Can you remember sitting in a classroom or lecture hall and listening to the speaker, professor or even a panel discussion, and wished they would stop trying to impress their peers or the audience with their eloquent rhetoric that sixty percent of the audience doesn't understand? You look at the person sitting next to you and ask them, "I'm not sure what they are referring to or what they mean. Can you explain what they just said?" The man/women just shrug their shoulders with the impression, "Hey, I'm just as dumb as you are."

Now you have missed the whole point and have no idea what is trying to be accomplished, or, is anything really being accomplished? Did anyone learn anything and what expertise or knowledge are you going to come away with?

It's parallel to watching a movie and you miss most of the conversation between the characters at a critical point. Now you're frustrated because you don't understand the plot. Sound familiar?

I attended Catholic Elementary School for four years. This is what they taught, this little impressionable brain of mine, and I believed it with very high conviction:

- God is almighty and the creator of all. I still believe, to this day, it is true.

- Jesus Christ is the Son of God. Again, I still believe it to this day.

- One can live with God eternally only through Jesus Christ. True.

- One can confess their sins to a Priest and he can forgive you. Have my doubts.

- Using God's name in vain is a sin and all other bad words are sins also. Using God's name in vain is a sin. But saying, "Damn it!" I don't think so.

- One must attend Church every Sunday and every Holy Day throughout the year and contribute money to the Church or you are committing a terrible sin. Well, attending Church Services are nice and respect to the Lord. But, every Sunday and every Holy Day mandatory? I don't think so. Contributions to the Church? Of course. Bible says, "Give Caesar what is his and give God what is his."

- God is all imperious judge sitting on top of throne waiting to pass judgment on you. This will now bring me to the point of the simplest approach and the use of words in teaching.

I feel very strongly that when words, thoughts, love, attention and God's roll in one's life, are presented in the most basic and simplest terms, that one is capable of learning quicker and with deeper understanding and true conviction. Allow me to present an example:

When I was eight years old, I met an uneducated, massive black man at a fishing hole. He was old, with skin like folds of weather-beaten and cracked leather. He wore bib overalls with the left shoulder strap unhooked and hanging down loose across a barrel chest. A beat up straw hat sat towards the back of his head. His boots were in tatters and shoelaces dotted with knots where they'd been broken and tied together again.

He approached me at an old fishing hole and I was scared to death. I was shaking and could not speak. I never talked to a black person and really, had nothing to do with them. I have seen them on buses and in stores, but that's my only connection to them.

He caught me play-acting and it embarrassed me. He told me that he play-acts all the time. That surprised me that such a huge man goes around play -acting. He told me how he talks to the animals, the birds and he even talks to the Man that lives in the big white house in the sky.

I said, "You must mean God?"

"Dats what folks call Him. Does you believe in God?"

"Yea, I guess so."

The man popped to his full height and burst, "Ya guess so?! Ya guess so, boy?"

We talked all day about God and His creations, the Bible, characters in the Bible and their roll in God's plan. I loved the way he talked and I could listen to him all day. And I did.

I told him what I was taught in Catholic School and how I was afraid of God. That He would smite you if you do bad things.

He went on to tell me that most of what I was taught was true, but that he thought "God is a Good Fella and wants us all to be real happy, and enjoys, and loves, all da things he makes for us."

I never thought of God as a 'Good Fella.' He'd always been that imposing bearded Man with a stern scowl, a cold judge sitting up on a great white throne passing sentence to people as they lined up before Him. Not someone with feelings and a sense of humor. Everything that big black man taught me rang true.

He taught me more about human feelings and the everyday things of the world in such a short time frame through his simple words, acts and humility than I'd learned in four years of school.

I was probably the only white eight-year-old boy that thought God was black.