conjectural navel gazing; jesus in lint form

peter marshall

weather: 40 degrees and very gusty...rain...now it feels like April.

I have been reading A Man Called Peter by Catherine Marshall. It is a biography about Peter Marshall, Catherine's husband. For those of you not familiar with Peter Marshall, he was a famed preacher, serves New York Avenue Presbyterian in Washington DC, and served as the chaplain to the Senate for a time before he died in 1949 still a young man.

The book is interesting for several reasons. He was an excellent preacher. He served an important pulpit during a difficult time in American history. The author, Catherine, is famed for her books. But a few things in particular have been running through my mind. As "famous" as Peter Marshall was/is, I had not heard of him until recently. And this is the first of Catherine's books I have read. Catherine went to school at Agnes Scott College outside of Atlanta. So, did my stepmother and her mother. In fact, if my math is correct, my stepgrandmother, Lelia, would have graduated a couple of years after Catherine. They may have known one another. For our worlds to be so close, that I have not heard about Peter until recently troubles me on some level I can't explain.

Anyway, I was lauging aloud yesterday on the train reading the book. Catherine was telling of their process of being called to the church in DC. It took fourteen months...arduous meetings and letters and processes. Peter and Catherine met with the search committee the day after they were married. They met again with the committee the first few days of a vacation to Scotland. On that visit she recalls picking out the wallpaper for the Manse in about thirty minutes...on their way to catch the steamer to Scotland. That a congregation, a call would interrupt such events in a marriage was assumed and even honored to some degree. Well, it seems to have been by Catherine and Peter.

What I remember about my grandmother is the story she told about telling a prominent Baptist church where her husband, Paul, would serve for twenty years, that she had no desire to live in the parsonage. "I did not want the ladies of the church to see my undergarments hanging on the laundry line. It is simply none of their affair." Lelia is a powerful woman. And she had her way. If I remember the story, the associate and his family moved into the parsonage.

Times change. People fall from popular memory. Peter Marshall was a hero to many. He still is a hero to many. The first edition of the book was a national best seller. There was a movie released about his wife that, it would seem, did quite well. Peter Marshall was a beloved man. And Catherine's telling of his life and ministry conveys all the sweetness of a woman who never stopped loving her husband even after he passed. It is a dear book.

And it is that color that is disquiets me. It is not that I am troubled by it somehow...I cannot really explain the emotion. That I am not Peter Marshall certainly plays into the foreign-ness I encounter when I read his tale. He was an immigrant and a powerful, famed preacher. Heck, they made a movie about his life. His life should feel alien to me. But what feels most alien is the way that he and Catherine engage their faith. It is lovely, but it is foreign. They completely surrender their lives to Peter's vocation. Meeting the search committee the day after you marry?! Holy cow. Can we have a boundary or two, please? They seemed to have none. What is so integral to how I understand my call and the boundaries that exist, the way I protect and preserve myself and my family seem to be totally different from Catherine and Peter.

But this relentless devotion is what also made Peter Marshall such a great minister, a great preacher.

If you can, read a couple of his sermons. Go to a used bookstore and get a worn edition of this book. It is a wonderful read.

Their son, Peter John Marshall, also has a website.

Posted by tripp at April 25, 2006 05:35 AM