SUNDAY
THESIS 8
There is no general rule that characterizes the relationship between the chapel man and his religion. For some, a given religious tradition provides one additional set of elements in a mosaic of ideas and practices. Others sell out and come to act and think the entirety of their lives through the terms of their adopted tradition. Some cultivate rage, and others gratitude. Some become monks, and some scholars. Some become apostles and share the good news. Some explore other religions. In pursuit of truth or justice, many become good. A select few are extraordinary. Some travel the world through texts. Some backslide. Some wander away. Some commit themselves to repaying the debt incurred through their crime. Some skirt on the surface of practice and hang out with their homies. Some make friends. Some band together and build institutions. Some take advantage, some make peace, some don’t give a shit about much. Most all, in their own way, struggle. Inevitably, through genius and frailty, imitation and innovation, as finished men and as works in progress, each man will make his religious practices uniquely his own. The permutations are endless, and each is worth taking seriously as religion.
THESIS 9
From a sociological perspective, however, chapel religion does one thing principally: it helps to transform convicts into prisoners—by which we mean those with the embodied know-how to survive prison. Often, by hailing men into the monkish disciplines befitting such a cellular edifice, religion at Graterford makes incarcerated men feel free even as it crafts the cosmos in the prison’s regimented image. If prone to hyperbole, one could well speak of the Warden-God—or, at Graterford, the Superintendent-God. The Superintendent-God’s law is extreme but eccentric. Those subject to this law are frequently intolerant of trivial behaviors and permissive of other ones that under a less capricious deity would surely be prohibited. Or, just as likely, the law’s letter has only a tenuous relationship to daily practice. While the proof, it is frequently said, is in the pudding, in this fishbowl, where every foible and trespass is visible, no one is unfallen. “Deviance is normal here,” Baraka said. “If you didn’t have deviance, you wouldn’t have daily repentance.” And so it works.
This disciplining works through groups, and it works for groups. As frequently cited, then, there are, indeed, social advantages to be garnered from these practices, with fellowship, protection, solidarity, and company as only some of the relevant yields. Upon reading these theses, however, and concluding that I’d overemphasized the ways that religion authorizes religious groups, Vic will accuse me of “having drunk too much of the Kool-Aid some in the chapel were serving.” Never forget, he will remind me, that what I’ve observed in the chapel is only what the authorities have allowed to exist. “If a particular religion becomes too much of a problem, it will be stifled and its adherents scattered into the four winds of the U.S. correctional system.”1
As a reflection of institutional priorities, then, and of the social reality of the prisoners who, with their bodies and minds, bring them to life, Graterford’s religious practices are principally geared to help a man survive only in the conditions he currently finds himself.
But given a sufficiently materialist perspective, the charge that chapel religion is reactionary in character might convincingly be levied not only against all religion but, indeed, against all but the most inscrutable and daring social practices.
THESIS 10
Religion at Graterford is decidedly of its time. In this era of carceral control, as educational and therapeutic opportunities have withered, increasingly, if a prisoner is looking to work on himself spiritually or intellectually, he will venture down to the chapel to do so. Timely as well is the kind of religion we find here. Figuratively and literally, the crusaders for social justice on the religious left have all but lost their teeth. As rehabilitation has given way to corrections, and now to warehousing, the aspiration to systemic change has largely been abandoned. As sentences have grown in number and duration and prisoner populations have been atomized by administrative brutality and cunning, ever more inventive and stringent forms of personal purity have flourished. Changing oneself, it is said, is the way to change the world.
This formula is not delusional. These religious goals are real, and in their pursuit, the selves these men become and the gods to whom they relate are as real as the principals in any way of life. Inescapably, however, the renunciation of transformative politics in favor of personal transformation means, in practice, the de facto acceptance of our present system. Mass incarceration is here to stay; best that one should learn to live in it but not of it.
Graterford has more than its share of religious radicals. Contrary to the public’s fears and wishes, though, these radicals are ascetics, not revolutionaries. Nowadays, only an old man or a madman would think to talk about revolution. For the time being, Graterford no longer produces Malcolm Xs. It produces prisoners. Not system shatterers, today’s religious prisoners are, in their own quiet and righteous way—much like the overwhelming majority of us—system sustainers.
* * *
First comes the thumping of the bass and the bass drum. Then, through the jostle of bodies, come the claps and shouts that burst forth from the chapel every time the steel door is swung open. In the shaking vestibule, the joyousness is palpable.
Thank you, Jesus, for saving me!
Thank you, Jesus, for saving me!
While there’s been contention lately over whether or not chapel workers should be allowed to use the office during the chapel’s abbreviated Sunday program, the collective presence of Kazi, Teddy, and Al tells me that the fragile status quo has survived another week.
Teddy asks me what’s up with my hair, so I head to the Imam’s bathroom to tamp it down. In the Imam’s office, Baraka sits at his desk, writing poetry. There are a slew of things I want to discuss with him, but it’s nothing that can’t wait until Tuesday.
In the conference room, half a dozen men—Jack among them—await the arrival of the Christian Science volunteer. Alex, the group’s dreadlocked and sad-eyed prisoner leader, greets me unassumingly.
I ask Alex how his Villanova class is going. Thanking me for asking, he says he’s doing his best to get into the “Ethics of War” class. Which reminds him, he needs to talk to somebody about it this morning: “You know that Muslim brother across the hall—Crocket?”
“Yeah,” I say, “Sayyid?” Sayyid’s been gone less than five days but I’m already surprised to hear him mentioned.
“Yes. Is he there?” he asks.
“No,” I say, and nothing more.
Alex asks me, “So, are you giving the appeal this morning?”
I don’t understand.
He means the sermon.
“No, no, no,” I say, laughing. “I’m not qualified for that.”
* * *
In a cloud of perfume at the chapel door, two Protestant ushers are distributing slips of paper for prayer requests to those in need, and emphatic handshakes to everyone.
The crowd of browns, blues, and two varieties of special-occasion whites—the dozen buttoned-down ushers, and scores dressed up in long white undershirts—fills the pews to the last row. I shimmy past the overturned chair and green plastic watering can that block the back leftward pew at the center aisle, and take a seat.
The Mighty Way is on the stage.
Because of who You are, I give you glory
Because of who You are, I give you praise
Because of who You are …
Teddy plops down to my left. “Oh, man,” he says, “watch this.” He points to a guy in the row in front of us, a blue with a salt-and-pepper beard and an old-school flattop that’s graying at the temples. “This dude used to be in another gang,” Teddy says. “He used to beat me up.” He laughs from his stomach. Finding a hand on his shoulder, the blue turns around. Seeing Teddy, he breaks into a wide grin. The two of them stand and slam right shoulders affectionately. “He was from on down Khalifa’s way,” Teddy explains to me after the two men retake their seats.
The Mighty Way plays on.
If your soul’s not hanging with Jesus
It will surely drift away
Of the two hundred men in the chapel, eight out of ten are black. Most sit, but a couple dozen remain on their feet, where they sway back and forth, clapping.
O give thanks to the Lord
He is good.
He is good.
Hallelujah.
From the lectern, Amos, a Spanish service principal and this morning’s worship leader, prays: “Let’s take a minute to thank the King of Kings, who woke me up this morning, who saved me this morning, who died on the cross at Calvary. Let me understand Your greatness. We praise You, we glorify You, Lord, the Rose of Sharon, the shining star of Bethlehem, in Jesus’ glorious name for the glory of God.” Having risen in volume along with the prayer, the congregation quiets into the amen.
“Although we find ourselves behind these penitentiary walls,” Amos says, “though we’ve even been back a couple of times … that’s by the grace of God, because by all rights we should be dead already!”
Amos cues the band, which plays “In the Sanctuary.” The hoppier number gets the congregation moving, and stirs me from the inside.
We lift our hands to give you the glory.
We lift our hands to give you the praise.
And we will praise you for the rest of our days.
A third of the men are now standing, clapping with arms upraised. One by one, Oscar, Damon, and John pass me by, each bestowing on me a hug as he does. Reverend Baumgartner comes over. Seeming especially jocular, he grabs Teddy and me each by the upper arm. “Teddy will interpret the sermon for you,” he instructs the two of us.
While the bullish egalitarian in me viscerally bristles at Baumgartner’s joke, he is surely right: the critical dimension of religion is indeed more my forte than Teddy’s. Baumgartner himself brilliantly characterized the anticlerical, antiliturgical form of worship favored by Teddy, most of his fellow congregants, and a plurality of his countryfolk, too: “What Teddy prefers is the closely guarded illusion of unstructured prayer … just as long as it goes exactly as planned.” And so it does. No priests, no sacraments, just the messy and putatively noncoercive assemblage of music, altar patter, and Bible readings, which semireliably makes a sufferer like Teddy feel and know God’s glorious presence for what it is claimed to be, and prompts him—for the duration of the worship, and in recurring moments during the hours and days to follow—to renew his commitment to the life that these thoughts and feelings demand. So far as I can tell from the outside, for Teddy the dominant mood of this recentering experience is that of gratitude. In the culminating altar call especially, I have, on previous Sundays, stolen sidelong glances at Teddy and watched him weep and whisper: Thank you, Jesus, Thank you, Jesus, Thank you, Jesus.
“It’s not about us,” Amos says. “It’s not about entertainment. It’s about acknowledging, making praise.” Everyone stands. Amos asks the men to turn their Bible to the Book of Galatians, sixth chapter, and proceeds to read the first ten verses.
I zone out. And then, unexpectedly, a voice very close: “That was it.” Standing at my ear is Al. He repeats the language of the final verse. “Do good to all men, especially to them who are of the household of faith.” This is the verse from Galatians he had in mind Wednesday when we were talking about Ephraim’s obligations to the community.
Slick-faced from his set, Gary of the Mighty Way joins us, and asks me how I’m feeling. I tell him I was feeling it, and I was.
“Well, hallelujah!” Gary shouts.
Oscar and Santana’s group, the Gospel Messengers, take the stage.
“Don’t look at me,” one band member pleads into the microphone. “Look at God!”
“I just want to thank God,” says a second.
“Brother here,” the first guy adds, pointing to someone in the first row. “I saw him in the infirmary last night and he couldn’t move a muscle. So to see him here this morning? Thank you, Jesus!” The men applaud.
The Messengers do one they’ve been doing forever: Wilson Pickett’s “Ninety-nine and a Half Won’t Do.” The arrangement is tight, their harmonies precise.
We got to bring it all down, start getting it right.
We got to stop this messing around, and keep the thing uptight.
I ask Teddy how he would characterize this sound. “That’s that old southern sound,” he says assuredly.
All right, sugar.
Got to have a hundred,
Got to have a hundred …
A minute later, Teddy walks himself back, saying that he isn’t quite sure.
If sound is hard to capture in words, atmosphere is similarly elusive. But it’s warm, and though the sunlight is still filtered through the winnowing morning clouds, the chapel feels bright—as it generally does on Sunday mornings when it’s packed full of men praising the Lord, measure by jubilant measure, and I’m fresh, focused, and only dropping in. Suffice it to say, it feels a long, long way from mass.
The band starts up another number, this one marked by a walking keyboard line and chorus of falsetto “oohs.”
“Take me to Jesus,” they plead as one.
“Now, that’s that old southern sound,” Teddy says. “Back in the woods.” He shakes his head in time.
Take it to Jesus
Take it to Jesus
Take it to Jesus
The soloist descends the stage and comes a third of the way down the aisle, both feeding and feeding off of the celebratory vibe.
Teddy has wandered off. At the center end of my row, Daffy Ball bounces along with the music. Daffy has the placard at the ready, should word come down that somebody has a visit. Wendell of Liberty Ministry approaches from the front with a smile, his big white thumbs-up thumb still upstretched and unbent. He’s on his way to the infirmary to get it cleaned and replastered, and I wish him well.
The song ends, the chapel quiets, the seated stand, and Amos reads two selections from Isaiah. In the first, the Hebrew prophet counsels those with thirst but without money to delight their soul in the everlasting covenant. In the latter passage, a messianic prophecy foretells a man to come, one reviled and rejected by men, a man wounded by and for our sins, through whom we are healed.2
“So if you’re thirsty and hungry?” Amos says. “Even if you’re broke, come and drink. Drink from the rock of the living waters, Jesus Christ. Because he’ll quench your thirst, Jesus Christ, who took away our sins and granted us eternal life.”
The Mighty Way retake the stage.
Think about His love.
Think about His goodness.
Think about His grace that brought us through.
Twice, a cappella, the Mighty Way declare the greatness of the measure of our Father’s love. Then Ezra drops the beat. Down my row, Daffy sorts through white slips of paper. The band doubles the tempo and pushes through into another of its standards, “You Ought to Run and Tell That.” Teddy leans over and grabs my shoulder: “Now this is the soul sound!” And it sounds good.
Let me tell you about a man from Galilee
He loosed the shackles
He loosed the shackles
He loosed the shackles and set me free.
Again Amos takes the mic. He tells the story of a congregant’s nephew who went before the parole board. “He went ahead and did his thing—you know how it is. They said they were going to give him a six-month hit. And he was a humble guy. Not that he was pretending, he was a truly humble guy, the kind of humbleness you get with fasting and prayer. And they saw he was so humble that they knocked three months off the hit. So, you know, with all that crazy law stuff, God will always find a way!”
Santana calls the Gospel Messengers back to the stage. I turn to Teddy. “I thought Santana was the Gospel Messengers.”
“Yeah,” Teddy says, “he was. He stopped singing with them two weeks ago. But now he wants them back.” He shakes his head. “Santana be crazy.”
“Yeah,” I say. “He seems stressed lately. You know what it is?”
Teddy looks at me cockeyed. “I’ve got my own,” he says. “I don’t worry none about his.”
I ask Teddy about how his visit went yesterday with Lily, his wife. “Beautiful,” he says. “She is a strong woman.”
He will find a way.
He will forgive you for all of your sins.
Open your heart and let me in.
Santana solos, his crystal voice exuding guileless goodness. Were the devil to sing, he’d probably sound like this. Without compromising force or clarity, Santana goes falsetto.
Tell God about it.
He will make a way.
On behalf of the Usher Board, Amos asks everyone to be quiet and attentive during the sermon, and reminds everyone that chapel schedules are also available.
Rudy of the Mighty Way and St. Dismas takes the lectern in order to read from the prayer slips: “Brother Edward thanks God for letting him get his test results that came back negative.” There is widespread applause. “Ralph thanks God for the light of Christ now glowing in his heart.” More applause. “Reggie finally heard from his sister after two years. He gives God the glory that he can make it through difficult situations with humility. He asks everyone to pray for his marriage, his family, friends, for the guys on death row, and for the guys in the hospital.” More applause.
Amos adds one final request. He says: “May the Lord save the soldiers and the boy who was critically shot by gun violence in Philadelphia last night.” Amos asks for new guys and first-timers to stand up, and a handful of men rise, to warm applause. He then calls forward the guys celebrating their birthdays this week. Three men approach the stage.
The first guy gives his name and his block. Then: “Tuesday I’ll be fifty-six.”
The second guy remains anonymous: “Today I’m too old,” he says. “I wish I were younger.”
Last is DeeDee. Born Dwight, DeeDee is a former bodybuilder, a former Fruit of Islam, and a transsexual. Last year DeeDee was a St. Dismas regular but these days stays away, reportedly because Rudy refuses to call her by her preferred name.
“My birthday passed,” she says. “I didn’t want to come up because usually they give me dinosaurs.” She laughs at the embarrassment of years. “Today I’m forty-nine.”3
Gary takes the mic. “I’m going to do it like Charley did it,” he says. Charley was a beloved community member who died last spring. Gary sings:
Happy Birthday to you
Happy Birthday to you
Happy Birthday, dear brothers,
And may God bless you.4
The congregation breaks into applause.
A brown I don’t know reads from the fourteenth chapter of the Book of Matthew. Some open their Bibles and others bow their heads. The brown reads about how Jesus coaxed his disciples into a boat on the Galilee only to disappear up a mountainside to pray. Night fell to find the disciples far from shore, buffeted by wind and wave. Long into the night, Jesus appeared to them, walking on the surface of the lake. The disciples were terrified.
“It’s a ghost,” they cried.
“Take courage!” Jesus said. “It is I. Don’t be afraid.”
“Lord, if it’s you,” Peter replied, “tell me to come to you on the water.”
Jesus said to come. So Peter got out of the boat and walked toward Jesus on the water. But when the wind picked up, he started to sink, and cried out, “Lord, save me!”
They climbed back into the boat, the wind died down, and the disciples declared, “Truly you are the Son of God.”
On the other side of the sea, word was sent around that Jesus had arrived, and people from all around brought their sick to be healed. And healed they were.
The brown concludes: “May the Lord bless us with an understanding of His Word. Amen.”
Retaking the lectern, Amos acknowledges the reader, to booming applause. To even greater applause, Amos introduces Reverend Baumgartner, who wishes everyone “Good morning” until the applause dies down. Baumgartner begins:
“Many of us remember with great fondness our brother, Harry Birdsong,” Baumgartner says. “Sweets.” Recognition flickers through the chapel. “Sweets helped me kill many an hour in my office, talking about music.
“Harry used to tell me this as a true story. You can decide whether you think it’s true or not. Harry was living in Cleveland, down by the lake, and an itinerant evangelist was coming to town for a revival, and all the pre-revival hype said he was going to walk on the water. And then the night of the revival came. And he was standing down by the waterfront, and everybody there was hooting and clapping. And the preacher said, ‘Do you believe?’ They all shouted, ‘YES!’ And he said, ‘Do you really believe?’ And they all shouted, ‘YES!’ And he said, ‘Do you truly, in your heart of hearts, believe that I can walk on this here water?’ And they shouted, ‘YES! We believe!’” Baumgartner pauses. “And the preacher said, ‘If you really believe, if you truly believe, then I don’t have to show you.’”
He delivers this with a showman’s timing. The resulting ripples of laughter are not merely polite. Baumgartner continues: “Harry swore it was a true story. I don’t know about you, but for me to believe, the man would’ve had to have taken at least a couple of steps out onto that lake.
“Today we read from Matthew’s Gospel.” Baumgartner provides some context: “So the disciples had been following Jesus for some time. And then, in the fourteenth chapter, John the Baptist is executed, and Jesus, being grief-stricken, goes away by himself, and the disciples are left alone, confused about what just happened. And then the people hear that Jesus is in the area and they all come out to see him. And then you have the story of the five thousand, plus women and children. Between you and me,” Baumgartner adds as an aside, “women and children were people, too.
“Anyway, Jesus tells the disciples that he’ll catch up with them later but, quite obviously, they don’t assume he’s going to catch up with them in the middle of the sea. And suddenly, there he is, walking on the water. And Peter says, ‘Is that You, Lord? If it is, I’ll join You on the water.’ And Jesus says, ‘Come.’
“Peter obeys and jumps in with two feet. So there he is, walking on water. And then suddenly he loses his nerve and starts to sink.” A stray chortle rises from the pews.
“Yeah,” Baumgartner guffaws toward the laughter, “as if you would do any better.
“And then Jesus calms the storm, and the next thing we know, He and the disciples are on the other side of the lake in Gennesaret, and the people there recognize Him and send word to all their family and friends, and the next thing we know, Jesus is healing all of the sick people in town through His touch.” Baumgartner looks around. “You know, that’s a lot of stuff for the disciples to witness, and it seems like it all happens in a twenty-four-hour period.”
Baumgartner waits. “What I want to remind you of today is that these astonishing stories never happened for their own sake. The miracles always happen in order to point you to something else. Miracle, in Greek, means ‘a sign.’ And a miracle is always a sign of something. So whenever we find a miracle, we need to figure out what it’s pointing to. Miracles are always signs to show just who Jesus is, and to remind us of all the promises that He is the incarnation of the loving and gracious God.
“You see, talk is cheap, and at some point a guy has to demonstrate all the claims that he’s made. Obviously, Jesus had a great following and He was an inspired and insightful teacher. Obviously, He was very good at telling stories, so people were drawn to hear Him. But He is not the only good storyteller that ever was. So if the claims about Him, about His messiah-ship, about His incarnate presence, about Him being the Son of God, are all to be believed, there would need to be some demonstration that He truly is what is claimed of Him, and that He truly has the authority to deliver what has been promised through Him.
“Remember the TV show Happy Days?” Baumgartner asks to more oohs of recognition. “Old TV shows never die, they just go into syndication. Well, in one old episode Richie decides that he’s tired of being bullied, so he decides to stand up to this bully who’s been picking on him. He goes to Fonzi and asks him to teach him how to be tough. The biggest thing, Fonzi says, is attitude. If you act tough and intimidating, then people won’t bother you. This calms Richie down a bit. Later in the episode, though, it comes time for the predicted confrontation and, unfortunately, the other guy isn’t backing down. Richie asks Fonzi what’s wrong. Why isn’t the other guy backing down? Fonzi says to him, ‘I forgot to tell you one thing: somewhere along the line you actually have to hit somebody so people know that you can.’”
This round of laughter comes peppered with knowing murmurings of approval.
“At some point, it’s not enough to act tough. At some point you actually have to hit somebody so people know that you can do it! When we talk about Jesus, that is what we are talking about. We can talk about Jesus being the Messiah. We can talk about Jesus being the savior. But until He actually saves somebody, none of what we say about Him means a thing. It’s like the guy in Cleveland that Sweets told me about. It’s easy to talk about walking on water but I, for one, need to see at least a couple of steps. Without proof, this preacher is just another in a long line of people that have disappointed us. So sooner or later, if you’re going to get me to believe in you, you’ve got to put your money where your mouth is and save somebody.”
Up the left aisle, an usher parades the placard overhead, a DOC number now inset. A visit is about to be bingoed.
“Only a month ago we celebrated Christmas, and heard the proclamation of a tremendous promise: the birth of the child who is promised to be the Messiah, Emanuel, the savior. In one verse, these promises are made, and all of a sudden, in the next verse, Jesus is all grown up and people are wondering if all that has been promised is truly so.
“But without any demonstration, they’re just another batch of failed promises. We have experienced so many failed promises that we’ve grown accustomed to failure being the norm. So unless there is some sort of demonstration, a promise means nothing. In Matthew fourteen, the disciples finally witness, finally experience, that such power to save as has been promised is demonstrably present. It’s no longer a matter of promise. It’s no longer a matter of hope. It’s no longer a matter of someday. It’s now a matter of witnessing it—firsthand—and knowing that the promise is true. What becomes vividly observable for believers in this chapter is that in the presence of this Jesus”—Baumgartner repeats the phrase—“is that in the presence of this Jesus, there is compassion for the needs of all people, and there is nourishment for all those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for those who hunger and thirst for God’s peace, for those who hunger and thirst for God’s healing power to save us through all the diseases of life. That’s disease but also dis-ease,” Baumgartner pronounces the word like it’s two. “So often in life, when we have no peace, and no certainty, we confront dis-eases. In the presence of this Jesus, though, as the story tells us, there is healing. There is calm in the storm that is this life. There is deliverance from that feeling of being overwhelmed by fear and doubt. Why does Peter sink? He sinks because he is afraid, and because he doubts.”
Shouts of approval greet the denunciation of doubt.
“And if it had been me?” Baumgartner slickly pivots, “I wouldn’t have even gotten out of the boat! But as the story says, there is no place, even in the midst of turbulent seas, where He cannot find us. All of us must deal with fears. All of us must deal with uncertainties. All of us must deal with dis-eases. But in all of the experiences, all of the changes, all of the dis-eases of my life, the healing of my spirit, the nourishment of my soul, and the calms in my turmoil have always and only been in the presence of Jesus. This is not hearsay. It’s not a claim. And it’s not a promise. It has been demonstrated to me and I have experienced it—all of my calms, and respites, and deliverances have been in the presence of Jesus. And when I look for calm someplace else, I start to flail, I start to experience supreme dis-ease. When I look for it someplace else, I find that I can’t sleep at night and my relationships become stress-filled and I start to sink. But in the presence of the promise of Jesus of Nazareth, I find the presence of peace and wholeness and certainty and love and salvation and the lack of being afraid.
“In all of our doubts, in all of our tribulations, in all of our dis-eases, it is our experience of the presence of Jesus that we can feel secure in. Amid all of this uncertainty, and pressure, and pain, we hear the voice. And the voice … and the voice says: Don’t worry, it is I. Do not be afraid.
“And then, when we experience that, no longer do we merely have promises. What kind of God would it be that would make us believe without seeing something? God doesn’t hide behind the cloud and say”—suddenly Baumgartner is the Wizard of Oz—‘YOU GUYS BETTER BELIEVE, OR ELSE!’ No, this God shows us something. That’s what the Gospels are about. He comes and dwells in our midst so we can touch Him and feel that there is no reason to be afraid. And, with the disciples, we can put all of our trust, all of our faith, all of our confidence in Him that is truly the Son of God.” The booming voice returns: “‘DO YOU BELIEVE?’ Good, then I don’t have to show you. I don’t have to show you because the presence of Jesus in all the moments and circumstances of your life up to now has already made the truth of His promises abundantly clear.
“See it, know it, trust it, confess it, live it. For the demonstration of His power to be the Savior has already been shown clearly in our presence. I’m not going to walk on anything other than the solid ground of my life, and I’m not going to ask you to walk on anything other than the solid ground of your experience of your life.”
An airy riff begins to waft from Santana’s fingertips. The altar call has arrived.
Baumgartner says: “All those who have experienced Jesus in a new way today, please walk forward and share the Gospel of Jesus.”
More with pure melody than with words, Santana begins to sing.
Baumgartner continues: “All those who have known Jesus but have felt far away, please come forward. All those who are experiencing dis-ease, come step over the side of the boat and trust. Just put your foot forward and feel how He brings us to Himself.”
Perhaps a dozen men approach and take their place at the foot of the dais, below the large gold cross and beside David’s etrog tree.
At this very spot, on one of my sporadic visits in the spring, Al will show me how without any outside horticultural intervention, the branches of the etrog tree will have become conjoined with its neighbor’s such that each plant sprouts the leaves of the other. As I marvel at this miraculous portent of pluralist concord, Al will admonish me that the body of Christ was grafted onto the true vine. Caught off guard by the sternness of Al’s tone, I’ll suddenly get it. In the two plants’ spontaneous hybridity, Al will have read not the promise of amicable Jewish-Christian coexistence, but rather the inevitable overcoming of this difference in Christ. That is, in fulfilling the covenant, the body of Christ took Israel’s place and I had best act accordingly. After an awkward embrace, I’ll push back. With less passion than came naturally when I was an everyday presence, I’ll try to pry open the holy community Al envisions to make room for all the righteous, whether they know Christ in the way Al does or whether they pursue truth and justice some other way. But quoting John, Al will stand fast: “Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” 5
Santana’s heavenly intonations continue. At the altar, prayer warriors lay hands on those men who answered the call, and who stand before them, both tall and bent, swaying and still. As it goes, when the service is over these needy souls will leave their names and cell numbers. Later on, they’ll be paid a visit in their cell by someone looking to help, someone whose ideas about who God is and what that means for their life are much closer to Al’s than to Baumgartner’s.
Throughout the chapel, hands are raised up as bodies sway in time to Santana’s keyboard and voice. The minutes pass luxuriously, and I have no desire for any of this to end.
Eventually Baumgartner prays. “Heavenly Father, we have heard Your promises. But we want and pray for Your presence to be shown to us. We no longer live in hope. We live in certainty. Heavenly Father, make clear the certainties of our salvation. Heavenly Father, we pray that the whole of Graterford may come to know the certainty of Your promise, that all in this world might come to know it, too. Heavenly Father, take away from us our fears, our confusions, our turmoils, and embrace us with Your peace and love that we may live in the wholeness of Your demonstrated promise. In Your name and in the name of Your Son, Jesus Christ, we declare as He taught us:
Our Father, who art in heaven,
Hallowed be Thy name.
Thy kingdom come.
Thy will be done,
On earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
As we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation,
But deliver us from evil.
The recitation rises to a shout.
For Thine is the kingdom,
And the power, and the glory,
FOREVER AND EVER!
AMEN.
Baumgartner concludes: “In a manner that surpasses all understanding, keep Jesus Christ in your hearts. Go in peace and serve the Lord.” With this closing injunction, the vessel of ritual tension cracks and the congregation begins to ooze from the chapel. I am scribbling feverishly, trying to capture as much of the altar call’s script as I can, and to corral into language the texture of the elation that still permeates the emptying chapel.
A tap lands on my shoulder. I look up to find Charles—Charles the religious eclectic, Charles the provocateur, Charles the wounded, Charles of video ministry, of EFM, occasionally of the Indians’ circle, and, this week, Charles of nowhere at all.
Charles gives me a warm if not strained smile. When last I saw him his hair was getting on scraggly, but his cornrows have since been impeccably rebraided so that not a single hair escapes. Taking my pen in my right hand, I hop to my feet and we hug. Stumbling a bit, I inadvertently dig my pen into his back. In a manner that, absent the din of the receding multitude, might well be suspect, our heads remain pressed close.
I tell him I missed him on Wednesday and ask how he’s been.
“I’m struggling,” he says. From his absence, I had assumed as much. “But I don’t know…” He shrugs. “Maybe I’ll give it over to the Lord soon. Maybe even today.” His eyes are glassy.
Then, intemperately, like an evangelist for a church dedicated to the sorts of peculiarities by which I swear, I ramble: “You know, Charles, guys at EFM like Daffy and Al, they love you, and you’re lucky to have them, and I don’t begrudge anyone who’s figured out how to make it in this place, but—though I hesitate to say this because I can’t imagine carrying what you’re carrying—I feel that everybody’s got to figure out his own way. And that’s true in here no less so than out on the street. You’ve got a super-inquisitive mind. So your resistance to what they believe might not be simply a matter of pride. Maybe you think some things that they can’t think, and perhaps even some things that you can’t not think. So I don’t think it’s just a matter of you hopping out of your boat and into their truth. It might be harder than that, I fear. Messier than that.”
Charles nods soberly. He suggests we talk sometime. I say I’d like that, and we agree on Wednesday afternoon. We embrace again. Neglecting to take proper care, I again jab the nub of my pen into the cavity between Charles’s shoulder blades.
“Sorry if I just stabbed you in the back with my pen,” I say, without immediate recognition of the full significance of my words.