As many of you know, Deacon John and I are just back from a 10-day trip to the Holy Land. Our primary focus was on all of the places we went and the biblical history that had unfolded all around us and even under our feet.

We also ate different foods there. Israel has a Mediterranean diet, a lot like Greek food, and they are kosher. I knew a little about the kosher diet, no pork or shell fish, but it was quite different to be immersed in it. For example, Jews may not eat dairy products at the same meal with meat. Dairy is fine, just not with meat. So, there is a general rule in Israel. Everywhere we went there was no dairy in the evening and there was no meat at breakfast. Not only no bacon, or ham or pork sausage, of course, but there was no meat at all at breakfast. We adapted, but we missed bacon. One of our group actually texted me a picture of frying bacon the morning after we returned.

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The first time I experienced the power of the Holy Spirit, I was just a kid, 13 or 14 years old. I was at the home of Bill and Joanie Yates. (This was years before he became a priest. Bill and Joanie were young teachers and leading the youth group at All Saints in Lakeland.)

A friend had invited me to their youth group’s Bible study where things were quite different. We dug into the Bible, of course. And we sang a lot. But the thing that was really different was the way we prayed. I was used to praying. My parents taught us to pray at meal times and before we went to sleep. We went to church regularly so I was used to the liturgy and we’d pray in Sunday school.

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Memorial Day means to remind us of over 1.3 million the men and women who died in defense of this country. What do we mean, then, by country? Certainly that means our geography including our states and territories. Certainly that means our people. And within our people, it is formed around ideas. The assumption is that if you are born here you’ll absorb those ideas in many ways, including schools. We hope. More about that in a moment.

It is very clear in the naturalization process where applicants for citizenship have to pass a civics test, which focuses on our founding documents: The Declaration of Independence and the Constitution with a special focus on the Bill of Rights. In other words, words.

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