Faith + Reason = Truth

The following is something I wrote today to answer a call by the Wizard of Ads to relate a personal encounter with racism.  I've subscribed to his "Monday Morning Memos" since at least July 2004, and I can't recommend them more strenuously! 

Racism is alive and well in Arlington, Texas, home of Six Flags, the Texas Rangers, and the Dallas Cowboys. It is not displayed overtly, and it is not shared with "strangers," but it is found in friendly conversation over a beer with friends. Off-handed, seemingly thoughtless comments along the lines of "I don't care if it's PG or not – there's no WAY 8-year old girls should be watching Hairspray! I mean, they have a white girl kissing a black dude!". There are also the always popular assessments of immigrant laborers, i.e. Mexicans, as housekeepers or outdoor workers, perpetually derided as both lazy because they're Mexican as well as really hard working; again, because they are Mexican. These are uncomfortable situations, especially when I call them on their racism.

The concerns I have about this "benign" form of racism are that: 1) it actually exists in suburban America in the year 2008; 2) it is exhibited by my close personal acquaintances, people who share my economic and social demographics ; and 3) even when the blatant racist nature of the remarks is pointed out to me through humor and good-natured disapproval, clearly letting them know that I do not share their views and that I in fact believe that they are wrong, it is often to no avail. Quite the contrary occurs, come to think of it:  rather than the expected blushing or embarrassment that one could see arising on the part of the offending party, there is instead a digging in that makes it tough to walk away from while agreeing to disagree. I have never actually said this, but have frequently wanted to push the matter with a comment along the lines of "we are not going to agree to disagree, because I will never agree about anything with a racist when issues of race are concerned!"

Racism, like poverty and diseases, may indeed be a pestilence that can never be expected to be completely eradicated, yet must always be battled against as if victory resides just around the bend. My belief is that the most effective thing any individual can do is to refuse to let "harmless" racist comments go unchallenged, whether made by family, friends, acquaintances, or strangers. The active resistance does not have to be confrontational or aggressive, and can be as simple as a look into the racist's eyes that conveys to them the sentiment that his or her view is not shared, it is not condoned, and it is not even so much as accepted as an opinion to which one is entitled. Racist views and actions are wrong, and there is no further debate required.

Jackie’s idea, via Alice, via Shefaly, who has tagged me. And who am I to refuse such a long and distinguished pedigree as this meme clearly has? My only regret is that I am wholly unqualified to weigh in on a topic for cooks and other lovers of the food experience, but here goes [and the British spellings are the meme’s, not my own :)]:

What’s your favourite table?

The one at my dad’s parents’ old house in Penn Yan, NY. The house itself was over 200 years old at the time (still is, for that matter), which is ANCIENT by US standards. The table seemed older than that, though it was not, and it was long, narrow, old, heavy, polished and knotted pine, set in the kitchen, where everyone just hung out and talked. The energy of the entire large family was centered there, I think – or at least I thought, as a young boy.

What would you have for your last supper?

Are we talking along the lines of “The Last Supper,” with close friends and relations and camaraderie, all while the thick atmosphere of impending betrayal followed by painful sacrificial death lingers on the horizon? Or is the setting a prison cell awaiting execution? Or simply the last meal before departing from family for an extended or permanent leave? In any case, the very nature of a last supper, the knowledge that something was about to occur that would nullify any potential future occurrences of that meal, would result in my caring less about WHAT was for supper than with WHOM it would be shared. And at the risk of leaving out acquaintances, I would broadly say all of my family members in Texas (nothing against those in New England, North Carolina, Arizona, or California) and all of my friends living within 60 miles of me – as for the rest, I don’t think we’d have much to talk about, and it would only take away from my time with the ones who matter most.

What’s your poison?

Vanilla vodka. Which, back in the day, would have been expanded to include all vodkas. That’s why I avoid it without proper supervision and stick to all of the other members of the alcohol family instead. Mountain Dew would run a close second, but I have never lost days of my life and millions of brain cells to its after-effects, so I’m going with vodka. 

Name your three desert island ingredients.

Garlic. Sugar. Butter. I could rule the world, or at least the island, if I had those at my disposal.

What would you put in Room 101?

Strictly foodly-speaking, I would say vegetables. I do go entire days without eating any veggies, as bad for my health as that is claimed to be. I don’t necessarily abhor all of them, but when prioritizing and then allocating my eating time and effort, vegetables never seem to make the cut; there are simply too many other things I’d rather eat.

Which book gets you cooking?

I believe it’s just called Betty Crocker Cookbook, or something similarly generic. I’ve had it forever, just like the one my parents had when I grew up and taught myself to cook as a youngster (I think they thought I’d grow up to be a chef one day with as much time and interest as I put into it). Nothing flashy or gimmicky or “celebrity chef-ish” about it, just yummy basic recipes for everything.

What’s your dream dinner party line-up?

This is a tough one, because I only speak English, and the people who most fascinate me speak languages other than English for the most part. But if we could all magically understand each other, I’d invite Moses, Zoroaster, Siddhartha Gautama, and Jesus of Nazareth, Plato, and Immanuel Kant. I would hope for all of them to clear things up and reconcile their experiences to what Jesus taught, with Plato being there to process it all (since I would be unable to do so, even if they spoke in English) and put it into terms that were universally understandable to people, adding Kant to the mix as the Enlightenment figure most amenable to religion and least likely to shoot the whole thing down without further consideration, as well as the most brilliant of the German and French philosophers (debatable, of course, but one is entitled to one’s own opinion, and this is mine!).

What was your childhood teatime treat?

We don’t have “teatime” in Texas, but we do drink iced tea, which was unheard of in the North when I was a kid. Chocolate chip cookies, preferably homemade, were the best snack treats that I recall.

What was your most memorable meal?

It would have to be a composite of all of the Thanksgiving dinners I’ve had at my parents’ home growing up, along with the ones at both sets of grandparents’ homes in Penn Yan as a little boy. No one memory of a specific meal comes to mind, but I can vividly picture the table settings, the faces, the dishes (always the same, depending on whose house it took place at), the Dallas Cowboy games on tv, the Willie Nelson Christmas album (“Pretty Paper” was the name of it) that my parents always broke out at Thanksgiving… .

What was your biggest food disaster?

It wasn’t much in the way of disasters, but one anniversary when my wife and I were cooking steak and lobster, we lost track of the steak, it caught fire from some fat drippings, smoked up the house, and we had to run the flaming steak over to the kitchen sink to rinse it off. Good times.

What’s the worst meal you’ve ever had?

Never had a “worst” meal.

Who’s your food hero/food villain?

At the risk of sounding too sentimental, the food hero is my dad. Our place was where all of the friends hung out, for one reason and one reason only: they knew they’d get fed, and it’d be delicious. And to this day, no matter whose home the gathering is at, dad’s still the one doing all of the cooking for all of us down to the grandchildren, breakfast lunch dinner and snacks, seemingly enjoying every second of the process.

No such thing as a food villain in my book, as anyone who prepares or provides food for others can’t be all that bad!

Nigella or Delia?

Being in America, and never watching any food channels or shows, I have no idea who either of these people are, apart from reading what others on this meme have written. So no comment.

Vegetarians: genius or madness?

Militant vegetarians are clearly psychopathic, but the peaceful ones who do it for their own reasons (the parallels to religion here are just jumping off of the page) have my respect and admiration – even though I would NEVER, EVER forego eating meat myself, nor hope to understand those that do.

Fast food or fresh food?

Fresh is overrated (I eat vast amounts of frozen and canned food) with the exception of fruit, which must be fresh; give me fast, easy, no-mess food every time.

Who would you most like to cook for?

Anyone who enjoys meals made with eggs, chicken, garlic, or butter.

What would you cook to impress a date?

I think Italian dishes are most impressive to a date, with the vibrant sounds, smells, and colors involved.

Make a wish.

That everyone in the world would stop imposing their wills upon any other person, with or without their permission.

Being the anti-social introverted blogger that I am, I am tagging no one (or everyone) to continue this meme.  But my deepest thanks to Shefaly, who tasked me with what I thought would be a thoroughly unfulfilling rumination on food and what has instead turned out to be a really enjoyable excursion filled with memories of some of the best times of my life - all of which, in some way or another, involved food!

Les Ruins ("The Ruins"), by Constantin Francois de Volney, is the publication that resulted from this Frenchman's visits to the middle east (Syria, Egypt, the eastern Mediterranean) in the late 1700's.  He cites the words of the ancients in his descriptions of those lands, and his passages on the ancient, ancient Ethiopians as described by Diodorus of Sicily (Greek historian, 90-21 BC) and also Strabo (Hellenized Roman from Turkey, 63 BC - 24 AD) and Lucian (Syrian Roman, 125-180 AD - like the others, also wrote in Greek), who in turn cite previous Greek historians as well as the subject peoples themselves.

While meditating on the fates of formerly fabulous civilizations that have been reduced to uninhabited ruins, which struck him very deeply as he wandered through those very desert ruins, he writes of a "Genius" who imparts much knowledge to him.  Here's what he has to say about Ethiopia, which is simply and utterly fascinating to one who was not aware that this line of thought existed through the millennia only to be recounted in a famous French work over 200 years ago:

    "And the Genius proceeded to enumerate and point out the objects to me: Those piles of ruins, said  he, which you see in that narrow valley watered by the Nile, are the remains of opulent cities, the pride of the ancient kingdom of Ethiopia.* Behold the wrecks of her metropolis, of Thebes with her hundred palaces,** the parent of cities, and monument of the caprice of destiny. There a people, now forgotten, discovered, while others were yet barbarians, the elements of the arts and sciences. A race of men now rejected from society for their sable skin and frizzled hair, founded on the study of the laws of nature, those civil and religious systems which still govern the universe."

His notes on the above passage elaborate as follows:

    "* In the new Encyclopedia 3rd vol. Antiquities is published a memoir, respecting the chronology of the twelve ages anterior to the passing of Xerxes into Greece, in which I conceive myself to have proved that upper Egypt formerly composed a distinct kingdom known to the Hebrews by the name of Kous and to which the appellation of Ethiopia was specially given.  This kingdom preserved its independence to the time of Psammeticus; at which period, being united to the Lower Egypt, it lost its name of Ethiopia, which thenceforth was bestowed upon the nations of Nubia and upon the different tribes of blacks, including Thebes, their metropolis."

Finally, further along in his notes with citations of Diodorus and Lucian of the Ethiopians as Fathers of Science and Religion:

    "What Diodorus says of the Thebans, every author, and himself elsewhere, repeat of the Ethiopians, which tends more firmly to establish the identity of this place of which I have spoken.  "The Ethiopians conceive themselves," says he, lib. iii., "to be of greater antiquity than any other nation: and it is probable that, born under the sun's path, its warmth may have ripened them earlier than other men.  They suppose themselves also to be the inventors of divine worship, of festivals, of solemn assemblies, of sacrifices, and every other religious practice.  They affirm that the Egyptians are one of their colonies, and that the Delta, which was formerly sea, became land by the conglomeration of the earth of the higher country which was washed down by the Nile.  They have, like the Egyptians, two species of letters, hieroglyphics, and the alphabet; but among the Egyptians the first was known only to the priests, and by them transmitted from father to son, whereas both species were common among the Ethiopians.""

    ""The Ethiopians," says Lucian, page 985, "were the first who invented the science of the stars, and gave names to the planets, not at random and without meaning, but descriptive of the qualities which they conceived them to possess; and it was from them that this art passed, still in an imperfect state, to the Egyptians.""

Couldn't have said it more succinctly myself!

Have you ever seen a black priest?  Catholic priest, to be more specific.  I have never attended Mass conducted by a black priest, but I have seen many black pastors, which are the Protestant leaders of congregations.  And I've also watched a black "bishop" on t.v., Bishop T.D. Jakes (a famous Dallas-area pastor at a very large, well-known, predominantly African-American church).  If there is a difference between a bishop such as Bishop Jakes and a pastor, I don't know what it is.  I DO know that in the Catholic Church, we have a hierarchy of clergy, with Bishop being a step up from a Priest.

In any case, watching Bishop Jakes as well as another African-American pastor on occasion always has the same effect on me:  I feel energized, I am excited about God and Jesus and the Holy Spirit, I feel a great sense of urgency to determine what exactly the Lord's plans for me on earth are and to then embark on a journey right that minute to work towards accomplishing those plans, and finally, I feel obligated to give them some money.  And I don't get angry at anyone for making me feel that way - I just feel like, right at that instant, something is compelling to make a contribution right then and there, for my own sake and the sake of others.  I don't really feel ANY of those things at Catholic Masses, although I do donate every Sunday because, unlike the thoughts I have about the Protestant ministers, I feel like someone's actually accounting for and keeping tabs of my money, and that it will go to appropriate causes as seen fit by the Church.  When I see the cars the really successful Protestant pastors drive, the houses they live in, the clothes and jewelry their wives wear (wives who almost never have full-time employment of their own, I have noted), I can't help but make the connection that all of those things are directly paid for by what's taken up in the collection baskets on Sunday.  That seems wrong to me.

So what's preferred:  feeling inspired by a powerful public speaker who, more often then not, seems more motivated by and entitled to my money than I myself am, or dutifully sitting through the current incarnation of over a thousand years of ritual tradition, leaving it up to myself to be open to the Holy Spirit if and when it so chooses to enter and work through me?