Holy Week 2020

Every Holy Week is, of course, unique. But 2020 is really very different from any previous one. The corona virus has us all under virtual “house arrest”. We have all been asked to stay in our apartment except for when we take our walk on the premises. Since it has been raining for the last few days Jane and I have just been walking the corridors-and we are careful to even then wear our face mask and to very careful about maintaining social distance. Since we have not been off campus for more than 2 weeks yesterday I went down and ran our car engine on idle for 15 minutes just to make sure the battery remains charged. We continue to be exceptionally well served here by the La Costa Glen Team. Daily food delivered is excellent. In between meals we have visits that bring us hot chocolate and ice cream. And yesterday we had the gift of a beautiful houseplant named kalanchoe delivered to us and every other unit in this building. 

I suppose it is a blessing of Holy Week to be home alone and to have extra time for recollections and meditation. Maunday Thursday brings back very special memories of Holy Communion. It was on Maunday Thursday 1941 that I received my First Communion. I also recall with deep emotion taking the Lord’s Supper while in Hong Kong. I recall especially one service at Concordia Church. As I worshipped I looked around and saw how I was surrounded by people of all ages, some extremely poor, some relatively wealthy. Most were Chinese but there were also Americans, a visitor from New Guinea and another from India. My mind went around the world and I imaged thousands of fellow Christians all over the globe sharing the meal on exactly this same day. Very inspirational.

This year we will not be meeting physically with anyone except our spouse. All services will be via Zoom on the Internet. Our pastor and his team are doing an outstanding job. I know we will set up our own little altar with wine and bread and we feel at one with millions. On Good Friday the traditional 7 Last Words will be reflected upon by 7 different congregation members and as each one of those sentences is recalled we will extinguish one of 7 candles we will have next to our computer altar.

I hope I wake up early enough on Easter morning to do some reflection on Easters past. I want to recall the enthusiasm, joy and determination with which we built our Easter egg nests in Walburg when I was a youngster. I recall vividly walking around our pasture and going to the wooded area behind our church to find just the right cut of grass and flowers (especially newly picked Texas bluebonnets) to make our Easter Egg nests, all arranged in the order of our siblings’ ages Then on Easter morning there would be a hard boiled colored egg or two placed there by mother. Sometimes there was even a chocolate egg! This will be the first year in memory when there will be not a single chocolate egg or rabbit around our house on Easter morning

While I might miss those chocolate rabbits I do know I will recall how my Father always got up early so he could ring the church bells just as the sun rose. Then a little later he would be at the church pipe organ on full volume and accompanied by a trumpet we all sang “Awake, my Heart With Gladness (in German)”. Then I want to shift my focus to the thousands around the world who this Easter will be mourning family members who succumbed to the corona virus. There will be so many sad memories. I do hope and pray that through the tears there will be a vision of a new day of a resurrected eternity, of peace and health and celebration.

Pre Covid-19 My Childhood Diseases

PRE COVID-19 MY CHILDHOOD DISEASES

It is now more than 2 weeks that Jane and I, like millions of others, have been doing this newly named practice of “social distancing” in an effort to limit the spread of Covid-19 caused by the corona virus. It has brought to mind all the children’s diseases of my childhood. Since I was one of 9 children born into my family in the 1920-30’s we had virtually all of the common childhood infectious diseases. I wish my Mother were still with us to go into more details. My memories of having these diseases are clear that I had them, but the details are very hazy. I will recount what I do recall.

MEASLES. In the early 1930’s there was no vaccine to prevent this disease so we all got the measles. I clearly remember the red rash. It spread all over my body, itching like mad. The rash covered my entire body and there was not much we could do about it. I do not remember hearing that it was lethal. However, I have read that at its worst in one year it affected some 20 million people worldwide with a death toll of 100,000. Then a vaccine was discovered and widely administered so that the USA had as few as 63 cases a year. Then false rumors regarding the vaccine stated to spread. Some parents became afraid, refused to have their children vaccinated and now we are back to some 2000 cases a year here in our country.

MUMPS. All of us Kieschnick kids got the mumps. I just remember the terrible throat ache and my Mother’s deep sympathy as she told me she felt sorry for me but there was nothing more she could do for me.

WHOOPING COUGH-SCARLETINA-RED EYE. We all had them all. My memory of Red Eye is the most vivid. Lots of puss was secreted from the eyes. After a night’s sleep we were unable to open our eyes as they were sealed shut with puss. Mother would give me a very damp hot rag. I would lay that over my eyes and the puss would be dissolved and my eyes could open.

I do not recall going to the Dr.’s office. I do recall that if we needed a doctor to come to our house Dr. Wiedemeyer would show up with his stereotypical black bag and provide compassionate diagnoses and treatment. If a drug was prescribed it is amazing to recall that there was a drug store and pharmacy in the little town of Walburg with its 50 citizens. Mr. McGuiness would fill the prescription and we were well taken care of. 

It is now 80+ years since all of the above occurred. An over-riding recollection is that of my Mother. Here she was with 3 or more children down with one of these sicknesses after another. She tended to the 3 or 4 of us who had them at the same time. Most likely she was pregnant with another child on the way. She went to the garden to get the vegetables for the day, to the chicken coop to kill a chicken for the fryer. She carried water to the clothes washing machine out in the shed, hung them out to dry and made absolutely sure that Dad had a freshly ironed white shirt to wear to school. She was amazing and I lift my heart and soul to her in grateful memory!

Corona Virus COVID 19 Disease (1

 I know. I know. Nobody wants to read any more about the corona virus right now. Yet I choose to write this Blog. I do it so that I  have a personal record of it. And just in case somebody still happens to read this Blog at some future date there will be one more very personal account.      

NUMBERS: The statistics, of course, change by the minute. As of yesterday March 25 here are just five figures. Cases in the world 500,000, Deaths 22,00. Cases in Italy 80,000, Deaths 8,000. Cases in Spain 60,000, Deaths 8,300. Cases in USA 82,00 Deaths, 1,200.

The symptoms vary from very mild to extreme. They include runny nose, cough, shortness of breath, fever, respiratory infection. It is the respiratory effects that cause death. The challenge of health care providers is to protect themselves with appropriate safety apparel, especially also face masks. The critical apparatus needed for treatment is ventilators for the lungs. The biggest challenge for the care providers is to have all these items in adequate supply.

To prevent the spread of the disease government at the local and state levels have imposed very strict rules: Stay home unless you work in an essential enterprise. All bars and restaurants closed except for take-out. No social gatherings of more than 6 people. Stay six feet apart. No physical touching of hands. In most states all schools are closed. Only a few churches are holding public worship. Those which offer public worship are extreme fundamentalists  whose  pastors assure congregants that if they pray hard enough and have enough faith they will  be protected from the virus.

We are all affected. Our family is typical of those who have no symptoms but are dealing with the precautions needed to avoid them.  They all work from home. Just a few examples: Liz does her interpersonal psychological counseling over the phone. Granddaughter Maria teaches sixth grade science over the internet. Tim stays home but helps Kaiser Permanente keep the public informed. John and Regina and their two kids are all in a single apartment in Spain regretting that Antonio’s university graduation ceremonies from NYU  have been cancelled. Ryan is without pay because the museum which he manages is closed. Jonathon sits in front of a computer for the Disney-CSPAN network doing very little because all live sports events are cancelled.

Jane and I are so comfortable that we almost feel guilty. This retirement community has urged all residents to stay in their homes except for when they walk outside to get exercise and even there they must always maintain at least 6 feet of space. Every single day staff comes to the front door of our apartment and disinfects the doorknobs and entrance area. All food for the more that 800 of us here is delivered every single da with each meal including soup, salad, entree, two vegetables, dessert and a drink. In between meals staff has come up to offer ice cream, a bouquet of freshly cut sun flowers or a drink of coffee or cocoa We are not allowed any visitors. If we must leave campus we have our temperature taken when we return.

The days do not get too long or lonely for us. We stay connected with email and telephone. I try to make at least 10 phone calls each day especially also to single people. Our congregation has also assigned me a list of eight families with whom I try to stay connected. There are three different Coffee Chat times on line for our congregants. Our Sunday worship, midweek Lenten services and weekly Bible Class are all on-line via  ZOOM. My Men’s Support Group uses Team View to stay connected.

These days of crises bring out the worst and the best of people. An interview that went all over the media featured a young college male speaking from a beach in Florida. He asserted his right to enjoy himself and said that if some old person died because of him that was just that guy’s bad luck. ”I have the right to stay on this beach and I am staying right here! ”  I have been distressed to read an editorial in The Wall Street Journal which complained about all the business shut downs. The writer argued that we must realize that in the long run keeping all businesses running is really more important than a few extra lives of ordinary people who might die. There are very unpleasant accounts of companies raising the price of protective gear by as much as 800%.

Fortunately these sad stories are countered with wonderful tales of self-sacrifice and generosity. The organization at which I often serve food to the homeless asked for more volunteers to prepare to-go meals for the homeless. The response was that more volunteers than were needed showed up and many of those were high school students who were now not in class. I heard of a very ill person who gave up his ventilator for use by a younger person and it cost him his life. I think of all the medical staff which have risked and even given their lives to assist the ill. I think there are now reports of more than 200 health care providers who have died as a result of their service to their neighbors.

This I believe. We will get through this. We will continue to support one another. We will move forward with a greater realization that within the four seas all of us are brothers and sisters.

Adolph Hitler

I just finished reading a very powerful book: “The Choice” by Edith Eger. The author was taken captive by Hitler’s forces. She endured unspeakable tortures at too many places including the hellhole called Auschwitz. The book recalls her remarkable survival and how she learned to be psychologically healthy. Her premise is that one must look reality directly in the face. We dare not deny one’s fears, hatred, guilt, shame or terror. Facing them can be a step to affirming one’s survival and making the choice to live a whole life.

When she became a well-known speaker she was invited by the US Army Chaplaincy Corps to come to Berchtesgaden, Germany to address chaplains on how to assist service personnel who had experiences severe trauma. When she arrived at Berchtesgaden she was assigned a sleeping room once occupied by the infamous Nazi Angel of Death, Dr. Joseph Mengele. Imagine being in that bedroom and having her recall that she as a 16-year-old prisoner had been stripped naked in front of him. She was saved from being raped by him only when his phone rang and he decided to answer it she ran away. I cannot imagine what it must have felt like to her to be in Berchtesgaden, in that room and be faced with those memories.

While   her experience was way, way beyond my experience it did help me recall an incident in the life of Jane and me. In the late 1980s Jane and I, too, were invited to Berchtesgaden by the US Chaplaincy corps. We were there to address especially lay people who were active providing Christian education to USA military families stationed in Europe. We, too, slept in a bedroom previously occupied by the top aides to Adolph Hitler. The room decor had been maintained from those days, a very oppressive atmosphere, with black pictures on the wall, dark walls and a foreboding aura that was powerful.

Jane I left Berchtesgaden and went to visit the Nazi concentration camp at Dachau. It was so overwhelming that when Jane got to the entrance she was unable to walk through the door. I entered. I looked to the left where I know a trainload of naked corpses had been found when the allies retook that place. Ahead of me was a vast gas chamber. Just beyond that I could still see the smoke stack from which the smoke of thousands of burned bodies once wafted into the sky.

Once again: my experience was nothing close to what Dr. Eger experienced; yet I came to the same renewed resolve that she experienced. We must resolve to never again let the world experience the torture and damnable activities like those of Hitler against Jews, homosexuals, persons with disabilities, etc. etc.

We live in a day in which fears are being stirred. People who are different from us are being demonized. Jews are in danger of being shot to death when they attend a synagogue. White Supremacists in America are yelling at fellow-American Muslims, “Go back to your own country!” Once again  I make a deep commitment to see all of God’s children as my brothers and sisters. I affirm my solidarity with all who seek the same things in life that I want: freedom, liberty, permission to worship according to the dictates of my conscience and the freedom to wear religious emblems of my own choosing. I ask for the courage to always proclaim “One nation, under God, with liberty and justice for all.”

Weddings II

 I enjoy writing blogs about weddings. Maybe that is because I have been so blessed in my relationship with my wife Jane and our marriage began with a wonderful wedding. Yet weddings were an important part of my life long before Jane and I had our wedding. 

When I was not yet in school I twice served as the ring bearer at weddings. I enjoyed doing that. I remember wearing a full suit and tie and having my hair carefully combed. I also remember some stress about “doing it right”. At one wedding I carried the rings for the couple on a small satin pillow. The rings were just laid on top of the pillow and I was told to be sure to not let them fall. The best man was especially concerned that the ring would slip off the pillow and down into my trousers. He twice told me he did not want to be in front of the congregation digging through my pants looking for those wedding rings!

I also remember that at one of those weddings, before we went to the reception after the ceremony at church, we went into Georgetown to a professional photographer to have pictures taken. And what I remember most is that while all that was going on a couple members of he wedding party kept urging me to kiss the flower girl. That was unthinkable and resolutely refused!

As mentioned in an earlier blog I especially loved going to the reception and being part of the small group of young boys who “held gate” and asked for a small donation from each car as it went through the fence gate to the farm house for the big party. There the meals were ALWAYS outstanding. There was always beef bar-b-cue. If the family was very poor and had trouble providing enough beef they would supplement the beef with a poor second choice: bar-b-cued mutton; but never chicken! Meals were served in three different seatings: first the wedding couple and the men, then the children and then the women.

After dinner there was often a bit of a “program.”  Central to that was my father singing a special song for the newly married. The songs were always in German and were improvised by my father. Depending upon the relative size of the two spouses dad would sing either “Die Kleine Frau” or “Die Grosse Frau” (The Small or the Large Wife”). I remember one section about the small wife having to climb a chair if she wanted to kiss her husband. After these ceremonies a” midnight lunch” was served to all. Then came to shivaree .Men friends of the couple came with their steel plow shares, wash tubs, and all kinds of other metal to make a big noise. They played until the groom called the helpers to bring on the beer and serve it to all the noisemakers. Technically there was no dancing during any of this since “Dancing is a Sin”. But the pastor knew not to stay too late because after the pastor left it was not unusual for actual dancing to begin!

 I had very little involvement in planning my own wedding and that was fine with me. There was no little boy ring bearer. Nor was there “gate-holding”, bar-b-cue, dancing or shivaree but it was wonderful. And for more than 68 years Jane and I have been doing our best to live out the call of the words from Psalm 34 which Pastor Weber encouraged us to embrace: “O magnify the Lord with me, and let us exalt His name together.”

Weddings I

 I have just agreed to preside at the wedding of my grandson Ryan and his bride Jill. It’s scheduled for the 4^th of July in the backyard of his parents Liz and Jim in W. Hartford CT. I write this as the coronavirus is spreading and I am hoping that will all be pretty much history by the time we fly across the USA. Planning for that wedding which they want to be “very, very simple” reminds me of the most recent weddings at which I have presided.

Three recent weddings have all been for same sex marriages, something I would never have even dreamed of when Jane and I got married 68 years ago. One of those weddings was indeed the “most simple” possible. A lesbian couple had been together for years. Finally their marriage could be legal. They wanted me to just “do the legal minimum”. We stood together at a kitchen counter. I asked each, “Do you take her as your spouse?” They both said “Yes.” And that was it (I should add that since they did not want to have a religious ceremony I said my own silent prayer.)

Another recent marriage of two gay persons was of a grand-niece in Texas. It was a beautiful ceremony in a beautiful outdoor central Texas setting. It was joyful and celebratory but I could also feel the tension of family members who were not approving of the marriage and yet wanted the best for this wonderful couple.

The wedding before that was somewhat out of the norm as well. The groom was getting married just 6 months after I had presided at the memorial of his wife of more than 50 years. The bride in this case had also recently buried her husband. The newly married pair had known each other for years and they are now a very happy and blessed couple.

The wedding before that one was really different. The bride is the biggest Disney Land fan in the world and that is where she wanted her wedding. However, she did not want to deal with all the restrictions, protocols and costs of it being “an official Disney” wedding. She wanted guests at the wedding. And she wanted it to be a surprise for all. So we just casually gathered at Disney World, stood around an entrance to one of the rides as I quietly asked for and heard their very brief and casual vows. Then we went to a restaurant there and celebrated. The  marriage is a great success and Disney Land is joyfully visited by the bride on a very regular basis.

 A joyful memory of weddings comes almost every week as I see the very first couple that I married some 25 years ago now always show up for Sunday worship at Calvary Lutheran Church.

Lent

 We are about to once again enter the season of Lent. My memories of observing Lent while growing up are very strong. We had worship services every Friday night during Lent. They were always in German. A key feature of every Friday night service was a reading of the events in the life of Jesus beginning with His instituting The Lord’s Supper up to Christ’s death on the cross. The reading of a segment of this each week from a harmony of the Gospels lies deep in my heart. The sermons preached at those services always related specifically to the events we had had just heard read. I remember especially one series related to questions asked during those fateful 24 hours and at my suggestion this year at my church we are following that pattern for our weekly Sunday Bible classes during Lent.) Once we started having Lenten services in English it seemed to be mandatory that we sing “Go To Dark Gethsemane “ every week.

Lent culminated in Holy week. There was always the ritual of youth “confirmation” on Palm Sunday and first Holy Communion on Maunday Thursday. As the years have passed so have the rituals related to Lent. I always regret that I never made it to New Orleans to observe Mardi Gras, specially also the revelry related to the Tuesday before Ash Wednesday.

At my current church the formal observation of Lent is quite different. We begin with some version of Shrove Tuesday observed by eating pancakes on Pancake Tuesday. We then have the deeply reflective practice of “imposition of ashes” on Ash Wednesday. However at the weekly services we do not focus specifically on the last days of the suffering Christ and I miss that. To indicate how different our rituals of today are from some 90 years ago I mention that to begin Lent at my church this year we are all watching the movie “A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood”. At our weekly events we will reflect upon lessons learned from Mr. Rogers. Of course we will read some scriptures and have reflections and it will be a very different experience. If we tried to repeat what we did in my youth I suspect that the only two people who would show up would be my wife and I.

So I look forward to this Lenten season. I no longer “give up” something for lent. Jane and I do read special Lenten reflections and prayers in our morning devotions at hiome and this year will use resources provided by Bread for the World. I know we will not be singing “Go to Dark Gethsemane”. I am determined to remember the past, be open to the present, and look forward to the future. Thus Lent will become for me a time to repent, reflect and recommit.