“Take Me Out To The Ballgame”   

and don’t even think about trying to burn our US Flag on the ball field!          

On April 25^th, 1976, at Dodger Stadium while 50,000 fans watched on, a scene played out in centerfield that has never been forgotten. It was a Major League game between the Chicago Cubs and the Los Angeles Dodgers and playing centerfield for the Chicago Cubs was lefty Rick Monday.

 According to Rick, this is what happened in the fourth inning. He says “I was in centerfield. I don't know if I heard the crowd first or saw the guys first. But two guys went on the field. One of the guys was carrying something and I noticed it was an American flag. And when they got to shallow left field, they unfurled the flag, as if it was a picnic blanket. They knelt beside it, not to honor it, but to douse it with lighter fluid.”

  The Players and the crowd at the Stadium could not believe what they were witnessing - these two guys were about to burn the American Flag. Rick Monday remembers getting very upset - what these guys were doing was wrong. He thought about all the friends he had lost while protecting the Rights and Freedoms that our flag represents, and he was mad.

 So, Rick Monday started to run. He said, “I saw them go and put the match down to the flag”, but he thought “They can't light it if they don't have it.” So, Chicago Cub, Rick Monday, scooped up that flag and took off running. To his amazement, it had never been lit on fire. 

And today, now retired ballplayer, Rick Monday still gets letters from all across the country. But one of the most moving letters was from a Vietnam vet. In his letter, the Vietnam vet wrote that during his two tours of duty in Vietnam, he kept two things with him. The first was a picture of his wife. The second was a small American flag folded neatly in the left breast pocket of his uniform. He said he would be in the mud for weeks and months at a time. And these two things were what he looked at, to keep him connected with reality. He wrote in his letter, “thanks for protecting what those of us who were in Vietnam, held so dearly”.

 Rick Monday ended the story with these simple yet powerful words. He says, “That wasn't just a flag on the field. It was a flag that people look at with respect. We have a lot of rights and freedoms in America. But we also have the option that If we don't like something, we can make it better. Or we have the option - If we don't like it, we can pack up and leave, but don't come on to the field and burn an American flag.”

 And one last piece to the story. That day, after Monday saved that flag from being burned. There was quite a buzz in the stands. People were shocked, but what they had just experienced, but then without any prompting or direction by anyone, the 50,000 fans stood and began to sing “God Bless America”. 50,000 voices, people who were moved by what they had seen, and they turned to God

Oh, may every day, be a day that as a Nation, we turn to God.

        I recently heard someone questioning why we decorate a tree for Christmas. Well, a few years ago I asked myself that same question, and as I searched through various books and research documents to find the answer, there were a number of theories and legends and stories – some even connected the decorating of a Christmas tree to paganism. But the answer I liked best of all was the story of this man, Boniface.