Christine Sunderland

Chapter 16, Father Nate Casparian, age 77, caretaker of Comerford House and Chapel, brother to Nicholas Casparian, dying of ALS, former Cal professor, 2014:

A sudden silence fell over them like a pall as they stepped slowly and carefully down the gravel path through the gardens, hearing only the sounds of their footfall and the caws of unseen birds high in the pines. Pausing, they looked out to the pale sky spread over Comerford House. When Anna spoke, Father Nate could barely hear her. “I was making breakfast when I heard,” she said. “Where were you on Nine-Eleven, Father?”

The question jabbed the priest’s memory, but he didn’t mind. Memory, he knew, could be healed by love. Anna wouldn’t probe too deep. He trusted her to heal and not hurt. He could see, when she glanced at him, that she simply desired to remember the day, to mourn for America then and now. He tried not to waver, but his face must have betrayed him, for she added, “You don’t have to tell me.”

“It’s okay, Anna. Stories are good. Especially true stories that explain the present, like all true history, all good history, handed down to the next generation. But let’s sit so I can rest my legs again.” He motioned to her to join him on a bench in the garden. Taking a deep breath, he said a quick prayer, forcing himself to give voice to that time of sudden, shocking loss. “I was a parish priest and friar. Nicholas was teaching at Cal. I lived near the church, St. Joseph’s. I remember hearing the news when I turned on the TV early in the morning.”

“Me too.”

“It was before the fire.” He touched his crimson cheek. “And before the ALS.”

“Two more tragedies.”

“But the worst tragedy was . . . Louise.”

“Louise?”

“Louise Casparian, Nicholas’ wife.” Anna grew silent, and Father Nate could see an array of emotions pass over her face. She waited for him to speak. “She died that morning,” he said, focusing on a pale pink rose in the garden. “She was visiting a cousin at her office in New York at the Trade Center. They never had a chance.”

“Oh, no.” He turned to Anna and met her soft dark eyes, caring eyes, eyes that understood loss. Encouraged, the words tumbled out, and he found himself gesturing with open palms, standing, pacing, and sitting again. “We didn’t realize, at first, where she was at the time, but when we didn’t hear from her . . . well, we learned soon enough. Nicholas was devastated, as were the children. They were adults, of course, a son and a daughter with families of their own. But it was so violent, so unexpected.”

“How did he manage such a loss?”

“He plunged into his work. But his academic colleagues claimed that America asked for it, citing our imperialism, capitalism, and wealth, and saying that the terrorists were the real victims. Nicholas was furious. It became his mission to correct their lies.”

“What did he do?”

“He fought them with words and ideas. He set up courses to teach the next generation the truth: America’s history, her institutions, what defines her, his six grand pillars.”

“Six grand pillars?”

Father Nate ticked them off on his fingers. “There were the three L’s: Limited government, individual liberty, rule of law . . . let’s see, the other three were free markets, personal responsibility, and traditional values.” 

Anna repeated them as if committing them to memory.

Father Nate continued, venting the concern he shared with his brother and welcoming the healing tonic of Anna’s friendship as though she could carry his burden by gathering it up, at least for a time.

“Nicholas claimed that our country had grown weak and vulnerable to another attack. Clinton eviscerated the CIA, he said, so intelligence was ineffective. He used the word eviscerated, I remember. I had to look it up.”

“And President Bush?”

“Nicholas admired Bush, said he would go down in history as one of our great presidents. He thought the liberal media had reached a barbaric low when they made fun of him. He often said that the guarantors of freedom and free speech were their close cousins, respect and responsibility.”

“I remember how the papers and TV made fun of President Bush, even little things, personal things. I don’t like sneering and bullying. It isn’t right. It isn’t civil.”

Father Nate nodded. “It crosses the border between the civil and the uncivil. But the media bias soon was out in the open. When President Bush’s term was up in 2008, the media orchestrated the next election. The new president, their man, eviscerated, my word this time, the military across the board, leading to our current crisis.”

“And this encouraged the rise of Islamic terrorism?”

“Yes, to put it simply.”

“Americans don’t like war.” Anna looked doubtful, and Father Nate knew she voiced the feelings of many, that if you don’t like something then it must be wrong. Even national defense was now guided by feelings.

Father Nate breathed deeply and spoke firmly, as though explaining to the daughter he never had, telling the truth, emboldened by love.

“Nobody likes war. But balance of power keeps the world safe, prevents war and protects peace. War is inevitable when you have tyrants in the world, regardless of their reason. Russia is another rising tyranny. So the balance of power has now been tipped in tyranny’s favor.”

They headed downhill, following the path.

“What happened to Nicholas’ son and daughter? And their families?” Anna asked as they neared the chapel.

“They’re fine, in Arizona and Maine. Each invited their father to come live with them, but he didn’t want to be a burden. So he sold the house in the Berkeley Hills and moved in with me.”

“He wanted to keep teaching.” 

Father Nate nodded. “He lived and breathed academia and the free exchange of ideas. Working was the therapy he needed. And now he was on a mission, to correct the media’s lies, the lies taught on campus, politically correct lies.”

“Was it really that bad?”

They crossed the lawn to the French doors. He wanted Anna to understand what it means to be a refugee, to emigrate to America. “Anna, our grandparents fled the Armenian genocide of 1915 in Turkey, where their own parents—our great-grandparents—were murdered. They worked hard when they came to this country. They farmed near Fresno, living in a refugee community. Nicholas and I grew up during World War Two. We were raised to deeply value liberty—the freedom to think, speak, and worship as we choose. We loved America. We loved the culture of the Western world. We didn’t have much, but we had America. We were Americans.”

“I understand, Father.” She opened the door. “I’m so glad to hear your story. Thank you.”

“Not an unusual one, even if ignored or forgotten. Thanks for listening to an old friar, Anna.”

“But what happened to Nicholas’ Western Civ program?”

“It struggles. Many faculty still think the West is the cause of the world’s problems, not the solution.” Father Nate shook his head. “I can’t figure them out. Do they want to be like Russia? Or China? Or Iran? Do they want women to be enslaved, children raped? Do they want Jews, gays, and Christians slaughtered, beheaded, crucified? Blasphemers whipped and adulterers stoned? What are they thinking? I’ll never understand the America-haters, and there are lots of them with powerful tenure in respected universities today. They’re teaching our children and grandchildren to hate their own country.”

They stood in front of the table, and Anna tasted her tea. “Cold.”

Father Nate picked up a towel and reached for a cup. “This Fire Trail killer is a victim of our not enforcing the law. We’ve grown lax because many don’t believe in the source of our laws. Nicholas sometimes quotes Jefferson: ‘Can the liberties of a nation be secure when we have removed a conviction that these liberties are the gift of God?’ The words are etched into the Jefferson memorial in Washington, D.C.”  

Anna glanced up at him. “He means that if we don’t believe in the source of the gift we might not believe in the gift itself?”

“Exactly.” 

“Religion is important, I’ve come to see, even if I’m not very good at believing. Now go and fetch Nicholas. I’ll meet you in the chapel. We have lots of prayers to say tonight.”

Christine Sunderland, The Fire Trail (eLectio Publishing, 2016, 128-133)

Chapter 15, Anna, age 57, Zachary’s mother and docent/librarian of Comerford House Museum, 2014:

“As Zachary ran the Fire Trail on Nine-Eleven, Anna busied herself in the Comerford kitchen, making tea. A grandfather clock tolled four. The notes, Anna thought, sounded mournful, appropriately so, on this day of such remembrance, such national tragedy. The day had cast a spell of sadness over her. She had skipped CircleFit and instead worked steadily in the library upstairs. No one showed for the two o’clock tour, now that school was in session, and she turned on the small TV in the pantry, muting the sound, simply wanting reassurance that her country had not been attacked again.

Having set the table with a bowl of sliced apples and a plate of oatmeal cookies (steel cut oats, whole wheat), she added a vase of red roses from the garden. She waited for the water to boil, glancing from time to time at the TV screen, reading the running news panel along the bottom: Trade center rises from ashes, opens 13 years after terror attacks; Berkeley Free Speech Movement rally planned; Militants behead British hostage in video; Suicide risk on the rise for elderly; Fire Trail suspect still at large …

Comerford House was quiet, as though a pall had fallen over the grounds. Anna vividly recalled September 11, 2001. She had been thirteen years younger then, only forty-four, and Luke had not yet left them for that young Rosalind, and they were a family. California time was three hours earlier than New York time, so Anna first learned about the attack shortly before six in the morning and Zachary was still sleeping. She had risen early to see Luke off for his shift at Foodmart and was making breakfast, the portable TV blinking and flashing its morning news.

The first TV bulletin had been nearly unbelievable. The voices of the reporters moved from pragmatic concern to astonishment to horror at what they were seeing, and then saying, as they described the planes diving into the towers. Today, thirteen years later, Anna could see it so clearly: the black smoke of the first plane and the fiery explosion of the second. It was, she recalled, when the second plane hit, that she, along with a stunned nation watching, concluded this was not an accident. The United States was under attack. But who would do such a thing? Later, she learned, four passenger airliners had been hijacked by nineteen terrorists who had turned the planes into suicide bombs.

That morning Anna had stared at the screen, dumbfounded, as American Flight 11 and United Flight 175 dove into the North and South Towers of the World Trade Center. She witnessed men and women jumping from upper windows to their deaths. She saw the towers implode and fall to the earth, and she could even now feel the terror of it, as though she were there. She could taste the dust billowing through the cavernous streets, the heart of America’s financial markets, as terrified workers ran from flying debris. The third plane, American Flight 77, crashed into the Pentagon and the Department of Defense in Washington D.C. The last plane, United Flight 93, diverted by passengers rushing the hijackers, exploded in a Pennsylvania field. Over three thousand died, including hundreds of firefighters and police, the deadliest attack on American soil in the history of the United States.

The kettle whistled. Anna turned off the burner, the flame died, and she poured boiling water over tea leaves in the pewter teapot. Leaving the tea to steep, she moved from the kitchen into the foyer and crossed to the music room. From there she could see the San Francisco skyline, its misty shape still visible, still intact. Comerford’s porch flag flew at half-mast, and she watched the heavy canvas ripple in the growing damp, its stars and stripes waving as though holding the past and the future in its weave.

Anna heard the French doors open and close in the kitchen. Father Nate had arrived for tea…”

Christine Sunderland, The Fire Trail (eLectio Publishing, 2016, 115-116)

Chapter 14, Zachary, age 26, grad student, UC Berkeley, 2014:

“On Thursday, September 11, close to four p.m., Zachary parked his car at the trailhead where the East Bay hills bordered Berkeley. It was the anniversary of a horrific day of national tragedy, and he needed to see the silvery bay, the San Francisco skyline, and the Golden Gate. He wanted to think. His mind and heart were a jumble. He needed to sort things out.

He began with a few stretches but could feel the chill of the fog moving up from the water, so turned up the uneven path toward the Fire Trail at a slow jog, watching his step and soon hitting his regular rhythm.

Zachary ran, pounding softly the packed earth, parting California bay laurel, passing under gnarly oaks, their aged branches turning and twisting into the air. He ran through stands of cypress pines, their trunks straight and strong, punctuating broad meadows of green grass. He ran through patches of lingering fog and splashes of sudden sun… He loped along the narrowing trail through low grass in a wet and foggy hollow. He plowed through more bay and laurel and on through live oaks to another crest. Soon he would emerge onto a vista point. Hopefully, he could see the San Francisco Bay, if it was not yet engulfed by fog.

He could stare at the city and figure out his life, what to do next, as he had done many times over the years. The long bench was welcome, and he sprawled on it, pulling out his water bottle. The San Francisco skyline and the Golden Gate glistened in the encroaching mist. Berkeley dipped low and shadowy toward the shoreline.

Thirteen years ago today, 2001, the year of the New York City attacks, he was only thirteen. Zachary could not imagine what it was like to have been in New York on that Tuesday morning, September 11th…. With the Trade Center attack, the recent wars, and now the beheadings, trust and truth and commitment were more important than ever. Life became serious when it was threatened.

Nine-eleven. Zachary stood and stared at the skyline, imagining the planes attacking San Francisco as they had attacked New York. He had seen the images on television year after year, and each time was astonished that others would hate America like that, hate their freedom. Such hate and such tyranny were so opposed to the innate human desire for love and transcendence. Those terrorists chose the bestial way, the way of the jungle, the way of illiteracy and babble, the way of chaos and death.

And yet America had its own communities of chaos and death. There were moments, Zachary admitted, that he desired greater control over criminals, greater safety on their streets. Was that a desire for tyranny? He hoped not… He could see the boundary between liberty and law was not always easily seen.

Zachary suddenly felt a great love for this skyline, this bay, this American city with its bridges. The nation had been at peace for many years before 2001, so that events like Nine-Eleven were shocking. They burned the mind and memory, seared images onto the soul. In this way, Zachary judged, the attack pulled Americans out of their lethargy and into paying attention, to watching, to being alert. Just so, the recent beheadings of American journalists James Foley on August 19 and Steven Sotloff on September 2 by the Islamic State woke up Americans. Even home-grown horrors like the Boston Marathon bombings of 2013 and the Fort Hood massacre of 2009 nudged the nation to evaluate who and what America was and is, and how best to re-form this perfect union of cultures, races, and beliefs.

But America, Zachary believed, still held close to her heart the values of freedom, even in the face of the hate flying into New York City on that clear, September morning. America still valued free speech, democracy, and peaceful assembly. America still had the will and the resources to protect the world from tyranny. The nation wasn’t perfect, the balance precarious, but that was the price of freedom…”

Christine Sunderland, The Fire Trail (eLectio Publishing, 2016, 107-111)

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.