20 of 52 Trip Around The
Sun – A Charger Football Game
Have traveled about 225,000,000 miles.
In case
anyone is able to decipher a code from the cards, here they are so far:
Week
01: 6 of
Clubs
Week
02: 3 of
Hearts
Week
03: 3 of
Clubs
Week
04: 5 of
Diamonds
Week
05:
Week
06: 5 of
Diamonds
Week
07:
Week
08: 2 of
Spades
Week
09: Ace of
Diamonds
Week
10: 3 of
Diamonds
Week
11:
Week
Week
13: 4 of
Spades
Week
14: 7 of
Spades
Week
15: Queen of Diamonds
Week
16: 7 of
Clubs
Week
17: 2 of
Diamonds
Week
18: King of Hearts
Week
Thoughts
during the week:
One of
my old bishops used to talk quite a lot about how he did not like professional
football. He said the stadium was a “temple” of evil. All the games are played
on Sunday, and it’s not really about the game of football. (He liked college
ball.)
In
1988, I went to this bishop on a Sunday morning (it was Superbowl
Sunday) and asked him a few questions.
“Football
is a very rough sport, isn’t it?”
He
answered, “Yes.”
“And
some of the roughness is just part of the rules – tackling – blocking, etc.”
“Yes.”
“But sometimes
there is roughness that is outside the rules – like when they talk in the
locker room about taking out the quarterback by hitting his knee sideways.”
“You
better believe it – that happens.”
“And
Bishop – when they do that, it’s a sin, isn’t it?”
“You
bet it is a sin – a bad one.”
“And
God will punish those people that commit such sins as this – right?”
“Absolutely.”
“Well,
Bishop – since God is going to be watching this Superbowl
game, I think I’ll bump on down there and watch it myself.”
I had
to go to that game. I played in it for seven minutes – I was number 55.
It was
1988 –
The
subject of the following cartoon is much of what I've seen during this Trip Around The Sun - but also I've been seeing some of the
opposite.
One of these guys is a
Jehovah's Witness. One of them is a fundamentalist "born-again"
Christian. One is a Mormon. And I'll bet you can all figure out another one for
the fourth.
None of
them can be a Swedenborgian. None a
Buddhist. These are religions which do not believe that they are the
only one acceptable to God. The Swedenborgian is
Christian, but they don’t believe other religions less valid.
There
is also a middle ground - denominations that believe one must be Christian, for
example - but that one is not required to be in their particular denomination.
The Methodists might fit into this category.
We, as
Mormons, are in the hardest class - not only do we teach that all the
non-Christian groups are operating without any authority, (all their ordinances
null and void), but that all the other Christian denominations also are without
any ability to baptize acceptably, etc. Everything they do officially,
will have to be done over again if it is to be of any effect. If they never
convert, their ordinances are forever invalid. This hard class is also
populated with Jehovah's Witnesses, many Muslim groups, to a lesser degree Jews
and Catholics, etc.
"Follow
Me To The Truth." The
truth, Exactly.
To believe one knows The Truth
is
ludicrous. Our deserved humility
dictates otherwise.
Another
thing I've noted on this trip is very disconcerting. The religions that are
"exclusive," that give their members the feeling they are "The
special ones," are more popular than the others. They have higher
attendance and more activity. Their "success" is very misleading. Perhaps
this is one reason the Savior told us there will be many going a wrong way -
and only a few who find "it," the right way. But the Savior was
always talking at a higher level than the letter of any law. The right way was
not a straight way, but a strait way. The difference between those two is not
really subtle – except for the spelling. It’s not like a straight edge of a
ruler – but like the
I
learned this long ago in college with fraternities. (At
There
were other units - the so-called service units, and they were much less
exclusive. There were some grade requirements, but not the stringent social
requirements of not being too heavy - looking a certain way, etc.
Many
people wanted into the exclusive units. The units accepted only a fraction of
those applying. The other units had to work to get members, advertising the
benefits, etc.
There
appears to be a human need (or want) to have this exclusivity. An Athenian
would tell you that he didn’t think they were any better than anyone else, but
that Athenian would be lying. They most definitely thought themselves better
than Tausigs, for example. Since I lived in the
house, I was privy to much of what went on. They had a song which was all about
helping the poor Tausigs - by buying them soap and
toothpaste - and razors for shaving their legs. This, of course, was all in
good fun, but I can vouch for the fact that Athenians regarded themselves as
superior intellectually and otherwise to Tausigs. The
Tausigs, of course, also regarded themselves as
superior to Athenians, whom they regarded as square.
We
Mormons, of course, also do not think ourselves better than others - we know
there is much good in all churches. We do, however, relegate them all to being
like the Lion's Club. "Much good is going on there, but there is no authority
to act for God." We think of their good works as "preparatory"
to later become Mormons. They are not regarded as The Church - not even as a
part of The Church - nor are any of their religious ordinances regarded as
valid.
"We
are so much more blessed than they," is what we would say, rather than,
"We are better than they." For the purposes of this needed
exclusivity, being "blessed," with authority the others lack, is
sufficient to set us apart from the others who just don’t have these things.
Joseph told us that he was told, “They draw near to Him with their lips, but
their hearts are far from Him.” I can testify that many of their hearts are
very near Him. Some are not, as among us also.
"We
are so blessed to be Athenians and not Tausigs,"
would appear clear to most of us, a statement of exclusivity. They do not need
to say they are better than the Tausigs to establish
that they have an opinion of superiority.
"I
am so blessed to be an American," is similar. It may indeed be a truth,
but pride in that truth can and often is a serious problem in the world. While
in
Pride
appears to have a positive aspect, but President Kimball told us that there is
no such thing as righteous pride - that all pride is wrong - in a President's
Message (We are supposed to regard this as Scripture.) In accordance with this
message, perhaps we should never be proud to be Mormons or Americans – or from
this college or that – or this state or that. It's a very tough thing to fix,
because often one is also proud to be proud - thinking it a very positive
trait. The problem is that it relegates the others, who are not in these
categories – to being inferior in some way.
The Visit: Charger
Football game
My son, Billy, came all
the way from
20 of 52 Trip Around The
Sun – A Charger Football Game