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Keepin' Tom, and Carryin' On....
Apr. 7th, 2013 08:14 pmNot to be confused with the other slogan of that ilk-
- I got to think a bit today about the doubter among the disciples. Thomas is, after all, the traditional villain of the Sunday-after-Easter sermons, for demanding physical evidence of the Resurrection before believing. It's not surprising, then, that his name has been largely reduced to the mud over the ensuing centuries.
Just listen to the parade of shame going by. Uncle Tom of Cabin-etry. Tom Dooley, famed capital punishment subject. Tom Joad, he of a semi-famous ghost. Clarence Thomas. Offhand, about the only positive uses I can think of the name are Thomas Jefferson, who's hated by the baggers for his staunch church-state separation stance and is slowly being edited out of his Founding Fatherhood membership in right-wing textbooks on account of it; and Tom Seaver, the only Met player to date to have his number retired solely on account of his accomplishments on the field, but whose first name was really George.
The original Thomas made his annual appearance in our after-Easter service today, both of which I attended since I had to formally announce both good news and bad: our seminary assistant, who's been approved for her next step toward ordination, will be taking that step at a Methodist Church about 150 miles from here. It's the one in Whitney Point, New York, which generations of Cornell students know as "that exit on I-81 that gets you to Ithaca." That route also makes you go past a church in that town that, Corey assures me, is not her future one, but one which I drove past many a late night in Greyhounds, Mavericks and Mustangs and saw this message on US 11:
(The blogger I stole that photo from thought the church looked "like a bank. I opened an account there immediately.")
Ultimately, Corey helped redeem the Ol' Original Tom, and did so mainly through a story about a man named Bill. He was a parishioner of her mother's (also a UMC pastor), in a church far smaller than either ours or her new one, but he was abandoned by his blood relatives to a Pennsylvania nursing home in his dying years and relied on that church's small but hardy congregation to drive his blind self to services and events. When he finally passed away, none of his real rels bothered to arrange a funeral, but Corey's mom and her flock memorialized him, and everyone there spoke of how much their lives had been touched by this helpless, needy blind man who none of them owed a thing to.
That's a powerful reflection of the good side of God whether you need to touch, or believe in, the actual crucifixion wounds or not.
- I got to think a bit today about the doubter among the disciples. Thomas is, after all, the traditional villain of the Sunday-after-Easter sermons, for demanding physical evidence of the Resurrection before believing. It's not surprising, then, that his name has been largely reduced to the mud over the ensuing centuries.
Just listen to the parade of shame going by. Uncle Tom of Cabin-etry. Tom Dooley, famed capital punishment subject. Tom Joad, he of a semi-famous ghost. Clarence Thomas. Offhand, about the only positive uses I can think of the name are Thomas Jefferson, who's hated by the baggers for his staunch church-state separation stance and is slowly being edited out of his Founding Fatherhood membership in right-wing textbooks on account of it; and Tom Seaver, the only Met player to date to have his number retired solely on account of his accomplishments on the field, but whose first name was really George.
The original Thomas made his annual appearance in our after-Easter service today, both of which I attended since I had to formally announce both good news and bad: our seminary assistant, who's been approved for her next step toward ordination, will be taking that step at a Methodist Church about 150 miles from here. It's the one in Whitney Point, New York, which generations of Cornell students know as "that exit on I-81 that gets you to Ithaca." That route also makes you go past a church in that town that, Corey assures me, is not her future one, but one which I drove past many a late night in Greyhounds, Mavericks and Mustangs and saw this message on US 11:
(The blogger I stole that photo from thought the church looked "like a bank. I opened an account there immediately.")
Ultimately, Corey helped redeem the Ol' Original Tom, and did so mainly through a story about a man named Bill. He was a parishioner of her mother's (also a UMC pastor), in a church far smaller than either ours or her new one, but he was abandoned by his blood relatives to a Pennsylvania nursing home in his dying years and relied on that church's small but hardy congregation to drive his blind self to services and events. When he finally passed away, none of his real rels bothered to arrange a funeral, but Corey's mom and her flock memorialized him, and everyone there spoke of how much their lives had been touched by this helpless, needy blind man who none of them owed a thing to.
That's a powerful reflection of the good side of God whether you need to touch, or believe in, the actual crucifixion wounds or not.