Duke University - Chanticleer Yearbook (Durham, NC)

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The Chapel My first visit to the chapel came in the midst of pro- found boredom. Worn dovm slowly from the September heat and made nauseous by the whole situation of freshman week, I decided to enter the backwards blasphemy as Christ might have entered his tomb a few days before Golgotha. Check it out, pre— feel the scene. The doors were hot to the touch, yet a cool blast that came from beyond them settled the mission in the face of last minute rationalities. I entered, ig- noring the guest book, ignoring the woman at the desk, ignoring the five perfumed women imitating angels at the side. Although the altar bored me from a distance, I pro- ceeded up the aisle, confident of my ability to view the crucifixion dispassionately, and concentrated on my lack of reverence. A yo mg woman I would not meet until three months later was the only other person in the long hall. She did not greet me, yet an affinity was there. I was to learn about karma that year, and this same woman was to offer me qualudes at an orgy, for God ' s sake, that I was to unwillingly attend the night of my first experience with LSD-25. She wasn ' t praying. The cmicifixion of Jesus Christ has always struck me as perhaps the most tragic example of the himan condition. No shit cry the theologians, yet I do not understand their trans- cendent salvations derived from the act. God crucifies his most lovely manifestation. He does it everyday. Soft, beautiful babies are torn to shreds by shrapnel, blood- wetting their mothers. Young men in a city, hate filling their bellies, whip each other with radio antennas, scars forever. How many million people on this earth worship the symbol of that torture, search for its repetition with a whip of guilt, nailing themselves to a confused binary mecha- nism that killed God himself? Do not tell me that Christ was reborn. They worship his death, not his life. The pilgrim of Emmaus was a new, innocent man, not really knowing his own crucifixion. Having come within twenty feet of the altar, I halted in the middle of the aisle and stood there a few moments, staring. The power of the cross ti tened my stomach. Smiling in recognition, though still wary of its direction, I began to wonder at ray presence here. Moving to the left, I sat down and let my stomach go. I heard a preacher say, surrender yourself, all children of God, be not amused that your God is odd. I sat for an hour, not bored, not mad, not even amused then. Nothing happened, the cross endured. In the middle of my vacant reverie, the young woman on my right left suddenly with a broad smile on her face. As I got up to leave, I saw her in the back of the chapel looking toward me. She carefully ignored me as I walked out into the morning sun. I later learned her name was Xaviera.

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