When I planned this blog a couple of days ago I wanted to begin by rejoicing that I finally again shot a full round of golf - in the 80’s. But that didn’t happen. So the theme has a more expanded focus. The topic is how I am doing now that my age is slowly creeping up through those numbers commonly referred to as “in the 80’s”. The bad news: The down side of being in the 80’s is most readily apparent on the golf course and in the bedroom. In my youth I often hit my drives 250 yards (before all these new technologies). Now, even with the latest in equipment, I barely and rarely hit the ball 200 yards off the tee. In the bedroom the libido seems asleep and when awakened seems to fail to notify the rest of the body. I still walk the couple of miles to and from the grocery, but when I carry a gallon of milk home I am glad that it is in plastic and not heavy glass. The woman cutting my hair no longer checks my age. She just automatically charges the senior rate (which I guess she should as total time elapsed for shampoo and cut never exceeds 11 minutes!)
Professionally there are other clues. When my congregation no longer asks me to preach or teach a special class during the pastor’s absence I begin to wonder. “Is it because I am no longer able to preach a stimulating, helpful sermon? Is it because there is a fear that if this old man in his 80’s gets into the pulpit the younger generation will automatically tune him out? And are my teaching methods not sufficiently enhanced with the latest media and newest theories of Biblical interpretation?”
The good news: Being in the 80’s has its up side. I still get those phone calls from colleagues at, for example, The Center for Urban Education Ministries or Wheat Ridge Ministries or search teams for heads of schools like the Hong Kong International School. These good friends seem very genuine when expressing appreciation for experience and expertise. At a different level it is very affirming when a congregation council member invites, “Let’s do lunch. I want to pick your brain.”
I have now been doing crossword puzzles (even those in the New York Times) long enough to have caught on to some of the traditional clues and I am able to remember that old #4 for the New York Giants was Mel Ott.
It was especially heart warming when in two recent confirmation classes at church I received the word that a couple of teen-agers had specifically requested me as their mentor.
There has never been a time when I did not feel the love and support of my wife and extended family, especially kids and grandkids. Yet as I am “in the 80s” this affection is prized ever more deeply. Grandkids are achingly missed as they live so far away and Skype connections are particularly valued.
In assessing my own spirituality in the 80’s I find myself more and more drawn to the radical message of what Jesus called the Kingdom of God, with its reign of love, its outreach to those on the margins, its call for commitment to the poor, the aliens, the humble of heart. And it is good to have that extra time at the beginning of each day to parade in prayer before God’s throne an ever expanding line of people about whom I care.
In the 80’s I live in a marvelous facility with my loving, 100% supportive and totally well and strong wife of more than 57 years. Wine and food still taste very good. There are minimal aches and pains. The stock market will eventually turn around. Two weeks ago I sank three long putts in one round. Friends still email. Kids are planning to visit. God is good. It’s good to be “in the 80’s”.
Thursday, April 30, 2009
Thursday, April 23, 2009
Cemeteries II-Lewis
I still remember the first time I saw Lewis and his wife Anna (as I will call them in this blog). It was in the very simple store-front church at 232 Tai Po Rd., Kowloon Hong Kong. I estimated that the combined weight of the two of them was less than 200 pounds. They sat among a large group of White Russians who, like them, had just finally been released from 6 years of Mao Tze Tung- imposed house arrest in Beijing. Somehow or other they made it to Hong Kong and got across the border. Lewis and Anna were not White Russians; they were American citizens, Lutherans at that.
Of course, Jane and I took them home for Sunday dinner and helped them eventually find a very small cramped upper story tenement house apartment - no elevator. Not long afterward I received word that Lewis had been taken by ambulance to the hospital. The attendant there told me his situation was grave, accentuated by the fact that the stairway to his apartment had been too narrow for him to be carried down on stretcher and so his body had been severely traumatized before he got to the hospital room. Fellow missionary George Winkler joined me there. I remember George recalling that Lewis had spoken German as a child. So George prayed the Lord’s Prayer in German. Within minutes we closed Lewis’s eyes in death.
We took Anna to our home. Jane invited Anna to sleep in the same bed with her that night.
Burial space in Hong Kong is severely limited. We arranged for a space in the Kowloon Christian Cemetery. Next I had to find a coffin and make arrangements for embalming. I found the coffin making shop. I till remember quite clearly standing on the sidewalk next to the narrow shop in which the coffins were being hewn. I really did not want a Chinese style coffin and negotiated as best I could for a somewhat more Western-style wooden coffin. My memory is that I finally secured it for HK$200.00 (about US$35.00).
The Memorial service was solemn. Then the four wiry-legged coffin bearers put their ropes around the coffin, suspended it from their bamboo poles across their shoulders and started up the very steep hillside toward the grave-site. Several hundred yards up the hill they stopped. They set the coffin down. They spoke to me in agitated tones. My Chinese language ability was quite limited at that time but I soon got the message, “This is more of a climb than we negotiated for. This coffin sits right here until our increased fee is paid.” I paid it. Our small entourage, including frail Anna, proceeded up the hill.
Once we got to the grave-site (no fancy artificial grass or anything other than bare dirt there) I was awed by the care shown by the coffin bearers. Two of them got into the grave. The other two lowered the coffin. They went to great length to make sure the coffin was positioned just right. They wanted it on a slight incline with the head above the lower body, the entire orientation toward the ocean. They checked repeatedly with me to ensure that everything was just right. It was all done with reverence and respect for the deceased. Then they left the grave. We concluded the service with the traditional “Ashes to Ashes. Dust to Dust.”
Of course, Jane and I took them home for Sunday dinner and helped them eventually find a very small cramped upper story tenement house apartment - no elevator. Not long afterward I received word that Lewis had been taken by ambulance to the hospital. The attendant there told me his situation was grave, accentuated by the fact that the stairway to his apartment had been too narrow for him to be carried down on stretcher and so his body had been severely traumatized before he got to the hospital room. Fellow missionary George Winkler joined me there. I remember George recalling that Lewis had spoken German as a child. So George prayed the Lord’s Prayer in German. Within minutes we closed Lewis’s eyes in death.
We took Anna to our home. Jane invited Anna to sleep in the same bed with her that night.
Burial space in Hong Kong is severely limited. We arranged for a space in the Kowloon Christian Cemetery. Next I had to find a coffin and make arrangements for embalming. I found the coffin making shop. I till remember quite clearly standing on the sidewalk next to the narrow shop in which the coffins were being hewn. I really did not want a Chinese style coffin and negotiated as best I could for a somewhat more Western-style wooden coffin. My memory is that I finally secured it for HK$200.00 (about US$35.00).
The Memorial service was solemn. Then the four wiry-legged coffin bearers put their ropes around the coffin, suspended it from their bamboo poles across their shoulders and started up the very steep hillside toward the grave-site. Several hundred yards up the hill they stopped. They set the coffin down. They spoke to me in agitated tones. My Chinese language ability was quite limited at that time but I soon got the message, “This is more of a climb than we negotiated for. This coffin sits right here until our increased fee is paid.” I paid it. Our small entourage, including frail Anna, proceeded up the hill.
Once we got to the grave-site (no fancy artificial grass or anything other than bare dirt there) I was awed by the care shown by the coffin bearers. Two of them got into the grave. The other two lowered the coffin. They went to great length to make sure the coffin was positioned just right. They wanted it on a slight incline with the head above the lower body, the entire orientation toward the ocean. They checked repeatedly with me to ensure that everything was just right. It was all done with reverence and respect for the deceased. Then they left the grave. We concluded the service with the traditional “Ashes to Ashes. Dust to Dust.”
Thursday, April 9, 2009
LOW SEE
I am nervous. Of course I’m nervous. I am a 30 year old school principal presiding at my school’s first monthly faculty meeting. There are 45 of us. I am the youngest. I am the only American there. My colleagues are all Chinese. Of course they are Chinese. The school is in Hong Kong, our students are all Chinese, the medium of instruction is Chinese. My colleagues include venerable scholars who have risked their lives to escape Mao Tze Tung’s Communism. They know life and death, Confucian analects, Chinese school systems, exam systems, the names of centuries of dynasties, filial piety, and respect for the elderly. And I stand in front of them with the weakest of all credentials: I was appointed principal by the American missionary board which controls the school.
So I give it my best shot. Of course, I need an English to Chinese interpreter to get through the agenda. But at least, I think, I can greet them appropriately, respectfully, in Cantonese, their dialect. I had practiced my greeting and so I began, “Low See”, etc. The rest of the meeting was eventually concluded to the credit of their patience and my interpreter’s due diligence. At the close of the meeting one or two even complimented me on my effort to learn to speak their language.
Many years later after many lessons learned and many occasions for me to learn humility, that first faculty meeting comes up in a discussion with a Chinese colleague.
He startles me. “Remember that first faculty meeting where you wanted to respectfully greet your new Chinese colleagues?” You called them “Low See”, but what you really meant was “Low See.”
In the Cantonese dialect each syllable can be pronounced on any of 10 different pitches (tones). The meaning of the word changes depending upon the tone. When I said “Low See” I thought I was using the tones to respectfully address my colleagues as “Low See” meaning “honorable scholars”. In fact, because of the tones I used I had begun my career as principal there by calling each member of my staff “Low See” - “Old Rats.”
To be forgiven by colleagues (and by God) is the greatest of blessings.
So I give it my best shot. Of course, I need an English to Chinese interpreter to get through the agenda. But at least, I think, I can greet them appropriately, respectfully, in Cantonese, their dialect. I had practiced my greeting and so I began, “Low See”, etc. The rest of the meeting was eventually concluded to the credit of their patience and my interpreter’s due diligence. At the close of the meeting one or two even complimented me on my effort to learn to speak their language.
Many years later after many lessons learned and many occasions for me to learn humility, that first faculty meeting comes up in a discussion with a Chinese colleague.
He startles me. “Remember that first faculty meeting where you wanted to respectfully greet your new Chinese colleagues?” You called them “Low See”, but what you really meant was “Low See.”
In the Cantonese dialect each syllable can be pronounced on any of 10 different pitches (tones). The meaning of the word changes depending upon the tone. When I said “Low See” I thought I was using the tones to respectfully address my colleagues as “Low See” meaning “honorable scholars”. In fact, because of the tones I used I had begun my career as principal there by calling each member of my staff “Low See” - “Old Rats.”
To be forgiven by colleagues (and by God) is the greatest of blessings.
FLOWERS
I stepped away from the small Lutheran church in Klittzen, Germany where my ancestors worshiped more than 150 years ago. I walked down the narrow street. It was obvious. The poverty resulting from the years when this little village struggled for existence under the harsh rule of the Russians was everywhere evident. The houses were in need of repair. The little country store exuded scarcity. The vegetables looked tired. The little trinkets had lost their luster. Even the lone gray-haired woman who ran the place looked tired beyond her years. When I approached an elderly couple working in their yard, they glanced at me briefly. Then they turned away with an unspoken but obvious message “We don’t want to talk.”
Yet there was something else I could not miss: the flowers. Each home had its own little flower garden. Even in fall there were blossoms everywhere, flowers planted in rows, row by row each with its own species of flowers. I recognized them all, yet to my embarrassment could name virtually none of them.
Flowers. Flowers of the Wends. Flowers of my ancestors. They were never too poor; the season was never so dry that no flowers could be grown. The yearning for the beauty of flowers had to find expression.
I remembered my Grandmother Kieschnick. In the hot arid sands of Lee County, Texas she would raise some flowers, usually in pots arranged on foot-wide board planks along the side of her home. My mother had struggled to raise flowers but the greater need was to plant, tend, harvest and can vegetables by the hundreds of quarts to help us make it through the winter. My older sister Leona keeps the tradition alive. Row upon neat row in all their blooming splendor the marigolds, zinnias, daisies, chrysanthemums - always in bloom. Always a few to cut and place on the table inside.
Flowers. They are as much in my Wendish-Kieschnick genes as any DNA. Nothing can remove or replace those eternal markers of beauty and identity.
Yet there was something else I could not miss: the flowers. Each home had its own little flower garden. Even in fall there were blossoms everywhere, flowers planted in rows, row by row each with its own species of flowers. I recognized them all, yet to my embarrassment could name virtually none of them.
Flowers. Flowers of the Wends. Flowers of my ancestors. They were never too poor; the season was never so dry that no flowers could be grown. The yearning for the beauty of flowers had to find expression.
I remembered my Grandmother Kieschnick. In the hot arid sands of Lee County, Texas she would raise some flowers, usually in pots arranged on foot-wide board planks along the side of her home. My mother had struggled to raise flowers but the greater need was to plant, tend, harvest and can vegetables by the hundreds of quarts to help us make it through the winter. My older sister Leona keeps the tradition alive. Row upon neat row in all their blooming splendor the marigolds, zinnias, daisies, chrysanthemums - always in bloom. Always a few to cut and place on the table inside.
Flowers. They are as much in my Wendish-Kieschnick genes as any DNA. Nothing can remove or replace those eternal markers of beauty and identity.
PEGGY, MY TEACHER
Peggy, only 16, but is a college freshman. (The reason she’s in college at 16 is due to a complicated set of circumstances related to enrollment in a Hong Kong British school.) As I walk into the family room of our St. Louis home I see her sitting on the floor. She is crying, tears streaming down her cheeks.
“Peggy, what’s wrong?” I inquire.
“I’m crying because of what you said, Dad.”
“What did I say that makes you cry?”
“You said that you had reached the peak of your career. That from now on you would have no opportunity to make a difference on this planet. That it seemed like life was more or less down hill from here.”
I don’t know if Peggy was quoting me accurately. I do know that she was exactly reflecting my belief about my future. I had just resigned my significant position at the top offices of a major Lutheran denomination. I was in conflict with what I saw as a fundamentalist take-over of the Church. I disagreed with new official documents on the role of women, prayer with other Christians, literal interpretation of Scriptures. I had accepted no other job but I knew that I could not serve with integrity in the position I had held. I had concluded that any other job I might ever take would not match the one from which I had just resigned.
Peggy spoke, “Dad, you have many gifts. There are lots of people and places that respect your integrity, experience and ability. I don’t know where we’ll go from here but this is not the end of your ministry. God is not done using you. There is still so much to look forward to.
It was then that I burst into tears. We hugged and let our tears mingle.
Peggy was right.
“Peggy, what’s wrong?” I inquire.
“I’m crying because of what you said, Dad.”
“What did I say that makes you cry?”
“You said that you had reached the peak of your career. That from now on you would have no opportunity to make a difference on this planet. That it seemed like life was more or less down hill from here.”
I don’t know if Peggy was quoting me accurately. I do know that she was exactly reflecting my belief about my future. I had just resigned my significant position at the top offices of a major Lutheran denomination. I was in conflict with what I saw as a fundamentalist take-over of the Church. I disagreed with new official documents on the role of women, prayer with other Christians, literal interpretation of Scriptures. I had accepted no other job but I knew that I could not serve with integrity in the position I had held. I had concluded that any other job I might ever take would not match the one from which I had just resigned.
Peggy spoke, “Dad, you have many gifts. There are lots of people and places that respect your integrity, experience and ability. I don’t know where we’ll go from here but this is not the end of your ministry. God is not done using you. There is still so much to look forward to.
It was then that I burst into tears. We hugged and let our tears mingle.
Peggy was right.
CEMETERIES
Cemeteries have always been a part of my life. I grew up in rural Texas in a home with the somewhat unusual designation as a “teacherage”. It is the counterpart to a “parsonage”. My father was a teacher minister serving a Lutheran congregation and school, so we lived in the teacherage. The church properties were all in a row: the parochial school, the parsonage, the barns, the teacherage and the cemetery. The graves, the tombstones, the arched entry gateway were all just next door. Whenever a member of that rural parish died my father went to the church and tolled the bell. Within hours the gravediggers were there. Soon the funeral home people came with their tent, folding chairs and artificial green grass. From infancy I had attended every funeral and when I was in grade school we sang at the funeral services. We marched by the casket, looked at the corpse and paid our last respects. Then the bell again tolled our walk to the cemetery. After the committal ceremony I would stay and watch the dirt and stones go back into the grave, covering the casket.
I might walk along the row of tombstones. I would always pause at the small marker noting my cousin Ben who died in infancy. Through the years the number of my relatives buried there grew: grandparents, uncles, aunts, dad and mom and then brothers-in-law. It is a good place to visit, to reflect, to cry, to smile, to anticipate.
The Christian Cemetery in Kowloon Hong Kong is very different. It goes up a very steep hill. There is no vegetation. Funerals there use no artificial grass to soften the realities. The first time I climbed that steep hill (following four Chinese coolies carrying the coffin suspended from bamboo poles across their shoulders), I was assisting Dorothy Gehring. We were laying her husband Ralph to rest. Ralph had visited Hong Kong while in the US Navy. After discharge and getting a business degree he wanted to return as the church’s business manager. First he served in Japan. Then he joined us in Hong Kong. He was great. His wife and two kids were wonderful friends.
For reasons to be talked about in a different blog I was the only Lutheran missionary to ever be admitted into membership into the Royal Hong Kong Golf Club. Guest passes for local friends were extremely difficult to obtain. But I managed to host Ralph. Even as we were returning home that day he said he felt inordinately weak. Before long he was in the hospital. Very early the Dr. made the surprising diagnosis. He had polio. Within 72 hours he had died. It was then that we learned that before he left Japan to move to Hong Kong he and his family had gone to get polio shots. He was told that the supply at the time was very limited. Some children were waiting in line. “Oh, by all means, immunize them first “ was his immediate response. His wife and children received the vaccine. He never got his. And now we were taking his body for a final rest in Kowloon Christian Cemetery - and ever since then it is for a me a sacred place, a place to remember a gentle, giving colleague named Ralph.
Not long after Ralph’s burial I was in a very different cemetery. It was lush in greenery. Impeccably well-manicured landscape. Spectacular vistas in all directions. And 33,230 plain small white crosses. I was in the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in the extinct volcano now called the Punch Bowl in Hawaii. I stood in silence for a very long time. All those under the sod at my feet had given their lives and in that action made my life choices possible. The day before my standing there at the Punch Bowl and after an absence from the USA for five full years I had proudly and gratefully presented my USA Passport at USA Customs. I was again enjoyed the privileges of a citizen in my own free country. Without the sacrifice of those now lying there it is most likely that I would not have been standing on the soil of the United States of America. And so I bowed in gratitude and in petition that the cost of my freedom would never again have to be paid as it had been by those among whose grassy beds I was now standing.
I might walk along the row of tombstones. I would always pause at the small marker noting my cousin Ben who died in infancy. Through the years the number of my relatives buried there grew: grandparents, uncles, aunts, dad and mom and then brothers-in-law. It is a good place to visit, to reflect, to cry, to smile, to anticipate.
The Christian Cemetery in Kowloon Hong Kong is very different. It goes up a very steep hill. There is no vegetation. Funerals there use no artificial grass to soften the realities. The first time I climbed that steep hill (following four Chinese coolies carrying the coffin suspended from bamboo poles across their shoulders), I was assisting Dorothy Gehring. We were laying her husband Ralph to rest. Ralph had visited Hong Kong while in the US Navy. After discharge and getting a business degree he wanted to return as the church’s business manager. First he served in Japan. Then he joined us in Hong Kong. He was great. His wife and two kids were wonderful friends.
For reasons to be talked about in a different blog I was the only Lutheran missionary to ever be admitted into membership into the Royal Hong Kong Golf Club. Guest passes for local friends were extremely difficult to obtain. But I managed to host Ralph. Even as we were returning home that day he said he felt inordinately weak. Before long he was in the hospital. Very early the Dr. made the surprising diagnosis. He had polio. Within 72 hours he had died. It was then that we learned that before he left Japan to move to Hong Kong he and his family had gone to get polio shots. He was told that the supply at the time was very limited. Some children were waiting in line. “Oh, by all means, immunize them first “ was his immediate response. His wife and children received the vaccine. He never got his. And now we were taking his body for a final rest in Kowloon Christian Cemetery - and ever since then it is for a me a sacred place, a place to remember a gentle, giving colleague named Ralph.
Not long after Ralph’s burial I was in a very different cemetery. It was lush in greenery. Impeccably well-manicured landscape. Spectacular vistas in all directions. And 33,230 plain small white crosses. I was in the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in the extinct volcano now called the Punch Bowl in Hawaii. I stood in silence for a very long time. All those under the sod at my feet had given their lives and in that action made my life choices possible. The day before my standing there at the Punch Bowl and after an absence from the USA for five full years I had proudly and gratefully presented my USA Passport at USA Customs. I was again enjoyed the privileges of a citizen in my own free country. Without the sacrifice of those now lying there it is most likely that I would not have been standing on the soil of the United States of America. And so I bowed in gratitude and in petition that the cost of my freedom would never again have to be paid as it had been by those among whose grassy beds I was now standing.
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