5 Years Later: PSA Zero

It has now been five years since my surgery for prostate cancer. At my latest check-up, my PSA (that stands for "prostate-specific antigen," and not "public service announcement;" or the Cursillo's "piety, study, action;" or our still-missed Pacific Southwest Airlines) level was still an undedectable less than .1. So, no change since my last report a year ago. And once again (and, I pray, the rest of my life), my urologist say, "See you in a year!"

Praise the Lord!

A Lockheed L-1011 TriStar in smiling PSA livery,
from when flying was fun.

It's Been Four Years

It's now been four years since my prostatectomy, and today was my checkup. My PSA (prostate-specific antigen, that is, not "public service announcement" or the dearly-missed Pacific Southwest Airlines) is still less than .1. So, no change since my last report 6 months ago. Even better, with no sign of cancer my urologist says now I can go a full year before my next check up. Praise the Lord!

A Lockheed L-1011 TriStar in PSA livery, from when flying was fun.

Curing Breast Cancer or Keeping Abortion?

Yesterday I "shared" a cartoon on my Facebook page got lots of "likes" and positive comments. It showed a funeral chapel with lots of empty chairs and a woman whispering to the man next to her, "He had over 2,000 Facebook friends. I was expecting a bigger turnout." I can't recall that last time I got this much response.

Today I "liked" "Komen Get It", today's "Best of the Web" by James Taranto over at the Wall Street Journal's WSJ.com [tip o' the hat to my Facebook friend, Pr. Rich Heinz]. I expect this one will not get so positive a response, but it's worth reading anyway. Taranto begins:

Susan G. Komen for the Cure actually is what Planned Parenthood advertises itself as being: a charity whose main concern is women's health. Komen was founded in 1982 by Nancy Brinker and is named for her sister, who died of breast cancer two years earlier. Until this week, it was probably best known for its fund-raising runs and walks known as Race for the Cure.

Now Komen has provoked the fury of Planned Parenthood, whose self-description as a women's health organization is at best tendentious. In truth, Planned Parenthood is America's leading provider of, and one of its most zealous advocates for, elective abortion. It is also a recipient of government largess; federal funds it receives are not supposed to pay for abortions, but they make it a political lightning rod all the same. And it is one of the most powerful interest groups in the Democratic Party. In last spring's budget deal, funding for Planned Parenthood was the one subject on which President Obama refused to compromise.

Taranto has more to say, then concludes,

Planned Parenthood's bitter campaign against Komen--aided by left-liberal activists and media--is analogous to a protection racket: Nice charity you've got there. It'd be a shame if anything happened to it. The message to other Planned Parenthood donors is that if they don't play nice and keep coughing up the cash, they'll get the Komen treatment.

There's one crucial difference, however. In a real-life protection racket, the victim never pays voluntarily. The threat is present from the get-go. By contrast, Komen presumably was not under any duress when it made its grants--and it could have avoided all this nasty publicity by never dealing with Planned Parenthood in the first place.

Thus smart prospective donors--especially ones that are apolitical, like Komen--are getting the message that supporting Planned Parenthood is a trap. Give once, and you will give again--or else you will pay.

Following the Komen-PP controversy of the last couple of days -- the mass media are either actually or playing ignorant of just how controversial that relationship has been for years -- I keep thinking of this past Sunday's Gospel (St. Mark 1:21-28), which begins:

²¹And they went into Capernaum, and immediately on the Sabbath he entered the synagogue and was teaching. ²²And they were astonished at his teaching, for he taught them as one who had authority, and not as the scribes. ²³And immediately there was in their synagogue a man with an unclean spirit. And he cried out, ²⁴"What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have you come to destroy us? I know who you are—the Holy One of God."

That's the thing about the Devil. He'll say anything to entrap you in his lies and deception; he'll even say the truth or do good works, when he can say it in a way to lead you away from the truth and good. And that's been my experience with Planned Parenthood, both nationally and locally here in Peoria; they will say and do anything -- even very good things -- as long as it profits and protects the abortion business. Threaten that, and watch out.

Thomas Peters, who blogs as the American Papist over at CatholicVote offered this comment just a little while ago to reports this morning that "Komen caved" in to the PP blitz. "No, they didn’t," he begins.

I’ve received a crash-course education in the foundation over the past couple days and I can say without doubt that one thing motivates their President Nancy Brinker: ending breast cancer. That’s why she decided to cease funding Planned Parenthood, because they are about the lousiest group to help if you are serious about ending breast cancer. Second, that’s why their President is worried about the damage to the Komen brand being done by Planned Parenthood and it’s pro-abortion allies. President Brinker knows if Komen is weakened it will be less able to pursue it’s objective of ending breast cancer. She’s not throwing pro-lifers under the bus, she’s trying to save an organization she built to honor the memory of her sister (who died from breast cancer) and prevent it happening to others.

That’s why we need to make common cause with Komen and support their pro-woman goals. That’s why we need to expose Planned Parenthood’s scurrilous move to destroy Komen.

I mean, just pause for a moment: if Planned Parenthood is so serious about protecting women’s health how does it justify leading a crusade to destroy the world’s leading breast cancer research foundation over these past days?? It’s simply incredible, and we need to make sure it’s never forgotten!

One last thing: we need to remember the big picture. Over the past 48 hours, not only did Planned Parenthood reveal itself as willing to seriously damage and attempt to destroy the pro-woman Komen foundation, but also, thousands and millions of people potentially learned for the first time that Komen doesn’t believe Planned Parenthood is an ideal provider of health care for women. So even if Planned Parenthood wins this battle (an outcome very much in doubt), I would argue they have seriously weakened themselves for the wars ahead. This will be a long fight, so take the long view.

Here’s what you can do to continue to support Komen in the short term:

1) email news@komen.org and say “Thank You for Defunding Planned Parenthood” and promise to buy products bearing the pink ribbon. Encourage them directly in other ways.

2) sign the petition at www.IStandWithKomen.com (this is not an effort to harvest emails, you only have to supply your name and location) and invite your family and friends to do the same.

3) blog/facebook/tweet/email/write op-eds about this. Get the word out any way you know how.

In a few moments, this blog post will make it to my Facebook page. My (currently) 859 Facebook friends really are all over the place on faith, morals, politics, and philosophy, as are those who regularly read Pastor Zip's Blog. We'll see what kind of reaction this gets.

[See comments for update. Zip+]

Smiling Airliner Strikes Again!

Yes, you've seen this smiling airliner before, the last time six months ago. For still in my mind PSA stands first for Pacific Southwest Airlines, secondly for Public Service Announcement, and only thirdly for prostate-specific antigen.

But however you want to think of it, our PSA L-1011 is still smiling, not because it was the best jumbo jet, but because yesterday afternoon I received the results of my latest blood test: my PSA is less that 0.1. That is, 3 1/2 years after my surgery for prostate cancer, it is still immeasurable. Praise the Lord!

Catch My Smile!

I know, you've seen this smiling airliner before. But in my mind PSA stands first for Pacific Southwest Airlines, and then Public Service Announcement, and only thirdly for prostate-specific antigen.

Regarding the last on that list, Thursday is the third anniversary of my prostatectomy, which is how we treated my prostate cancer. Our PSA L-1011 is still smiling because this morning I learned the results of my latest blood test: my PSA is less that 0.1. That is, still immeasurable. Praise the Lord!

Today was also local Election Day in Illinois, and in my part of Peoria the ballot included members of the City Council and the community college board. I voted shortly after 3 o'clock in the afternoon and was the 11th person to vote in my precinct. No smiles there.

Still Smilin'

The following is an updated version of a post originally from July 19, 2008.

Yes, that's an airliner smiling. The plane is a Lockheed L-1011 Tristar, arguably the best of the original widebodies. The airline is Pacific Southwest Airlines, the legendary San Diego based passenger carrier better known as PSA. The smiley face was part of its livery, which tells you something about PSA's corporate culture. Growing up in the West San Fernando Valley in the '60s and '70s, Lockheed and PSA were part the air.

Lockheed no longer makes airliners and PSA was swallowed up by USAir (now US Airways). Nowadays "PSA" usually means "prostate-specific antigen" and it is an indicator for prostate cancer -- which was discovered in me during the autumn of 2007. I had a prostatectomy right after Easter of 2008, and after that guys have their PSA tested regularly. Yesterday morning I got the results of my latest PSA:

Less than 0.1.

That is, immeasurable.

Alleluia! Still right where we want it!

As PSA's ads said, "Catch our smile!" (Besides, can you think of a better graphic?)

Oh, My! That's Me!

The return address is OSF Saint Francis Medical Center here in Peoria. Inside the envelope the sheet has the logo of the Relay for Life of the American Cancer Society. The heading reads, "There's No Such Thing As Too Many Candles...."

Your American Cancer Society and OSF St. Francis Medical Center have partnered to help create a world with more birthdays. As a cancer survivor, you are the reason so many are dedicated to fighting, so that one day we can live in a world where no one faces cancer.

Relay for Life is a unique community activity...

I glanced ahead as saw the words "Cancer Survivor Celebration." And then it sunk in. This is addressed to me. I'm a "cancer survivor."

April Seventh, Twenty Oh Nine

One year ago today my prostate gland was removed surgically and, since then, there have been no further signs of the cancer that was contained in it. Thanks be to God.

This afternoon shortly after four o'clock, I went to vote in the Peoria city election. I was the 31st person to cast a vote in my precinct. The 32nd came in while I was voting. The poll watchers and election workers were having a very slow, boring day.

A Year Later

It was a year ago that my urologist gave me the news. The biopsy of my prostate gland -- I'd had a PSA of 11.3 -- showed cancer. My "Gleason score" was 3+3, or 6, and it showed on both sides of the gland. Dr. B. gave me a lot of information to read, for I was going to have some decisions to make about my treatment. But given my relative youth, he thought my best choice was to remove the prostate -- that clearly removes the source of the cancer and, unless it had already spread beyond the gland (which didn't appear to be the case), and offers the best chance of no re-occurrence.

I looked at all the options, but surgery was my ultimate choice and that was done shortly after Easter. So far, the cancer is gone. My strength and endurance are getting closer to where they were before the surgery.

I'm still overwhelmed by the offerings of prayers on my behalf during this last year. Thank you. And thank God.

The Switch to Digital TV

I entered the digital TV age when, at the beginning of the year and in preparation for my convalescence from prostate surgery (good news, my PSA level is still immeasurable and, while I still tire too easily, I'm doing a lot more to get there), I bought a DVD player that has both a VCR and a digital tuner. There I discovered that a Peoria resident does not have to hook up to cable TV to get the CW affiliate (CW 4) or the PBS affiliate (WTVP 47) after midnight. They are broadcast over the air using digital transmissions, the CW being on WHOI 19's subchannel. I also discovered the 2 subchannels for WTVP and NBC's WeatherPlus (the subchannel for WEEK 25), which enabled me to discover the very-pleasing-to-the-eye Samantha Davies (whom the Urban Dictionary describes as "smokin hot chick."

The bad news with digital is that you either get the signal or you don't. No more in-between, where with a weak (analog) signal you get a somewhat (or severely) snowy picture. And that is particularly annoying in the Parsonage because TV signals here, even with an amplified antenna, have a habit of suddenly becoming shadowy, especially (but not necessarily) where there is a major weather change. A channel comes in just fine for weeks, then suddenly the signal goes kablooey and I spend weeks realigning the antenna to get as many of our over-the-air channels as possible clearly. It's pretty rare that all 6 analog signals come in decently, though usually I can get 4 very good and 1 quite acceptable with one set up. WYZZ 43 (Fox) or WAOE 59 (My TV) throw fits the most, but it can happen with any of the Peoria area channels, the afore mentioned stations or WMBD 31 (CBS).

The TV stations are also busy promoting the changeover to digital and I have gotten my converter boxes, one for the living room TV (the "big" 20-inch one connected to the DVD/VCR -- heck, it's a perfectly good 12-year-old Zenith) and one for the upstairs TV -- a 23-year-old 13-incher which is a bit fiesty on UHF (which is what all the local channels are) but with the converter works just fine on Channel 3. Except, naturally, I can't get all 6 digital signals no matter what direction I put the (regular rabbit ears) antenna. Well, I don't use that TV set much anyway.

Nevertheless, a digital converter box enables me to continue resisting the evil cable company. This video guide to the conversion is more useful that others:



Meanwhile, NBC is pulling the plug on Weatherplus. But you can watch the lovely Samatha Davies here. Enjoy!

Smilin'

Yes, that's an airliner smiling. The plane is a Lockheed L-1011 Tristar, arguably the best of the original widebodies. The airline is Pacific Southwest Airlines, the legendary San Diego based passenger carrier better known as PSA. The smiley face was part of its livery, which tells you something about PSA's corporate culture. Growing up in the West San Fernando Valley in the '60s and '70s, Lockheed and PSA were part the air.

Lockheed no longer makes airliners and PSA was swallowed up by USAir. And nowadays "PSA" means "prostate-specific antigen" and is an indicator for prostate cancer. It's how mine was discovered last autumn and in the year after treatment, guys have their PSA tested every three months. Yesterday afternoon I got the results of my first post-op PSA:

less than 0.1.

Alleluia! Right where we want it!

As the PSA ads said, "Catch our smile!"

Healing and hopeful.

Last December near the end of this post I requested prayers in the light of my then-new diagnosis of prostate cancer. Last Monday I underwent a radical prostatectomy. Given my original test results and pathology reports, and after several weeks of research, it became clear to me in the middle of a medical consultation with a physician proficient in other kinds of treatments that this was the way to go. That happened near the end of January, and my urologist said there was no reason this surgery could not until after Lent, Easter, and a wedding at Zion the end of March.

The last few months have been an incredible experience of being on the receiving end of intercessory prayer, pastoral care, and support -- from those I'd always counted on before, and from the most unexpected people and places. Unexpected, I should add, only because I didn't really expect them to know about it, not that I expected people to not care. I am so appreciative of the encouragement I've received from my urologist and his colleagues; the people of Zion (especially the guys who've received similar diagnoses in the past) who have once again shown themselves to be a parish family; fellow ministers of the Gospel across the ELCA and across denominational lines both at home and far away; my friends; and my family. And, during this last week, those in surgery and, especially, the nurses and techs in the orthopedics wing where I began my recovery. You have all been angels of God's grace and mercy.

I came home on Friday and was able to worship at Zion this morning -- no, sitting (mostly) on the Epistle side near the back of the Nave. The first time I'd "just worshiped" at Zion since that last Sunday in September 1992 as I was moving in to be her 13th pastor. It was good to be with them. And it will be good to lead them in worship in two weeks.

For now, it's walking, eating, sleeping, building strength, waiting for pathology reports, continued prayer, and letting others minister to me. Every indication so far is that the cancer has been removed. And until we know otherwise, that is how we live each day.

Alleluia! Christ is risen!

An Era Ends (and on My Birthday)

Hmmm. It's another March for Pastor Zip's Blog.

T. J. Simers opens his column in today's Los Angeles Times:

VERO BEACH, Fla. -- The Dodgers played their last spring training game here Monday, like most folks in California really care.

The Dodgers have been training here for 60 years, out of sight as far as Los Angeles is concerned, and who cares where they practice?

It's just another minor league baseball stadium, a clubhouse off limits to fans, and even the players no longer stay overnight in Dodgertown, passing on nostalgia for almost $700 a week in living expenses to hang wherever they want.

Blow up the place, and I don't think any of my neighbors will lose any sleep. Make a museum out of it, and I can still think of a thousand different places worth a visit first.

Read it all here. But T. J. Simers must never have been a boy growing up in Los Angeles. I was -- born on St. Patrick's Day as the Los Angeles Dodgers (a term at that point that tripped off the tongue of no one except Kenny Hahn) were in Spring Training for a season that would, shock of shocks, bring baseball's World Championship to the West Coast. (That means I passed a milestone yesterday, celebrating my 49th birthday -- one more than my grandfather, Charles Wallace Tibbetts, did.)

Vero Beach mattered. Even to an Angels fan in the West Valley who craved, instead, reports from Holtville and games from Palm Springs (it would be years before I finally figured out that the guy yelling outside the press box almost drowning out Enberg and Wells or Drysdale was hawking "ICE COLD BEER!") on KMPC. It meant the sports pages and reports on the TV news and a game or two on Channel 11 focussed on the other Southland team, meaning Dodger talk. It meant that the wonderful voice of Vic Scully was again describing the action on the field while selling Farmer John hot dogs, bacon, and other pork products.

In 1983 our Pastor's 15-year-old son was diagnosed with cancer in the bone of his right leg. Keith was at the time quite a young pitcher whose life ambition until then was to pitch for the Los Angeles Dodgers. The Saga of Keith and the Dragon Slayers became a focus of the congregation's shared life and all sorts of people got involved in offering comfort and support for Keith. Even the Dodgers had been involved -- baseball players and teams can be so good at providing inspiration and hope -- and, after treatments that included chemotherapy, radiation, and replacement of the bone with a titanium rod, it seemed young Keith had been cured.

And as 1984 was blending into 1985, somehow arrangements had been made for the high school kid who should have been pitching for El Camino Real High School (arch rival of the Hunters) was going to Dodgertown in Vero Beach, with his dad, and get to spend time with their beloved Los Angeles Dodgers. Alas, within hours of his arrival, Keith collapsed and in the hospital it was discovered that, unbeknownst to anyone, a tiny piece of that bone cancer had escaped capture and the cancer was now in his brain. And suddenly the questions were, as Pastor Dave was all alone in Vero Beach, how long could Keith live, and could he come back home to LA.

There were lots of stories yesterday as the Dodgers played what should be their last game in Dodgertown. Sports Illustrated's SI.com has a wonderful article, Dodgers: Farewell, Dodgertown of the day, with an 80-year-old Tommy Lasorda managing (while Joe Torre has part of the team playing an exhibition series with the Padres in China):

"It is a special place," former Dodgers ace Carl Erskine said.

His white hair ruffling in the breeze, Erskine played the national anthem on his harmonica. He threw the first pitch at cozy Holman Stadium when it opened in 1953, back when grassy embankments served as the outfield walls. Even now, there are just 17 rows of stands and no roofs on the dugouts.

The popular "Oisk" first arrived in 1948, when the Dodgers touched down at the converted naval air station a year after they trained in Havana.

The Boys of Summer are grandfathers now, Jackie and Pee Wee are gone and Brooklyn is now home to a minor league team.

But there was always that link to Dodgertown, where Sandy Koufax still came back to teach pitching. History abounded -- heck, the camp is older than almost half the franchises in the majors.

David Hinkley of the New York Daily News in "A farewell to Dodgertown" remembers being a 9-year-old Brooklyn Dodger fan in Connecticut struggling with the notion that, since the Dodgers had just moved to Los Angeles, Vinnie wouldn't be on the radio from Dodgertown.

Around 12:30, when the pregame shows used to start, I went to the kitchen and turned on the radio, a small black Magnavox with a plastic gold grill. I switched from WTIC, where Bob Steele gave us the weather every morning and school closings on really good days, to 840.

Nothing sounds like a baseball game on the radio. You know it as surely as you know the smell of popcorn in a movie theater. Even a pregame show is distinctive.

This afternoon, there was nothing distinctive on WKNB - probably, thinking back, some NBC network show.

I adjusted the dial, hoping I'd tuned wrong. I hadn't. I turned it off. Fifteen minutes later I came back, hoping maybe they just weren't carrying the pregame.

I started trying again around 12:55. By 1:15 there had been no mention of a ballgame.

Maybe it was rained out, I started to tell myself, but even at 9 I knew when I'd exhausted this delusion.

By 2 o'clock the announcers had done a half dozen breaks and never mentioned a ballgame.

I stared at the radio. I remember feeling very lonely.

As years have passed, I've thought of a lot of things I wish I had done, or could have done, when I was young. If I'd been just a year or two older, I might remember my great-grandmother, who came over from Ireland in the 1870s on a "famine ship" and died when I was 4. What a story she must have taken with her.

But those senses of loss came gradually. For acute, immediate loss, it would be years before anything would come close to what washed over me in the kitchen on that March afternoon.

It felt unfair. Just unfair.

Curiously, I didn't look to blame anyone, because it didn't really seem to matter who did it. Even if I'd known about Walter O'Malley, I wouldn't have understood enough to hate him. It would be years before I appreciated the treachery of Robert Moses.

I certainly didn't blame the Dodgers. I remained a fan, now a cross-country fan, hating the playoff loss in '62, loving the sweep of the Yankees in '63 and so on through the years.

So when I arrived back here in Vero Beach this spring, the sharp pain of that afternoon in the kitchen was tempered by the expectation of seeing Matt Kemp and James Loney and Andre Ethier, hoping they can make the Dodgers a good team again.

When they came to bat, Holman Stadium didn't feel like the scene of a wake. It felt like a a pleasant afternoon when I had tickets to see my team, which for the last 50 years I haven't had enough chances to do.

Still, it's hard not to feel the ghosts around Dodgertown, starting with Jackie Robinson's "42" on the right-centerfield fence.

Vero Beach is still the place where all those guys that I played in the backyard got good every spring - Hodges and Reese and Campanella, sure, but also Don Demeter and Randy Jackson and Gino Cimoli.

I was all of them. They were all here. And now this place is going to be gone, and that takes them away, too. There will be no more blue Dodger uniforms in a stadium where tropical trees grow up through the middle of two reserved sections. No more Dodger dogs.

Tom Singer now over at MLB.com, but who I read every day in the sports section of the Los Angeles Herald Examiner (now that was a newspaper), wrote Dodgertown blues: Time to say farewell:

Legendary broadcaster Vin Scully, eyewitness to almost as much of Dodgertown, calls his spring home for 59 years "my memory factory."

"This," Scully said before bidding an early farewell to Dodgertown on his way to China, "is where I stood in place and it seems like half the world came by -- players, coaches, managers, writers, broadcasters."

This is where time still stands still. Strolling down the dusty path from a back field, you come to an intersection where a traffic sign directs pedestrians, "Players, Left," "Public, Right." They rub elbows with each other, as they have for over a half-century, passing across Duke Snider Street, Don Drysdale Drive, Sandy Koufax Lane and so on.

"There were times you'd be rushing to get to the park," said Steve Garvey, the former Dodgers first baseman/icon, "and you'd be signing [autographs] and putting your bat between your legs and walking along through the people."

The homogeny also extended to the players, hundreds of them on dozens of Minor League clubs in the early years, when Holman Stadium was essentially the quad of Dodgers University.

Holman? Vero Beach Caddy dealer Bud Holman scored one of the first "naming-rights" deals for convincing legendary Dodgers general manager Branch Rickey to relocate the team's training base here. How long ago was it? To sell Rickey, Holman had to look him up in Cuba -- where the Dodgers were training in 1947.

"When you came here, you felt that competitive worry of having to make the club," said Jeff Torborg, Dodgers catcher 1964-70. "That's what Dodgertown meant. That family feeling you get being here, you don't feel anywhere else."

"We played baseball all day long," Lasorda recalled, "and that was the best part of it. Learning how to play so you could advance yourself to the Major Leagues. Greatest, most unique sports complex in America."

"Just walking in there ... smelling the orange blossoms, hearing the crack of the bat. The whole atmosphere was just something special," said Mike Scioscia, the Angels manager who first came here in 1977 before becoming the Dodgers' catcher, and last departed from here in 1999 as their Triple-A manager at Albuquerque. "And it's the people who made it special.

"Sandy Koufax, Carl Erskine and Roy Campanella would be in the Chow Hall, eating breakfast with you. They were all reminders that you were there to win, to achieve. Every time you stepped into the clubhouse, you were prepared to spend that day becoming a better ballplayer."

Even the poetic waxing about the place is itself part of the anachronism. The game is as great and as absorbing as ever, but the romance seems to have long ago left it. Sentiment is quickly put into its place.

The Times has a regular report of that last Dodger game at Holman Stadium in Dodgers bid farewell to Dodgertown (maybe):

VERO BEACH, Fla. -- Carl Erskine played the national anthem on a harmonica. Tommy Lasorda made a speech. And then the Dodgers said what may be their final goodbye to Dodgertown after 61 spring-training seasons today by losing to the Houston Astros, 12-10.

. . .

The Astros took a 3-1 lead in the third on back-to-back homers by Michael Bourne and Hunter Pence before the Dodgers rallied with four runs in the bottom of the inning, helped in part by Rafael Furcal's second home run of the spring.

Houston answered with another home run in the fourth -- one with an ironic twist given the day's history because it was hit by second baseman David Newhan, whose father, Hall of Fame baseball writer Ross Newhan, covered numerous spring training games in Vero Beach as the Dodgers beat writer for The Times.

The Dodgers hold Spring Training in Glendale, Arizona? With the White Sox?? No, it doesn't feel right. Not on my birthday, for heaven's sake. Dodgertown is part of the Dodger mystique! No, T. J., this LA boy knows you've opened your story all wrong.

But get past those heartless first paragraphs...

And when it was all over, the players leaving after a 12-10 loss to the Houston Astros, Lasorda lingered at home plate.

As he began to walk down the right-field line, every step appearing to be a chore, something almost chilling on a hot day began to take shape.

Somewhere beyond first base he looked up, and he saw it, too, Dodgers players standing in a long line, two-by-two across from each other, bats raised above their heads as if they were crossing swords in honor of a military hero.

And as he walked down the tunnel, he shook each of their hands, a bunch of kids taking it upon themselves without a call to any of their agents to honor an 80-year-old man.

A few minutes later, after making it to the clubhouse, Lasorda cried.

"A lot of amazing things have happened to me in my life," he said. "But what those players did for me with the bats is something I'll never forget."

It was another miracle. Somehow arrangements were made for a medically equipped jet -- this was 1985 -- to fly Keith from Vero Beach back to LA where his UCLA doctors could see what they could do and, unlike what we had feared, Pastor Dave would be leading his congregation in worship for Holy Week and Easter. Then the miracles ran out. Young Keith died a few weeks later, and for his funeral, people packed Resurrection to the gills.

Ah, "Resurrection." Stories for another time. But ponder this: the miracles really don't run out. Eras end, but there'll be something more. And better.

A Personal Note

Canon Kendall Harmon's TitusOneNine is second on my list of "Blogs for Faithful Churchmen" because it is as good a place as any in the blogosphere for reading about the crises in what was once called "Mainline Protestantism." T19 is "a free floating commentary on culture, politics, economics, and religion based on a passionate commitment to the truth and a desire graciously to refute that which is contrary to it…." and it's biblical reference is "He must hold firm to the sure word as taught, so that he may be able to give instruction in sound doctrine and also to confute those who contradict it." (Titus 1:9, Revised Standard Version)

Among Dr. Harmon's contributions to the continuing debate is his description of the disputants as "reasserters" (for those reasserting scriptural witness) and "reappraisers" (for those reappraising it in the light of newer knowledge) as an improvement over the media's use of "conservative/liberal" or other descriptors like "progressive," "traditionalist," etc. He is Canon Theologian for the (Episcopal) Diocese of South Carolina, so the faith focus of his blog is the Episcopal Church and Anglicanism. It is useful for us in the ELCA, too, for our church seems to be very much following in the directions of the Episcopal Church. I look at it every day.

While much of the reporting and commentary on T19 centers about the crisis in Anglicanism precipitated by the election and consecration of Gene Robinson, a divorced father who has been in a long-term, committed gay relationship, as the Episcopal Bishop of New Hampshire in 2003, Canon Harmon continues to take seriously the "free floating" nature of the blog -- to the annoyance of some regular readers who prefer to focus on the Anglican disputes or "religious" matters. But while the Church is generally at the center of a cleric's life, there are other things. You can see that in some of my posts here. It's what helps make a weblog more personal and, in bringing up other matters (baseball, something I read or saw, etc.), hopefully helps reveal me to be somewhat interesting to those who find this -- without (again, hopefully) appearing to be too vain.

Today Canon Harmon includes an entry on Dan Fogelberg, whose heart-tugging 1981 hit, "Same Old Lang Syne," is part of the soundtrack of my university years. Fogelberg's also a native of Peoria, and this is a city that takes a certain amount of pride in those from here who go on to "bigger things." And so it was interesting to me to learn that the inspiration for that song was an event in his life that happened near the home of one of my parishioners.

Apart from "Same Old Lang Syne," Dan Fogelberg's music doesn't strike many personal heartstrings for me as apparently it does for Canon Harmon. But in taking note of it today, in the light of Fogelberg's death this last Sunday at the young age of 56 from prostate cancer, Harmon has provided me with an entrée to post a very personal matter that I've been wondering whether, and how, to share on this blog.

For I am asking for your prayers for me. Two weeks ago, I was diagnosed with prostate cancer. I don't intend to dwell on it or my treatment here. I have plenty of personal and spiritual support to see me through this new journey and, from what I know so far, there is every reason to believe that I can be cured of this. Yes, I'm on the young side for this kind of diagnosis, but I also share some of the increased risk factors, which enabled us to discover this relatively early. The medical techniques get better and better and Peoria has excellent medical resources. I have great confidence in the Lord's healing powers. Prayers for me and those who will be helping me fight this disease have been lifted up in so many places here and across the continent already that I cannot begin to count them. I do know, however, the power of such prayer.

Yet even when one is confident in the ultimate destination, a journey can have it's fearful, scary moments. And that's where I am right now -- in fear, and in confidence. I'm in good company though, as we are reminded especially this season:

In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David; and the virgin's name was Mary. And he came to her and said, "Hail, O favored one, the Lord is with you!" But she was greatly troubled at the saying, and considered in her mind what sort of greeting this might be. St. Luke 1:26-29

Thank you for you prayers.