Last night I saw Bernstein's Mass. Peter Bay and friends pulled out all the stops to mount this massive (pun intended) production. I was amazed and awed that Austin would have gotten behind this deep look at faith and hope. Because Austin seems more comfortable with being cool than being introspective. At least, that's my impression.
As the scenes devolved into chaos and anarchy, even the altar wasn't reserved for the sacred. Leonard was pushing our boundaries. Pushing, pushing, pushing to make us say how much is enough. What is of man, and what is of God? How much grief can a human take and still turn to hope, turn to God, turn to truth, turn to good? One thing I liked is that Bernstein stripped away all the props of religion, yelled at and cried out to God, and in the end was left with only the silence, and the small voice of hope singing a new song. A Psalm. Really quiet music from the throat of God.
What struck me again last night is that these times we live in forty some years later are part of the same picture, part of the same journey that America has been on since Kennedy was shot. And way before that. Like to the time of Cain and Able. We had a few years in there that made us think (some of us, because for some this is never the case) that we had come out of the social schisms and tears in the fabric of our society's identity, and that we had healed as a nation. But this grief we experience today at the hatred of one for another isn't new. Our clothes are different, but that's about it.
I know this is a theme I keep coming back to. And I'm not saying, "It's okay, it's been this bad before so we don't need to worry." I'm saying, we are still on this hard road of grief, and we still have choices to make about who we will be in the end. Thanks for the reminder, Leonard.
Wow!
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