Three Beautiful Things 01/12/14: Her Gratitude Choked Me Up, Christian Existentialist, Pork Bun Tacos at Agate Alley's Laboratory

1. As the lector for the 11:00 service, I got to read Isaiah 42: 1-9, a majestic passage.  During the passing of the peace, the woman in front of me thanked me extensively for my reading, explaining that she had accidentally left her hearing aid at home and that she could hear every word I read clearly and she loved my inflections.  I don't know if she could tell her words were creating a huge catch in my throat.  I was ready to cry, her gratitude touched me so deeply.  I didn't cry, but my voice quivered when I thanked her for telling me what she did.  Peace of the Lord, indeed.
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2.  LeeAnn and I met about forty minutes before we began our the first of our four classes in a four week course on Christianity and existentialism.  We are presenting this course under the huge title, "Living Profoundly".  Our meeting went very well and so did this afternoon's class, as we each told the class our personal experiences with existentialism, how this way of seeing the world had come to mean so much to us, and how existentialism is always present in the living out of our Christian practice, in our experience as Christians.  I've taught existentialism for years in courses at LCC.  It's always been, and rightly so, a secular discussion.  It was deeply satisfying to me to have discussion with fellow parishioners about the world's absurdity and the experiences of estrangement and alienation and the terrible responsibility we have to make meaning in life in a Christian context.  LeeAnn had so aptly quoted Pascal in her presentation:  "The heart has its reasons, of which reason knows nothing."  Yes.  In many ways, I would say reason knows little about my life as a Christian existentialist.

3.  The Deke had been there once, but I had never been to the Agate Alley's Laboratory.  For dinner, I had Pork Bun Tacos which combined Korean pork belly, shaved cabbage, sesame vinaigrette, cilantro, lime and wasabi crème fraîche on dim sum tortillas.  I didn't want my dinner to end.  I loved every bite.  I also found the restaurant's concept kind of fun:  my margarita and my Moscow mule were both served in facsimiles of a chemist's beaker.  Ha!