History Lesson

For Wilshire Baptist Church

At the dinner table recently I asked our parents if they had a sense that they were living in historic times during the Great Depression and World War II, and if so, do they feel that same way now during the pandemic? I told them I was asking because my own belief is that indeed this is a historic time but too few people seem to understand that.

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Dinner on the Corner

For Wilshire Baptist Church

pandemnic  (pan-dem-nick)  Noun : A picnic held in a responsible, socially-distant manner, during a pandemic. Verb : To pandemnick with friends. 

So, has anyone else been having pandemnics during the pandemic? We’ve had four so far and we’ll have another this week. We may schedule more if this season of isolation continues.

I’d like to say it was our idea, but it wasn’t. Our friends Scott and Denise suggested they bring takeout dinner to our turquoise table and we come outside and join them from our porch. We said, “Sure,” but we came off the porch and set up at a card table with our own dinner six feet away. It was shady and breezy and we enjoyed catching up on family and business and life in general. We had such a great time pandemnicking with the two of them that we invited a family of four to fill up the turquoise table a week later while we sat nearby. And then after describing the concept, we were invited to pandemnick with another couple in their yard, and we followed that with another friend back at our turquoise table.

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Together Alone

For Wilshire Baptist Church

If you saw the Wilshire worship service online this past Sunday, you saw the Wilshire Winds performing an arrangement of “Precious Lord, Take My Hand” in one of those video collages that instrumental and choral groups have been doing around the globe during the pandemic. The first one I saw and still my favorite is the Toronto Symphony Orchestra playing an excerpt from Aaron Copland’s “Appalachian Spring.” My favorite moment is at the very end when a percussionist shows up in the collage with giant headphones and a triangle to play one single “ting.”

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