Saturday Sermon

One of the worst memories of my youth is that of being forced, in grade school, to watch films of children my age locked into what they called “iron lungs.” Those were machines that allowed children with polio to breath. Yes, to perform the simple act that allows us to breath. Invariably, after seeing such a film, my Sainted Mother would decide, after school, to subject us kids to a homemade test for polio. You had to lie on your back on the kitchen table and hang your head over the edge. You lowered it, waited, and then had to lift it. If you couldn’t, you might be headed for one of those machines that allowed you to breath.

Know what allows us to breathe without an iron lung? Green plants do the trick. Trees do the trick. Science-based physical transformation does the trick. I know of no peer-reviewed double-blind study that supports a thesis that “thoughts and prayers” will do the trick.

In the news, I read recently that a sizable section of our population is composed of Americans who “don’t believe in the scientific facts of global climate change.” Believe? Science is not something in which someone believes or doesn’t believe. Goodness gracious. Jump from a tall building and see if the Law of Gravity cares whether you believe in it or not.

When the last tree on earth is cut, as the last tree on Easter Island was, nature won’t care if we don’t believe in the scientific fact of photosynthesis, not even if we declare loudly that we believe in individual property rights more than we believed in survival.

When we start bringing back the iron lungs for children with polio, the disease won’t care that we claimed a right not to believe in the healing power of scientific facts.

Reading the news today, I can’t help believing that the major policy determinant emerging from the current American presidency is the desire to eradicate the memory of President Barack Obama in the manner of Egyptian kings defacing the statues of their predecessors. No matter how sound, or popular the existing policy may be, the goal will be, not to amend it, not to replace it with a sounder tool, not to ignore it, not to admit, however grudgingly, the efficacy of a rival’s work, but simply to end it. “I’ll show him,” sounds better as comic book dialogue than as political policy.

Back in olden days, national policy often changed as a result of thought, dialogue, compromise, and a public administration concept called “satisficing,” or finding a solution, perhaps not the best, but one that got the job done. Yes, sadly, national policy was once settled by means of a bloody civil war. We should all behave in such a rational manner that it is never again solved that way. The signs are not encouraging.

Nowadays, national policy is changed or established by an executive order by one man. Another man has ended dialogue between the two legislative bodies of government. One man in a foreign country controls a broad swath of our foreign policy. Another man in a foreign country controls parts of our free-election processes. One man leading a secret organization led, for many years before his death, our national government’s direction regarding our First Amendment right to exercise religious belief or non-belief as we choose. His successors still do.

I’m sure that there is a name for all of this, but I can’t put my thumb on it right now.

As another hurricane prepares to slam into our east coast, public systems based on science will determine the amount and extent of damage to our native soil. Whether one believes in science or not, transportation and communication systems based on science will be the sole determinant of life and death for many Americans.

Don’t bother asking Hurricane Dorian if it believes in science.

When Trump Tower is under water up to its second floor, the Atlantic Ocean won’t care that an American president didn’t believe in climate change. The National Geographic Society, owned by a Rupert Murdoch-controlled company that owns the 20th Century Fox movie studio, the Fox television network and Fox News Channel, made a prediction. The following photograph suggests, based on our current path, how America will look after the ravages of global warming take control.

A bit of irony that will comfort me until my last hours appears here. As you will notice, the little homesite near Pine Bluff, Arkansas, once purchased by my sharecropping parents will be more valuable than Mar-A-Lago.

“Fear and Loathing …” is a catchy phrase for a book title, but no way to run a country. As author Hunter S. Thompson said, though, “Buy the ticket, take the ride.” We bought the ticket, and now we are riding into oblivion in a country ruled by fear and loathing. What a shame.

           

“Buy the ticket, take the ride.” Tomorrow's children won't travel far in an iron lung.

Science eliminated these.
Disbelief in Science
will bring them back.