Clothed in a Naked World

Today I was kind of in limbo in my Saturday morning novel reading routine. (I get up in the mid to late morning, get something to drink, and then settle back under the covers until early afternoon with a good book.) So, I decided to attack some of my short stories. In particular I read selections from "Stained Glass Elegies" by Shushako Endo, and "Whore's Child" by Russo. In particular one story stood out to me as a picture of the church. The story was called "Bouyancy" (sp). It was about a recently retired couple who went to some Island resort for a vacation.

The couple went to a beach, and had a good section to themselves. On one end far away they seemed all to themselves, with the nudists barely visible further on. They went swimming, and were having a good time. At one point they were in a semi-secluded spot, and in an act of daring took off their clothes.

The man falls asleep, wakes up, and realizes that his wife is gone, he is sunburned, and the nudist group has moved closer to where he was at.

He wakes up, in a panic is worried about his wife, and starts wandering around and over exerts himself to the point of near collapse. He puts on his swimtrunks and starts looking everywhere, and evenutally ends up lost himself. There is this wonderful picture in this story of a man frantically wandering through a crowd of naked people clothed, drawing the contempt of all the world around him, saying things in anger and frezy that they do not understand. When he gets help and his wife finally finds him, he snaps at his wife for being naked too, even though he is half delirious.

A wounded man walking clothed in a naked world. I could think of no better picture of what the church looks like today. Expecting the world to play by its more traditional rules. Blurting things at people that he comprehends, but they do not quite understand. Yelling at the ones that seek to understand and connect with the people and environment that they are in. The church is truly a clothed man in a nudist world.