Glad Tidings

Packed houses in Pittsfield and Worcester were buoyed yesterday as the Presiding Bishop of this country’s Episcopal Church, Michael B. Curry, a.k.a. the Wedding Preacher since his sermon at the Royal wedding last May, celebrated the power of love. Read about the Pittsfield event here.

Bruce and I were all but oblivious to Henry and Meghan’s nuptials on our walk across Massachusetts last spring.* We rarely flipped on the TV sets in our motel rooms before heading out for supper.

We found Worcesterites relatively enlightened regarding “9/11” compared to other Bay Staters along Routes 6, 6A and 9 — not that the Telegram & Gazette, an alma mater of mine, gives in a thought to anything but the official accounts (more on that another day).

At one point yesterday in the ample sanctuary of the First United Methodist Church on Pittsfield’s Fenn Street, the Most Rev. Michael B. Curry referred to one of the late Jimi Hendrix’s mantras, that “when the power of love overcomes the love of power, then we shall know peace.” He was quick to note, however, that British Prime Minister William Gladstone said it first, roughly the same way, and that Gladstone’s assertion was founded on plenty of passages in the Bible.

Gladstone’s words popularized by Hendrix didn’t make it into Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations, but others worth remembering in the pursuit of 9/11 truth did.**

A fragment of the concluding hymn filling the Methodist church (after Curry had left for Worcester) lent itself to the same pursuit: ” … lead us to the truth that frees.”

The bishop’s overall message in Pittsfield and Worcester as at the wedding in May was that “love is the way, love is the only way.” Yesterday it included readings from Paul’s 2nd Letter to the Corinthians 5 and the Gospel According to John.

For audio/video of the Pittsfield event, click here. For the same at the Hanover Theater in Worcester, click here.

It may not be far-fetched to think that Curry, currently based in Manhattan, doesn’t swallow whole the government/media accounts of the September 2001 attacks.

— Mark

* between April 13 and May 14 to raise awareness about the impossibility of the government and media accounts of the mass murders of September 11, 2001

** “Justice delayed is justice denied.” (Attributed) “You cannot fight against the future. Time is on our side.” (1866) “I have always regarded [the United States] Constitution as the most remarkable work known to me in modern times to have been produced by modern intellect, at a single stroke (so to speak), in its application to political affairs.” (1887)