Where's a Preacher When

You Need One

From Uncle Vellanoff's Journal

(Editor’s note:  After reading some of Uncle Vellanoff’s journal, I’ve concluded that he was a believer in God, but had a somewhat cavalier attitude toward organized religion. He saw the humor in some of the practices of people who claimed to be “religious.” I present the following entry from his journal feeling sure he would not have meant to offend anyone.)

Another experience that I had when we were playing in Madison, Wisconsin: several of us were invited to the house of an admiring farm couple of some means. These folks had seen the show several times and had brought the kids to an afternoon matinee the day before.

The excuse for the invitation was Sunday dinner, few of which we passed up as we were staying in Mrs. Olsen’s boarding house at the time and the food there was - - well, we were glad for the invite. When dinner was ready we were all asked to gather around the table. There were the two adult hosts, their three kids, and us three actors, one of which was our leading lady.

I suppose that you have noticed that anytime there is a meal anyplace close to where a preacher is present, that same preacher is asked to pronounce the blessing on and give thanks for the upcoming meal. (No pun intended.) The giving thanks part, at that early point in the proceedings, always seemed a little premature to me, but who am I to know about these ecclesiastical things.

These folks, not having a preacher handy, fell back on the next best thing, that being one of us three actors. Why folks always confuse a person’s being able to quote twenty-five straight minutes of Shakespeare with his closeness to God is something I don’t understand, but it happens every time. As the other male actor was somewhat in his cups already that day, and of course the female actor could not be trusted to approach the Deity with so serious a matter, (she was wearing makeup), they fell upon me with their request to do the formalities.

When you’re sitting at someone else’s table that is loaded down with a roast turkey and all manner of other stuff, it is hard to refuse such an appeal. When I acquiesced, I thought I heard a low moan from the three kids. They might have been remembering the twenty-five minutes of Shakespeare. I’m sure you’re wondering where someone with my limited English came up with the word “acquiesced?” Well, one day - - you’re not? Okay, but it was a good story, still is! Maybe another time.

My mind raced back to the blessing/thanks that I had heard given just the previous Sunday and I quickly decided to use what I could remember from it. It started with, and I’m just hitting the high spots here: “Dear Lord and Creator of all mankind. Thou who created all the earth with it’s bountiful harvest of all good things and Thou who watches over all Thy creatures,” with the possible exception of the turkey present and “Thou who resides above the starry skies and has the working of the universe in the palm of Thy hands.” Well, I figured that the addressee already knew His address and job description and I wasn’t sure that he would want to be reminded about what he had started here on this planet, so I just pulled out the part I felt comfortable using which was, “Lord.” My mind raced on, trying to remember more -- “we so humbly bow before they throne on this blessed Sunday, in the home of these beloved friends, with our hearts overflowing with thankfulness for all the bountiful goodness that Thou hast bestowed upon us, Thy humble servants.” I started to go with the humble thing as it seemed to be pretty prominent. But as I thought about it I knew that knowing what I did about the three of us, and not knowing any more than I did about the five of them, the humble thing was probably stretching it pretty thin, so I passed on that thought. “Beloved friends” was a stretch to be sure, as we didn’t yet know how good a cook this gal was, so I discarded that thought.

The thankfulness theme did seem to have some merit so I said, “Thank you.” Under the pressure more and more was coming back to me. “Lord, we know that thou art the one who brings us the rain, and that Thou art the one that makes the seeds send up their tender green shoots, reaching toward Thy warm life-giving sunshine, and that Thou art the one who gave these children of Thine the strength to take the copious results of Thy blessings and prepare this magnificent repast on this Thy holy Sabbath day.” Just in time I remembered that only last spring this same farmer had his bottom forty flooded by too much rain which carried fifteen of his prize cows over into the next state, so decided not to remind him that the Lord had been involved in that small miscalculation. As for the sunshine, it was easy for me to rationalize that the Lord was just trying to make up for the rain thing, but the current drought had all the locals in a mutinous mood, so I left that out. And again, I thought “copious results” and “Magnificent repast” to be just a tad premature, as we had not actually put a fork to what was before us. The thing about the “holy Sabbath day” I wouldn’t touch with an eight-meter pole, as we used to say in Russia.

By the way, that saying has an interesting history behind it that started when - - but back to this other thing.

I had been around enough to know that there was some difference of opinion about which was the holy Sabbath day, so was not about to offend anybody, especially the one who established the Sabbath, by getting onto a religious topic. Well, again, that left me with very little so I just said, “For the food.” My mind flashed over and discarded another ten minutes of those previous prayers which had covered such topics as missionaries, including headhunters in particular. (why they always seemed to get honorable mention I’ve never figured out, especially when they seemed to be eating better than the rest of us did on some of these Sunday invitations.) Also covered were government leaders, local sinners, and the shortcomings of the pastor, and elders, some of which also were mentioned in with the local sinners. Having nothing more to draw on or wanting to say, to the One I was addressing, about being thankful for the food, I closed with a resounding “Amen!”

My prayer had taken about five seconds, including the pauses for effect, so caught everybody off guard. The children seemed delighted to think that they were about to get to taste something different for a Sunday dinner, mainly anything hot. The husband came in with a belated and sort of weak, “Amen,” and the wife shot me a glance that said I was definitely not religious, a poor example for her children, and someone who would be on the list for prayer meeting, if not to pray for, at least to talk about.