On Doubt as a sign of Faith

 

 

 

I doubt;
Therefore I believe.

Dubito;
Propterea credo.

Steven L. Bassett
{a word play on René Descartes}

To Behold my Mother

Things I have never seen my mom do.

run a dishwasher

do a load of laundry

console her mother

embrace her father

consume alcohol

smoke a cigarette

save money

be free of debt

nurse her child,

abandon the same

approach death four times,

to deliver a child

lose a fifth before birth.

leave a friend,

 stranded

work a day,
without pain

rest her soul through the night
at peace with her past mistakes

break a promise,

tell a lie

read the bible,

bear a testimony,

talk of christ,

rejoice of christ,

teach of christ,

fail to support a son,
on a  mission

take the sacrament

at home
in her final years

Steven Lynn Bassett
        

On differing perceptions of death

By my grandfather's bed, my mother is reading,

Psalm 62, God is our refuge,

My grandfather stirs, could it be,

He is waking, one final time,

He has something to say,

If you only knew what lies awaiting

If you could only see what I can see

If you could only hear the music playing

The angels singing sweet victory

Oh, if you only knew, if you only knew,

How much he loves you

By my grandfather's bed, my mother is broken,

Psalm 17, O God I call on you,

She doesn't want to hear

Any words about leaving

My grandfather says

"Fear not, this is my time,

And into his presence I'll fly"

If you only knew what lies awainting

If you could only see what I can see

If you could only hear the music playing

The angels singing sweet victory

Oh, if you only knew, if you only knew,

How much he loves you

(Randy Travis , If You Only Knew)

On the Direction of Another One's Vice

A thousand ways, is there no black or white?
Ask your own heart, and nothing is so plain;

'Tis to mistake them, costs the time and pain.
Vice is a monster of so frightful mien*,
As, to be hated,
    needs but to be seen;

Yet seen too oft, familiar with her face,

We first endure,
    then pity,
        then embrace.

But where th’ extreme of vice, was ne’er agreed:

 




Ask where’s the north?
    at York, ’tis on the Tweed;
    In Scotland, at the Orcades;
and there,

    At Greenland, Zembla,
        or the Lord knows where.

 

 
No creature owns it in the first degree,
But thinks his neighbour farther gone than he;
Even those who dwell beneath its very zone,
Or never feel the rage, or never own;
What happier nations shrink at with affright,
The hard inhabitant contends is right.

Alexander Pope, An Essay on Man

*Definition of MIEN

1: air or bearing especially as expressive of attitude or personality
: demeanor <of aristocratic mien>