Wearing it Out

As I reached to open the door of the northern Michigan 7-11 for Kathy, two young men came out, one of them holding the door open for us, wearing a black tee shirt in the warm afternoon. Their dark complexions at first made me think of the Chaldeans we’d left behind in these stores in Detroit. But then, as I turned to thank them for their courtesy, I saw that the tee shirt one of them was wearing was covered across the back with a rendering of Our Lady of Guadalupe. I watched them walk out of the store and down the sidewalk, engaged in comfortable chatter. It may as well have been a NASCAR tee shirt, or one emblazoned with “Detroit Tigers.”  I envied the casual gift of some Hispanic youth I’ve known, who can wear their religion on the outside without telling me I ought to join it. They seem to do it not because they think it’s good for me, but out of joy and honor and gladness that is so good for them.

I struggle with writing in this blog about faith sometimes, belief in God. I don’t want to turn readers off, turn them away by touching a scar left by an old wound, one inflicted by some crusader who once saw them as an infidel, a wrong-thinker, an outsider.  We got back in the car and on the radio was an NPR feature on a just proposed Belgian law that prevents the wearing of the niqab, for reasons of security and identity, since it shows only the eyes. The participants included a female government minister from Quebec, where even the much simpler hijab, which shows the entire face, is disallowed in the schools. Some feel that these restrictions are anti-Muslim.

A week after Easter, some Christians consider what it was like for the followers of the now crucified Jesus, as they struggled with believing his rising from the dead. They became torn between believers and non-believers. The language used in the stories of the time said that the believers “spoke boldly” about their risen Lord.  But the Tea Party movement and the Are You Saved zealots these days and so many others are indeed speaking boldly, and it seems to be doing the world more harm than good.  I recall the words that a priest friend had used that morning, facing the challenge of expressing our belief in a God of Love. He rejected ‘Speak boldly” as appropriate mandate in today’s divided world. “Live boldly” was his alternative advice. He suggested that we consider St. Francis, who said that while preaching the good news of a loving God constantly was our duty, to use words was optional.

I see the back of that Hispanic youth, so comfortably wearing that image of his Lady. He trusts, I suspect, that if we find her beautiful, we will make her ours too. He trusts the beauty of truth to speak without words, and for the good news to be spread not by tongues, but by hearts.

I prefer his quiet crusade, not a cross on the front of his armor, but beauty worn on the back of his tee shirt.

 FreeLemonadeStand by John J. Daniels is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.