tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10326675.post225184330890498843..comments2024-02-15T03:32:25.686-05:00Comments on Preludium, Anglican and Episcopal futures: Of Commitments, great and small.Mark Harrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06871096746243771489noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10326675.post-75366280298926801942012-01-11T16:48:01.096-05:002012-01-11T16:48:01.096-05:00George Abbott White, Brookline, MA
Rev. John Croc...George Abbott White, Brookline, MA<br /><br />Rev. John Crocker, Jr<br /><br />Johnny Crocker was the Real Thing. Could anyone be so encouraging and direct, so devout and yet so open to the secular world? Hard as Yankee granite on "cheap grace," forgiveness was always at the ready.<br /><br />It was my good fortune to find Johnny in the late Sixties. Me a most uncertain graduate student from Michigan and "anxious Christian" in Robert Coles' apt phrase, I knew Johnny as one of the "Episcopal bus" Freedom Riders in 1961 and no sooner had I wandered through his MIT ministry door than he found me a space and - no questions asked - encouraged me to organize and write.<br /><br />Over the years with Johnny as prop and prod, gaunt as an Old Testament prophet and as driving as he must have been as Harvard's hockey captian, the "Technology and Culture" seminar of Mike Bloy and Scott Paradise finally included my extravagant and risky attempt at taking Simone Weil's measure. <br /><br />The accompanying Lecture Series was, well, lively. No matter, in fact for Johnny all the better, 'stir the place up a bit!' Dorothy Day couldn't make it but Weil's brother Andre could, Conor Cruise O'Brien showed up with the Secret Service in the wings (IRA well supported in Boston, you know), Staughton Lynd not exactly sweetness and light himself, and so it went. We even got a book out of it, and his son John III cross-registered in the course as well.<br /><br />It was all in a day's - or year's - work and if that work could include "discourse" with academic technocrats, "dialogue" with State Street money managers, "engagement" with the 1% -whom he also knew very well indeed - it also included long days and even longer nights with lesser fry - the confused, misunderstood, forgotten, alone.<br /><br />I still have the Pascal he "loaned" me from his MIT library but even more I keep the memory of the evening I came to him and told him my Father was gravely ill, and what should I do? 'Get on a plane," he urged, "he needs you, go to him as quickly as you can." I did what Johnny said; it was, as usual, good advice. God Bless.George Abbott Whitehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07972609052273371526noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10326675.post-60314747368062258092012-01-09T09:06:34.778-05:002012-01-09T09:06:34.778-05:00Johnny was rector at Trinity when I went there (19...Johnny was rector at Trinity when I went there (1982-1990) and was my sponsoring priest for ordination. His life and witness had a profound effect on how I understand the church's obligation to reach out to the world and get involved in those areas where oppression rules. Johnny, to me, is of the Paul Moore school of social activism. I am profoundly grateful for having my life's path cross with him and pray to carry on somehow in some small way his legacy (got pretty thwarted these past three years).Caminantehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16610142955176992982noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10326675.post-79795305335407097372012-01-02T18:34:15.821-05:002012-01-02T18:34:15.821-05:00Mazel Tov to Drew and Lisa! :-D
May John RIP.
Th...Mazel Tov to Drew and Lisa! :-D<br /><br />May John RIP.<br /><br />The RC's may have the "Ordinariate", but we have all the EXTRAORDINARY ex-RCs in TEC! God bless 'em!JCFnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10326675.post-57507405339927551142012-01-02T17:08:45.174-05:002012-01-02T17:08:45.174-05:00Jim...oops! Thanks for catching that. My bad. His ...Jim...oops! Thanks for catching that. My bad. His good.Mark Harrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06871096746243771489noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10326675.post-38128038409664066722012-01-02T13:06:44.548-05:002012-01-02T13:06:44.548-05:00Mark,
Chris Coons is our US Senator, not Represent...Mark,<br />Chris Coons is our US Senator, not Representative.<br />JimAnonymousnoreply@blogger.com