The Unclad Soul

I have been fascinated with medicine since I was a boy. Somewhere along the path of middle school, I thought I might be a doctor. As a kid, I got a toy doctor’s kit one Christmas and everyone in the family was targets of my doctoring. Though, as I remember it, I think my brother Terry was the only one who actually tolerated being one of my patients. Later, in high school, I figured I wasn’t smart enough to be a doctor after all. I wasn’t any good at math or science. But as long as I can remember I wanted to help people. My grandparents were a big part of our family life. And they were a huge influence on how I saw the world. Loving, gentle, caring, I learned from them a deep compassion for others. And as they got older, I felt such tenderness for them and the increasing limits of their bodies and minds. I eventually decided to go into the ministry. And there is certainly an aspect of healing in that if one takes it seriously and is dedicated to it. I enjoyed the compassionate...

My Huckleberry Friends I have returned from a trip to the country where I spent glorious days with my son Luke, my daughter-in-law Tawna, my granddaughter T’Lee, and the dogs—Maggie, Trapper, Finder, and Poncho. We fished, we ate, we talked and laughed, we rode around the stunning ranch, we breathed clean fresh air. We even played golf one day at a little 9-hole course down the road. Well, Tawna and I did. Luke managed the snacks and drinks on the golf cart. As I drove out of the ranch to return to Dallas, I passed on the road an Amish couple in a horse drawn buggy. They gave me a friendly wave and I waved back. There is a solid Amish community in the area. They live mostly quiet lives. They follow strict standards of Christian morality and family life. They are a peaceful people. Hard working and immensely gifted craftsman and builders. The women are talented quilt makers and seamstresses as well as devoted mothers. Some have their own businesses. Some are teachers within the Am...

Oh, America Oh, America. You lay wounded in the blood of your democracy. Beaten by the hands of your own government. Choked by the lawlessness of those sworn to protect your dignity and your existence. Sirens wail in the streets. The emergency is real. The time is critical. But no one comes to carry you to healing. Nothing is done to repair your injuries.  Your citizens. Your people. They cry out. They weep. They protest. They walk in the hot sun holding handmade signs for your support. But their protectors, the men and women with badges, they wield clubs, they unload tear gas and shoot rubber bullets. They push citizens back. They shove them to the ground. They walk over them, left unattended as rubbish in the streets. Justice is trampled with them.  Judges, Administration officials, Congressmen, even the President, talk endlessly about the crisis. They pretend to care. They hold up the Bible. They say we are all in their prayers. They stand beside the Fl...

The 2019 movie, Portrait of a Lady on Fire, is a stunning representation of deprived destiny and lost love. Centered around a wondrous coastal landscape in Brittiany in the late 1700s, the story centers on two young French women—Marianne, an artist and painter, and Heloise, recently cloistered in a convent and brought home to enter an arranged marriage. Her sister, who was supposed to marry the man, had killed herself by jumping off a cliff into the sea. Heloise is to take her place. Heloise, however, has no interest in the marriage and is angry that her mother has placed her in the arrangement. As was the custom then, a portrait was to be made of the bride-to-be and sent to the groom to approve of his future wife. But Heloise refused to sit for a portrait and had already chased off a painter frustrated by the experience. Enter Marianne. Brought in as simply a companion for Heloise until the marriage was finalized, her real purpose was to get to know Heloise and from snip...

What is Real? The HBO series, “Westworld,” is a tough to watch show about a futuristic park; sort of a perverted Disneyland for rich adults. It offers people a chance to live out their worst fantasies with “hosts,” who are human-like and life-like robots. As you can imagine things go horribly wrong. You can’t create an environment of no consequences no matter what awful things you do, without disastrous results. Even if you do them with and to robots. We were created with a conscience, the ability to self-limit our actions, if we know they will harm or destroy others. This is an essential part of our humanity. In Westworld, those innate boundaries are eliminated. In one insightful scene, Bernard Lowe (Jeffrey Wright) the programming director of Westworld, is talking privately with one of the beautiful hosts, Delores Abernathy (Evan Rachel Wood).  Delores is becoming confused. She questions her purpose. She’s having disturbing dreams she doesn’t understand. In the scen...

In my innocence I grew up believing in the goodness of people and all things. My parents and grandparents modeled this in front of me. I saw in them patience. Joy. Human warmth. Integrity. I felt their love and affection. I observed and absorbed their goodness.  I grew up extremely sheltered because of this. My world was small, provincial, full of church life.  I had great school friends. As a teen my buddies were not necessarily honor roll, but they were smart, athletic, and fun to be around. My girlfriends were cute, clever, flirtatious and, yes, honor roll.    Aren’t most girls? In college I wanted to be a broadcast journalist. I loved my speech and radio and TV production classes. But then, after an emotional church service I attended, I believed, as it was described then, that I was being “called into the ministry.” It wasn’t until I had my first rural church as a single, young, naive minister, barely out of college, that I began to understand t...

If there was a Jordan River nearby today, where Naaman’s leprosy was washed away. If we were blind Bartimaeus begging for help, when Jesus passed by and healed him himself. If all the mysteries and ministries of the present and past, could undo the virus and bring us wellness at last. Then the world would sigh a breath of relief, and people everywhere could manage the weight of their grief. But the miracles now are in the hands of the few, physicians and experts still looking for clues. These are the champions day in and day out, who stay in the fight and work through the doubts. It’s not a time for grandstanding and political games, or egos of glory and small minds with no shame. The virus is real and the numbers are people, and the fears are giants and the consequences lethal. We cannot despair and we cannot give in, we must trust the science for the virus to end. And while we are waiting in a time so distressing, we have to remain calm while the professio...