Before The Rain Pt 12: We Need More Church

Steven Pavlov / Wikipedia

At the Eighteenth and One Third Rising Tabernacle on Prytania, Sister Helena Temple clapped her hands. the microphone and lights were flickering in and out, but the magenta-turbaned Sister Temple really didn’t need much outside help.

Echoing her personal avatar Evangelist Shirley Caesar (anpther powerful Lady of God native to NoLa, comme Mahalia J. her own annointed self), Sist’ Helena launched into “CHOOSE YE,” a longtime favorite; “Come and sup with me, Children, I will play ye Host of Heaven…

Call the Doctor, Call the Lawyer,

Tell the Policeman Walkin’ His Beat,

You Gotta Know, WHO CHOOSE YE!!

-Tell The Postman, YourMama and Papa Too,

You Have to Be Saved…

HOW ABOUT YOU!!!”

Down Poydras, a side door of the Morial center creaked open. In the triage, Lyndsey stood, agape. Loomis’ sandwich lay largely unconsumed on a clean towel. Strange.

“Solomon, did Mister Reader leave the triage?” Solomon merely shrugged. Lyndsey jammed thumbkeys madly on her BlackBerry, desperate to corral him with her own version of the old “APB”. Loomis, wearing only a clinical gown, his skivvies, and light felt slip-on pad-arounds; crawled out on his all fours to a battered dinghy laying magically beside the exit door he’s just slipped thru. In his head, different medicine had kicked in, and he was a twelve-year old boy again, transfixed by the crystalline Christmas sparkle of the Maison Blanche department store rotunda. His mom firmly held him still-he clutched back lovingly. Over the huge gilt cloth speakers, the chimes played out,

“O Come All Ye Faithful, Joyful And Triumphant…Sing Choirs Of Angels, Sing In Exultation, Sing All You Citizens of Heav’n Above!” Why, it was Christmas of ‘69, all over again! Loomis felt a rude THUNK!! as the dinghy his the top step of the Eighteenth Rising Church. He was back in the now of this slime-drenched city, but the Sister helena’s ark was his sanctuary, AND the Choir was wrapping up “Adeste Fideles,”otherwise known as ‘O Come, All Ye Faithful!’

Two white-wrapped Head ‘Nurses’ led him to the glistening mosaic glass and stucco altar, bedecked with serpahim the Sister had carved from soapstone long before. “Why, is this Christmas?”, cried a most befuddled Loomis Reader. “No, son,” proclaimed Sister Helena, ‘We are in the midst of the mightiest Deluge the Lord hath ever visited upon our dear New Orleans. The Philistines folks done named this devil “Katrina,” but ye may rest assured the only thing I’ll name it is Satan.” “Well, I’ll drink to that,” offered Loomis, before he sank onto a velvet-padded prayer bench.

“God bless us,” intoned Sister Helena. “I do b’lieve this boy done brought us a rescue craft.

“Together, the Sister and her flock of more than a hundred flood marooned sould raised their hands heavenward. “PRAI-ISE THE LORD!!!”

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