That's the Community Choir Celebration concert finale to the left. It's about 200 singers including grade school students, a combined choir of Patton and Duniway Middle Schools, The McMinnville High School Symphonic Choir, the Linfield Concert Choir, and the "Old People's Choir" from McMinnville Cooperative Ministries. (I'm in that last choir and proud to say it!)The evening was pulled together by my wife, Robin Pederson. I'm always totally impressed with how she is able to herd two hundred people and get them to perform beyond anything they would have thought possible. We took an offering at the concert to send off to the people of Haiti (through Medical Teams International). I do a lot of singing for causes. I'm part of a men's ensemble called The Occasional Quartet, although the way we've been singing lately (three times in the past four days) I'm thinking we may need to change our name. The quartet is made up of myself, Jim Dayton, Ron Olisar, 
and Elwyn Behnke. (That's us to the right, singing at the Community Choir Celebration.) We decided fairly early on that we would dedicate our performances to trying to wipe out food insecurity for the people who live around us. Jim Dayton came up with the idea after listening to a sermon by Steve Ross. Steve was sharing UMC Bishop Robert Hoshibata's vision of wiping out hunger in the Pacific Northwest. The Bishop put out a call for the people of the church to use their gifts in this wonderful cause. So we did. In the past few years we've teamed up with other musicians to raise over $10,000. If there is any hope for this world, and for this country it will come through beauty. It won't come through beating people up over life styles and theological differences. It won't come by building bigger fences at our boarders to keep us isolated and safe. It also won't come through military might, or the increasingly divisive politics of our country. It will come through beauty. I'm not sure just exactly how.
I once heard someone say that music was the international language. Wherever people live you will find music. It's something we all can appreciate and to which we can all relate. Last Tuesday's concert was a beautiful picture of that reality. The grade school kids who had only been singing together for six weeks were just as appreciated as the old people who sang. Anna Song's choir from Linfield displayed amazing mastery of classical choral technique which was also greatly appreciated. The beauty of it all is seeing all of these people from all walks of life and from every age span (from 8 to 80+) come together and make beauty. That's the way that the human race is going to be saved. By coming together and appreciating beauty.
I'm limited in my ability to express beauty. Singing is one of the primary ways I have of expressing it. But I can appreciate the beauty that others have created. I love to see how other people are expressing creativity and beauty--especially in a beautiful glass of wine. Around here they grow a lot of Pinot Noir which is also sometimes called the "poet's grape". It's among the hardest grapes to grow, but the most receptive to the efforts of the wine maker. Done well, each glass is a beautiful symphony of flavors.
One of the most inspiring movies I've seen lately is: "A Man Named Pearl". It's a documentary about a man in South Carolina who is among the first in his family to ever own their own home and land. As he is scouting out possible home sights he is told by some residents of one community that they do not want him as a neighbor because he would never keep up his yard. That's about all of the encouragement Pearl needs. He goes to the local nursery and grabs their discarded plants from a dump pile on the back of the property. He turns these rejected plants into amazing shapes of beauty and imagination. His two and a half acre park have turned into a tourist attraction. He's single handidly revitalizing the moribund town in which he lives. Pearl has no formal training, never took a class in horticulture, never took an art appreciation class, but has created one of the most beautiful gardens I've ever seen. See the movie and be inspired to find your own place of creativity, your own way to make beauty, and then open your eyes to the beauty around you. Go to an art exhibit, a show, or a concert. Support the arts. I believe with Dostoyevski that our future depends on it.