Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1962-06-03
SPIRES OF THE SPIRIT l.r.-e
Strawberries and Cream
By DIR. FREDERICK BROWN HARRIS
Chaplain Of the United states Senate

LIE ScdoOll ID AlCIC AOI
Strawberries and cream. Now
what a dish to set before a
kingI That combination is q
result of a mystic chemistry
which adds something not
found separately in either of
the elements involved in the
union. Here is a togetherness
which creates something new.
The joining Of these two fac
tors, one from the garden
and one from the dairy. is a
culinary proof that in union
there is a strengthened at
tack on the taste buds. A
quaint English writer of long
ago declared, 1T might be
that God could make a better
berry than a strawberry but
certainly He never did"
But this message is not
about strawberries but about
STRAWBERRIES and cream. How
ever delectable a subject this
may be at first glance, per-
haps it seems to belong
rather on the dining table
than beneath the Spires of
the Spirit. Perhaps straw
berries and spires are Joined
only in the nostalgia remem-
brance of old-fashioned
strawberry festivals held un-
der the trees in close prox-
unity to where the house of
worship steeple rose to speak
OF more sacred things. But
let us see!
When my ministry was
very young I came across a
chapter written by a preacher
in far-away Tasmania, where
they grow strawberries equal
in size and flavor to those of
New Jersey, Pennsylvania and
Delaware, when May and
June trip North. The title
OF the article was Straw
berries and Cream" Because
OF the spiritual insights of
that preachment. across the
years I've gone back to that
old volume and reread those
pages, especially after par
taking of strawberries and
cream. Today I am going to
pass to my readers a dish of
the red-ripe fruit-a crimson
island entirely surrounded by
cream - never mind the
calories.
Without any claim of orig
inality I will try to break
through the garden fence and
appropriate some of the wise
comments Of the author who
walks the earth no more
Then we will leave it to those
who consider this combina-
ton Of strawberries and
cream to decide If it is not
gospel truth and therefore
worthy of a place under the
spires.
The topic lifts up offerings
from the animal kingdom,
and the vegetable kingdom,
perfectly complementing each
other. For ages strawberries
and cream was an unheard-
OF mixture. Here, may we
quote the exact words of this
other preacher: There came
a fateful day on which some
audacious, dietetic adventurer
took the cream that had been
brought from the dairy,
poured 1t on the Strawberries
that had been plucked from
his garden, and discovered
with delight that the whole
was greater than the sum of
its parts"
Man is an animal, but he
is more than an animal, and
he proves his superiority by
mixing things. His poor rel
atives Of the brute creation
never do. They eat straw
berries and they are fond of
cream, but it would never
have occurred to any one of
them to mix the strawberries
and cream. They can never
know what the one does to
the other.
Now one Of the oldest, and
one Of the silliest mistakes
that men ever have made is
their everlasting inclination
to divide things that belong
together. In our thinking
and doing much hinges on
whether we live in the realm
OF either/or, or of both/and.