When in Rome

Proofing galleys for the Letter to the Romans.

July 16, 2014

When in Rome . . .

My now former friend, Bill Tuttle, called this morning to ask me to teach his Sunday School class. I’ve done it twice before, and neither time did I tell him afterward how uncomfortable it made me; so, from his point of view, it was not an unreasonable request — except that the class is studying Romans. So, I declined. “You know, I can’t this week — sorry”; and that was a lie; I wasn’t sorry.

          It’s too late for me and Romans. I wouldn’t know where to begin; and I don’t want to know. I’ve had a pretty good life without Paul’s letter; so why begin something that can only give my spirit’s brain a headache and turn her stomach sour? I’m too old to drink until I’m hung over the next morning.

          But Romans is not a young man’s book any more than it’s an old man’s book. (Try to imagine The Apostle at a kegger with a brew in one hand and in the other an opinion about Naomi Watts vs. Rila Fukushima. And try to picture him at an old fart’s breakfast group, drinking coffee now and arguing Joe DiMaggio’s stats if he’d played under Eisenhower, Kennedy, and Johnson instead of Roosevelt and Truman. Paul would surely have much to say in either case, but who would be listening? — it would be too much. “Lighten up,” the young would say; and the old would say, “Lighten up.”)

          Romans is not for the young or old but for angry middle age. That can begin early for some, though it didn’t for me; and it can run late for some, though not for me either. So, with me the letter had a small window, and because Paul couldn’t lighten up — what he had to say was too damn important to lighten up — for me the window for Romans was narrow, and it was too fat to climb through it.

        r