Читать книгу Be Still! - Gordon C. Stewart - Страница 6

by Eric Ringham News Editor, Minnesota Public Radio

In any newsroom, there’s a predictable pattern to the unfolding of a major story. First comes the initial, fragmentary report: a tsunami has struck, or there’s been a school shooting.

Then there’s a ghastly little pause, when it’s clear that this story is indeed one of those awful ones, but there’s a frustrating lack of material to publish. It can be a special problem for commentary and op-ed editors. That essay on France’s burkini ban that we were planning to publish will seem aggressively off-point in the days after a terrorist attack.

Fortunately for me, there’s been another dependable element of the pattern: the phone call from Gordon Stewart.

I couldn’t begin to guess how many times I’ve heard his calm, deliberative voice on the line: “Hello, Eric? Gordon Stewart calling. I’ve sent something to your inbox.”

That “something” would be an essay on exactly the topic of the hour—a nice, short (to an editor, “nice” and “short” are redundant) exploration of the moral aspect of the story. Sometimes he reaches into his personal history; sometimes he pointedly unpacks the fallacies that surround a public current event. The consistent characteristic of these essays is that he always addresses the moral or ethical element of an issue. If there is an angel in the room, he wrestles it.

I don’t think I’ve ever told him how comforting his calls have been to me. Yes, he’s a writer calling to pitch a commentary, but by the time the call has ended, I feel like a hospital patient who’s just received a visit from the chaplain. In a word, I feel better.

Gordon knows something about writing commentaries that many people of faith do not: that is, how to be inclusive in addressing an audience that may hold some other faith, or no faith at all. He writes from a Christian perspective, but not to a Christian perspective. He writes to everybody.

I’m a different kind of editor now, and it’s been a few years since I’ve been directly involved in publishing Gordon’s work. I miss reading his commentaries, which is why this collection is such a pleasure.

In Be Still! Departure from Collective Madness, Gordon demonstrates his ability to be both topical and versatile, both insightful and unconventional. He ponders the manatee’s knowledge of Disney World, the barbarity of beheadings (whether committed in the name of Allah or the Old Testament God), and the fate of a man just hours from his scheduled execution. He claims an affinity for John Lennon and admits his sympathy with Lennon’s song “Imagine.”

And there is much more, besides: the evils of Hitler, the remorse of a World War II Marine, gun control, the deaths of black men at the hands of police, hearing loss, the pleasures of solitude, and the demands made by cell phones.

He revisits his childhood and reflects on his own death. “Whatever lies on the other side of my years is beyond my mortal knowing,” he confesses. I imagine that on the day he reaches the other side, he’ll find a way to write about that, too.

This gentle, thoughtful writer deserves a wider audience, and I’m glad you’ve found him.

Eric Ringham

September 5, 2016