Night. I want to fill his house with clones of Joan Rivers, Don Rickles, Carol Channing, Sam Kinison, Mr. T., Pee Wee Herman, Phyllis Diller, Gilbert Gottfried, Tiny Tim, Roseanne Roseannadanna, and the cast of “Gilligan’s Island.” You get the idea: my heart’s pumping crocodile blood at the moment.

Noodling around with creative revenge is fun, but it’s not what I’m about. I’ll get past this cruddy karma. What I won’t get past is love. Most of my wells are shallow or fetid, but for whatever reason, I have love to spare. So, thankfully, when shamatha gets my brain human again, I’ll get back to work. Eventually, in my imagination I’ll have a compassionate conversation with the Cyclops, taking into account the probability that he listens to a dozen people a day lying, playing stupid, or making excuses. His red voicemail light is hot to the touch.

I’m eye-rollingly awful at some jobs, but most days I can hold what’s before my eyes in a kind embrace. I’m grateful to have words to put to such a life purpose. Pray for me that I understand myself.

Corny? Yes. I want to hug the world or at least rub noses. (Credit: FotoFeeling)

A Study in Complicated Joy

Posted on July 19, 2013 by John Coleman

Paul Simon (Credit: Wikimedia Commons)

I’m fussing with a tension lately proposed by Paul Simon. In the liner notes for his 2011 album “So Beautiful or So What?” Simon writes, “The trick is, as I know it, is to care like hell  and not give a damn at the same time.”  He puts the challenge in harsher terms than I do. I would say, “How can I offer the world mindful appreciation, love and compassion and remain joyful?” As I try to be a responsible, engaged planetary citizen, Rhymin Simon’s question and mine are far more concrete than they first appear.

I’ll let today, Friday, July 19, 2013—my day off–be a case study. Other than skanky hot weather and a mild crick in my neck, I’m great. I indulged in a wee bit more Apostic Red than was prudent last night, but have escaped a hangover. I gave wife Kathy a kiss goodbye as she headed off to chemo nursing work this morning, and her loving smile was medicinal. Then I dropped son Micah off at work. He and I had the following exchange a couple days ago when I picked him up after eight sweaty hours of painting:

Me: You know, Micah, I’m really proud of how hard you’re working.

Micah: Yeah, I’m actually kind of proud of myself. It’s a nice change from hating myself.

A lot of gorgeous living is possible when you kick heroin. My son’s been clean over a year now, a reality that feels like an anvil has been lifted from my spirit.

Anvil: what landed on Wile E. Coyote’s head. (Credit: Wikimedia Commons)

Daughter Elena is scheduled to provide Kathy and me with a grandson in November. We viewed his in-progress pictures this week, which is at once teary and bizarre. In some shots you can make out a sweet-faced baby and in others his head resembles lumpy clay. He’s apparently healthy and, if present proportions hold until adulthood, his self-esteem in at least one department is going to be positive, indeed.

Cute future grandson–still a little lumpy.

As usual, I’ve got my self-indulgent carcass parked at Starbucks, where I’m sipping my fourth iced decaf refill and breathing in and out the present moment’s causes for celebration. Can circumstances take a lousy turn and grind a Nazi heel into today’s happy face? Sure. But for right now, as Simon says, “So beautiful.”

I’ve no desire to stay in any way detached from my fragile joy. No “so what” for me. The tension to be kept productive has to do with silent partners on this Friday walk. How do I care like hell about them without losing my joy? If I’m not mindful of those who’ve been trampled, then my glad day off is selfish and anemic. But if I sacrifice my heart on the altar of everybody else’s suffering, where’s life’s savor?

Two fliers are pinned to the bulletin board behind me.

“16 year old missing from local Residential Treatment Facility since July 14th at 9:30 p.m.”

I’m guessing people who love Bob Fuller and the unnamed teenage girl aren’t whistling and skipping right now. If Elena were missing, I’d be frantic and paralyzed at the same time.

A couple of folks in my congregation are getting schmutzed over by cancer, and one of them is about to enter hospice care. How many are looking mortality in its black maw as I try to decide whether to get yet another refill?

Yesterday I drove about an hour to visit a friend in prison, only to be told that the place was on lockdown. Sorry, no visit. I think of what it must be like to always talk to loved ones separated by thick plexiglass over a telephone—and to look forward to half-an-hour with a friend, only to have it postponed for a week or two.

“The warm rush.” Heroin addict shooting up (Credit: Barry Lewis / In Pictures / Corbis)

I read this morning in The New York Times of increasing heroin overdoses in New England these days. Cheap opiate + unpredictable purity + desperate addicts selling themselves for the next fix = auf wiedersehen. “Theresa Dumond, 23,” the article states, “who lives on the streets of Portland, said she sells her body three times a day to support her heroin habit. She lost custody of her two young children about a year ago (‘I can’t keep track’), and their father died.” Shooting up, she says, “It’s the best feeling ever. It’s the warm rush.”

Okay, so there’s a world of hurt—heroin in Maine, cancer in Pennsylvania, vulnerable teenagers missing, God knows where. “So what?” On the whole I bet Paul Simon and I are on the same page, but my trick—to use the songwriter’s term—isn’t detachment, but embrace. It’s making room within my joy for suffering. It’s inviting the junkie and the hospice patient and the lost girl into the day’s mindfulness, the morning and evening prayer, the afternoon siesta.

This way of dealing with the joy-despair tension isn’t pious. Trust me, I’m as screwed up as the next pilgrim, but I refuse to feast on gladness and pretend that others aren’t retching in the dust. So in my spirit I set out napping mats for Bob, Theresa, and all the others and keep them close by as we rest. And in prayer I welcome them to breathe with me.

I like the way this kind of joy works. When I watch hummingbirds drink from the trumpet vine, the wind always carries a hint of manure. Even on dazzling, cloudless days, there’s thunder in the distance. Yes. This gladness seems right.

(Credit: Wikimedia Commons)

A Napper's Companion

Tag Archives: Compassion

A Case for Human Beings

To My Grandson, Who “Settles in My Low Places”

An Apology to President George W. Bush

A Sad Bird Looked Back at Mary

A Prayer for Philip Seymour Hoffman, Justin Bieber, and a Child in a Fire

The Sacrament of Trying on Boots

Getting Past Reptilian, Waiting for Grateful

A Study in Complicated Joy

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