Praise Songs

Tonight, at the weekly proton patient potluck, the entertainment was a young woman singer from the church of an alumnus of the program who lives nearby. She came fully equipped with a karaoke system for accompaniment, a strong voice unnecessarily aided by the public address system, and a ton and a half of missionary zeal.

When she informed us she is part of the praise band at their church and directed us to the handout of lyrics on the tables, I knew I was in trouble.

She launched full bore into her first praise song, all along slipping in asides urging us to "lift it up" (complete with motions, raising her hands heavenward, in case we needed a model). I glanced around the room at the other patients and their wives. Some were looking earnestly at their song sheets, and their lips were moving. Barely. Others, like me, were just sitting there. I didn't see anyone awash with our songstress's spirit. Or Spirit, for that matter.

I say they were sitting there like me, but I don't know if they were really scrunching up inside like me.

Now readers of this blog certainly know by now that I have a deeply religious turn of mind. I have been fully involved in Christian churches my whole life long, and I take deep comfort and strength from that source. But I cannot stand gospel praise songs and the whole rah-rah, clap-and-cry piety that accompanies them. My Aunt Faye calls this "Seven-Eleven music"—seven words repeated eleven times. This kind of religious expression disgusts, appalls, and embarrasses me.

I don't know why praise songs affect me this way. I have found peace, joy, and an expansion of my spirit sharing prayers with Muslims in their mosques, chanting with Hindus in their temples, meditating with Buddhists, even celebrating solstice with wiccans. Tears which issue from emotions I can't name have flowed down my cheeks while singing hymns in church, and I can think of few experiences more moving than listening to Roy Wilson's organ postlude at the close of service at St. John's United Methodist. And I've listened for—and sometimes heard—that still, small Voice in the silence of a Quaker Meeting. So why I can't abide praise songs, I do not know.

Suffice it to say that, after the singer's second number, I excused myself from my table as inconspicuously as I could, collected my casserole, and made my exit.

I ought to at least mention proton treatment in this posting. As a regular feature of the potluck, new patients are asked to introduce themselves by name and home town; they usually also add their PSA and Gleason score. It's a prostate cancer patient thing, I guess. Tonight, amongst the initiates, was a surprising variation in this group of greying men—a young woman. In a pleasant voice with an Eastern European accent, she said she comes from New Jersey and is here for proton treatment of a brain tumor. Then she added that the doctors apparently mislaid her PSA. She got a huge laugh on that line. If you don't understand why, you need to read the books I listed last evening.

Treatment count: 11 down, 34 to go.