He’s Not Talking to You

A litte while back, some harsh things were being written about a friend of mine named Jay.  He and I agree on most things about about 90 percent of the time, from politics to entertainment to theology; but he went to the University of Florida while I went to Florida State, so it would be unfair to expect perfection from him 100 percent of the time. 

In any case, I wrote a blog article to remind people of Jay’s good qualities–many of which I would be thankful to see in myself.

That was a about a year and a half ago–or a few weeks before we all learned what “social distancing” was, what “PPE” stands for, and who Dr. Anthony Fauci was.  All of a sudden, the big elephant in every United Methodist room–a possible split of the United Methodist Church–was nowhere to be found.  2020 didn’t do much to make our lives better (unless you own stock in Amazon or Uber Eats), but I did enjoy the respite from the constant talk about how the United Methodist sky was falling.

The détente may have come to an abrupt end for you when you watched a video of Jay surrounded by forlorn faces (Figure 1.) with a harp playing in the background. In the video he renounced his ordination as a clergyperson in the Florida Conference and sent his licensing documents back in the mail. He joyfully (his word) described the decision–declaring his many reasons for believing that the United Methodist Church is no longer something with which he can be affiliated.

The Disorganized Religion Podcast! (S2, Ep1)

America Hating Flag-Kneelers

When someone kneels during the national anthem, they’re not doing it because they hate America, hate the flag, hate our troops, or whatever else they’re accused of by our various outrage & anger fabrication specialists (or OAFS, for short).

OAFS know how good moral superiority feels.  That’s why they point out for us all the people at whom we should be angry, and to whom we therefore get to feel morally superior.  Moral superiority feels so good that we’ll come back to feel it over and over and over again, making us such devoted, loyal fans of our favorite OAFS that their voices become the only ones we can hear.

Sights and Sounds from “Church Bells at Midnight”

So many times while I was writing Church Bells at Midnight, I wanted to be able to not just tell the story, but also show you its sights and sounds. I hope that by sharing some of them here, those who found the book meaningful will feel a deeper connection to the events by seeing and hearing what it was like in the years leading up to, during, and after those 51 difficult days.