theblessedmeathead

[theblessedmeathead]

The Greatest of These

Old City Jerusalem, 2024

I move up the ancient walkway covered in metal and plastic. Trying not to slip and stumble on the cobblestones covered in the early morning dew. I barely look up from my shoes. The presence of God follows me from the Western Wall, my first stop every morning when I am in the Holy City. After shoving scraps of papers scribed with loved ones' special needs into the cracks of the Western Wall, I lean on a huge stone worn smooth by time and pray amongst Jerusalem's holiest for each want. In reverence, I hope nobody heard me muttering the name of Jesus.

After my prayers, I sit in a white plastic yard chair and read and ponder the scriptures surrounded by Rabbis shrouded in righteousness. They worship Adonai in rhythmic reverence. Since my first time here in Jerusalem, I have read the Old Testament with different lenses. The prophecies of old jump the new fence and illuminate the fulfillment of our messianic salvation. A final prayer, and I slip through the growing crowd of the white-robed worshipers, reverently bowing to those I see every morning. 

Running past the public restrooms, I take the concrete stairs up to the entrance and exit right, heading to my second helping of God's grace at Christendom's holiest sanctuary. Closed store fronts line the desolate walkway. The vendors who are open begin to set up their small shops, selling everything from biblical souvenirs to the necessities of life. The majority of these stores survive on visitors looking for a piece of heaven to take home with them. Since October 7th of last year, the annual pilgrimages and spiritual tours to Jerusalem have dissipated to a trickle. Even though I stick out like a sore thumb, I smile and share Christ’s love with all I pass. This year my prayers are for the Lord’s love and peace to blanket the Holy Land.

I walk through a large chiseled stone arch and head down a wide path lined with an impregnable wall and a huge church courtyard. Passing the small police station, I enter the outer courtyard of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. I stop and stand there in awe, no one is here. Last year, the line of the faithful stretched from the large wooden doors through the courtyard, around the corner, and up the stairs. Now, only one door is open into the church. It feels spiritually eerie. I walk over to the door. Only one side is barely open. Removing my hat, I push open the door and peer in. Nobody is inside. Making the sign of the cross, I enter slowly. Every time I enter this church, I feel the same overwhelming emotion of thankfulness. 

Walking into the large room with tall ornate ceilings, the stone of the Unction lays feet from the door. I kneel at the revered stone that disciples for centuries believe the Lord’s body was laid upon and prepared for burial. I place my forehead on the surface; it is cool upon touch and wet from holy water. I breathe in hope and pray out my repetitions. Slowly rising, I take the stairs up to the upper chapel to the suspected place of Jesus' crucifixion. The marble stairs are worn and rounded from centuries of pilgrims climbing them. In the small chapel, gold icons surround glass panels that expose Golgotha's jagged rock. I slip under the altar, look at the stone, and kneel. Like the stairs, the marble is round and worn, surrounded by drops of dried salty tears on the grey floor. I contemplate Jesus’ sacrifice till another disciple shows up for their time with the Lord. I crawl out backward, bow, and slowly leave.

I walk back down the stairs, past the Unction stone, and cross into the large room covered in a magnificent dome. A large circular opening at the top lets light in. It feels like the eye of God is keeping watch. The immaculate Edicule built over the tomb rises to meet the Father. In front of the tomb is a small metal pedestrian barrier to keep people out until a priest shows up to monitor the daily pilgrims and tourists. There are only a few people in the big room. I nod to a couple of regulars that I met last year on my pilgrimage. Seeing no priests around, I go to the side prayer chapel at the end of the room. Small and bright, I sit in the back pew and read the Gospels. To sit yards from where Jesus was crucified, buried, and rose from the dead while consuming the scriptures of hope is a powerful ointment for my insecurities and doubts.

 A couple of people enter. I get up, walk out to the main room, and see the pedestrian barrier before the Edicule. A few tourists wander around, trying to look inconspicuous while emotionally overwhelmed. That is when I saw him. The older man was sitting in a bundle of clothing in the corner of the bench across from the entrance to Jesus' tomb. His shoes were worn down to the souls of his feet. I tried not to stare due to his horrible physical deformities, but his hunger for the Lord was addicting, making me jealous of my weak devotion. 

I sat on the opposite bench and prayed for God to give him every dream possible. His right arm was gone, and his left hand connected to a four-inch arm jutted out of his left shoulder. He held a small, tattered bible in his wrinkled hand and turned the pages with the few teeth he had left. Reading out loud, I could hear his Eastern European accent. After reading a few scriptures, he would worship and pray as if his life depended on it. I sat mesmerized, watching him as though my own life depended on it. Eventually, he stopped and sat there, looking up at the massive dome hole. An intense light blasted down from the dome, illuminating one of the walls of the church. 

Walking over slowly, I knelt in front of the man. He lowered his gaze from the heavens. 

"May I pray for you?" I asked the man. He looked up at the light and down at me. Warmth and love flowed from within this saint.

"Don't pray for me," he answered. "Pray for those who don't know Jesus yet." 

Scooting off the bench, he smiled at me and then shuffled toward the church's exit. I sat there for a while, ingesting the interaction. Looking at the entrance to Jesus’ tomb, it became an eternal moment that will last a lifetime. 

Ducking down I tiptoed into the Edicule, kneeling in front of Christ’s  tomb, my hands resting upon the stone of my salvation. 

“Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves,  not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.”  Philippians 2:3-4 NIV

[theblessedmeathead]

Summer of Love

Chicago, Illinois 1986

In the fall of 1986, my future wife walked through the front door and over my toxic muscularity. Cynthia's blonde hair, a dancer's toned body, and her movie star appeal instantly stole my heart. I was forever hers. 

Now, well into her second life term of marriage with me, Cynthia's stiff sentence of matrimony has been classified as an international crime by NATO. The Vatican recently announced they will canonize Cynthia before the Lord takes her home in a golden chariot. A biblical honor reserved for the upper crust of recognized Martyrs, Saints, and accomplished Bodybuilders.

I met Cynthia in a religious hippy commune in a gang-infested neighborhood on the north side of Chicago. The rundown building that I lived in with the other single brothers was missing most of its windows. At night, you walked by twos, avoiding certain street corners.

Cynthia was a spiritual tourist who dropped in to help for a bit and then left to get moving on with their lives. I was there hiding in the shadows from Pablo Escobar and myself.

The commune's primary outreach was to love Jesus and serve the homeless and discarded. Cynthia worked with the elderly, sharing God's love with those in need. My caveman I.Q. and prideful muscles had me quickly assigned to an outdoor work crew for the safety of the other community members. 

My backbreaking labor on the construction crews helped pay the bills for distributing God's charity. As a bonus, it burned off the extra pizza and hot dog calories that taunted us from every street corner of the city.

Jesus was my Lord back then, but Arnold Schwarzenegger wanted to be the king. To fight the muscular action film star, I lifted weights daily to build a more significant temple for the Lord to fill, though most disciples thought it was blasphemy to repeat that idea to new members. 

I lived in the commune's third-world gym every night after work with the other rocket scientists. Mopping five-hundred-degree tar all day in thermonuclear temperatures or pounding nails in the arctic winters was just a warmup for our lengthy weight-lifting sessions. 

Afterward, while hunting for protein and carbs, we would walk through the rundown neighborhood, spouting famous action film catchphrases in horrible Austrian accents. Occasionally, a homeless person or lone street gang member would answer the proper retort from the movie. We would all break down laughing. Earning each other's respect, we shook hands, traded names, and became street friends for life.

Believing it was time for Cynthia and me to begin our God-ordained journey into holy matrimony, I figured somebody better get the Lord's ball rolling. Hiding in the shadows of the commune's cluttered kitchen, I looked for the perfect romantic spot to talk with her.

Seeing Cynthia walking through the packed dining room wearing a bright green sweater and heavenly smile, I moved into place. She stopped to greet everybody along the way, which blew up my perfectly conceived plan. The seconds were ticking away, and I began to panic. God's window was closing.                                 

I followed Cynthia to the large dish rack in a tiny alcove. Striking up a conversation with her, I fumbled through some crazy small talk. Finally, working up the nerve, I asked if she'd like to hang out sometime.

She kindly replied, "It might not be a good idea." I asked if it was because of the strict relationship rules in the community.

"No, it's because all the protein in your diet goes to your biceps, leaving very little for your brain." Winking her eyes, then laughing, Cynthia picked a plate from the dish rack. Turning on a dancer's cue, she melted into the long dinner line of starving community members. 

Taken aback, I wondered how she had gotten her hands on my college entrance exams. I scanned the busy dining room filled with hungry disciples standing in line for mushroom gravy over butter-coated rice.

Who had sold me out? Was it somebody jealous of my bench press record?

Running out of the kitchen, I hightailed it down the dark alley. I tried to soothe the pain of Cynthia's rejection of God's will through a brutal upper body workout.

Decades later, I realized Cynthia was spot on. My biceps have always been bigger than my brain.

[theblessedmeathead]

The Saving Grace of Rocky

Grand Rapids, MI 1976

Growing up, the beat of Motown ruled our house, and they shared the living room radio and television with the Detroit Tigers baseball team. Like every other future Harvard-bound genius in my neighborhood, school was just a break from what really mattered, anything other than school.

Summers meant baseball, and after pitching all winter to my father in our basement, I was ready to hit the field. From dawn to dusk, the kids in my neighborhood played religiously in the ballfields next to the Catholic Church we all attended. During the late afternoon, the shadows from the church's tall spires covered the fields in God's hand of protection, helping us raise our game to a biblical level.

At night, I secretly listened to the Tiger games under my covers with the lights out, praying my parents wouldn't walk into my room. I lived under the rigid mantle of Irish Catholic discipline. Even an innocent sin of passion had a substantial emotional and physical price tag.

My penance usually ended with my mother glossing over the bogus penalty by bullying me into giving up my pain for the poor souls in purgatory. Kneeling on the hardwood floor, I dream about giving those spiritual slackers an earful when I find them cowering in the back alleys of heaven.

I was the skinny neighborhood kid with the rocket for a throwing arm and a flowing fountain of never-ending comedic sarcasm. Life was good unless I couldn't outrun the bully I had verbally pummeled. Good never lasts forever. Consequently, I was thrown an unhittable pitch during the first week of my summer vacation between seventh and eighth grade.

One minute, I'm standing in the University of Michigan's end zone, dreaming about scoring the winning touchdown, and a few hours later, I'm crumbled and broken at the bottom of a 50-foot sewer. Of course, my parents told me not to play down at the construction site. But who listens to their parents? As I lay on a sterile, cold mattress, the days turned to weeks floating by in morphine-induced dreams.

Returning to eighth grade with a huge cast covering my leg, I was the wounded warrior, emotionally surviving on handouts of fraudulent pity and penny candy. The concern and warmth lasted about three weeks, which made for a brutally long school year. After the doctor removed my cast, my few friends left me. Times are tough for those with significant physical struggles. You pay daily for the pain, both physically and emotionally. 

The summer before my first year in High School, my father received a company promotion. We moved within a few weeks before my first year in high school to West Michigan: the land of empty fields, blond hair, and low IQs. On the first day of school, my mom dropped me off in front of a crowd of incredible-looking people I would never know. I opened the car door, exited the front seat, and limped through the preppy crowd.

Within weeks I was given the nickname "The Cripple" I kept my head low, shuffling down the crowded hallways avoiding any eye contact. Even my golden mouth didn't bring the guaranteed laughs like the old home crowd. It cost me humiliating taunts, public beatings, and visits to the nurse's office. 

My classmate Matt, a professional bully, lived on the end of our street. He took the burden upon himself to make sure I didn't arrive home from school without a public humiliation or a new contusion on my skinny frame. Typically, the beating came right in front of my house. The school bus stopped, the doors opened, and all the other kids ran from the bully torture.

Running past me, looks of pity and "better you than me" were all I ever received from them. There was no escape. I wouldn't fight back; I was too scared. I have always hated myself for not fighting back. My only solace was that I could take an ass-kicking like a champ and survive till my mom would run out of the house and rescue me again. The next day, the "mommy's boy" stigma had its own penalties at lunchtime.

In 1976, the year of running from bloody noses, a little-known movie called Rocky was eating up the box office, changing attitudes and transforming lives. The day after it won the Oscar for Best Picture, my mother rescued me again and took me to see the movie at the first matinee during school. The peace of mind of being safe during school hours was a vacation.

The movie touched me where it counts. I didn't want the credits to end. On the way home from the theater, I used "Yo" in every sentence until my mom told me to knock it off before my lips would freeze like that. When I arrived home, I cut my fingers off my black leather gloves. The booming soundtrack in my head told me to get up and go for a run. 

Seconds later, I was out the door in street shoes and trying to run with a spastic gait, my leg dragged behind me, but I didn't care. The film's soundtrack pounded in my head, giving the classic fight songs a 3-D stereo effect decades before surround sound became vogue. I wanted to kick Matt's ass for how he made me feel. The film's vibe moved me to push myself, to endure the fire burning in my lungs, screaming the theme song's lyrics: "Gonna' fly now"! I am the heavyweight champ of the world. I round the block in a feeble, sweat-drenched shuffle. 

Shit! I stop in my tracks. The school bus takes off down the road; kids run for cover. Matt and his surly group stand there with toothpicks precariously dangling from their lips. I look around. There isn't any other social outcast insight to take the beating. I am the sacrifice of the day. 

I hear the order, and I walk to the position. I had no urge to fight; not even the mental still frame of "Yo Adrian" could move me to do it. I have failed Sylvester Stallone. Matt’s crew grins at the easy workout their fists would get on my face. They circled, and I tensed my stomach.

"Why did you cut your gloves like that," Matt asked. My answer fell to the ground,

"I don't know?" I look down. It hurts less that way. 

"You see that movie, Rocky?" Matt asked me point blank, barely three inches from my forehead.

"Yea," I mumbled.

"You like it?" Matt directly asked me. "Yes," I answered. 

"Cool," Matt mutters. He motions for his thugs to join him as he walks down the windy street whistling.

"Yo ADRIAN!"

[theblessedmeathead]

The First Step

San Gabriel Mission, Ash Wednesday - 2025

The rain finally stopped. The long line of vehicles pulling into the church's parking lot stretches tediously around the block, and for once, I don't care. I struggle in traffic. Waking up every day, I ask the Lord only to allow thoughts of life to enter my mind and let all words that leave my lips be of love and kindness. Then I get in my car, and within a few city blocks, the snarl of traffic makes me want to kill every m**********r on the road. Today, though, I graciously allow all cars to pass with a warm smile. Today, we are all sinners racing through the full parking lot to our promised forgiveness. 

Entering the church built with a Danish, 1960s feel, single parishioners and families of all races stuff the hardwood, yellowing varnished pews. From the back of the church up to the iconic altar, the faithful kneel in fervent prayer. Working my way up towards the front, I see an empty end of a pew calling my name. I silence my phone. Lowering the worn kneeler, I take the hallowed position, gazing at the vast iconic image of Christ on the cross hanging over the altar. Jesus’ visual sacrifice tugs at each disciple's soul. 

Over the last few years, I have slipped away from my obligatory weekly church attendance due to an unforgiving work schedule and age-related laziness. Excuses abound, but I try not to use the same lame one on a weekly basis. But today is Ash Wednesday, and it is a must for me to attend church. Growing up under my grandmother's Irish Catholic motto of: "play, and you will pay" theology, repentance was a daily exercise.

Sitting and waiting for the mass to start, I relish in the pomp and reverence associated with the Catholic Church's holy days. It reminds me of shuffling through the stone-lined back alleys in Rome and the Old City of Jerusalem, where churches sit on every corner, open all day and night for the saints to enter and worship their God, on their time. 

The bell rings to signal the start of the service. I struggle to figure out when to sit, stand, and kneel in sync with the other disciplined parishioners. The gregariously amusing priest with an East Coast accent finally stands to deliver his homily. He explains that Ash Wednesday is the busiest day in the Catholic Church, even busier than both Christmas and Easter. 

He then proclaims, "Welcome back!"

We all chuckled and laughed, lighting the fuse for his next punchline, wonderfully sugarcoating the spiritual truth we painfully needed to swallow for daily victory. I quickly make a long list of addictive vices to eradicate for the forty days of Lent, and also for the last forty-five years. The priest carries on his act, joke after self-deprecating joke. Then I peel away his facade. It's not only about what you give up for Lent, but what you add to your life spiritually to bless others.

The next Wednesday, I return to the near-empty church for the noon service. I see the daily warriors fighting for their loved one's souls. Kneeling, I am thankful for the Lord's grace as I repent for quickly vacating my Lenten list of enticing sins. Looking around, then up to the cross, I am forgiven. At least, till my next slaughter on the drive home.