Resthaven Cemetery

On a Sunday, my 13-year-old grandson and I were on our way to the Unitarian Universalist Church to refresh ourselves spiritually. Since we were early, we detoured to the Resthaven Cemetery on the way. As we walked solemnly and respectfully among the final resting places of hundreds of people, I discussed with him death. After sharing with him about cremation, my select means of disposing of my body, and the traditional burial six feet under the sod, he turned to me and said “Papa, I’ll come to visit your burial place if you have one.” On that Sunday, I experienced a deeper intimacy with my grandson, Brett.

As a veteran, I have a death benefit. If I choose, my survivors could request a military funeral with a flag, firing of the volley, playing of TAPS, a Chaplain from Fort Campbell to say a few meaningful words, and a single gravestone marker. I can be buried at the new Kentucky Veterans Cemetery. These benefits are available even with the increasingly popular cremation. Every American veteran deserves such benefits, especially those killed in action.

Recently in the Church and State newsletter, I read a story of Sgt. Patrick Stewart, killed in the war, whose family was denied the privilege of full military honors. In Missouri, we use the metaphor “that causes my blood to boil” to express our outrage, anger, and righteous indignation.

What disqualified Sgt. Stewart and his family for this benefit? This is the inside story:

“…Sgt. Patrick Stewart was killed in combat in September of 2005 when his helicopter was shot down. The Department of veterans Affairs refused to put a pentacle, the symbol of Stewart’s Wiccan faith, on his memorial marker. Roberta Stewart (his wife) sued. to settle the case, officials in the department greed to add the pentacle to its list of disapproved religious symbols.

“Patrick was my everything,” (Roberta) Stewart said in taped remarks. “I decided to fight because I decided that if I didn’t, I felt felt it made our love not as valid, and I wasn’t willing to accept that. Nor was I willing to accept discrimination. We took our vows underneath a pentacle, on our altar; the pentacle was a huge part of our lives. Every special moment in our life, there was a pentacle present. And there would be one on my husband’s headstone.”

“…(Roberta Stewart) regrets nothing about battling the federal government. She noted that president George Bush even called her to apologize after she was left out of a meeting with family members of deceased veterans.

“My husband was a military man…there was no way (he would forget) his brothers on the front line, his Pagan brothers, his Wiccan friends. I had to fight and continue to litigate.”

Discrimination does exist, although it’s done covertly. Through spiritual growth and especially fellowship with others of different denominations and major faiths, we can be aware of our religious prejudices and control and conquer such latent evil in us. The VA under pressure expanded their policy to include even unpopular religious so-called “sects.” VA benefits for all regardless of their faiths. Religious symbols on memorial markers are normally Christian and Jewish, but now, because of one wife’s insistence, the surviving families of all deceased veterans will have their requests granted, even when their faith is not on the “popular list.”

As I read this story, I gave a prayer of Thanksgiving for Americans United for their support of Roberta Stewart. AU accepted a member of our greater US Army family. The AU is dedicated to serving everyone, including the members of minority faiths.

The film for this month is Women Behind the Camera, a documentary showing how women have shaped cinema both in the US and around the world. This film is not rated, but it may not hold the interest of children.

This global documentary, based on Alexis Krasilovsky’s book of the same name, explores the lives of camerawomen in Hollywood and Bollywood, Afghanistan, Australia, Canada, China, England, France, Germany, India, Iran, Japan, Mexico, Russia, Senegal, the U.S. and other countries in a way never seen before.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Admission is free; bring snacks to share if you wish.

American camerawomen include top Directors of Photography Ellen Kuras, ASC (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind), Sandi Sissel, ASC (Salaam Bombay!) and pioneers like African-American camerawoman Jessie Maple Patton—who had to sue the union and television networks to get a job.

For the past six years, the filmmakers have followed the lives of over fifty camerawomen, from video journalists risking their lives in war zones, to feature DP’s, shooting buddies-with-guns escaping in slow motion from total destruction on commercial sets. From secret films by camerawomen of the Taliban beating Afghani women to historic footage by China’s first camerawomen of Mao’s travels through the Chinese countryside, from the narrative of a Russian filmmaker who filmed the fall of the Soviet Union, whose choice of career is told as a love story, to rural India, where subsistence-level women are taught camerawork as a means of empowerment to the glowing young Senegalese camerawoman willing to climb onto a man’s shoulders—literally—to get her subject, Professor Krasilovsky shows us a world of beauty, courage and technical skill.

For more information about this film visit it’s web site at http://www.womenbehindthecamera.com/

When: 7 p.m., Friday, September 7
Where:

A Map to the UU

Upcoming Films

Upcoming films for the rest of the year

• October – Control Room , Topic is the Middle East
• November – Gypo, Topic is prejudice, Eastern Europe
• December – Motorcycle Diaries, Topic is South America

He spent a couple of paragraphs slamming bigots in various cultures and got a lot of positive responses, including from me. But the more I think about it, I wonder if I should be so encouraging to that kind of mindset.

As that distant piccolo continues to play its cheerful tune that guides my skips, I remember the kinds of responses I had when I encountered different cultures and races as a child. My generation never had to deal with the culture shock of desegregation. I never saw “white only” or “colored” signs on movie theatres or water fountains. They were as ancient as history could be.

In fact, I thought it was perfectly normal that my father, a young judge who had just been appointed by then-governor Lamar Alexander in 1979, would strike up a profound friendship with a ridiculously tall African-American pastor named Jimmy Terry, Sr. I went to school with one of his sons, and never did understand why he and I didn’t have the same kind of friendship that our fathers did. Maybe it had to do with the fact that I liked to skip a little too much. I’ll never really know.

Even more than 20 years later, Pastor Terry is still very much of a friend of the family, and I know even today that I can walk into his very conservative church or home and be welcomed with genuine love and warmth. He recently introduced me to a friend of his with that all-too-embarrassing, and all-too-common “I knew him when” speech.

“I knew David when he was THIS high,” he said as he held his hand to around his knee.

“Pastor Terry,” I interjected, “You’re so tall I’ll ALWAYS be that high on you!” Alas, it’s the truth.

Sadly, I heard some children my age call me “nigger lover” because our family would have friends from all walks of life. We would even visit our cleaning lady in her apartment at Lincoln Homes from time to time. In reality, my father taught us—his children—that respect and friendship is color-blind. But he didn’t have to teach that with words. He taught it with his actions.

He recently told me that he was in a local chapter of a Christian organization, and there was a discussion on how to bring growth to the group. He pressed for involvement of the African-American churches. Naturally, the idea was met with hostility and an utterance of “nigger lover” by one person. Dad smiled and said he considered it a compliment.

In a classic example of divine humor, a member from another chapter moved into the area and wanted to serve locally. His German-accented wife was told over the phone that he would be welcomed. When he arrived, my father smiled ear-to-ear. The transferring member was black and quickly became an integral member.

I’ll always have an appreciation for anyone who’ll look beyond what they see in order to build relationships. Whether it’s social status, skin color, sexual orientation, they are all outward expressions or appearances of our lives. But they are not expressions of our hearts. People like my father and Pastor Terry understand that.

Sadly, many in our community do not. They’ll only look for every single reason why a certain group of people should always be second-class. It doesn’t matter if they’re marginalizing blacks, Hispanics, or the GLBT population. They’re not looking to build bridges, they’re looking to expose weaknesses.

They’re the first to point out the faults of a race or a community by the failures of a few… or even many. The darkness of their own hearts has blinded them to the reality that we are all in this thing called life together. Instead, they have to elevate themselves by trashing others.

The more I think about it, the more I realize that the people who called me “nigger-lover” in school were the same kind of people who called me “faggot” every time I passed them in the halls. The attitude is the same. “This is what separates you from me, so therefore I’m better than you.”

We “enlightened people” might even pre-judge a bigot by their attitude just like someone else might pre-judge a black teenage girl because of her skin color as she enters a clothing store as a shoplifter to be watched like a hawk. We would call the latter “racial profiling.” It’s just prejudice. No fancy names are required. It can be subtle, that prejudice. And it will darken our hearts without our even realizing it.

Because of this, I have to search my own heart on a regular basis. Am I pre-judging someone because they might not like my sexual orientation, or the fact that I will work toward equality for all people?

Well, maybe I am. Now I have to decide if that’s a bad thing.