Yesterday was blazing hot.  The sun felt like you were too close to that charcoal grill.  Yet my wife, the disciplined person that she is, prepared to embark on a lengthy walk in the neighborhood.  I offered to go along, and she said Ok.  She is serious about walking as a fitness regimen, while I am a dilettante. While walking I admired the varied landscaping treatments of the front yards.  Landscaping done mindfully is an art-form.   My interest was also captured by several yard signs prominently displayed with the intention of conveying a message to all who pass by.  Intrigued, I stopped long enough to take a photo of several signs.

The messages are stark, arresting, not just in terms of meaning, but also in graphic presentation.

Black Lives Matter.  For some, including the person who posted the sign, this is not a trite phrase, a throw-away line.  Do not all lives matter?  Why make a point of Black lives?  If those thoughts are triggered by hearing or seeing the assertion of the worth of black peoples lives, it is a cinch that you are compliant with soft core racism.  What could I possibly mean by that?  I could refer to the habit of hosting a black candidate for a job opening, particularly, acutely aware of the candidate’s language nuances and other mannerisms that mark him or her as “different” from the majority white community.  The conclusion:  this one is a poor fit.  Next candidate please.  Soft racism with knife-edged consequences.  If you cannot obtain work for decent pay, you will not experience a decent life, racial status notwithstanding.

The other sign,  a promo from one of the evangelical mega-churches in the area.  “Keep God Close, everyone else 6 ft away.”  This is a tongue in cheek attempt to remind the passerby that God is a resource for these times, a resource that is close at hand.  That is a generous, maybe overly kind interpretation of the intention behind the sign.  What is certainly true is the subtext: that the particular church mentioned in small print at the bottom, is the locale, the font of divine inspiration where the divine resource can be appropriated. (Remember the oracle at Delphi) This is my ungenerous, more realistic interpretation of the sign.  The tongue-in-cheek ironic language is so contemporary American.  It’s hip, cool, Christianity in our image, streamlined for efficiency.

I‘m finished.

Yesterday there was time enough to review some favorite passages in one of my notebooks.  I’d like to share some words from Cornel West with you.  Thinking about these words, I tended to some chicken on the grill, and enjoyed a can of Leinies Summer Shandy.  The Leinenkugel logo is my sign of choice.

Natural justice
is a symbol or expression of usefulness,
to prevent one person from harming
or being harmed by another.

There never was an absolute justice,
but only an agreement
made in reciprocal association…
providing against the infliction
or suffering of harm.

Justice is something useful
in mutual association.

Money magnifies the voices
of the few
and crowds out
the voices of the many.

To be human is to suffer,
to shudder in the face of life’s mysteries,
and to struggle with that mystery.
To be human is to learn
how to die,
to illusions,
to viewpoints that arrest
our development.

America is a hotel nation,
preoccupied with convenience
and superficiality.
As long as the lights are on 24×7
there is no need
to address the underside
of human existence.
We are addicted to stimulation,
titillation, shallow pleasures,
and have discarded
the search for depth.

How do we accent non-market values
in a market culture?

Free Market Fundamentalism:
     1. Free, unfettered markets are sacred.
     2. Corporations have magical powers of salvation
     3. Yielding obscene levels of wealth inequality
     4. Intensified class hostility and hatred

This fundamentalism puts a premium on activities of buying
and selling, consuming and taking, promoting and advertising,
and devalues community, compassion, and improvement
of general quality of life.

Quotations from Dr. Cornel West, political activist, social critic, author, and public intellectual. West is a Professor Emeritus of Princeton, and continues to teach occasionally.