We recently went down to Boston for a fantastic day in the sun to travel the Boston Freedom Trail. The idea was to walk the trail and at each location one of us would present an oral history of the site. I drew the Park Street Church and cringed a bit knowing full well my propensity to rage against the turpitude of "The Church" in all its incarnations.
As I delved into the research I found my anticipation was not without merit. I found that the Park Street Church often works with an organization called Exodus International, an anti-homosexual group that classifies homosexuality as a mental disorder and seeks to "cure" gays through behavioral modification and the words of Christ.
Despite my skin crawling and the words tasting like ash I attempted to present the early achievements of the church in unbiased and impartial voice. My professor said that as long as we presented the history accurately we were allowed to also speak of the modern implications of each site. So yeah... I just had to speak my mind about it. My speech went a little something like this.
I was the third stop along the trail, so once I got my speech out of the way I was free to enjoy the afternoon in the sun listening to my classmates dominate public speaking. Several of my classmates gathered a bit of a crowd for their speeches, apparently they thought we were the tour guides. :) I ended up taking something like 170 pictures that day and used picasa to throw together a quick and dirty video slide show.
Good luck, chum.
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