I read somewhere recently that there are two kinds of anesthetics, vocal and local. When the doctor sewed up my injured thumb, he used a local to numb the pain of the procedure. But there are other occasions when I’m listening to someone who drones on and on so long that my mind numbs and my spirit runs away to a private place to sleep.
It’s a rare thing for me to be really engaged by a story or an article in a newspaper or magazine. Reading most news stories, I really don’t expect interesting stuff. I read the papers to keep myself informed. But, going over once again the sermons of Hillary Clinton (They sound like sermons to me.) I find my mind dulled and my interest forced. Lets not even talk about O’Malley or even Ted Cruz (How high can you pile arrogance?). Gee, this stuff manages to deaden whatever hope I had as I began to read.
I like the magazine “Atlantic.” The articles are in depth, which means they are long. Usually the writing is very good but the topics are often supported by scientific research which sounds factual but with out a heartbeat. The last two issues of Atlantic anesthetized me.
This month’s Atlantic had a pleasant surprise called “Attitude Adjustment” by Tim Gautreaux. It’s a story about a priest, broken by a terrible accident and able to function only minimally as a priest. His body and spirit do not relate well and he loses his train of thought often. He wonders why this has happened to him, this traumatic dismembering of his life while he was at the peak of his creativity. Before the accident, his sermons were great and his confidence in hearing confessions and counseling penitents was firm. Now he feared losing his place at Mass and being confused in the Confessional.
At the lowest point of his ministry he found himself teaching the parable of the Good Samaritan to little children, the oldest was six. He sat down with the toddlers and told the story of the foreigner who stops to rescue a poor man who had been robbed and beaten along the road to Jericho.
“Don’t forget to ask the Big Question,” he said. He waited and then he asked it himself. In these or other words he asked them why the children thought this terrible thing happened to the man who had been beaten? They answered with ideas like because he was bad to the Samaritans; because maybe he stole the Samaritan’s cookie; because he bragged all the time. The six year old boy, raised his hand and said because regardless of the pain it caused, the man needed an attitude adjustment. He told Father Jim that the Jewish guy was probably kinder to Samaritans after he had been rescued by one.
The priest thought that that was a pretty good answer. And, I think this was a pretty good piece of writing and I’m still surprised Atlantic published it.