Ken’s e-Pistle

February 8, 2023

I had a dear aunt, now departed to glory, who made a trip to New Orleans to visit relatives.  It so happened that the trip coincided with the annual celebration of Mardi Gras.  As a righteous Presbyterian, she was woefully ignorant of the sights, sounds, smells and general demeanor of  the crowd which typically attends the event.  All she knew was that it was the day before the beginning of Lent, whatever that was.  (She was of the Old School which maintained that anything having to do with liturgical seasons was evidence of creeping Papism and, thus, of the devil.)

She eagerly anticipated the trip and I decided that it would be well to let her experience the occasion without my cautionary warnings.  Yes, the devil does get to me at times.

About a week later she came back home and I went over to her house to visit her the day after her return.  To my surprise, I found her at her kitchen sink, washing her shoes.  Espedrills, if I remember correctly.  I asked her what she was doing, to which she replied, “I’m washing Sodom and Gomorrah off my shoes!”

Somehow, that experience left a mark on her.  Not unlike Post Traumatic Stress.  She had witnessed just about every expression of sin she could imagine and a few that seemed to defy reality.  “Forbidden fruit!” she would exclaim whenever one of us transgressed the Law of the Medes and the Persians.  She was pretty well convinced that sin lurked around every corner and we would do well to keep our guards up until the Second Coming of Jesus.

I hope that she is happy now, floating on her cloud and playing her harp.  That is how she envisioned the afterlife and the anticipation brought her much comfort.

Mark Twain once made an observation which makes a bit of sense in light of her outlook.  He wrote: “Adam was but human – this explains it all.  He did not want the apple for the apple’s sake.  He wanted it because it was forbidden. The mistake was in not forbidding the serpent; then he would have eaten the serpent!”

Kind of sets the Christian mind to thinking, doesn’t it?

I bid you peace!