As I walked through this wicked world,
Searching for a light in the darkness of insanity,
I asked myself
Is all hope lost
Is there only pain and hatred and misery

And each time I feel like this inside
There's one thing I want to know
What's so funny about peace, love and understanding?

Elvis Costello, "What's So Funny ('Bout Peace, Love and Understanding)"

A reader filled out a survey the other day and under the "What did you like about the magazine?" he wrote, "It made me laugh." The rest of the survey was filled with the usual anti-gay vitriol that I have grown far too accustomed to reading.

I did what I always do, dutifully recording his comments and deleting the survey. But something about his comments began to bother me. It struck me today as I drove home from the grocery store when my favorite Elvis Costello song came on the radio. This critic found Whosoever a laugh riot ... and my reaction is, "What's so funny?"

I fail to see the humor in what Whosoever tries to do. Sure, we try to have a sense of humor while we spread our message ... God created humor as well, y'know! However, when someone comes here and says they find what we do, or are attempting to do, laughable, I have to wonder at the humanity of the person who finds it funny! What Whosoever is all about is peace, love, and understanding. I ask, as Elvis does, what's so funny about that?

I truly fear people who can laugh at others who try to bring peace, love and understanding into the world. Hundreds of years ago, those were the people who put Jesus on a cross for trying to do it. The bitter irony is that today those same people laugh in Jesus' name. I have to shake my head and give a sad laugh at that realization.

Remind me again, who are the ones lacking in peace, love and understanding? And, what's so funny about peace, love and understanding, anyway?

Blessings,
Candace