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Calvary
Episcopal Church
Memphis, Tennessee
THE CHRONICLE
March 30, 2003
Volume 48, No. 13
Father Knows Best
I write this on the eve of war. A wise person told me today that another
wise
person had told him that everything anyone wrote about the world situation
before 9/11 seems naïve now, and so I write this knowing that the
world may
be very different when you read it.
When
I was in the insurance business, I used a brochure that I have never
forgotten. It was laminated and colorful and it explained in simple, everyday
terms why a man with a family needs life insurance.
The
page I remember best is the one that shows the man, the father, the head
of the family, sitting in his easy chair with his wife and three children
gathered
around him, mostly at his feet. And I remember clearly the words on that
page:
"Every problem of theirs can be solved by you from the throne of
your easy
chair." That was the early sixties and that didn't sound weird at
all.
Of
course we had a TV show in those years, the name of which is the title
of
this piece, in which the same cultural norm was played out, with the father
(Robert Young) knowing best what was best for everyone in the family.
I
must confess that I have, up to this point, thought that President Bush
was
being a bit that way, with millions of everyday folks and some of our
closest
allies advising that we wait another month or so before going into Iraq.
I have
felt that he was being kind of "Father knows best." So I hope
to God that the
President has reason and data, that we don't have, that make this war
absolutely necessary.
Let's
remember that there is another Father who knows best of all, and that
one of God's favorite things is peace, peace on earth, an end to suffering.
Let us
pray that we do successfully what we must, and that peace comes soon,
and,
with God's Grace, permanently.
Bill Kolb+
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