Downtown St Augustine is very Old-World if you’ve never been. The buildings express a charm that I’ve only found in the French Quarter of New Orleans and the Northeast. The historic Catholic church faces a small green plaza, and acres of parking are nowhere in sight, thank God. On our visit the entire scene was almost perfectly Old-World except for a van strategically parked right in front of the Catholic church.
Br Tony Dellumo’s clothes matched his van: a white baseball hat, white sweatshirt, white shoes and white Air Jordan athletic pants with red trim. He had Bible verses (King James version) on his chest and hat that I don’t remember only because they didn’t stand out from the van.
We had time to look at the catechesis painted on the van because Br Tony was talking to a young man interviewing for a college newspaper. The first message that stood out was on the tire cover: “God kills / I kill and I make a live [sic].” More surprising was the message below dating the end of the world to 2011. Even more shocking was the message painted on the corner of the van: “no more church!” Befuddled, I walked to the side of the van where I saw “BIBLE” written on a window in thick, red caulk that reminded me of red frosting on the white icing of a red velvet cake.
Cake analogies and anti-church messages aside, the man was quite civil in his conversations. He never raised his voice but simply told us that he was preaching the gospel without a sugar coating. I was surprised that he didn’t ask us any questions characteristic of street preachers; rather, he did all the talking. I was also surprised at his reluctance to give us pamphlets describing God’s plan for salvation. “You have to believe this before I give it to you,” he told us.
On the pamphlet we found the explanation for the end of the church age that we were looking for. If you read Mt 24:15,16 and interpret Judea to mean the local churches and the mountains to mean Christ, then you are one step closer to understanding Br Tony’s message. Apparently the apostle Peter in 1 Peter 4:17 also speaks specifically to today’s local churches (in this verse the “house of God”) and their futility. According to Br Tony, these verses have special importance at this point in time because Biblical texts reveal the date of the end of the world, 2011. Br Tony’s dates for the end of the world and its creation, 11013 BC, come from Harold Camping of Family Radio. I leave it up to you and google to find out more. Hopefully I’ll see Br Tony and his van in Louisiana before 2011.
After recovering from that spiritual shock we went to the beach for a shock of a different kind. The beach at St Augustine was not empty, and surfers in black bodysuits gave the impression that a colony of penguins was feeding in the water. “What need have we for bodysuits? Into the water!” I yelled to deaf ears. The Louisiana pilgrims were hesitant (rightly so), but luckily two native Floridians, Kevin Jones and Jason LaLonde, from the University of Florida joined me in plunging into unknown depths of unknown cold. How cold was the water? Cold enough to make me catch my breath. I wasn’t rolling in the snow like St Francis, but I shared in some small way in that freezing experience. Even though the feeling of being sapped of my body heat was invigorating, the waves were too small to make the swim worth it. After 10 minutes we got out of the water, dried off and soon were on our way back to Gainesville.
1 comment:
The waves just weren't breaking right. No good body surfing to be had. I haven't decided if the icy cold water helped stimulate my immune system or made my cold 10x worse. It was fun, nevertheless.
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