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Entry: Brave New Britain Link: http://www.takimag.com/site/article/brave_new_britain#4017 Post contents: @ Mr Hoermann, who wrote: "Andy Capp and John Ball, what does your infantile diatribe against Lutheranism/Protestantism have to do with Mr.Miller’s article?" Ah. Mr Hoermann. First of all, let me reprise what our friend Adriana has often said, "THIS IS SUPPOSED TO BE FUNNY, YOU CHOWDERHEADS!" Now, that said, let me tell you: 1. I posted that bit from Garrison Keillor, about Lutheranism, BECAUSE I COME FROM THE SAME HERITAGE and I'm sharing a joke about it, TO SHARE WITH OTHERS OF MY GERMAN-AMERICAN LUTHERAN HERITAGE! (And/or with others who can get the joke.) Good God. Good God, do I have to spell it out? Here, I will: 2. I was born and raised in Pennsylvania's Upper Perkiomen Valley, where around 80 or 90 percent of my childhood friends were German-American Protestants, mostly descended from German religious dissidents of the 1700s. I was a Catholic (of recent English immigrant family), but in our Valley, the Catholics and Protestants all got along fine, BECAUSE of our old Pennsylvanian heritage of TOLERANCE, William Penn's Quaker Colony, where EVERYONE who simply acknowledged "God" was welcome. I remain deadly proud of this, to this day: My heritage from Old Pennsylvania, the Quaker colony where ALL monotheistic believers were welcome to live among each other in peace. My homeland, Pennsylvania, has the oldest Jewish cemetery in all America (Gratz cemetery, started in 1742, where several Jewish combat veterans of the American Revolution are buried.) And at 2nd and South Streets, in my Philadelphia, there is St Mary's Church, where a plaque says, "This is Holy Ground...here (at that ROMAN CATHOLIC Church!) in 1781, the captured flags of the British Army were laid at the altar." 3. As I was saying, I grew up in the Upper Perkiomen Valley, among friends and neighbours who were 90 percent descended from German Protestants who fled to Pennsylvania for refuge and sanctuary in the 1700s. THEY ARE MY PEOPLE! So don't you, or anyone, DARE insult them, or suggest that I would ever offend the people of my own native Valley. 4. And, SIR, Mr Hoermann, you spoke too soon. Because you didn't know, that I spent my first year of school - at Kindergarten - in a Lutheran Church. In my (Pennsylvanian) Valley's school district, in 1968, there was a logistical problem. Our local Lutheran Church (founded in the 1700s) volunteered to give its edifice for the public school's Kindergarten (children of around 4-6 years old) to go to school in. So, I spent my first year of school - in the PUBLIC school of our region, mind you - I spent it in the basement of our local Lutheran Church. Here is a photo of it. I spent my first year of school, in Kindergarten, 1968-1969, in this Lutheran Church in my Pennsylvanian Valley: http://www.jelc.org/images/JELC_Front_Facade_-_2_small.jpg ...and consequently, until I was around nine years old, I thought I was a "Lutheran." :-) :-) HA! HAHAHAHA! And so was my mother's father - Edwin Kaplin (1899-1965), my mother's father was also a Lutheran, the son of a converted Berlin Jew. And my mother was a Protestant until she married my English-Catholic father and she converted in name - but my German-Jewish mother always remained largely Protestant in spirit. SO, Mr Hoermann, please refrain from accusing me of making any (in your words) "infantile diatribe against Lutheranism." You jumped to premature conclusions there, my Friend. Funny thing is, that although I'm a nominal Catholic - and a 99 percent believing Catholic - a big part of me will always remain Protestant, for the sake of my belief in private conscience. The biggest part of me believes in a universal Church of Christ, in my Catholic way - yet another part of me will always have some reservations about Roman Catholic temporal authorities, and part of me will always agree with Martin Luther's divinely inspired words: "Hier stehe ich, ich kann nicht anders!" So. SO, Mr Hoermann, WHAT do you say to me NOW? HMMM? :-) (God bless you, Mr Hoermann, for provoking this continuing discussion in a Protestant way in which I, of all people, believe in...) Sent at: 2008 12 02