From: Joel Sax <jsax@igc.apc.org>
Newsgroups: soc.religion.quaker
Date: 02 Jan 93 11:20 PST
Subject: Re: Friendly Thoughts No. 2
Nf-ID: #R:cdp:1744600059:cdp:1744600061:000:3838
Nf-From: cdp.UUCP!jsax    Jan  2 11:20:00 1993


From: Joel Sax <jsax>
Subject: Friendly Thoughts No. 2

/* Written 12:55 pm  Jan  2, 1993 by peacemedia@gn.apc.org in igc:gen.quaker */
/* ---------- "Friendly Thoughts No. 2" ---------- */
To pick up on the stories Joe Maizlish shared in his response, let
me add another.

Jim Forest / Peace Media Service, Holland

==================================================
One of my favorite stories of how ordinary people can respond to
crisis concerns Mrs. Louise Degrafinried, 73 years old at the
time, and her husband, Nathan. and living in Mason, Tennessee.
When I read about them eight years ago, they were still alive.
They belong to the Mount Sinai Primitive Baptist Church.

The story:

One morning Riley Arzeneaux, a man who had just escaped from
prison with four other inmates, came into their house. He aimed a
shot gun at Louise and Nathan and shouted, "Don't make me kill
you!"  

Louise responded to this nightmarish event as calmly as mothers
normally respond to all the crises and accidents that happen in a
house full of children

"Young man," she said, "I am a Christian lady. I don't believe in
no violence. Put down that gun and you sit down. I don't allow no
violence here." He put the weapon on the couch. While she had
Nathan get the unexpected guest some dry socks, she made
breakfast: bacon and eggs, toast, milk and coffee. She put out her
best napkins.

When the three of them sat down to eat, she took Riley's hand in
her own and said, "Young man, let's give thanks that you came here
and that you are safe." She said a prayer and asked him if there
was anything he would like to say to the Lord. He couldn't think
of anything so she said to him, "Just say, `Jesus wept.'" (She was
later asked how she happened to choose that text. "Because I
figured that he didn't have no church background, so I wanted to
start him off simple; something short, you know.")

After breakfast she held his hand again. He was trembling all
over. "Young man, I love you and God loves you. God loves all of
us, every one of us, especially you. Jesus died for you because he
loves you so much." 

Then the police arrived. Hearing the approaching sirens, the man
said, "They gonna kill me when they get here." But Louise said she
was going out to talk to them. 

Standing on her porch, she spoke to the police in the same terms
she had spoken to the convict: "Y'all put those guns away. I don't
allow no violence here." 

The police were as docile in their response to this authoritative
grandmother as the convict had been. They put their guns back in
their holsters. Soon afterward, the convict was taken back to the
prison. No one was harmed.
The story of what happened to two of the other convicts is tragic,
but a familiar tragedy. They came upon a family preparing a
barbecue in their backyard. The husband, having heard about the
escaped prisoners on the radio, had armed himself with a pistol.
He tried to use it but was himself shot dead. The men took his
wife hostage, stole the family car, and managed to drive out of
the state before they were captured and the widow was freed.

Louise and Nathan Degrafinried might also have been killed, of
course. Good, decent people die tragically every day. But actually
it isn't so surprising that their gentle welcome to a frightened
man provided them with more security than any gun. 

It may be that both the prisoner and the police who encountered
Louise that day thank God for meeting her and have an altogether
different idea of what it can mean to be human than they had
before. Perhaps they live quite different lives because one old
Christian woman does in fact love her enemies.

[extract from _Making Friends of Enemies_ by Jim Forest, published
by Crossroad, New York.; based on "Bless You, Mrs. Degrafinried,"
by William H. Willimon, _Christian Century_, March 14, 1984]


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