Good Neighbors With No Fences

Next month I will celebrate 28 years of living in my neighborhood. I live on a cove with 5 other houses. We all know and care about each other, but of course that didn’t happen overnight or without intention.

We are a cultural mixture. Some families are of one race, some of another race.  Some families are Democrats, some Republicans. Some are gay, some are straight. Some go to church, some don’t.  But we don’t seem to pay much attention to those things.

Over the years various neighbors have done favors for me.  They have delivered medicines and groceries.  They checked on me if they thought I was sick.  They have driven me to physical therapy appointments.  They have given me produce from their garden.  The children of one family have made greeting cards for me.  One time, long ago, a very special lady drove my son to the hospital when he broke his arm.  One family has block parties and invites us and other neighbors into her home.  And one neighbor even helped rescue me from an attacking hawk!  I have babysat for them, taken them baked goods, homemade jam, Easter baskets and birthday presents, and prayed for them.  In return I have a safe place to live and the knowledge that I am never alone.

I think I know what Robert Frost was getting at when he wrote in “Mending Wall”: “something there is that doesn’t love a wall, that sends the frozen ground swell under it,”¹ for nature tends to tear down barriers,  but people have to be intentional. 

My block is not like the neighbors in Frost’s poem, but is more like Scout Finch’s description in To Kill a Mockingbird:

“Neighbors bring food with death and flowers with sickness and little things in between. Boo was our neighbor. He gave us two soap dolls, a broken watch and chain, a pair of good-luck pennies, and our lives”²

One day I was at a party at one of these neighbors’ homes, along with a lot of people I didn’t know.  My friend greeted me in a heartwarming way.  She welcomed me and then turned to her guests and announced:

“I have a Beto sign in my yard and she has a Ted Cruz³ sticker on her car…” then she reached over and put her arm around my shoulder and hugged… “And we love each other!”

Be intentional, my friends.

1.Mending Wall by Robert Frost

2.To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

3.Beto and Cruz were opposing candidates for the U.S. Senate from Texas.

Who is to Blame -- the Jefferson Statue

We're angry!

Jefferson owned slaves!

Tear his statue down!

The statue of Thomas Jefferson, commissioned to celebrate the Louisiana Purchase centennial, and sculpted in bronze by Karl Bitter, was paid for by the students of Thomas Jefferson High School in Portland in 1916.

The statue was recently toppled and vandalized by protesters.

But who do we blame for this statue?

Do we blame the Cuyahoga County Courthouse in Cleveland, Ohio for commissioning the original in 1909?

Do we blame Karl Bitter who sculpted the statue out of marble and replicas in bronze.

Or perhaps the Roman Bronze Works of New York who cast it?

Do we blame the Exposition Executive Committee of the St. Louis World’s Fair which commissioned a replica?

Do we blame the Jefferson High School students and alumni who raised the money to put up their statue in 1916?

My question is this:

Did anyone ask any of these people if it was OK to tear down their statue?  This was private property, probably owned by the school district or the City of Portland, and those who desecrated the statue violated their property rights, to say the least.

Another question for those who vandalized it is this:

Are they so incensed at the existence of this statue that they will now destroy all copies of it, which are currently displayed in Cleveland, Brooklyn, Charlottesville, and St. Louis?  What about all the other statues and memorials currently honoring this 3^rd U.S. President?  And all references to him in books, paintings, student textbooks and the like?

I doubt it.  Their act was symbolic.  It was aimed to create a reaction, and it certainly has.  Destruction of a country’s symbols inflames the patriotic. 

The vandalism may not have been anti-American, but, as the graffiti states, a protest against slavery by the BLM.

But if it was a Black Lives Matter group that aimed to topple Jefferson as a symbol of the oppression of Black Americans, they missed their mark.  For one thing, they failed to notice the inscription on one side of this statue which shows that Thomas Jefferson, whatever his faults, agreed with them.

“BEAR IN MIND THIS SACRED PRINCIPAL, 

THAT THOUGH THE WILL OF THE MAJORITY IS IN ALL CASES TO PREVAIL, 

THAT WILL, TO BE RIGHTFUL, MUST BE REASONABLE; 

THAT THE MINORITY POSSESS THEIR EQUAL RIGHTS, 

WHICH EQUAL LAWS MUST PROTECT, 

AND TO VIOLATE WOULD BE OPPRESSION."  

-- THOMAS JEFFERSON.

LOSING EASTER

I have always loved Easter traditions – the flowers, the special new outfit, the music, the food, the family gathering.  And there’s the egg-coloring with the kids, hiding baskets of goodies for them, Easter egg hunts.

But how will we celebrate Easter in quarantine?  Most of the traditions I can think of would be impossible or would be “virtual” realities.

Time to rethink.  What was the first Easter like?  Not all of  that.  They had a sad and confusing meal.  Then one of their number deceived and betrayed them and left.  Then they all went out to an olive grove where their leader spent the night in groaning and prayer, and asked them to also.  They disappointed him and fell asleep.  Suddenly the deserter came back with armed guards and took their leader away.  They scattered.  Some of them watched him die. 

Then they went into hiding.  While still hiding out, some of their women sneaked out to Jesus’ grave, which was guarded by soldiers, and came back saying they saw him alive.  More confusion and chaos.  Dare they believe it?!

While still in seclusion, they waited.  What else could they do?...  They waited and prayed in the midst of terror and visions of Jesus appearing and disappearing.  It must have all been very disorienting.  So much changed so quickly.

Then they tried to go back to their old jobs and make a living, but everything in their lives – their whole world – had changed.  Finally the resurrected Jesus gave them new orders.  They all had a new life and new jobs.  It was a new day they never could have imagined before.  (Read the book of Acts to see what that life was like.)

I see some parallels between the condition of the disciples in hiding, and our current social distancing, do you?  Rapid change, fear and uncertainty, unparalleled events, and separation from others.

Pause.  Let’s rediscover the First Easter this year.  Let go of the layers of tradition which don’t work while we are “sheltering in place.”  Wait on God.  Pray.  Perhaps God has a new life and new jobs for us after this.