When Jellyfish become liturgical furniture we know we have lost touch with Christian Tradition

I am thinking I probably need to offer a seminar on the liturgical imagery of jellyfish [ Phylum Cnidaria (pronounced ni*da"ri*a)] since we have four of them presiding over our new sanctuary at St. George's Episcopal Church in Germantown,
Tennessee. Here is the Bishop consecrating this jelly fish altar apparently completely unaware of the ensnaring and entrapping imagery he is exalting into the liturgy. The top of the altar is made of blue glass, the pediments are made of aluminum tendrils. What were they thinking?
Apparently, they weren't.

What do you think? Have you ever thought that those gelatinous floating stinging ensnaring predators should be exalted to suitable decorations for sacred space? Well it has happened to our church. How it happened is inexplicable, other than by recognizing that sometimes the real truth behind theology will sometimes burst forth and proclaim its entangling, ensnaring and predatory features.

So we sold our wonderful old cruciform church over on Poplar Avenue, built a new one that looks more like a bus than a church. Two rows of seats are separated by a central aisle. A large windscreen/picture window sits where the cross or some other suitable sacred imagery worthy of contemplation should be behind the altar. Front and center is a large operating jellyfish console where the Priest steers us on our spiritual journey in this ecclesiastical omnibus.

Stage right there is another large jellyfish pretending to be our lectern. It sits there with its large blue mantle sitting on top of its curling tendrils as if waiting to ensnare its speaker in one error after another.


I was part of a committee that worked on the decorations for this church. The Rector asked me to help find liturgical antiques we might consider. Europe just now is flush with amazing relics of ancient churches for sale. Amazing craftsmanship reflecting centuries of christian tradition was available. Just go looking here for example: http://www.kingrichards.com/viewCat.php?item=1


They asked me what kind of liturgical furniture we should include in the sanctuary. I offered many ideas--traditional mostly--I found fantastic antique possibilities for them to consider from our Episcopal tradition. We considered one of those magnificent eagle lecterns for a brief moment, but eschewed the eagle of St. John for the Jellyfish of . . . Jonah? Or was that a whale?

Here is the baptismal font in jellyfish form: an amazing image of an engulfing and ensnaring creature placed right in the middle of our most sacred rites having to do with infants.

The opportunity to have wonderful things which have been surrounded and saturated with prayer and singing was clear and compelling.

What did they do? They hired a local artist--not a bad idea actually--and he went wild and came up with glass and aluminum jellyfish--four of them. Jellyfish have absolutely no tradition of religious symbolism, except as spiritual monsters.

Two which make up the altar seem to be engaged in some kind of mating dance. The lectern seems to want to float away and that baptismal . . . . it is the most scary given the implications of the English poet and painter William Blake's imagery.

At one time when I was writing actively about William Blake, I wrote usefully about one of Blake's great spiritual monsters which he feared most especially: The Polypus.

In his poem, Jerusalem, he writes:

In every Nation of the Earth till the Twelve Sons of Albion Enrooted into every Nation: a mighty Polypus growing From Albion over the whole Earth: such is my awful Vision.

then later

Soon Hand mightily devour'd & absorb'd Albions Twelve Sons. Out from his bosom a mighty Polypus, vegetating in darkness, And Hyle & Coban were his two chosen ones, for Emissaries In War: forth from his bosom they went and return'd. Like Wheels from a great Wheel reflected in the Deep. Hoarse turn'd the Starry Wheels, rending a way in Albions Loins Beyond the Night of Beulah. In a dark & unknown Night, Outstretch'd his Giant beauty on the ground in pain & tears:

Soon Hand mightily devour'd & absorb'd Albions Twelve Sons. Out from his bosom a mighty Polypus, vegetating in darkness, And Hyle & Coban were his two chosen ones, for Emissaries In War: forth from his bosom they went and return'd. Like Wheels from a great Wheel reflected in the Deep. Hoarse turn'd the Starry Wheels, rending a way in Albions Loins Beyond the Night of Beulah. In a dark & unknown Night, Outstretch'd his Giant beauty on the ground in pain & tears:

The image Bake draws upon is the jellyfish and the hydra which he imagined as living in the spiritual loins of women which would snatch the soul from heaven and embed it in a fleshly tomb of the body. Hence the horror of seeing it embodied as a baptismal.


In Blake's period there were fantastic wax sculptures of the human body he would have known which exhibited just this kind of jellyfish/body structure. We must remember that for many many years dissection of the human body in England was forbidden on the theological hypothesis that the body had to be put whole and entire in the grave it the person expected to be resurrected.




In Blake' day this prohibition was broken when the authorities held that convicts probably were going to hell anyway so their bodies could be dissected. Consequently, there rose in London great dissection theaters like the one managed by William Hunter and his brother, a dissection theater which we suspect William Blake might well have frequented in his effort to familiarize himself with human anatomy to prepare himself as a medical book illustrator.

But for the ordinary citizen of London, it was exhibits of wax preparations such as these and those which Hunter was famous for creating which revealed the interior workings of the human body. These images may not seem shocking to us in the 21st century. But in Blake's day they were shocking.

In response to images like this, and perhaps his encounter with uterine cancer which was called the polypus in his day, Blake created a spiritual monster to represent the obscuring, entangling, entrapping materialism which was/is concealing the eternal world in which he believed we live daily.

So you can imagine my amazement and concern when I discover that our new and otherwise beautiful church celebrates this monstrous imagery in its most sacred liturgical furniture. Perhaps it is the universe speaking to us, giving us a serendipitous sermon about the reality behind the words.

Surely, we need to think about our embrace of this image before we invite it into the sacred spaces of our liturgical life. How on earth I can join the celebration of the Mass with these monsters surrounding me is beyond me. As a result of this invasion, my church has become an alien space infested by creepy entangling predatory sculpture.


So because I am so unsettled by these creepy crawly polypi swarming about our new church, I am unchurched these days, I guess. Maybe I'll go be a Buddhist. To my knowledge they have yet to invite jellyfish into the design of their liturgical furniture and temple architecture. I may be wrong, but I don't think so.

Photos self Induced

Well then I am supposed to post pictures of me on this blogaroo thingy, but I only have old pictures taken years ago. Life goes on and on and on apparently if you are as ancient as I am.

Anyway who wants an old picture?

This one is late 90's.




Then there is this one which is early 80's in a photo taken by Dr. Sam Tickle, my dearest friend and publishing maven, entrepreneur and fabulous physician.



So I got out my trusty Exilm Casio Digital camera and blasted away . . . well if holding a camera arms length is blasting away I guess that's as good an adverb as any. So here I am as of July 2008 sitting in my library in my big Morris chair where I pearch my Levenger lap desk and lap top and generally plunge into things digital and intrernetish.




Erm, I guess I should set the date in my camera huh. This is not December 31, 2006, but nice to imagine I was time travelling and just got back. There is a jaw here some where, let's see now, where . . . could it be?


Gees, lots of Jaw there but no smile, it musta got lost along the jaw line. This guy seems awfully glum. Maybe he was thinking about Harold Ford, Jr. or Monsters in the Church, I dunno.





Well now there's the smile back but no neck. Surely a lionesque mane like that is held up by some significant substructure. Let's see here now . . .


Oh, dear. a smile and that double chin emerging out of the ears is not quite the thing I had hoped for either. Well back to 2006 for a neck piece.



Well that's better somewhat, but what is that glare and what are those pontoons on either side? Grrr. Well perhaps that's what I should expect.

Oh well, you get the idea of self inflicted photography. Now if I could just get these two doggies who are sitting on my chest to take a picture, that would be good. Sadly they have not got thumbs, a thing so needful for holding a camera and other important bodily functions.

Isn't invisibility grand? Not too difficult, I suppose since most of humanity existed before photography. These two house demons go by the names of Christina Georgina Rossetti and Dante Gabriel Rossetti. Well, we could only find these two brothers and sisters of literary note, and thought the names quite suited these tiny (3 pounds and 4 pounds respectively) beasties.

click

Salsas, Sambals, Chutneys & Chowchows

So, I am going to crank up my big green egg this afternoon and cook up some bovine flesh. I used to be a vegetarian long ago in the seventies when most of my students were mere eggs waiting for daddy's wink and curling finger. So I still cringe when I go to Kroger's and stare at the bloody hunks so neatly laid out and packaged in glistening plastic.



But I long ago sold my metabolism to the Country Store in exchange for barbecue. So I will go out and find a cringeworthy slice of some unoffending steer, lay in the charcoal chunks and get out the electric fire starter, and burn my way to din din.

But first I intend to make my favorite accompaniment which is sweet and spicy peach relish a recipe drawn from my favoriteist cookbook by Chris Schlesinger and John Willoughby, Salsas, Sambals, Chutneys & Chowchows: Intensely Flavored Little dishes from around the world. This is a fun book to read just for the idea that we might make some of these bizarre garnishes.

'

When peaches come in season like NOW, and when some fool from the FDA is not claiming that this or that vegetable is poisoning us, this is the recipe I get out and wrap my thick fingers around.

First, I have to peal four large semi-ripe peaches, pit them and slice into nice thin chunks.

Then a red and a green bell pepper, each cut into thin strips.

I get out my mandolin and slice a red onion into ribbons--do you have any idea how hard it is to find a red onion small enough to fit on a mandolin? Somehow Kroger has only giant red onions on offer these days.

Half a cup of orange juice, freshly squozen (if that's not a word, it sure should be), if you can afford the usurious prices Mr. Kroger is charging for these rare fruits.

Quarter of a cup of virgin olive oil--though I think it a shame not to find some well experienced and worldly olives to reduce to oil--

the juice of four limes.

[What has happened to limes? There must have been a bad freeze in Florida or Mexico or Chile or Poona. Surely a Typhoon in China or a tidal wave in Mozambique has wrecked the possibilities of having nice limes. I was in Mr. Kroger's the other day and they had on offer the smallest, palest green orbs, unlike Fresh Market which had the most amazing plump darkest green ones on offer, if you can afford to mortgage the house to own a few.]

a tablespoon of blackstrap molasses,

one well chopped jalapeno pepper,

half a cup of snipped cilantro--or parsley, if you are like my wife and can't stand the magnificent flavor of this herb, and

two cloves of minced garlic.

This is so wonderful, it is not to be missed in peach season. You can of course season this with pepper and salt if you must.

I do recommend this little book, if it is still in print. American Publishers like Willam Marrow and Co who published this in 1990 are not used to keeping things in print very long. But Amazon might have it used. [It is just as I feared. The book is no longer in print, but 27are available used from $5.17 + postage and handling or $14.95.]

Don't deprive yourself of this amazing summer garnish for that poor steer's offering.

Randy Pausch Exits Stage Left

If you have not watched Randy Pausch's last lecture on You-Tube, I encourage you to watch it as soon as possible. It is simply amazing.Here it is: Grab hold. Take a listen.



I was not going to buy his book--as I am in the book disposal mode not in the book acquisition mode as I prepare for retirement--but I finally did break down and buy a copy. At least, I can gift it to someone after I read it. It is amazing, and even better in many ways than the lecture. It is the saddest book I have ever read. Much of what he probably could not have handled in a public forum because he would be come too emotional is here included. Stories about his last Christmas and New Year. His courtship of his wife. The birth of his children. These are all narrated with such love and poignancy that it is particularly heart wringing.



It is not something I find I can read in a single session. I have to read a chapter here and then a chapter there, not necessarily in the order written, but in the order they speak to me.


So what is it that makes Professor Pausch's lecture so amazing?

First it is the complete absence of self pity. Here is a man who has been told he has--at 47 years of age no less--only about six months to live because he has nearly always fatal pancreatic cancer. He is 47, has a beautiful wife, three young children, a promising career and everything on earth to live for. And he knows he is dying, a process which has now regrettably taken its course.

Second, it is the total dedication to having fun, "Edutainment" he called it. His approach to teaching programming as something else like story telling is one of those lightening bolts that is utterly transforming. It gives me hope that there is a possibility that the dark age predicted by Maggie Jackson and Bill McKibben in their prophetic new book Distracted: The Erosion of Attention and the Coming Dark Age is not a necessity. The legacy he leaves is so hopeful so filled with good will and great fun, that one can only hope the Huns of this world will leave it alone and allow it to flourish.


Let us all struggle to be a bit more like Professor Pausch and take his lessons to heart.

Senator McCain is leading a dishonest campaign

Here is an important video which proves how dishonest John McCain has been in this campaign. No wonder. For a group who has spent the last 8 years looting America they have nothing to say except to try and distract us from paying attention.

check this out

Bread and Puppet Dreams I

Every now and again in this life we come across people and events we wish we had known about when we were younger. Such is the case with The Bread and Puppet Theater. What a delight! I have followed their work, read their books, collected their publications--which are wonderful things.

Peter Schumann was a German immigrant who founded the Bread and Puppet Theater in the early 1960's in New York City.


Schumann was trained as a sculptor which gave him the skills to create amazing street theater during the wild days of the sixties.



Sometimes in the early 1970's Schumann moved his company to Glover, Vermont, where he gathers crowds of volunteers to stage pageants during the summers.

I confess to never have actually seen a bread and puppet theater performance. Sigh.



Even so I have not been idle. I have built my own puppets in homage to Peter Schumann as part of a celebration of St. George and The Dragon since my church was St. George's Episcopal here in Memphis. Compared to The Bread and Puppet creations mine are primitive and poor echoes of what could be.

Bread and Puppet Dreams II

So although I have never been to Vermont or seen the Bread and Puppet Theater troupe on its tours, I have undertaken to build my own puppets in shameless imitation. I put together a small library of how to books--Schumann needs to write one, I am mystified about how he builds his amazing creations--and with the cooperation with my Rector at St. George's Episcopal Church put together a process and built some puppets myself.

The first one I built was one of the local Episcopal Saint, Sister Constance.

In 1878 Memphis was a busy city of some 46,000 people. In the heat of the summer a plague of Yellow Fever begand it stgeady movement up the Mississippi River. At the time they did not know this plage was caused by an infected mosquito moving from the swamps of New Orleans steadily north emptying cities and villages along the way.

By mid August the plague was at the door of the city.With remarkable speed 25,000 wealthy and middle class residents ecacuated the city moving north and away from the river as fast as they could manage. The remaining, 21,000 people were too poor or too ill to leave. Sadly most of the Protestant ministers fled too leaving the Episcopalian and Catholic priests, and the sisters of the three Memphis religious communities elected remain behind dedicating themselves to helping the sick and dying at the risk of their own health.




As the plague raged over 90 percent of the citizens were sick and quickly filling the cemetaries. The three communities of sisters, the Episcopalian Society of St. Mary, and the Catholic communities the Sisters of Charity of Bethlehem Academy and the Nashville Dominicans not only rolled up their own sleves but also sent for reinforcements from their sister communities in other cities. Remarkably, reinforcements came to the River of Death.Constance, the sister superior of the Society of St. Mary, was the first to perish. When the first frosts came, 38 sisters and priests lay dead. Only 800 inhabitants remained of the 46,000 who had been there in May.

Building this puppet was a real experiment as I had never built anything like this. Constance I were totally alone in our effort. But I am pleased with how she turned out. I selected the radiant blue cloth and gold skin to suggest the spiritual brightness of her sacrifice.Constance was a delight to build and we had a lot of fun honoring Constance on her Feast day.

Putting her together was a real challenge. Here is what she looked like in process.



What I learned about the process with Constance, I applied to a puppet of St. George. He was a wild experiment as I tried lots of things to reduce the weight of the head. It was not really successful, but still was fun.