Jesus the Unseen Guest

Jesus the Unseen Guest

fiction
edward w pritchard


He was the President of the United States but even he couldn't accommodate his wife's request over the regulations of White House Staff.

The President's wife had arrived at the White House with her two girls and as the First Lady had continued her side of the family's custom of always having a space set at the table for Jesus the unseen guest at Family meals. Her family practiced an Eastern European form of Catholicism and had an old custom, although many practitioners believed in figurative interpretation of the idea, her family chose a literal interpretation of always keeping a place at the family table set for Jesus. The original ancient custom was to sanctify family meals, to show respect to Jesus, and to remind everyone that Jesus was coming back to fulfill the scriptural message he left for the faithful.

At first the Chief-Usher at the White House the staff position that oversaw the room specifically designated as the China Collection Room. [ note this has only incidental relevancy to the 21st century country China a major world power] was apprehensive when the President said he wanted to talk to him. Like all staff persons at the White House the chief usher was constantly volleying for position and power and he was pleasantly surprised and a little nervous when the President and Press Secretary had invited him to one of the morning meetings to ask him to accommodate his wife's request.

In due course after a long meeting concerning major problems in the US economy, terrorism, bad weather and myriad other problems, the 12 people in the meeting, mostly men, ended with a ten minute discussion of how to keep a table service set at a formal table where the President, his wife and two girls routinely ate dinner together as a family at least four times a week. The President who was getting a headache after a very long meeting in the middle of late morning of many more to come, and since his wife was not present to add her opinion, had for now vetoed the chief Usher's idea of his administration getting their own China setting. Instead it was agreed that the family would use one of the 30 or more complex and expensive sets from earlier administrations and more genteel times stored in the china room.

The President and his two daughter's would just prefer to go out to a modest restaurant but they couldn't without a lot of rigmarole concerning national security and so when she arrived at the White house Mrs. President had established a family custom of four semi formal dinners a week. Naturally like everything else at the White House, which is why the president was getting headaches for the first time in his life, there was always a persistent drive for more and more complexity in daily life at the White House.

The Presidential family did not eat their family dinners in the actual china room itself where the dishes were stored in elaborate cabinets, established by first lady Wilson back in 1916; which had a few tables for informal teas; instead they ate in another very formal room at a long walnut table designed to seat up to 50 people. At first the two girls especially enjoyed the pomp and circumstance of the long table, white table cloth, four settings of very fine china, and an extra setting for Jesus. After the meal the dishes would be cleared by the staff, although sometimes the family would help, if they could get away with it, and the dishes would be meticulously washed and returned to the china room. Although they didn't do the ritual every day, but up to four or five times a week; each day a new set of china from a previous administration would be used. As was the original custom of the first lady's family, the next days set of dishes for the family would not be set out after the table was cleared, however Jesus' place setting was always on the table although, of course each time it was a new clean setting that matched tomorrow's setting. As of the writing of this story, Jesus has not stopped by yet, but the chief usher is very diligent in insuring his place is always ready and although his dishes were not used they are never the less washed along with those of the rest of the family each meal.

Sometimes when he is preoccupied with a major problem and walking about the White House the President will always feel better when he sees that lone place setting at the long table and his mood will lighten knowing he has done his best to make his wife comfortable at the White House which can be a complex place to live. Secretly when daydreaming the President felt like Louis the fourteenth at Versailles; but thought that the usual story of the sun king's controlling behavior may be historically inaccurate. Maybe the French Kings staff's jobs and routines evolved and became more and more complex and in time the palace became a world apart. In fact although he had never said it aloud at times Mr. president often found himself fantasizing that he could just get a small house in a conventional suburb for his little family to live in and just get up very early and drive to the white house for work.

One morning the President's very busy schedule was interrupted by the Press Secretary, the head of the office of protocol, a supreme court justice, and the chief usher, needing an immediate audience. The complexity of his days at times seemed surrealistic to the President but this potential meeting seemed just bizarre. The executive summary of the meeting was that there was a substantial outcry among interest groups against just setting one place setting for the major figure of one major religion, albeit one of the largest world religions. So, duly it was done that each major US religion would have a setting at the formal dinner table going forward. It was highly recommended to Mr. President that no back lash, knee jerk policy change was made such as just removing Jesus' place setting but that the family custom be modified and allowed to evolve to accommodate additional religions.

Who would have thought that there were 23 major US religions. The table settings for the unseen guests of the major religions were taking up the entire formal table and requiring additions of ten additional staff persons around the white house, to set, rid up and clean the dishes each day. Additionally the wear and tear on the previous administrations china collections were enormous. Many dishes were broke or chipped in dish washing. Once one of the Presidents daughters had accidentally bumped and broken a cup at one of the unseen religious guests places when scooting out of her place at the table because of crowding caused by all the new settings. The entire family, including Mrs. President were commenting once when alone that the Family dinners were not what they used to be.

About three months after the the broken cup incident, when Mrs. President was in Chicago on business, and the President was watching the girls, rather than deal with the usual formal Thursday night meal, Mr President and the girls had secretly slipped out of the house, taken a bus to a Wendy's, and each had a value meal. Naturally the girl's said to their Dad that it was their favorite meal they had had in a long long time. He of course had asked them to please not tell that to the chief usher.