Christine Sunderland

Whether or not one agrees that America needed to leave Afghanistan, the nature of the leaving, the exit as it were, has been a catastrophic failure, not only in leaving many vulnerable Afghans and Americans behind, but in allowing the Taliban to take over the country. Three weeks ago the terrorists who attacked America on September 11, 2001, took over Kabul and most of Afghanistan. Six days from today, we remember and mourn those lost on nine-eleven, all those killed in the World Trade Center bombings in New York by the Taliban.

Will there be another attack on U.S. soil on this September 11, 2021, the twenty-year anniversary?

The fear of pandemic has been replaced by another more familiar fear: terrorism.

My sixth novel, The Fire Trail (eLectio Publishing, 2016), is set in September 2014. I chose the month largely for reasons of setting. I wanted dusk to be falling in the hills east of San Francisco, where the fire trail winds above UC Berkeley. The novel opens with that setting, as the student Jessica runs the trail alone and comes upon the body of a girl recently murdered. She sees the murderer and he sees her. And so the plot unfolds. September was the best month: school in session, waning daylight in the early evening.

At first it did not occur to me that the span of the novel, essentially the month of September, would include the anniversary of nine-eleven. Given that a central theme is the collapse of Western Civilization, I would need to handle this in some way, either utilize the memories of my characters or merely mention it in passing.

I decided to honor the memory with four central chapters in which each of the four characters recalls where they were on that day, adding to their respective backstories and paying tribute to the great sacrifice of Americans, including first responders and may others who helped the horrific rescue.

And so, this week I will be posting selections from each of those chapters in honor of those who died in the greatest attack ever on U.S. soil. They are memories typical of the character’s age and disposition, memories that formed them in powerful ways. Americans will never forget.

And now, three weeks after Kabul was taken over by the same terrorists that attacked us in 2001 – the Taliban – we watch and wait and pray that our people are vigilant here on our own soil. For terrorism throughout the world is now on the rise. Our borders are porous and in many places torn down, and tyrannical regimes hate our freedoms. They hate our way of life; they hate us. And they see that we are weak and decadent, and they are right. We are.

Artist unknown, 1035-1040

With these fears and thoughts running through my heart and mind, it was good to return to the Berkeley chapel to be strengthened in body and soul. The Gospel lesson was a reminder, too, of why America is a great nation, founded on great principles. The lesson was the account of Christ healing the ten lepers, and only one returns to thank him. “Where are the other nine?” he asks.

Thanking and thanksgiving are fruits of a Judeo-Christian culture. They are fruits of freedom, for they come from the heart. They give a true accounting of gifts given, an acknowledgement of the brotherhood of man, the giving and receiving freely. They are the fruits of freedom and the fruits of love. Thank-yous are one of many courtesies we learned as children to get along with one another. We learned to say the words so that one day we would feel them.

I came across an essay by John Horvat at the Imaginative Conservative site, called “Time to Return to Medieval Courtesy Books.”   He describes how the “woke” crowd of today deems civility and manners to be artificial concepts that reinforce power structures and should never be taught to children. He goes on to explore the history of manners and their teachings through “courtesy books” created in twelfth-century Christendom. These books were an attempt to instill virtue in children to aid their developing consciences, with direct instructions including table manners, sharing food, and the one command I particularly liked was, “Don’t chew with your mouth open.” This one seems to have been cast upon the wayside today, as they say. Caxton’s Book of Curtesye (1477) can be found on the Google Books site.

It is this heritage that is being attacked today, over two thousand years of nurturing ways to get along together according to the God of Abraham and his descendants, according the Western Civilization. It is this heritage of freedom that terrorists seek to destroy.

Tomorrow is Labor Day, and again, a feature of the West, the desire to work and create, to imagine and build, a desire to be celebrated and protected. The rise of labor unions in the nineteenth century was this desire to honor the work of Americans and protect their rights. We honor our workers and the contributions of each and every American to this great land of liberty. We honor work by honoring the virtue of self-discipline, responsibility, and perseverance.

And so we remember nine-eleven in this aftermath of the fall of Kabul to our enemies, to those who did us such great harm. We remember, on this twentieth anniversary, why we are called to remember, to keep America free and strong, to save Western civilization from the barbarians at our gates, gates that today appear to be wide open.

As we watch the fall of the West, the twilight of civilization as we have known it, it is good to remember to breathe the name of Jesus.

I learned this one-word prayer, one-name prayer from my friends in Kentucky who know something about prayer. They pray without ceasing in a hermitage/retreat house called Nazareth House Apostolate. For we are told to pray without ceasing, and breathing the name of Jesus helps us live this joyful command, calling upon the Lord of Hosts to be present here and now.

We are also told to rejoice in the Lord always. For he is the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the ancient of days. When Western Christendom fades with a whimper and not a bang (T.S. Eliot) we still have Christ ordering our days, our hours, our minutes. We still rejoice always. As some say, God is in charge. And others remind us to fear not. And my bishop of blessed memory often said, we know how the story ends, at least Christians know, and it is a good and glorious ending.

The bombing at the Kabul airport on Thursday, killing over 200 people, including children, trying to flee Afghanistan, was not unexpected, given the tensions in the radical Muslim world and their hatred for the West, and yet it sent shock waves through the West. The response from President Biden, when he finally addressed the American people late in the day, and by extension, addressed the world, was a weak attempt to placate, sidestepping the crisis he caused by the sudden exodus, preceded by the shameful closure of Bagram Air Force Base in the dark, without notice to our Afghan friends and NATO allies.

And so we prayed for them with The Litany (1928 Book of Common Prayer, 54+) this morning in our Berkeley chapel. We dedicated our prayer to those trapped in Afghanistan and those who lost their lives. As we chanted the responses to the many supplications I was thankful for the poetry of these ancient lines, said in unison as a chorus, many voices becoming one, creating a work of art of its own in our haunting barrel-vaulted chapel, unique to the moment and setting:

O GOD the Father, Creator of heaven and earth;
  Have mercy upon us.
O God the Son, Redeemer of the world;
    Have mercy upon us.
O God the Holy Ghost, Sanctifier of the faithful;
    Have mercy upon us.
O holy, blessed, and glorious Trinity, one God;
    Have mercy upon us.

We prayed for mercy for we prayed for the world. We prayed for the world because we love the world. We take on the suffering of others and ourselves and offer it all to Christ.

As I chanted, I thought how good it was to be a part of this stream of Christ’s body, this artful, beautiful, exquisite liturgy we sing together. There is another time and place for spontaneous prayer, always good. But praying and singing in unison the words of thousands of years with other Christians, uniting those who came before with those who come after us, and those along side us today, is a powerful and joyous cleansing and fortifying. Having the words embedded in heart and mind sculpt a finer heart and mind, a more holy heart and mind. Online services are not the same. How good it was to be there.

I also realized that we must seize every moment, hour, and day to live fully in the love of God. We do not know how long we will have the chance to meet this way. We cannot predict tomorrow. The recent events in Afghanistan brought home the realization that we live in an increasingly shrinking world, and all events effect our fragile existence, no matter who we are.

The smoke from the California wildfires smothers the hills and valleys in the Bay Area. We cannot breathe. It is like a cursed blanket of ash.

And so breathing the name of Jesus is healing. The Lord God Eternal enters me with each breath. I inspire and am inspired. And I received the Eucharist today, the Real Presence absorbed into my flesh.

I give thanks this afternoon for one more chance to gather together with other Christians, to pray and sing and celebrate together as one born of many: one voice uniting us in this moment in history, one body of believers in this place in this moment, never to be repeated, a moment now the past, never to be the present again.

How many Sundays and how many Eucharists and how many moments of such delight will come to me in my span on earth? I shall take advantage of all I can, remake my poor flesh and my weak soul with the love of God, the food of eternity and life everlasting.

The fall of Kabul to the Taliban shocked the world this last week, and the images of desperate Americans and Afghans trying to escape Afghanistan have been seared into our memory. I pray for them, for their safe passage, and for all those immigrants who desire to come to America.

The war is, of course, a religious war between Christian freedom and Islamic slavery. Islam, the religion of “peace,” can only accept peace through tyranny and oppression, according to the Koran and the laws of their God.

Christianity is also a religion of peace. But our interpretation of the laws of God is quite different, founding cultures of freedom and democracy, in contrast to sharia’s cultures of absolute obedience and medieval punishment.

It is a war between cultures and their foundational belief systems, a war of ideals. The Christian West, however, has forgotten its roots, has even denied its founding principles. So we have a war between a (nearly) dying culture of materialism in the West and a living culture of domination in the Middle East.

Other tyrannies – Communist China and Communist Russia – will seek to use this rising force for ill to their own ends. And Pakistan, home of the Taliban and ISIS (Islamic State), has a nuclear bomb. There was great celebrating in Islamabad, Pakistan, as Kabul fell, as the soldiers paraded in U.S. gear and brandished U.S. weapons, having taken U.S. helicopters and U.S. bases.

Does America have the nerve and verve to rescue her people trapped behind enemy lines? She has the ability, but does she have the will?

Many in America are waking up to the reality of today’s world, that America is a unique experiment in freedom, a fragile one at best, one that needs nurturing and above all, love. She is a country that depends on generation after generation being educated in her goodness, if not her perfection, her desire for good, if not her achieving it. She is a Christian country, founded upon principles of bravery, self-discipline, and compassion, with a strong work ethic. She is founded upon confession and repentance, and has done significant repenting since the earliest days of the colonies. She sees all her warts and flaws, yet moves on, taking a higher path, learning from her mistakes.

She is an aberration in the world. Freedom and democracy are not the usual stream in the flow of history. That is why everyone wants to immigrate to America. She is unique, an aberration. She is exceptional, a bright city on a hill, a light in the darkness.

I hope to feature a few immigration themes in my next novel, picking up on some of the themes in Angel Mountain (Wipf and Stock, 2020). The hermit living in the mountain’s caves and his sister living in the foothills are Jewish refugee immigrants who hid from Hitler’s Holocaust in Greece during World War II. They understand freedom. They understand the miracle of America. They do not forget how blessed they are to make it to this country, to survive. In my new novel, Return to Angel Mountain (working title), at least one character will embody the immigrant experience.

For we are a nation of immigrants, and that is our crowning glory. We understand the miracle of America, or at least we did, at least until the last few decades when those who hate America slid and slipped into our universities and poisoned the curricula, now doing the same in our grade schools with Critical Race Theory and other versions of “social justice.” The haters are loud and threatening. They cancel open debate and silence speech. They destroy lives with innuendo and threats and mob violence. They threaten the world with their hatred of freedom.

What do the haters think about the cargo plane packed with people fleeing the Muslim world? What do they think about those who held on to the wings and dropped to their deaths in a terrifying attempt to leave and come to America?

And so I prayed this morning in our Berkeley chapel for the Americans and others who value freedom, who are trapped behind enemy lines, whether in the Near East or the Far East.

The Gospel lesson today was the healing of the man who couldn’t hear or speak.

America is like that man, deaf and dumb. And also blind. We need to be healed, healed by Christ. We need to be reminded who we are and our role in this violent world of war. We need to look to the flag and be proud of our great gift to all humanity, through the ideals of America’s founding. We need to teach our children to love our country and, since we were founded in the Christian West, how to truly love one another.

The Bay Area is smoky today, temps burning into the high ninety’s. I was glad, as I smelled the smoke, that I resupplied our evacuation bags this last week. We are entering fire and earthquake season. So far we are safe.

I grew up in the East Bay, Orinda and Lafayette, and while I recall high August temps, I don’t recall fires like these we are experiencing in the northern valley country. Some say it is climate change, but facts do not support this. What facts do support is that these fires are caused by poor forest management, too little deforestation, and dollars diverted from grid and infrastructure maintenance toward “green energy.” Such is the case in a state known for its liberal save-the-earth policies and disaster scenarios. We shall probably have rolling blackouts due to these policies as well. Ironically, I recently learned that solar panels are made in China by high emission factories, and electric cars must use batteries using fossil fuels from Venezuela. The one nuclear plant (safe energy) is being closed in California.

So it appears that summertime is a time to restock the evac bags in the Peoples Republic of California. It made me think about life and death, being prepared. It is a time to consider restocking our lives as well, preparing for the great crossing into Paradise. Am I ready?

I was thinking about this today in Berkeley at St. Joseph of Arimathea Chapel, as we prayed for two friends who entered Paradise this last week. I had not seen them recently, but had known them for many decades, fellow parishioners, dedicated to the Church, lovers of God. They both died of age-related deaths, and I am sure they are in a better place now.

When friends pass into Eternity, we think of our own lives and our own passing someday. Are we ready? Have we packed evacuation bags?

I suppose the Church prepares us for the journey with evacuation essentials. We enrich our minds, souls, and bodies at the altar each Sunday. We sing praises to the Lord of Hosts. We soar with the organ on the wings of hymns into the barrel vault that domes the medieval crucifix and Real Presence in the tabernacle below. We become one with one another in the ancient liturgy commanded by Our Lord Jesus himself at the Last Supper. We leave the chapel, our evacuation bags near to bursting. We are restocked with the essentials, the Eucharist, absolution, healing of body and soul.

Our good Vicar and Seminary Dean has been offering an anointing with holy oils, signing a cross on our foreheads and praying for our healing. In this time of fear and pandemic we have been given one more blessing to calm our souls and disordered minds. I am grateful. He loves us so.

Today is the Feast of the Assumption of Mary, a “pious opinion” doctrine in the Anglican world, meaning you can believe it, or not believe it. I think there are good reasons to believe she fell asleep and was bodily carried into Heaven to be with her son. No group has ever claimed her body, the relics, in a time when they would have done so, eventually. It is said she went to sleep in the hills above the port of Ephesus. We visited the “House of Mary” many years ago, arriving by cruise ship at the port of Kusadasi, Turkey, touring the nearby Ephesus ruins where St. Paul preached (including the arena) and making our way up the hillside to the shrine of Mary. It is believed that the beloved apostle John (Evangelist) looked after her, then lived his life out on the nearby isle of Patmos where he was given the vision of Heaven, the Apocalypse, as written in the Book of Revelation.

So much of life is a mystery, hidden from us, tucked in the silence of the air we breathe. We have been given many hints and clues, many appearances and many miracles since Jesus Christ appeared on earth two thousand years ago. We have been given evidence, argument, reasons to believe. I believe it is a matter of desire, of wanting to understand these mysteries, for they are not hidden if we open our eyes to see and ears to hear. The Church is a rich source of salvation. She opens her doors (when not mandated closed) to all of us. “Come. Come and see,” she sings. “Come and meet the Lord of Creation, of Eternity, of Life itself. Come to the banquet spread upon the altar.”

At the conclusion of our liturgy in our Berkeley chapel, we turn and face an icon of Mary, the Theotokas, one donated by a Russian émigré who was a friend of our Bishop Morse in the mid-twentieth century. We repeat the ancient salutation of the Archangel Gabriel to Mary, “Hail, Mary, full of grace, blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us now and at the hour of our death.”

Yes, Our Lady Mary, Mother of God, pray for us now and at the hour of our death. Bring us to Heaven to be with you, dear Mother. To be with your Son, Savior of the World, Salvator Mundi. We are packing for the journey with every prayer, every liturgy, every song, every encounter with Christ.

For more information about St. Joseph of Arimathea Anglican Chapel, visit sjachapel.org. Masses are streamed through St. Joseph’s Facebook page.

It has been a week of transfiguration.

There are times in my life when I feel transfigured and transformed. These are moments often following an emptiness, a hollowness that needs filling. I wait and see what God has in store for me. For these lesser moments, if given to Christ in prayer, usually are redeemed into something delightful.

I suppose it was the mask mandate that returned with all of its ferocity here in the Peoples Republic of California. Of course the people have little to do with such governance, and powerlessness adds to the darkness that threatens to engulf us all, when the heavy hand of the State, that jackboot in the face, weighs so upon us.

I have difficulty wearing a mask, and I’m not sure why. I panic, thinking I cannot breathe. But I also miss seeing others’ faces, dear ones, beloved friends. I hadn’t realized how important the smile is and the lips and the tongue to the formation of words and sentences. Facial expressions are now prized beyond measure. How can I connect with others without seeing their faces? We are given these features for a reason and masks divide us from one another.

So part of my dark mood was a sense of great loss, once again and, once again, unmerited by facts and figures. Fear threatens next, fear of the tyrants who mandate without cause, who despise we the people, but I have Christ who banishes all fear. I waited and I wondered. I prayed my way through the week. How would I be transformed? How would this night become day?

And then, on Friday, Christians celebrated the Feast of the Transfiguration of Christ, when his face became filled with light on Mount Tabor. His was a holy face, white and glistering. He was transformed before his select disciples, who had grown sleepy, as he rose into the cloud with Moses and Elijah. It is a glorious moment, one that portends a rising of all humanity, or at least those that believe. I worshiped with a few others online. It was enough. Simple devotion. Simple obedience. Simple change of heart. The simple banishing of the dark and the simple welcoming of the light.

When the doorbell rang on Saturday morning and my grandchildren (ages 18 and 22), and their father, stood on the porch, they waved their masks in their hands. “Masks?” they asked. “No!” I replied. “I want to see your faces!”

They were transfigured with relief and their smiles filled my heart.

We chatted over lunch about church, and in my reflections of their visit, I realized a new truth, a divine truth, that the many denominations of Christianity, the various ways of worship, ways of interpretation of Holy Scripture, ways of dressing, of singing, of even praying – all these forms and styles – are a part of God’s plan for humanity, giving us free choice even in ways of worship. Andrew Klavan touched on this in his Friday Daily Wire podcast (highly recommended).

As a secular Jew converted to Christianity (recounted in his memoir, The Great Good Thing) Mr. Klavan could not understand the dividing animosity he saw between these various streams of Christianity, at least among those that accepted the creeds. These are merely ways, he explained, of God reaching all of us in our individual uniqueness, our great diversity. I had sensed from time to time, when jealousy and pride puffed up Christian leaders to degrade other ways of believing, that there must be a reason we have so many split factions in the Church, knowing that one day there will be one Church, and divisions would cease. But the reason might be that that one day, when Christ returns, there will be no Church, and divisions will cease, for Christ himself is the Church. We will become one people, believers in Jesus the Christ, joining together in his body. We will experience another great good thing, union in Christ.

This simple thought transfigured my heart and transformed my mind. I reflected on my grandchildren. One attended an evangelical church and the other a Catholic church. I was in the middle, the Anglican, a denomination full of ritual and song and praise with organ hymns sung through the ages. Perfect for me, a lover of tradition and beauty.

Perhaps it is a truth sometimes acknowledged that when we grow we are transfigured, we are changed. We may have growing pains in the process. Or not. We may feel that we have climbed a mountain and can see our world from its peak in a new light. We may simply feel profoundly rested, at rest, for we have come closer to the heart of our Maker, closer to the vision he had and has of us when he formed us in the womb.

Today’s Epistle recounted the many spiritual gifts given to each one of us, that in our uniqueness each one of us has a talent that we share with the others, and this giving, this love, transfigures us, makes us whole, holy.

Diversity is central, organic, to Christianity, part of its very nature. We celebrate each difference and glorify God in each transfiguring. As someone once said, all creation is made up of infinite diversity, each gene different, each cell different. Worlds residing in each of us, and worlds within the worlds. Each of us is a universe.

For we are a people transfigured by Christ. 

I’ve been thinking about authorities, as in what authority lies behind a truth told, what proof or evidence witnesses to the truth told. For we must choose carefully today to whom we listen, to whom we rely on to tell the truth. Are they biased? Are they competent? Do they have sufficient knowledge and background to make the statement?

Our medias fly at us like bullets, thousands of emails, thousands of words, thousands of statements claimed to be facts. Which ones are accurate? Which words do we listen to and believe? For it makes all the difference, which authorities command our allegiance.

I have found that given the liberal left slant of mainstream news, I should balance their opinions, opinings, with conservative versions of the same event or statistics. For the mainstream, I read our local paper, which channels New York Times into a community paper, complete with vicious denunciations of people of faith and people of tradition. For the balance to our local screed, I turn to the Epoch Times and the Wall Street Journal.

The numbers reported in the Chinese Flu Pandemic have been odd ones in the mainstream press. It has been difficult to see real numbers, i.e. death rates by age, by comorbidities, by country. At first I searched online through the major medical sites, CDC, etc., and eventually I would find the case numbers and the death numbers and do the math to get to the death rate, the percentage that, I am told, is standard for comparison of flu, etc. waves. But that took time, and I finally gave up.

I finally found in the Epoch Times this last week a death rate percentage. It was a global rate, so not the best for our country, but there it was: COVID death rate globally over the last year has been .15. That’s the same as the average flu season. The COVID death rate is probably lower than this, since the numbers of deaths in this country have been off by 70% in terms of reporting causal or incidental. All those who died of any cause were tested for COVID and if they were positive, they were listed as a COVID death. A person dying in a car crash would be tested for COVID and, if positive, the death would be listed as a COVID death. One writer explained that death causes are either “causal” or “incidental.” It appears that around 70% of reported deaths due to COVID were not causal but incidental, and they were misreported. Why?

So I choose my authorities carefully. I weigh the numbers and the evidence and consider the source. Then I make up my own mind. I am not a medical doctor (or any doctor, for that matter) so I must look to others to give me the facts.

How can we see things as they truly are? I rearranged a few of my icons in my office, moving them from the bookshelves, where they seem to disappear into the many titles, to a blank bit of wall. I did the same with some family photos, moving them also to a white space. I can see them now, and feel they have been given new life. Life is often like that, so muddled with too many details (or emails). We lose our way in the forest of trees.

One of my authorities is Scripture. But here, too, there are many interpretations. So I consider which source to use, and have concluded our Anglican tradition hits things pretty much on the mark. In the parable of the Prodigal Son this morning, our good preacher reminisced a bit about his own past, and then stepped into the parable, told by our Lord Jesus. I listened carefully, for I trust his insight, I trust his authority. It is a story we have all heard many times, the younger son leaving home for a dissolute life and returning desperate and penniless, the older son jealous of his brother’s reception by their father. The father forgives. The father welcomes. The father celebrates. The young man is like the lost sheep of other parables and the last minute vineyard worker. 

And so I was reassured that God the Father loves us, each one of us, and welcomes us home, even after a dissolute life, even after no-matter-what. We are forgiven when we come home. But we must come home.

There is an integrity in the Gospels and the Epistles, an integrity that complements and affirms the whole of Christianity and Christian witness, including the Old Testament prophecies and wanderings of Israel’s people. And there is an integrity, an honesty, in our clergy, for the most part. For they are human too and make mistakes. But if I immerse myself in weekly Eucharists, healing my soul and my body, I sense that I am also healing my heart and mind, and being fed with truth that will shine light on the world around me. I will be less blind. I will see better.

We all want to be able to see, and to see better, more clearly. We want to understand who we are as individuals and as mankind, as humanity. We can only do this if we evaluate our authorities carefully. Whom do we trust to tell the truth about Man, about God, about the Earth and the Heavens? About a rather nasty flu pandemic?

I am glad they call the Mass the Eucharist. For I give thanks throughout the hour of song and praise and prayer. I give thanks I found authorities I trust to tell me the truth. I give thanks I found God, or rather, he found me.

For this makes all the difference. I sleep deeply. I live and love wholeheartedly. I embrace the world that God made for us. But I will not countenance lies, or slander, or silencing, or malicious reporting. I want the truth.

And I am relieved that the global death rate over the last year has been similar to a normal flu season. I’m double vaccinated, but my mask remains in my pocket in case I scare anyone with my joyful, fearless countenance.

Friedrich Justin Bertuch, 1806

I have been researching the battles fought in the Pacific Theater in World War II as backstory for my next novel. My father, William Carl Thomas, served as a chaplain in the Navy aboard the USS Phoenix, a light cruiser, from 1944-5. I never knew exactly what happened in that year, except that he experienced the terror of kamikazes dive-bombing close to the ship. So I saw this as an opportunity to find out more.

I was able to chart the route of the USS Phoenix and sense a bit of what my father experienced, if that is humanly possible.

The name intrigued me, for I recalled the ancient myth of the phoenix, the bird that rose from its own ashes, a kind of resurrection. Indeed, the resurrection of Christ has been seen as a kind of phoenix, as if the phoenix were prophesizing the future salvation of mankind.

Our present day is in need of rebirth, for there are many signs that our civilization is dying. Will there be a rising from the ashes of the West? Will the resurrection be in time? Will we even have voices to tell the story, the history, to our children? Or will be silenced?

The USS Phoenix, named after the Arizona city, was a light cruiser. Her job was to guard convoys in dangerous waters. She shelled beaches to protect American troops in their amphibious landings. She was attacked by torpedoes and kamikazes, many near misses. In the course of the war, she lost only one man. She was a true phoenix and was nicknamed “Lucky Phoenix.”

The ship was present in Pearl Harbor during the Japanese raid of December 7, 1941, but anchored northeast of Ford Island and not hit. The men on board witnessed the attack and the fire and the smoke and sailed to find survivors. My father was not enlisted as yet. He would join the Phoenix on June 3, 1944 according to the Navy’s “Muster Roll.” He had recently graduated from Dallas Theological Seminary.

The cruiser had executed many operations by this time, and the current goal of General MacArthur was a massive amphibian attack on the islands arcing up to the Philippines, occupied by the Japanese (“I will return,” the general had promised). They would liberate the Philippines and thus have a position to invade Japan. The Phoenix was part of many battles off the northwest coast of New Guinea, protecting and escorting at Biak, Yapen, Noemfoor, Morotai, and Halmahera islands, and in the battle of Leyte Gulf, a key victory in the battle for the Philippines.

My father saw a great deal of fire in the year he served in the South Pacific, but he survived, and like many, rose from the ashes of the war to return home, marry, and have a family.

By C. J. Dyer

Curious as to how the town of Phoenix, Arizona, was named, I learned that a Civil War Confederate veteran, Jack Swilling, was prospecting in the settlement of Wickenburg in 1867. He saw an area in the Salt River Valley that could be farmed, providing food for the town. They built a canal. Lord Darryl Duppa, one of the settlers, suggested Phoenix as a name for the town, for they had found evidence of a long-gone native civilization. They would build a new civilization, rising from the old one. 

Today, perhaps Phoenix, Maricopa County, will rise again, this time from the turmoil of purported election 2020 fraud.

And so this morning in our Berkeley chapel, I thought of the freedoms we still enjoyed, the freedom to worship and assemble, to write and to speak, although self-censoring has paralyzed many, and many who have spoken have had careers destroyed, reputations ruined. But this morning, in the chapel, we prayed and praised Our Lord of Resurrection. For America is a country of resurrection. It is a place of new life rising, a beacon burning on a hill, a torch flaming, held high by Lady Liberty in New York’s harbor. Within our nation’s laws, and within its borders, America offers a new life to immigrants escaping tyranny, a resurrection.

I prayed too, that we remembered to remember the heroes of our nation, at home and at sea, in the air and on the land. I prayed that we remembered to tell these stories to our children so that they would tell their children. In this way they would understand that rising from the ashes happened and can happen again, that they can protect the sanctity of life and all that that means. I prayed for freedom, the freedom for which my father fought and was willing to die, for he knew he would be resurrected too.

July, 2021: Praise for Angel Mountain

“I soon became involved with each character and the bridge between the past and the present day. They captured my attention and made me think from a mountaintop vantage point. As Abram heeds the call to leave his worldly life to follow Christ, he becomes as John the Baptist in his hermitage on the mount – preaching and baptizing. What man and nature had meant for harm, Abram’s prayers used to bring glory to God on Angel Mountain…  It was a lovely read and makes me look forward with keen anticipation to what comes next!”

  – Cindy Rushing, Development Director, Clare Boothe Luce Center for Conservative Women, www.cblwomen.org

I needed another shelf for my books, those titles that would be my research for my next novel. I eyed three shelves that I had not cleaned out in many years, crammed, not with books so much as Sunday School materials. Still, there were children’s books as well, slim shiny covers with happy faces that invited a look inside.

There were Bible stories and stories about the Church, about the sacraments, about the existence of God, all written to inform a child, from age three to fifteen. I thought of the many classes I had taught in the past, the young upturned faces ready to absorb my words like a sponge. I thought of how we sang together in chapel time, and how we formed circles and prayed together. We learned the Our Father and we learned hymns – All Things Bright and Beautiful in the spring/summer, I Sing a Song of the Saints of God in the fall, and Advent Tells Us Christ is Near in the winter season along with Christmas carols. Good times.

And so I kept these slim volumes handy, to reach for on a Sunday morning for story hour. I wouldn’t give them away, not yet, but keep them in another bookcase in another room for the time.

I needed space for my current project, Return to Angel Mountain.

I sorted and stacked and made piles of craft books and coloring books separately. I couldn’t yet part with Maria Montessori’s titles on how to teach the Faith to young children. They were too precious, too old, and would always be a part of me. They remain. She was a devout Catholic, something not everyone recalls, and she worked miracles with young, disadvantaged children. Her method caught on, but the religion lessons were left behind.

As I recalled those years in the Sunday School, I was thankful. At the time I took on the challenge as a parish duty and, like so many actions done in love and out of responsibility, I didn’t fully appreciate the experience until many years later, when I could see the past more clearly.

It is always difficult to see the present, for we are often blind to what is in front of us, all around us. And so we act from selfless interest rather than self-interest, allowing God to mold us without our knowing it. We try to obey His commandments, and in doing so, immerse ourselves in his love. The growth is not seen at the time. Only later. Only later when we order our libraries of words and paper, volumes living in wooden bookcases, each one a treasure.

So on the shelves, I plan to have a section for each main character. Each character will incarnate a theme that calls me to write: Critical Race Theory, Free Speech, Immigration, American History, the Pacific Theater in WWII. They will overlap and merge, to be sure, but once I have the books domiciled on the shelf, I shall begin the character backstories. These stories are told from a first-person point of view. When I have gotten to know the characters I will consider how they might interact, how a crisis could arise between them, how they might all gather on Angel Mountain.

For novels are all about character, creation of individuals who breathe the turmoil of the present day, who search for meaning, who desire to be free, who want to love as we are commanded to love.

I am allowed to “play God” in a way, allowed to create incarnations of souls, of thoughts, of yearnings, of desires. And so I listen to His voice, always hoping to be in tune with the music we are both singing.

Music was a theme in Angel Mountain, the music of the spheres, the music of prayer and hymns. They are saying now that singing is good for the lungs, that it helps to strengthen them. How sad we were not allowed to sing in church during a pandemic that attacked the lungs. Heaven, I believe, is full of music, full of beautiful melody, ongoing. Will we choose which heavenly choir to join? Do we have glimpses of those eternal choirs as we sing on a Sunday with other faithful voices? Are the choirs looking in on us, over us, or perhaps angels hover close to hear us?

The shelves wait for their volumes to take up residence, a powerful presence near my desk. They wait for the incarnations of characters, as I breathe life into them with letters and words, incarnations themselves. And I, an incarnation of God’s spirit, breathe His name, Jesus, with every word typed. I am in-spired, breathed upon, as I do this, with the breath of life itself.

And so the love of God whispers among us, like a soft breeze wrapping us in arms of joy. And now comes the music to inspire the muse, to pull us into the great dance of eternity, and as we dance, held in his arms, we follow his lead, step by step, note by note, letter by letter, and word by word.

It was a curious birthday this year, this time of celebrating seventy-three years on Planet Earth, this time of launching my seventy-fourth year. There are days when I feel so much younger than seventy-four, and there are days when I feel so much older, as though my great wisdom has aged like wine or distilled like a fine whisky. And then I trip on something or forget something or . . .

All gloriously humbling.

And so I sit at my desk, my cat Angel in my lap (with her abundant and remarkable tail), and I reflect on my birthday and why it was so curious, meaningful, and strange, as though God was pulling my crooked lines straight, then breathing life into the lines.

On my birthday (Friday) my sister and I visited the columbarium which has been pre-arranged for our mother’s future cremains. Our mother lives in assisted living, at the feisty old age of one hundred-and-one, and will probably live on for some time. The interment space is outdoors in the Kurth Memorial Garden to the side of the sanctuary of the Lafayette-Orinda Presbyterian Church, known locally as “LOPC,” east of San Francisco.

Our father, Carl Thomas, was the founding pastor in 1953-4, having come from Berkeley First Presbyterian as a Student Chaplain. Our mother was the founding pastor’s wife, with her own amazing talents. So LOPC was a natural location, and the church welcomed the idea, even suggesting that my father be remembered there too, even with his ashes scattered at sea forty years ago. He was a popular pastor, loving and inspiring and full of faith in those early years. He preached the love of Christ in the new suburbs east of the Caldecott tunnel, to young families still bruised with war but grateful for survival. He had served in the Pacific in WW II and had survived. He was grateful too, and glad to bring his family (I was seven and my sister five) to these rolling hills and comparative safety.

And so we toured the present-day church in blistering heat, pausing in shady places, and letting memories flood us. Here is where we went to Sunday School. It’s now turned into offices, but a new building houses a preschool and classrooms over there to the right. Here is the Fellowship Hall where our father preached. Here is where his old office used to be. Here is where we had choir practice and Confirmation classes. Do you remember? Do you recall? It’s quiet this heat soaked afternoon but it was bustling then when our young energy was, for a few hours on Sundays, corralled and tamed, for we were in church, within boundaries that required good behavior.

At home we grew up surrounded by walls of books that informed quiet purposeful pursuits.  Our mother was organized, and while not wearing heels and pearls in the kitchen (that I recall), she took pride in her homemaking skills, and we were the beneficiaries of the home she made for us. She took pride in her neat-as-a-pin rooms that graciously opened onto one another, the sofas and the matching draperies, the color schemes carefully considered. Quiet and balance and beauty surrounded us. Our daily schedule was ordered as well, breakfast, school, snack, dinner at 6. Homework and reading and more reading. Piano lessons. Tennis at the public parks. Brownies and Girl Scouts and merit badges sewn on to a wide green band. Sometimes tea in the afternoon, a lesson in manners and pouring and offering and conversation. We listened to music played on long-playing records in the hi-fi cabinet: Mozart, Beethoven, show tunes.

We didn’t have much income, but a great wealth resided in our mother being home, in charge of bringing us up to love the Lord. She became our finishing school, teaching us table settings and table manners. We wrote – in cursive – thank you notes and prayer journals. We had “Quiet Times” to reflect and wonder and write. We said bedtime prayers that placed us safely in the Savior’s palms.

She and my father hosted church dinners, and “LOPC” became famous for their potluck gatherings for newcomers in one another’s homes. We children would peak around corners to see what was going on in the living room, or spy the pies set aside in the laundry room, around the corner from the kitchen. We counted the dishes on the buffet in the dining room, casseroles sitting on hot pads, lids tight, waiting to be eaten, bites between words.

She saw her first calling as wife and mother. My sister and I were blessed to be raised in such love and safety and order.

Many years have passed since those years in the ‘fifties. Many experiences have molded and moved us in ways both good and bad, to bring us to this moment in the heat of a Friday afternoon on a hilltop east of San Francisco, touring the church in which we grew up. And considering our mother’s future ashes, and my future ashes too, ashes to ashes, dust to dust, thoughts on my birthday.

I thought of my father, and how he lost his faith and left the ministry. I thought of my mother, who followed his thinking (or perhaps he followed hers) and abandoned all Christian belief. They embraced the new world of self expression and psychology and proclaimed the new religion, that God is dead; we have been fools.

And I gave thanks that our parents would be remembered here, in this Presbyterian church on a hillside. Before we left, the current pastor’s daughter gave us a heartwarming welcome and tour. She was so very gracious, full of grace.

I had completed a circle in some unfathomable way, stepping through the past, through the shadows and the sunlight, seeing our parents return to their glorious time of faith, where they made a true difference, saving souls for all Eternity.

One day my mother’s cremains will be placed in the stone vault, and one day my own body will be buried in a local Catholic cemetery, Queen of Heaven, awaiting St. Peter at the gates. Both locations are in the same town, Lafayette, where we grew up, one on a hill, one in a valley.

This morning I thought of these things, as I joined in prayer and praise at St. Joseph’s Chapel in Berkeley. I thought how these fellow worshipers were my true family, had been for many years, for we were one body in Christ. We were mask-free, our faces glowing with the love of God. How can one describe such joy? The joy of letting go, all the worries of the week, the pain of the past, the fear of the future. We give it all to Christ on the cross, Christ of the empty tomb, Christ of the ascension to Heaven. We offer our sufferings and we are healed with joy. We know our Redeemer lives and we shall live with him. We are giddy when we leave St. Joseph’s Chapel. We are giddy with grace.