If you're an employee of the Chick-fil-A fast-food chain, you have at least one day off every week. Of course, that's Sunday, as everybody in the South knows and appreciates. Doubtless the company could make even more than $6 billion in sales every year if it were open all seven days of the week. But it's a tradition with the family-owned chain. Employees are off on Sundays to rest, spend time with family and, yes, worship where they please.
Silly religious types. Imagine not going for the mammon every day of the week, and closing on the day of the week when everybody seems to eat out. As if there was something more important than cold cash in the bank, something more important than the rat race, the order of Top Chain Restaurants, and who's bottom line is the uppermost.
No accounting for taste.
You might have heard all the ruckus the top brass at the company caused a few years back when the top guy at Chick-fil-A said something in support of traditional marriage. (This was before the courts ruled that gay marriage was the law of the land.) New York's mayor urged a boycott of the restaurant. Somebody accused the chain of making hate chicken. No, really--hate chicken. For uttering an opinion based on a religious belief, and a belief that, until a few years ago, both the current Democratic president and the current Democratic Party nominee for the post both agreed with.
Fast forward to last weekend.
A crazy type who was either directed or inspired by terrorists in the Middle East opened fire in Orlando, killing almost 50 people at a nightclub where gay people liked to hang out. The nation got angry. Even mild-mannered types like Arkansas' senior senator were demanding we take the fight to the enemy. Clean 'em out like rats in a nest. Fire for effect and all that.
And while the nation woke up Sunday morning, in more ways than one, and began talking about affixing bayonets, some employees of a Chick-fil-A shop in Orlando got up Sunday morning and quietly went to work. They showed up at the restaurant nearest the nightclub and began frying chicken. And getting out the pickles. And opening bags of buns.
Then they served sandwiches--free--to volunteers, cops and those standing in line to donate blood. The company HQ put out a press release saying . . . basically nothing. That the act of kindness shown by its employees shouldn't require recognition. As if folks running that outfit think we're all God's creatures and should do unto others. Without requiring praise like the hypocrites a certain Prophet talked about during the Sermon on the Mount.
Tell us again about hate chicken.
Some folks just won't be fenced in. They'll be boycotted. They'll be shouted down. They'll be ostracized. Or as the first Mayor Daley of Chicago once said, "They have vilified me, they have crucified me, yes, they have even criticized me." But these types of people will bless those who curse them. And give them who've taken away their coat, their cloak as well. And pray for those who might curse them. (Suggested reading: the book of Matthew, chapter 5.)
Bless them. Every one.
Now if you'll excuse us, there's a certain fast-food restaurant that needs our business today. Bon appetit.
Editorial on 06/17/2016