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Thomas McClure - Theme
Thomas McClure - Theme
By Thomas McClure
I. Introduction
Eye hath not seen nor ear heard the things which
God hath prepared for them that love him,
(1 Cor. 2: 9)
10 For by my a Spirit will I b enlighten them,
and by my c power will I make known
unto them the d secrets of my e will
—yea, even those things
which f eye has not seen, nor ear heard,
nor yet entered into the heart of man.
(D&C 76: 10)
What God hath prepared by His power and the secrets of His will --
will be made known unto man by His enlightening him by His Spirit.
God's will toward man has not yet entered into his heart.
II. Practicum
Theme differs from pitch in a screenplay. The first involves character; the
second involves plot. Finding a progression in character development means
finding it for your self. You are finding your way in the world by losing
yourself or giving up yourself for others. Finding what is important.
For In the Scene, it is finding your voice in lyrics. It is about for who you are
and for what you stand. For Miss Amy, it is finding what to anchor yourself
with in your career, in your marriage, in your child-bearing and child-rearing.
For The Polynesian Story, it is forging a new life from the essence of the old.
For Christina, it awakens to past hopes for a second child in the first's death.
These four practical stories invoke a death of unworkable past behavior. And
seeing within their self-a new life, springing forth from the past, that works.
III. Conclusion
Letting go of blame and being honest with ourselves aids progress within us.
[C. Terry Warner. What We Are, p. 1]"We systematically keep ourselves
[us]."
Addendum
When we walk in the shoes of the gay man, even when he has died, we see
what he meant to his male lover and what he meant to his female lover. And
each of them must see something in his death of some kind of meaning. Was
he lucky enough to find in his space of probation some kind of remission of
sin? Did he give his life for others in his own choice of self-burial? And what
did they each one seek in the betrayal of their last lost loves? Of each other?
We meet here in the lost life of the outsider our own feelings of being
shunned. Their betrayals of us become our betrayals of others. The cycle of
self-blame and blaming others for our betrayals can never be broken without
in sight. And that seeing into our own hearts by the grace of god is said in
"there for the grace of god go I". "If you have done it unto me" recalls that
we could have been the leper whom Christ healed. "And when saw we thee?"
we ask. Had not God been graceful, we would be he, the leper, the outcast.
Had all of the stories in the Practicum begun with the death of a character.
Or of the death of characters, or the death of tradition, or the death of false
values, we would still be left of the question posed at the wake or funeral.
And that is this: What value had we found in the life of the living? Did he
come to realize he had lived long enough to value his departed wife? Did he
find lost love again? Did he give hope to forgotten dreams of another child?
Did she find an anchor to her material girl soul adrift in search for meaning?
Did she find a voice and a lyric to sing which had meaning when others died?
And did he find solace in solitude being outside, never being let in, by giving?
Who killed cock robin? Who is to blame? Can we blame God? After all, he set
it all in motion, this earth, this time of probation between sin and death. By
letting go of blame and honestly seeing ourselves as what we are we gain.
We are repulsed by first his gay life style. Have we too been bashers? Are we
like King Saul opposed to their confusion? And second by their confusion?
1 Sam. 20: 30
30 Then Saul’s aanger was kindled against Jonathan, and he said unto him, Thou son of the perverse
rebellious woman, do not I know that thou hast chosen the son of Jesse to thine own confusion, and unto the
confusion of thy mother’s nakedness?