Something Is Coming

Thornton Wilder’s play, “Our Town,” was extremely popular when first presented years ago and is often performed to this day in regional theatres, colleges, and high schools. As the third act begins, there is a moving sequence in which the dead — some young, some middle-aged, some old — are seated in chairs in the town cemetery. A narrator tells stories about the dead people sitting in the chairs: when they died; how they died; who they left behind. Then the narrator walks to center stage and says to the audience:

“Now there are some things we all know. We all know that something is eternal. And it ain’t earth, and it ain’t even the stars. Everybody knows in their bones that something is eternal… there’s something way down deep that’s eternal about every human being. They’re waitin.’ They’re waitin’ for something they feel is comin’. Something important, and great.”

An elderly pastor stepped off the curb to begin crossing the street. A motorist honked…