September 12, 2010

Vivid dream before waking. We were at “The World’s Fair” in Jacksonville, Florida. The Fair consisted of a series of ascending passages that were each a sort of ride, a cascading waterfall, or a staircase that kept you from going where you wanted to go, or a spooky dark passage that twisted you around. We kept getting lost or losing one of our company, and some of the “rides” were actually perilous. I received a phone call from Denny, who said he was just hours from my home on a visit, so I was suddenly desperate to get out of the maze and hurry home. It was, predictably, very hard to find an exit, but we did, and drove up a road on the side of the mountain, looking back on the “fair,” which was gaudy, but, beside the mountain and under the roof of stars, ridiculous. This dream is related to the recurring dream I had years ago about getting lost in the mazes of the Goodyear Factories– which are all pretty much parking lot and open air now– and easy to interpret. I’m in the labyrinth. Last night suggested there are plenty of ways out short of through, and getting through may be an honor only in the context of the fun house itself.

A passage stood out from the familiar haze of church this morning. The bishop of Durgapore, our visiting preacher (who otherwise was almost unintelligible to me), said at one point, “Christ has come to give good news to the poor.” I’ve long thought that Christianity was kidnaped near its birth by those who wanted it to be a religion of sin and sadness and remorse, of hierarchy and authority, when it was meant to be none of those things. It lied and said Christ’s gift was the Cross, when in fact it was the Stone rolled away from the tomb at morning. Not the thorn, but the rose. The Cross was a historical, legal accident, which distracted them from the true message of justice and humanity. It was a door that could be closed, a lock that could be locked, a gift that could be withheld, and so it was. Likewise, I began to think this morning that the rich robbed Christ from the poor, to whom he came, that Christianity was always meant to be poor, outside, unestablished, an alternative the power-base. When it became all those things it shouldn’t be, rich, inside, established, the seat or near the seat of power, we got a whole lot of great art, but spiritual catastrophe. Far from arbitrating matters of state and morals, the church should have no opinion at all, but merely serve.

Crickety night, extraordinarily dark for some reason. My sister and I talk on the phone, largely about what we will do when we’re too feeble to take care of ourselves. She promises to help me over the bridge rail if I’m too far gone to make it myself.