[Oe List ...] More reason we find Fred

[John Cock]

Thanks, Terry, for broadcasting the link. I laughed so hard (about third
time I've read it -- keeps getting better) that Lynda came running. It's the
hottest thing on the Portal
http://twiki.wedgeblade.net/bin/view.cgi/Main/OrderHistory

All the more reason we find Fred: we pay him to finish his book on the OE
from money we get from the sale of Kemper, or the archives, or something --
or even take up an offering. He's probably a failure at teaching anyway, but
they all probably adore him.

J 

-----Original Message-----
From: oe-bounces at wedgeblade.net [mailto:oe-bounces at wedgeblade.net] On Behalf
Of Terry Bergdall
Sent: Thursday, October 18, 2007 1:42 PM
To: oe at wedgeblade.net
Subject: [Oe List ...] Katanga cross & Lyn Mathews

I have used this link for years: it is the best summary that I have come
across about the "Congelese" cross as it was called when I first heard about
it in the Order. Here is what Fred Buss -- before he apparently became
displaced(!)-- wrote about it in March 2007; see
http://twiki.wedgeblade.net/bin/view.cgi/Main/OrderHistory

I heard the basics of this same history in 1968 when I first visited the
Ecumenical Institute. After I was assigned to Africa in 1984, I asked Lyn
Mathews to elaborate on the story. She told me that Joe was given an antique
cross at Victoria Falls during his first research trip to Africa. She said
he liked that fact that it came from a non-western culture. Lyn also
confirmed that this same cross was used to symbolize the covenant of the
Order shortly after their departure from the Faith and Life Community in
Austin. Lyn told me, however, that the original cross from Victoria Falls
had somehow vanished. If I ever came across another one in Africa, she told
me that she would be most grateful if I would obtained it for her.  

This is the kind of quest I enjoy. Little by little, I pieced together their
African history (which has since been confirmed in the link above from they
McClung Museum): they are copper ingots that were used as a primitive form
of currency in pre-colonial Africa. They primarily originated from the
Katanga region (thus some refer to them by that name). Today, this is where
the southeast tail of the Congo spears into the middle of Zambia -- an odd
border negotiated by European colonial powers due to huge copper deposits.

In the mid-1990s I finally stumbled across some of these antique copper
ingots in an open-air market in Lusaka. At the time I felt it was almost as
if I had found the Holy Grail! I bought four and gave one to Lyn in Dallas
during the January 1996 conference of the International Association of
Facilitators (IAF). That was the last time I saw her.

That brought my long and interesting search in Africa for an original
"Congelese" cross to a successful end. What it symbolizes, however, (i.e.,
embodying a new religious mode in a secular time), remains an active
pursuit.

Terry 




------------------------------------------
MAP, Methods for Active Participation
Terry and Pamela Bergdall
P.O. Box 408617
Chicago, Illinois 60640
+1 773 334-8306
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