After Pulse: Father Miguel Gonzolez

Posted on by Thor

Advisory: Please note that this post is about the Pulse nightclub massacre on June 12, 2016. It contains sensitive and difficult to read content.

Father Miguel Gonzalez, is the director at Saint James Cathedral in Orlando, Florida. After the Pulse Nightclub massacre Catholic priests, deacons and bishops provided pastoral care and leadership to the Hispanic community and the larger community of Central Florida.

When he heard the news, he was dumbfounded and in shock. New York City might be a target, Columbine in Colorado, but Orlando doesn’t seem like a likely target. Disney might one day be a target, but not Orange Avenue in SODO, Orlando. It was baffling.

The night before there was the murder of the young performer, Christina Grimmie, at the Plaza in Orlando. Father Miguel was a Radio D.J. before priesthood, so that senseless murder hit him particularly hard. He was still dealing with that when Pulse happened.

He had written Christina into his homily that weekend, so now Pulse became another overwhelming component. The driving theme remained, which was, how the power of love transforms. How can the community renounce these acts? How do we raise our families in a loving caring environment? This person was clearly mentally disturbed. How can proper care be provided to keep things like this from happening again.

Between masses he got a phone call from the Holy Family parish in Windermere, asking if he could come to the hotel where families were gathered. They needed bilingual priests, pastors, counselors and social workers. Some of these families were flying in from Puerto Rico. He headed over after the Spanish mass at 12:30pm.

There was a lot of chaos in that hotel. There were also a lot of good people ready to support and help.  Their focus was on the victims and relatives who were hurt by this. He ended up on the 3rd floor, with other ministers from different organizations, families would be brought up and into different rooms where they would break the news from the coroner’s office that the body of their loved one was identified.

You could her the screaming and wailing down the hallway. It was painful to listen to. Prayer was his life preserver to keep focus and keep calm. To pray for them. When the doors opened someone would come into the hall and ask, is anyone her for the Baptist denomination? Then that Baptist minister would enter the room. Or they would ask, is there a priest her, then father Miguel would go into the room.

There was a change of plans and everyone gathered in a big room downstairs. The lobby was jam packed. The media was all over the place outside. The hotel wanted to regain some level of normalcy. Miguel was told to prepare for havoc. Because there were so many people jammed into the lobby, he could not hear what was happening, or how the news broke. Comments trickled through the crowd. The message that made it back to him was that they were going to give the names of families who should report to the hospital. The hope then is that their love one is still alive. The move increased hope.

After the names were read, there were still a lot of families crowded together. They were all told the had to come back the next day. That is when chaos erupted. People wanted to go to Pulse. They wanted to go to their loved one. Where were they? Screaming echoed down the commodores. People grabbed their heads, they held one another and cried and then ran out the front doors of the lobby.

He moved to a side door near the back. They wanted to meet the families out front by walking around through the parking lot. Outside the wall of reporters were waiting, focusing on the mayhem. He mingled among the families, ready to respond and embrace. He needed to be present for the families.

One young man was very upset, frustrated and angry. He saw the collar and he was angry at the god that Miguel served. Where is he? How could he allow this to happen? He vented about this God who does not care. What could be said to not aggravate the situation? He told him about a brutal murder a family member in Puerto Rico to let him know that he at least understood in some the way the pain felt. Some common ground was found. They sat together and the young man brought over his family.

The next day Miguel went to the Senior Center. Families gathered, and slowly families went to the second floor where the news was conveyed. By then families knew that their loved one did not make it, but there was the agony of waiting. He knew a couple of the families. He prayed with them and talked to them.

His parish was opened up as a space for Catholic charities and social workers. In 20 years of priesthood this was the most challenging, and difficult event he ever had to deal with to provide healing hope and care. The healing for survivors would not happen over night. How could life return to normal?

 

Beach Day

Posted on by Thor

20 years ago, On September 11, 2001, I was off on  painting vacation in Colorado. In the morning I finished a plein air painting of a mountain range and I went to a fish camp to use the men’s room. A man outside the men’s room said the twin towers had been hit by planes as well as the Pentagon. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.

Instead of doing another painting, I returned to the hotel and turned on the news. I let the gravity of hat as happening wash over me for the rest of the day.

It was impossible to fly back home to Orlando Florida, so I ended up driving back across the country. Several times I was rattled seeing crop duster planes spraying fields in the mid west. All air traffic had been grounded because of the terrorist attack.

On this 20th memorial, Pam and I drove to the beach for some peace of mind. NPR news on the radio was playing audio for September 11, 2001 but we couldn’t listen. 2,977 people died that day and it was a day of infamy much like the attack on Pearl Harbor for my parents generation. So far, between 2020 and 2021 659,558 Americans have died from COVID-19. Will their memories ever be honored in the same way? Or will Americans deny, deflect and immediately ignore the toll from a tragedy that could have been mitigated with strong leadership and citizens who worked together to keep each other safe.

COVID-19 Psychic

Posted on by Thor

In America the surge of Delta COVID-19 cases is trailing off, but what will happen as we head into the winter months? Americans vaccinations have come to a virtual stand still and many people prefer to believe that the pandemic is over.

The virus will return and it will once again peak. Scientists are baffled to explain it’s continuing prevalence around the world. The best weapon against continued hospitalizations and deaths is to get vaccinated.

The New York Times reported that cases are rising in five northern states, Vermont, New Hampshire, Colorado, Michigan and Minnesota. This like the 2020 surge as the weather got colder.

There are about 80,000 cases a day in the United States. The U.S. is also not doing a great job of testing and contact tracing so those numbers are likely low. We are averaging 1,560 deaths a day. In the US over 50,000 people have died since that start of the Delta surge which began in June 2021. They did not need to die. A simple vaccine could have saved most if not all of those lives.

We can learn much about what might happen in the United States by watching trends around the world. Around the world there is declining activity. Europe however is seeing the highest number of cases and deaths in more than five months. Eastern Europe is particularly bad. Vaccine acceptance is particularly low in these countries. In Russia only 33% of residents are vaccinated. They don’t trust the government. Does that sound familiar? The death toll is likely under reported in Russia. The virus is not done with humanity. There are plenty of people that it can continue to burn through.

 

S&M as entertainment in Deviant Behaviors.

Posted on by Thor

Dangerous Theatre of Denver Colorado presented Deviant Behaviors at this year’s Orlando International Fringe Festival. I went into the show with no per-conceptions. This was a one woman show in which Winnie Wenglewick explains how she discovered sadomasochism. As a small child she discovered her dads porn stash underneath a dresser drawer. The only way to get at the porn was to pull the drawer completely out. She was almost caught by her father, but she manged to fling the magazines under his bed as he walked into the bedroom. She began to cry an in his efforts to comfort her, he never stopped to ask what she was doing.

She discovered sexual pleasure at a very early age but also felt guilt. Much of the show involved explaining masochism. She felt that most peoples view of masochism is skewed the the tepid Fifty Shades of Gray book and movie. Masochism is the tendency to derive pleasure, especially sexual gratification, from one’s own pain or humiliation. She lead a rather normal life, getting married and having kids. Later in life however, a man introduced her to masochism and she was hooked. Experiencing pain in a safe environment could help her forget the many responsibilities she had. Eventually, she went on to found her own dungeon.  She will be moving back to Orlando later this summer. Orlando now has a dungeon called The Woodshed. She will be
opening another Dangerous Theatre in Orlando.

Towards the end of the show an older man with long blonde hair walked onto the stage holding leather whips. He whipped Winnie’s back, softly at first and then harder with each thrash.  She verbalized her many complaints as she was being whipped. This was certainly one of the strangest theatrical experience I’ve had. I learned quite a bit about an alternate lifestyle. If there are dungeons in Orlando, I just might get off on sketching people in pain. Perhaps this could be defined as sketch masochism.