WWAGD? [M, 4-26-21]

REFLECTIONS ON FAITH & LIFE FOR THE YEARS OF WINTER

WWAGD?                  [M, 4-26-21]

 

My most excellent friend and Academy of Parish Clergy colleague, Fred Skaggs, “suggested” that I should keep on writing this column, despite my farewell column on April 17. He said that even though I am out of stories, and need to concentrate on dealing with the Word, without the words shielding me from the Word, I could cut and paste old columns, since “good stories never die.” He did not say it, but he was also probably thinking that since my readers are mostly “mature” folks, they would not remember the old stories anyway.

Fred has a history of being right about such things. Besides, I thought, surely cutting and pasting old words would not be as effective a shield against the Word as writing new words. So, I tried. But even cutting and pasting seemed to lead me into the weeds.

However, it made me think of a conversation long past with Aunt Gertrude. She is 99 now, still the IU Hoosiers men’s basketball team’s biggest fan, and still the woman of whom Helen said, “I often can’t answer WWJD because I can’t see Jesus sometimes, so I don’t know what Jesus would do, but I can ask WWAGD, because I can see what Aunt Gertrude does, and I know it will be right.”

We were visiting Aunt Gertrude and Uncle Randall in Hamilton, OH once when I was in my 40s. I was telling AG how fed up I was with the ministry and how I wanted to change professions. She assessed all my complaints and said, “You know, I think you really just need a vacation.” As always, she was right. I wanted a permanent solution for what she realized was a temporary problem.

So when that song I wrote and posted on F, April 23, 2021--using Bob Dylan’s “Don’t Think Twice” as its template--arose, unbidden, as I faced the Word about the end of earthly life, I thought about the writing of words: maybe I just need a vacation.

We’ll see.

In the meantime, I am writing an explanation of my “Now It’s Over; That’s Alright,” that I’ll post before long, just in case it’s a bit confusing or confounding.

But remember, confusing and confounding are among my super powers, along with rationalization.

John Robert McFarland