One of the male children of Dutch
ancestry, living in an area termed by
some outsiders as “Albino heaven”

because the area in the United States
was so ethnically isolated, married a
Hispanic girl from a growing Latino pop-

ulation in the area thus upsetting his family.
The family pastor, a progressive fellow for
the area and an advocate of the notion that

there is only one race, the human race, but
many beautiful ethnicities in God’s great
human creation, sought to help the family

adjust by telling them a pun: A woman
has twins and gives them up for adoption.
One of them goes to Spain, They name him

“Juan”; the other went to a family in
Egypt and is named “Ahmal.” Years later,
Juan sends a picture of himself to his

birth mother. Upon receiving the picture,
she tells her husband that she wishes
she also had a picture of Ahmal. Her

husband responds, “They’re twins! If
you’ve seen Juan, You’ve seen Ahmal.”
Sobber faced, the family said they would

pray about it. A year later, a baby girl
was born to the couple. She was the most
beautiful child imaginable. The Dutch

family and the Hispanic family decided
to give thanks by having Thanksgiving
together. That was destined to be quite

the cross-ethnic feast. The pastor was
invited and, of course, would offer
grace.

Christi, whose birthday is December
25, early on waxed philosophical
about it realizing that she always
would be jipped out of a gift or two,

“How do you compete with Jesus for
a birthday?” Her husband suggested
that they move the celebration of
her birth to June 25 but everyone

including Chris and her husband
forgot. Relegated to a destiny of
fewer birthday presents than if she
had had the fortune of having been

born on a different day in a differ-
ent month, she just shrugged her
shoulders. Her husband not want-
ing her to feel bad as Christmas ap-

proached, told her the following pun:
A group of chess enthusiasts checked
into a hotel and were standing in the
lobby discussing their recent tourn-

ament victories. After about an hour,
the manager came out of the office
and asked them to disperse. “But
why?” they asked, as they moved off.

“Because,” he said, “I can’t stand
chess-nuts boasting in an open foyer.”
With that she started to cry. Her
husband thought to himself, That

wasn’t the intended outcome. He
then rushed off to the store to buy
her a few presents. She thought,
That was the intended outcome.

He just read a poem by
a Native American poet
who had cancer of the
tongue and later died
of cancer. He thought
about his most recent
dental exam and the
special light that was
used to detect cancer.
He is cancer-free. He
was sad when he read
her poem about lilies
dying and blooming.
He wanted to cheer
her up by telling her
this pun: Did you hear
about the Buddhist
who refused Novocain
during a root canal?
His goal: transcend
dental medication.
He was so sorry that
he couldn’t tell her
that pun that he
began to cry. She
was only fifty-nine
when she died.

Hilda, the best church office
manager ever, noticed that the
pastor seemed depressed, so,

having a compassionate side,
she asked the pastor what was
wrong. The pastor, the first

woman to serve the congreg-
ation, said she was being
criticized as a woman in the

pulpit. Hilda, who knew
prejudice against women in
leadership, said she found

the pastor’s preaching in-
spiring, electrifying and
charged with positive vibes,

so she told the pastor that
she had a pun to lift her
spirits: Two hydrogen atoms

meet. One says, “I’ve lost
my electron.” The other says
“Are you sure?” The first re-

plies, “Yes, I’m positive.”
The pastor smiled and then
laughed, gave Hilda a hug

and said, “I’ll try to stay
positive, Hilda. Thanks for
being there for me.” Hilda

said, “Sure. That’s my call-
ing, Rev.”

The couple got into their respective
recreational kayaks and paddled
onto the beautiful, but cold, late fall,
inland lake. After an hour the hus-

band said he was tired and wanted
to head back to shore. Getting up in
years and not as agile as he used to
be, he struggled to get out, tipped

the kayak and fell into the cold water.
The wife, younger and more agile,
tried to make her shivering husband
feel better while he stood in waist

deep water. “Honey I have a pun for
you: two Eskimos sitting in a kayak
were chilly, so they lit a fire in the
craft. To no one’s surprise, it sank,

proving once again that you can’t have
your kayak and heat it too.” He turned
away from her, threw his paddle on-
shore and hurried to the car to get the

dry clothes he forgot to take along. Pull-
ing her kayak out of the water, she
shrugged and thought it was an ap-
propriate pun given the situation.

A man and his teenage son
decide to spend a glorious
spring day fly fishing at the
waters below the local dam.

Unfortunately, every other man,
woman and child in town know
it is the season opener for fly
fishing on the river and people

line up three deep below the dam
casting over, under and around
each other to get their flies in
the water. The man’s son can’t

ever get in a cast and he loses
his prized baseball cap to others’
casts snagging it and lifting it
off his head and slamming it against

the dam. The man, feeling sorry
for his son, says that he has a
pun to lift his son’s spirits:
Two fish swim into a concrete wall.

One turns to the other and says
“Dam!” The teenager just drops
his rod, turns and walks back
to the car. The man thinks to

himself, I thought that was
pretty funny.

So there they sat in the waiting
area of the terminal when their
number was called to get in line

to board the plane. They rolled
their carry-ons with them, both
pieces of luggage having been

accepted. They were glad not to
have to go to the luggage claim
area upon arrival because time

was short for his wife to get to an
incredibly important meeting upon
which her future employment de-

pended. Her carry on was then
rejected as too big and would
have to be checked. When they

got to their seats, she sat sullen
and despondent at the prospect
of losing her position with the

company and to make her feel
better her husband told her a pun:
A vulture boards an airplane, carry-

ing two dead raccoons. The steward-
ess looks at him and says, “I’m
sorry, sir, only one carrion allowed

per passenger.” His wife wiped
her eyes, ordered two shot sized
bottles of bourbon and stared daggers

at her husband with what he was
sure were raccoon eyes. He sat
back in his seat assuming that
hadn’t been helpful.

Couples awake and kiss on the silver screen,
But I always reach for the Listerine.

Whites are as threatened as a
prairie dog by a rattler, a rabbit
by a coyote, and “large un-
gulates and medium-size birds

to lizards” by crocodiles and
just about anything to the king
of the jungle. Except those are
real threats. Whites are afraid

of the advance of people of
color and have no idea how
to share because they buy in-
to the myth of the superiority

of the spoiled only child. Well,
child, it is time to get a life.
There is one race, the human
race and many, many wonder-

ful ethnicities forming a rainbow
coalition of God’s great people
and God’s great world and God’s
great universe and God’s great

creation and we have the privilege
of being a part of it all — together.

I am called to love my
enemies and I am told
that the dividing wall of

hostility has been broken.
I have to repeat these as
my mantras in order not

to be sucked right into
the very violent cultural
posture I despise, but I

don’t have to stand by
as the “hear no evil, see
no evil, speak no evil”

monkey. I must oppose
peacefully, I must oppose
non-violently, I must

oppose in the love, which
passes understanding,
the ultimate opposition

to evil, that which, in
the eternity of now
converts evil to good

and the cold pincers
of avarice to the warm
hands of compassion.