Blog 577 – 03.20.2017

My Uncle, The Druid

I remember that my dad’s side of the family, the White(s)and the Underwood(s), for many years held an annual family reunion on a weekend in the summer at East Lake Park in Chattanooga, Tennessee. I was privileged to be in Tennessee with my second wife for one of those gatherings. My dad’s family was pretty much equally divided between the Baptist and the Pentecostal persuasions of Christianity. From about the age of ten years old my mom took me and my brother to Sunday school at a Church of God (not Pentecostal or tongues) within walking distance of where we lived.) My dad was a Baptist who rarely attended church services. My mother, brother, and I were the odd ones out in the family mix or at least I thought we were till my Uncle Joe was questioned about his own religious beliefs. You see these White/Underwood reunions were always a battle royal between the the Baptists and the Pentecostals who argued their differing views quite strongly. My Uncle Joe, who lived in far away Houston, Texas had flown in and rented a car to attend this particular reunion.

After a few opening volleys back and forth someone said to my uncle, “And what are you, Joe.” And without blinking or hesitating he replied, “I am a Druid.” None of my dad’s family knew what a Druid was so they just nodded and said, “That’s nice.” I smiled thinking that I had gotten the joke. You see I had already learned from my dad that the best and easiest way to end a conversation with people trying to sell their angle on God or to increase their church’s membership is just to say you are a member of a church, sort of like saying, “I already have a favorite charity or I gave at the office” to someone collecting for their favorite charity.

I later looked into what Druids believe and realized that my uncle might not have been joking after all. I have studied different religions most of my life but it is quite a different matter to look at another religion with an open mind and not with the usual bias that my religion is “the one true religion” and all others inferior or some form of paganism or apostasy.  I challenge you to get online and read what Druids believe with an open mind and at the same time to honestly consider some of the great misdeeds that have been committed in the name of religions, perhaps even yours, in the past.

I did that again just this morning and, Uncle Joe, I think maybe the religion that best describes my current belief is, you guessed it, Druid. Who knew? I have known for a long time that like Jesus says to Mac in the recent movie, The Shack, “Mac, as you can see I am not really a Christian.” But I really could not think of one word that describes my belief that God is all in all, that God is Love, and wants His/Her children to be tolerant, respectfully, and loving to one another. Druids profess all those things so my brilliant and fast thinking Uncle was way more on the mark that just being funny with his reply to the question, “And Joe what are you.” To my Uncle, The Druid, I say, “Me too.”

I love the song Walking In Memphis especially the verse:

“Muriel plays piano every Friday at the Hollywood
And they brought me down to see her and ask me if I would
Do a little number so I sang with all my might
She said, “Tell me are you a Christian, Child?”
And I said, “Ma’am, I am tonight.”

Your friend and fellow traveler,
David White