Missing the Rabbi

In the annals of modernist art, three European Jewish names stand out: Marc Chagall, Chaim Soutine, and Amedeo Modigliani. A fourth should be added. This is Emmanuel Mané Katz. Born in 1894 to a traditional Jewish family in the Ukraine, he moved to Paris at the age of nineteen to pursue a career as a painter, and there joined the three more fabled artists named above. Together, they have been loosely called the School of Paris. [Not Marc Chagall, Aryeh Tepper]

Les Désguisés, M. Laurencin

In 1986 my mother and I visited the Petit Palais museum in Geneva, Switzerland. My primary reason for wanting to visit was to see artwork by Marie Laurencin, whose paintings of women I had come to admire. Before leaving the Petit Palais we went to the gift store where I purchased a print of one of Laurencin's paintings along with a print by Emmanuel Mané- Katz. He was completely unknown to me that day and sadly, for many years I wasn't even sure of his name when it hung on my living room wall. 

The Rabbi was painted towards the end of Mane-Katz' life in 1960.  Typical of his later work it is bright and colorful with a red-headed rabbi and a Torah cover of bright green. Rabbis, Torah covers and members of the Jewish community were primary subjects for M-K.  If, like me you've spent years with one of his paintings, you will see that the faces in The Rabbi are mirrored in many of M-K's work. Although, I must say, that I find the expressions in my painting to be particularly deep and meaningful.

Three years ago we moved twice in one summer and some how the rabbi never made it to our final destination. There is no way to truly replace the print. I can't go back to the Petit Palais gift shop. In fact, nobody can! It was a privately owned museum which closed after the owner died. The paintings are cared for by a trust which loans them to museums around the world. To date I can find no trace of my painting. I have searched for hours with little luck. M-K had a few favorite subjects, rabbis, students, Hasidic communities and Klezmer musicians. Every so often there is a still life of flowers or a bare breasted woman, but mostly it's Jewish men teaching, praying, worshipping or simply being, all of which makes this search more difficult. In the meantime though, I have come to have a deeper appreciation for this artist whose work clearly demonstrates his connections to Chagall, Picasso and others of his age. Again from Tepper's 2011 post in Jewish Ideas Daily.

The Rabbi, Emmanuel Mané-Katz

"Mané-Katz's connection to the Jewish world was based on more than nostalgia for a vanished past. He first visited the land of Israel in 1928, and returned often even while spending most of his adult life in Paris. During Israel's 1948-49 war of independence, he arrived with sixty of his paintings for an exhibition at the Tel Aviv museum; he was the fourth tourist formally to enter the newborn country.

"His love affair with Israel was officially consummated in 1958 when the city of Haifa offered him a modest villa perched on Mount Carmel overlooking the Mediterranean Sea, with the understanding that his works would be stored there after he passed away. He died suddenly four years later, in 1962. Today, the site is home to the Mané Katz museum." [A. Tepper] 

Today I emailed a used book store which has a museum catalog featuring the work of Mane-Katz. The Rabbi is the cover artwork and I am hoping it is of a size worth framing. On the other hand, if it is only as big as a snapshot, that might be okay as well. It would still remind me of the day with my mother; the lovely house that became a museum; and what it means for me to study the Hebrew Bible.

It was the Sabbath.

I am currently taking a class on Parables and Healing Stories.  This is my homework for the story of Jesus healing the man with the withered hand.

Can't stay up ALL Night!

The gift of the BE is twenty new friends. And most of them are blogging and emailing and chatting to beat the band right now. It's fifteen minutes past my bedtime and I don't want to go to sleep because I am afraid I'll miss something. (We call it "Family Reunion Syndrome" at my house.)

I said this in another spot, but it can't be said too often. When you have online friends they are wonderful. I have prayed for these folks. I've tried to cheer them and cheer for them. I've laughed and cried and sighed with them. But now they are no longer two dimensional. As I told Will Smama, the package got fuller. As a result, the things they have written over the last few days have been much deeper. Much truer. And I can feel the blogged hugs because I know what the real hugs feel like.

I can hear their laughs and their lovely voices. Such a blessing I had not imagined when I made my deposit six months ago.

But now I really should go to bed. Tomorrow is another day of work. And I do need to do some work. Although it will be hard not to check a few blogs in between the tasks of the day!

More About the Vagina Monologues

When Eve Ensler was developing "The Vagina Monologues" she started with hundreds of "Vagina Interviews". Women were asked a series of questions and the monologues came out of these varied and fascinating interviews. I have been thinking about the questions this past few weeks and decided I would dare to post my own answers.

• If your vagina got dressed what would it wear? A white cotton batiste nightgown, soft from several washings. It would be long and tailored like a man's shirt.


• If it could speak, what would it say? Whatever it wanted to say. Whenever it wanted to say it. Without fear. It's always been gutsier than I am.


• What does your vagina remind you of? "The Dinner Party" by Judy Chicago. The Emily Dickinson setting especially. It reminds me of the vagina and the vagina reminds me of it.


• What's special about your vagina? It's mine. They're all special. They're defining.


• What does it smell like? An October walk on the beach in Monterey.

If this prompts you to write your own thoughts, wonderful! If this is too much information, relax!

And Dorothy, we're not in Kansas anymore.

Friday Five: Signs of Hope, Signs of Spring

Sally posted these hope filled questions for the RGBP Friday Five.

1. Sign of hope? Tonight I was part of a group that performed "The Vagina Monologues." As we heard the challenge to end violence against women and girls in the next decade, I was filled with a sense of hope. Hope that perhaps this is possible. If not in whole, at least in part. I was delighted by this strong group of women who dared to speak such amazing words. And delighted by the response of the men and women who shared the evening with us.


2. An unexpected word of light in a dark place? A friend noticed something in me this week and said so... It's too long and complicated to explain the whole thing, but being noticed for a certain gift affirmed it... affirmed me... and it was a light for my day that I will hold onto for days to come.


3. A sign of spring? There are groovy little green things poking up from the ground in the churchyard. My favorites are on their way... tulips!


4. Challenging/ surprising? Being invited to participate in the Vagina Monologues was a surprising challenge. (I got to moan a la Grace Slick at one point in the evening.) I never tried out for plays in school. My dramatic performances have been mostly the kind that pastors take on during VBS. That and first person sermons. It was a challenge to speak vagina vocabulary tonight. And a surprise that I like wandering out of my box. I need to do more of that.


5. Share a hope for the coming week/month/year.... See number 4.

Bonus play... a piece of music/ poem guaranteed to cheer you? I have been listening to Cole Porter songs on my Ipod of late. Cheers me up every time.

Friday Five: The Water and The Word

In this Sunday's gospel Nicodemus asks Jesus, "How can anyone be born after having grown old? Can one enter a second time into the mother's womb and be born?" Poor old Nicodemus! He was so confused about the whole "water and Spirit" business of baptism. Maybe he was just tired, all that wandering around looking for Jesus in the middle of the night!

For today's five, I asked everyone to tell us about their baptismal experiences.

1. When and where were you baptized? Do you remember it? Know any interesting tidbits? I was baptized as a baby on January 1, 1961 in the church my parents belonged to before my dad was drafted into the army. They came home over the holidays and had me baptized. My sisters and I were all baptized at St. John Lutheran Church- but they are three different churches. This has made it more difficult for my mother to be sure whose momentos are whose.


2. What's the most unexpected thing you've ever witnessed at a baptism? While baptizing my nephew, he spit up. I've done a lot of baptisms but that had never happened before. Not wanting to create a fuss and wanting him to put "his best face forward" I took the baptismal napkin which was damp from drying his head and made a quick swipe across his face. I have wondered if my sister washed the napkin later or if that's just a part of his baptismal memento.


3. Does your congregation have any special traditions surrounding baptisms? The church we belong to currently has a lovely font up in the front of the chancel. When there is a baptism, a gentleman in the parish creates a wreath of greens and flowers that fits around the top of the font. It's really quite sweet.


4. Are you a godparent or baptismal sponsor? Have a story to tell? I am the godmother of Little Sister #2's daughter. She was very good at her baptism, but I cried more than I might have. The service was at the Easter Vigil during my second year at sem. I was having a real crisis of faith and the baptismal service really put me in touch with my fears and questions.


5. Do you have a favorite baptismal song or hymn? Why do I ask questions that I don't know the answers to! I really like "O Blessed Spring" by Susan Cherwien and Bob Farlee.

O blessed spring, where Word and sign
embrace us into Christ the Vine:
here Christ enjoins each one to be
a branch of this life-giving Tree.

Through summer heat of youthful years,
uncertain faith, rebellious tears,
sustained by Christ’s infusing rain,
the boughs will shout for joy again.

When autumn cools and youth is cold,
when limbs their heavy harvest hold,
then through us, warm, the Christ will move
with gifts of beauty, wisdom, love.

As winter comes, as winters must,
we breathe our last, return to dust;
still held in Christ, our souls take wing
and trust the promise of the spring.

Christ, holy Vine, Christ, living Tree,
be praised for this blest mystery:
that Word and water thus revive
and join us to your Tree of Life.

Text: Susan Palo Cherwien, b. 1953
©1993 Susan Palo Cherwien, admin. Augsburg Fortress

Duplication in any form prohibited without permission or valid license from copyright administrator.

Elvis has left the building!

Let me begin by saying that I am not making up any of this. It is too strange to be a fabrication!

In 1993, the Soda Chicky was only 6 weeks old. My family of origin had all arrived at the outskirts of St. Louis to celebrate the baptism of the Chick and her slightly older cousin. (Lil Sis #1's boy-child who is four months older.) We travelled one afternoon to Wright City, MO to have lunch at the Ruiz Castillo, home of some of the best green pork chili nachos you'll ever have. On the way to or from, Baby Sister noticed that there was possibly the tenth or eleventh wonder of the modern world in Wright City- The Elvis Is Alive Museum.

The people in the photo are not my relatives but they are standing at the place. We paid our money and went in. After all, it's not often one gets to see proof that the FBI, the CIA and Nixon were all in on some plot to fake the death of a rock and roll icon.

The museum was housed in a double wide trailer with an add on. It was hoaky, repetitive and silly. But this week the Associated Press actually reported that the museum was closing.

Bill Beeny, the 81-year-old proprietor of The Elvis is Alive Museum, said he has placed his Elvis Presley memorabilia on eBay in hopes that someone else will take up the cause. His collection includes photographs, books, FBI files, replicas of the Cadillac the King drove and of the casket and gravestone from his 1977 funeral, even a painted Elvis head.

Beeny, a self-described "western Kentucky hillbilly" Baptist minister who wound up in Missouri 50 years ago, is selling the contents of his roadside attraction, a transformed coin-operated laundry 55 miles west of St. Louis that he opened in 1990, to satisfy something else that drives him.

"I have a burden to help people," said Beeny, wearing the penciled dark mustache, long sideburns and slick black hair of an Elvis aficionado. "Someone else can run, will run, the museum. No one in the whole county is doing the job I intend to do."

Beeny wants to put his energy into serving the needy in rapidly growing Warren County by providing child care, senior services, a food pantry and counseling for the addicted.
Beeney said he'll miss Elvis, "but life has its changes. You have to let go."

He hopes someone will buy the collection and open a new museum dedicated to the theory that Elvis lives — although the look and feel of Beeny's place could be hard to duplicate.
Outside, a 16-foot sign of a rhinestone-belted Elvis holding a microphone dominates an otherwise humdrum small-town landscape. A replica of Elvis' old Cadillac that hasn't been started for years is parked out front.

Inside the small museum, signs in large, bold letters and exclamation points scream out, "FREE MUSEUM," "SEE FUNERAL ROOM," "10 REASONS WHY I BELIEVE ELVIS IS ALIVE!" and "DNA PROVES ELVIS IS ALIVE."

Visitors wind their way around a casket, complete with a mannequin that doesn't look anything like Elvis, hundreds of photographs and yellowed news clippings, and a poster of the famous photo of President Nixon and Presley from 1970.

Visitors can hear what is said to be a tape recording of Presley's voice, supposedly copied off a telephone answering machine six years after the funeral, as well as see piles of documents that Beeny said are FBI files proving Presley's involvement with federal authorities.
Beeny, who had been only a nominal fan of Elvis Presley, started to doubt his death when customers at Beeny's former 1950s Cafe in Wright City asked questions that couldn't be answered.

Beeny said he eventually showed that the tissue samples of Elvis he says he obtained from a Memphis doctor did not match samples he says were taken from the cadaver "purported to be Elvis." Beeny later wrote a book, "Elvis' DNA Proves He's Alive!"

He also claims Presley had good reason to disappear: He's in the federal Witness Protection Program for assistance he provided federal law enforcement authorities.

David Beckwith, a spokesman for Elvis Presley Enterprises, which manages Graceland, the King's estate and mansion in Memphis, Tenn., said the company has no comment.

So if you ever get to Wright City, Missouri- you can still stop at Ruiz Castillo and order the nachos. (They also make a great chile relleno.) But unfortunately, you won't be able to check out Bill Beeny's museum and his assertion that, Elvis is alive!

The May Day Flowers

There once was a little girl with big brown eyes. She had short brown hair which her mother called "a pixie cut." The little girl wasn't sure what a pixie was, but she dearly wished that her mother would let her have long hair. Long hair that you could curl and tie up with ribbons.

The little girl was four years old. She lived in a big white house at the top of Strawberry Hill Lane with her parents and two little sisters. Her littlest sister was only a baby, barely a month old. She was a very sweet baby who for now, was taking up quite a bit of her mother's time. The other sister was just turning two. She too had big brown eyes but she had lovely blonde hair that hung to her shoulders.

One Saturday, the girl with brown eyes went out in the yard to play. Her little sister went with her and together they chased about blowing the heads of dandelions. As they watched the clocks drift off in the breeze, the little girl began to wish there were other flowers in her yard. The day before she had learned all about May Day. The class had made little May baskets out of construction paper to hang on the doors of their friends. The teacher had said that sometimes people would also give flowers to their friends to celebrate the first of May. The little girl thought this sounded like a marvelous idea! She and her sister would pick a bunch of flowers for their mother. But where would they find them?

Mother had always said that the girls must stay inside their yard. They must stay inside the fence that surrounded the yard. The girls walked along the fence line hoping to find flowers on the edge of their yard. All of a sudden, they found an opening in the fence. The girl with the brown eyes couldn't remember seeing this opening before. She thought about this very carefully. Mother said to stay inside the fence, but they weren't going outside the fence, so this must be a doorway into another part of the yard that they had never seen before.

The older girl took her little sister's hand and through the opening they went. The little sister wasn't too certain that this was a good idea. But her big sister assured her that they were breaking no rules and as long as they stayed together, they would be fine.

As they went through the opening in the fence they passed through some trees into a clearing. There were flowers everywhere. A whole garden of flowers to pick and choose. As they walked through the garden they saw other houses that they couldn't remember seeing before, but on they went. After all, they were in their own backyard.

The two girls picked handfuls and handfuls of flowers. Red and pink and yellow- even blue. They tried to be careful and not cut the stems too short. This would never do for Mother's beautiful bouquet! When their arms were fairly laden with flowers, the two girls turned back to go home. They made their way back through the trees and the opening in the fence and hurriedly went to the back door.

They rapped on the door and beamed as their mother came to answer. "Happy May Day!" they shouted. Their mother looked stricken. "Where did you get those flowers from?"

"From the back yard," said the girl with the big brown eyes. Her little sister kept quiet, knowing that they were in some kind of trouble. And after all, she was just two years old and not expected to speak for the group.

"But we don't have flowers like that in our yard," said their mother. The girl explained about the opening in the fence and the marvelous gardens in the secret part of their yard. Her mother still didn't seem happy, which confused the girl because the flowers were so beautiful.

"Honey, that's not our yard. That's a gate that goes out of our yard into the neighbors' yards." The little girl was sure there must be some mistake. But Mother explained as she walked out to firmly shut the gate.

That Sunday, the flowers picked by the two little girl were placed on the altar at church. Mother said she wanted to share their beauty with the rest of their friends, but the little girl suspected there was more to the story.