October | 2010 | Borrowing Bones

Manitoba autumn

Manitoba is not the Autumn Glory centre of the world, I’ll grant you that. It has to do with our particular climate, the kinds of trees that grow here, and so on. The “East” is definitely the place to be for spectacular oranges and reds in fall.

Still… we do have autumn and we do have much to enjoy and celebrate, and this year the season has been especially warm and lovely. Last Tuesday, since he had a day free between projects, and since I wanted to do some research/observation for the writing I’m working on, H. and I set off for a drive into the country, down to the Pembina Hills area, as far south and west as Manitou. The colours in the trees and also ditches were a treat for our eyes and spirits.

Even the ditches put on a show!

After lunch at the Kopper Kettle in Morden, a favourite local eatery it seems, we continued to Neubergthal, a village that is also a Canada heritage site because of the number of Mennonite house-barn structures it still contains. Here we viewed Himmelbleiw, an exhibition of Manitoba Mennonite heritage furniture and floor patterns. (Himmelbleiw is Low German for “heavenly blue, a colour used to paint walls and decorate furniture that expresses joy and hope.” – Catalogue)

We enjoyed seeing the cupboards, tables, cradles, clocks, toys, and floor patterns on display in the Friesen Housebarn Interpretative Centre. Nearly every item would have been useful in some way, but aesthetic appeal and satisfaction — through skill of construction, decorative detail, or colour — was added to functionality as well. I was especially taken by the floor patterns. From the late 1800s to the mid 1900s many Mennonite women painted the floors of their homes. (Note the samples in the catalogue page below.)

The Mennonites lived simply. Ostentation was not a community value. Nevertheless, they took opportunities to express artistry within the parameters of their lives.

It all made me think of Steve Bell’s yearning rendition of the Jim Croegaert song, “Why do we hunger for beauty?” It’s a rhetorical question. We love to look at “the leaves,” here today and gone tomorrow, and we paint chairs and floors, which will be worn by sitting and walking. We do hunger for beauty, so we seek it and create it.

There’s a video clip going around my friendship corner of Facebook, of Ellen DeGeneres responding — movingly, pleadingly — to the senseless death of Tyler Clementi, the Rutgers student who committed suicide after being “outed” as gay. Please watch it at the link above, if you haven’t already. (Sorry, I haven’t quite figured out how to add video to my blog.)

There’s nothing I could possibly add but Amen.

And yes, I know, I know…. many church groups, including my own, are still figuring out their “positions” on homosexuality. It could be argued that the debate itself contributes to an oppressive dynamic, but can we at least agree that whatever time that conversation takes gives us absolutely no excuse to put off a major overhaul of behaviour, or the urgency of teaching our children firm and unequivocal protocols of behaviour about difference? Being gay is not a crime — or a sin. Harassing, outing someone without their permission, bullying, is never — never! — okay. Figuring out who you are, as DeGeneres says, is hard enough (remember being a teen?) without the added cruelty of bullying — for any reason. And gay youth who wish to live with integrity, with authenticity, will eventually come to their own conclusions about how they do this. But it’s their timeline, no one else’s.

There are many other names and faces, other stories, that could be highlighted in reference to this “suicide epidemic,” people who attempt to escape for various reasons, but most certainly often because of the harassment.

William C. Trench has some pertinent words:

For years, those who oppose equal rights for gays and lesbians have said that they have nothing against the Tyler Clementi’s of the world, what they are against is “The Homosexual Agenda.” This tragic event brings that debate into sharp relief.

The “Homosexual Agenda” is precisely this: to create a society in which young men and women do not jump off of bridges in a desperate attempt to escape who they are, because society has told them in a thousand different ways that who they are is not acceptable.

We who are Christians must bear a special responsibility in this effort.

I hope you’ll also take the time to read Trench’s whole post here. I don’t have much more than Amen to add to it either. Except to wonder, in light of DeGeneres’ wake-up call, and Trench’s call for angels, whether we’re awake, and alert to our assignments.