Mr. Brown Chills in Washington

The images of this city never cease to amaze me, and what they do to me are even more profound than me. A city whose surface function is to be the legislative and distractive mechanics of this beautiful society that we live in boosts an amazing array of cultural beauty. I love just sitting on the bus being a fly on the wall able to witness the exchanges between my fellow bus riders. It’s good to know that even in a city like Washington; living in the financial strenuous times like we are now people still have faith in God. It really makes my heart soar. It also gives me the strength to go on. As some of you may know Washington is a city that I used to reside in; but and alloy of timing and maturity made it impossible for me to live here. I am not sure if I could ever call a place like this home for a myriad of reasons. But I have a handful of loved ones here that I wouldn't trade for the world, and they make this sometimes cols city as warm a hand-woven quilt on an autumn day.

But I am addressing you, on this place because of the images, I haven’t even been here an entire 24 hours and already I have been touched by what I have seen. The first of these is a advert on the metro for the Humanist; it’s a magazine that publishes on a bi-monthly basis. I used to read it in the library all the time when I was living in Philadelphia. Most of the articles take a very secular human stance on most issues, they report on; mind you they report on a humanist not merely human stance. Thus they yield to the higher angels of human existence rather than the lower demons of human nature. But it’s hard to gather that if you just take the advert on the image and words alone. I have made no secret of my allegiance to the almighty on here, but I have also made no secret of my plurality, regardless of the close-mindedness of some of my brothers and sisters out there who’ve already condemned ‘non-believers’ to hell. But to be honest to deny yourself or your being of being open to some omniscient being is counter intuitive to human existence, but further from what I have read of the humanist it’s readers are usually open to love of nature and communal brotherhood of some kind. Which at the end of the day what most, if not all sacred texts are getting at, at least on a human to human level.

Juxtaposed on the other end is what may send others screaming to something other than a ‘God’ this is an image I saw not two hours after the above in a family member’s neighborhood. Images like these frighten me for a number of reasons. The most ranking is that it scares people into a relationship with a being that doesn’t relate to his children that way anymore. If I were a 1st century Jew I suppose this would scare the crap out of me (even if they don’t believe in the traditional ‘Satan’ that we do). It’s also very immature on the part of the clergy; it’s as if they are teasing the ‘unsaved’ by waving an effigies of  the living Christ in their face. In the NT St. Peter tells the readers of his epistle to live such good lives that even if they accuse you of doing wrong they see the good you do. Actions brothers and sisters speaks volumes more than words ever could. But our words can cut as deep as the sharpest blade; turning one’s heart cold as ice. The vibrations of our songs can pierce the sensitive ear drums of those who need it most. Regardless of intention we can water from the mouth of Hagar’s crying child. So it is my suggestion that we (you/they) stop spooking the Almighty’s starving children, with their blurred view of  the gospel.