Jesus in Virginia

Jesus in Virginia There is something about the drive in gray-green twilight along the Blue Ridge west of Culpeper; the indistinct thistles and shrubs line the highway like dark Pharisees bound for Golgotha; the trees rise ominously; the winter light wanes corpse-colored beyond the worn-down mountain barrier leaving this side now dark. There is something about a blue light in mute darkness; shrill blue, this one, the ice blue of neon, brilliant light blue, almost iridescent; even in neon, even so bizarre, so crassly wired on a stubby steeple over a shabby little roadside church of doubtful denomination; even so, ice blue, it glows, proclaims, endures it electrifies the night. And there is something also about a cross, whatever it may be made of, copper or silver or gold; or blocks of concrete such as compose the road, tree branches tied together, thistle stalks or car axles, rocks piled up near the peaks, of the highest ridges; even (as one comes closer and stops to stare to see what really this thing is); even encapsulated gas in bent glass tubes ignited by exposed electric wire, can stand for a crucifixion. In the black night far beyond Culpeper it is possible to believe (nothing else in sight) that this is the last thing left in all the world or of it. —Gerald George 44 ...