You have a future . . . and Jeanie unfogged writes!

Those first century Christians, pursued and persecuted, scorned and beleaguered, as they were because of their insight, were right: the secret of the first advent is the consolation of the second advent.   The message in both advents IS political.   It celebrates the assurance that in the coming of Jesus Christ the nations and the rulers of the nations are judged in the Word of God, which is, at the same time, to announce that in the Lordship of Christ they are rendered accountable to human life and to that of the whole of creation . . . Christians rejoice, on behalf of all humanity and, indeed, all creation, at the prospect of the judgment because in that Last Day the destruction of political authority at once signals its consummation in the kingdom of God . . . If some have put aside the expectation, it is not because Christ is tardy and not because God has postponed the next advent, but because the consciousness of imminence has been confused or lost.   I regard the situation of contemporary Christians as much the same as that of our early predecessors in the faith so far as anticipation of the Second Coming matters.   We expect the event at any moment.   We hope for it in every moment.   We live in the imminence of the Eschaton.   That is the only way, for the time being, to live humanly. (William Stringfellow)

Advent 2004

Dear Friends and Intercessors:

For those of you who've been clamoring for news since the last posted report, now seasoned more than a year, let this be an update on Jeanie Wylie's estate of health. (You know it's only recently dawned on me that, courtesy of The Witness, we've been “blogging” in these serialized epistles all these years?). For some, read on as well for family Advent greetings.

Jeanie news first. At the very outset of her illness six years ago, that first Advent following the initial surgery when we were casting about for alternatives to chemo and radiation, we had just finished a consultation with a doctor in Evanston and went out to a Chinese restaurant for dinner. I saved it for a while and wish I could put my hands on it even now, but I swear her cookie fortune read, “You have a future in medical research.” We giggled for days. But over this last summer she fixed her status as American poster child for the “chicken vaccine” – MTH-68/Newcastles Disease Virus – by appearing as “case 4" in an article in The Journal of Neuro-Oncology (67:83-94, 2004, click here for the abstract ). If you have been for a couple years confused, like myself, about whether this works as an immune system stimulant or attacks tumor cells directly by genetic means, the article will settle that for now: it's both. Or so they argue. We have copies of the full thing.

This year, sadly, we had to change our own local neurologist. Our previous, much beloved, left private practice, so we ended up back in the Henry Ford system – with which we've had widely mixed experience. One beneficial consequence, however, was access to their epilepsy clinic, which has overseen Jeanie's phased withdrawal from the worst of the anti-seizure meds. (She takes a handful three times a day). She has, in fact, been seizure-free for more than a year, and getting off depakote was like coming out from one layer of the fog. Friends who took her out to birthday (48th) lunch recently declared themselves astonished at the difference. Jeanie traveled with me on a seminary recruiting trip this fall and at one point, with prospective students posing questions, testified to her conversion and political awakening. Oh, she still insists on watching too much daytime TV, details page-long lists of intended purchases from mail-order catalogues, and would buy candy by the pound if she had the money in her pocket. Her judgment and emotional range can go thin, though last week she actually got angry back at me(!) – which, I might add, reflected good judgment as well. But above all, where the most she used to muster was an over-edited postcard note to friends, she now can now manage occasional letters by the page in longhand.

I planned to write this update months ago, during a cabin day together on our anniversary (20th), September 1. An impulse took me and I asked if she wanted to try her hand at drafting it herself. She promptly commandeered my laptop for the afternoon and filled a page, almost effortlessly. It's not yet her brilliant old prose, and it's sat unfinished since, but Jeanie writes! This is no post-it note – I'm appending her version below. (Let the eager jump down now). It was actually her take on Lydia's summer health crisis, which was just then exercising our hearts. And which is the next topic at hand.

Lydia graduated with some lovely honors from Mercy in June. She suffered a late semester case of mono, missing a number of finals, but rising from her sick bed to arrive at the prom with her circle of best friends by tugboat (ask her about that, for thereby hangs a tale). Over the summer she was stressed, by an overdemanding assistant directorship at the community theatre and angsting over her decision to attend Loyola University in Chicago. (Her inner debate concerned staying closer to home in Detroit – mostly for the sake of her Mom's care and her sister's psychic security). When she went in for her standard physical I wanted her to inquire about a series of relentless headaches; she wanted to check out these purplish stretchmarks. Turns out the combination signals a syndrome associated pituitary tumors. I freaked. Mentioning “brain” and “tumor” in the same sentence with Lydia's name tapped my worst fears. Jeanie's account is more or less accurate. We ducked the final torture test, and she's fine, flourishing in Chicago. Loves her studies, the city, the lake, and above all the good circle of activist companions with whom she's fallen in. Even a beau with common spiritual politics. They organize fasts, vigil in cardboard homeless boxes, and journey to the gates of SOA. Needless to say she and I get to travel together some, have met for meals in Chicago, and even took in an opera at the Lyric (another tale).

Lucy, meanwhile, has proven Lydia's fears groundless. She loves Mercy High School, gets straight A's, was cast in both the fall play and spring musical, takes five dance classes (including ballet point, jazz, and tap), has quickly made fast friends but seems to savor solitude as well, and drives everywhere on a permit – often with her Mom functioning as licensed adult. The two of them have a really lively and loving relationship which I love to peek in upon.   She's been a classic second child (Who's in charge of me today?), but now, be it with her Mom's med schedule or her homework assignments, she's incredibly responsible and organized. Stepped up, as they say. She used to be the quiet one at the dinner table with Lydia talking a mile a minute. Now she spiels away herself, rising to fill the space and make it her own. Over the summer she hiked the White Mountains with her godfather and two best friends, and played Puck, dancing all the while, in Midsummer Night's Dream (with Lydia as Helena and me, lo and behold, as Theseus).

That tale: I was at the end of a frustrated sabbatical (graciously funded by Louisville Institute) and was frantically consumed with Lydia's erstwhile health crisis. The former Theseus in Lydia's community production had bailed at the last minute and when she asked if I'd cover, I stepped up – doing four productions on the basis of two rehearsals. At 55, my memorization synapses are a little bit pickled, but I couldn't have stumbled on a better spiritual discipline for distraction from my tumorous anxieties. Or one more fun. And all the while actually being with her. All the worry spaces of my brain filled with soliloquies or preoccupied themselves with well-timed banter. “The best in this kind are but shadows, and the worst no worse if imagination amend them.”

I'm back at SCUPE and we're in an expansive phase, developing an African-American MDiv program with Chicago's premier faculty and an MDiv certificate in Community Development. I'm collaborating on a book project, Urban Ministry in an Age of Empire, arising from two interdisciplinary symposia we did a year ago. Word & World has struggled through a transition year, moving offices to Greensboro NC and staffing the organization with two remarkable interns. We completed the Rochester school on “Gender and Sexuality: Justice and Inclusion” and have committed to the next in Memphis on “Faith and Labor” which will draw on Dr. King's local legacy there.

As a family we plan to spend Christmastide first with Jonah House folks at their Holy Innocents Faith and Resistance retreat, then with Jeanie's mom and sisters in Philly.

The Stringfellow quotes at the head of this letter are from Conscience and Obedience , which along with Ethic , and Instead of Death, are being republished as an “ethics trilogy” just in time for the anniversary (20th) of his death in March. He is so cunningly prescient. In a moment when empire couldn't be more openly embraced or it's “theology” more publicly blasphemed around, he's like a gulp of biblical air. I recently listened to a talk tape of his and began to cry – just to hear his voice I suppose, but even more for the Word of hope in a dark, dark season. Hope which Advent itself remembers and brings round, right on time.

Live humanly, dear friends.   For the time being. Hope. Yearn. Expect. Be.

Our salvation is near at hand.

love and holy kisses,

Bill for the Wylie-Kellermanns

(and more from Jeanie below)

Sept. 1, 2004

Dear family and friends,                                                                              

We continue to move on, “moving ooon.” (“I feel like moving on. . . I feel like moving ooon.” – from a civil rights song .)

Many of you know that just before Lydia left for college last week, she had a series of headaches and became really sensitive to lights and smells. She also has odd, purple stretchmarks on her thighs and abdomen. It reminds me of when I first got pregnant. So, off she went to our doctor with Bill who ends up having to drive us everywhere because at this point neither Lydia nor I can drive. (Lydia describes a couple blackouts. One was in the car. She has a sense of waking up at the wheel and not being sure how long she had been in a dream state – which terrified both her Dad and me. So we were glad that when she got to Chicago, she was willing to let Bill drive me home in Grandma Bea's car – which she has been encouraged to think of as her own.)

However, all the tests that Lydia was subjected to have come back clear, an MRI, EEG, X-rays of her pituitary gland (which is located where the third eye is said to be). Bill cried over her a fair amount. I felt a little abandoned – like, “So, what happened to me?”   And, I have to admit I felt a little vindicated when her tests all came back clear. The last test that they are recommending is one in which she is supposed to stay up all night the night preceding the test. Then she'll lie on a stretcher and have lights flashed in her eyes for eight hours!

At that point, I guess – if it comes back clear, we'll know she really is okay. I guess the primary question before submitting to that test is whether she needs it. They never did anything like that to me, but, of course, before needing to do anything like that they discovered that I had grade-4 cancer and would probably die within four months. To their surprise the doctors at Henry Ford Hospital have watched me outlast their predictions by 5+ years! (Lydia suggested that last Labor Day, we have “Jeanie has survived for 5 years beyond the doctors' predictions!” party. So, we did and it was terrific. Teenage sons – that we've known since before they were born – were the deejays. Lots of people came including all Bill's brothers and wives and some of the next generation down. We danced and danced. And played. Everyone had a great time. I'll be ready for the 10th anniversary party!

So, here we are. Bill and I are up at the cabin that we got just before the cancer was diagnosed. I had done several preparatory things, which looking back all seem providential. Getting this beautiful place was one of them...

all love,

Jeanie