Gloria Foster

This is the interview with Ed Simmons. OK, Ed, what experience has brought you to Grace Lutheran Church?

Ed Simmons

Well, we moved here in 1990 and Grace Lutheran Church was very similar to the Lutheran Church we had been attending back in the outside of DC and Maryland.

Gloria Foster

When did it feel like Grace was your church?

Ed Simmons

Probably about 10 years later. Maybe longer. It was shortly after Pastor James arrived.

Gloria Foster

Why do you feel like Grace Lutheran is a place worthy of your time? What has led you to stick with Grace?

Ed Simmons

I think James and his openness was part of it and once I started going back on a regular basis, finding out that there are a lot of people that I missed seeing... Yeah.

Gloria Foster

What are your hopes for Grace Lutheran in the future? What would you like to see your church become?

Ed Simmons

I'm not too worried about the future of Grace. I think where it's standing right now is very comforting and very open. There are no hidden venues. You either accept what they're offering, getting earnest, or you don't then if you have problems with it. There are other churches you can attend. I'm happy where I am and with what they're doing.

Gloria Foster

Yes, if you were not born into Lutheranism, then what drew you to a Lutheran Church.

Ed Simmons

I was not brought up in our church. My mother, for her own reasons, which I'm not going into, had no use for them and I had a 9th grade friend who was playing basketball and a little following of teenagers. And so they invited me to go with him to a Lutheran Church back in Columbus, OH. Which I did and found it was unusual. Like I said, before 9th grade I never walked into a church. And that's where I was baptized a year later, attending all through high school and playing basketball with him.

A league of I think 8 or 9 different denominational churches who had basketball games that would play at least one game a week and that was attractive to me because I was a large person so I seemed to be accepted. My mother started attending, she became a member for a while. And she felt that the pastor wasn't visiting her, so she stopped goin. And that's the same church.

Now while I was in college, I would provide musical support whenever they would ask. And then I had started dating Ruth at the end of my freshman year of college, and since she was in a private School of Nursing I would see her Friday evening, Saturday, and Sunday mornings. The good nuns had her back by noon and Sunday. And we'd been counseled by the barrister. He wasn't keen on my getting married and just because of my mother's background of divorce he said it would never work. I said, “Well, are you saying no or yes, you will?” He looked at me and said, “I'm not going to turn you down.”

That's where we were married and then a year later is when we moved to the Washington DC area. Yeah, we found a nice place after a year. It’s a big city, he told us till we found a small ALC church. There wasn't an ELCA at that time and we were starting to raise our family and the pastor just had a real connection with young people. There were probably 30 kids our daughters’ age that went all the way through high school. And their parting show they put together for a church in a fundraiser was Jesus Christ Superstar. And then they went off to school and I retired and we moved down here. That takes us up to now. Things were going pretty well, but there were a couple moments that we've been out here... I think my mother was a week, two weeks shy of attending the classes to become a member when she passed away and she was a bit central. And I had made a phone call to Pastor Lundberg.

Yeah, he said, well, she's really not a member of the church. And I said are you going to worry about two weeks? You’re the only minister she knows, but she's unconscious right now. So he came out and he gave her last rites.

At that time we were doing what they call a blue book service. A little bit country and it required violin, piano and string bass. I guess they had a little bit of country music because it was not so conventional. They had a special book for you. And I enjoyed the service. We ran across the pastor and his wife again, we were at a home show on Saturday. We saw him going up one of the aisles by displays. And I stopped him and introduced my wife to his and then said, “By the way, I’m sorry but I won't be able to play the blue book service on Sunday. My brother signed me up and we have a golf tournament to play and my tee time is 8:00 o'clock.

And he said “Oh” with a grin on his face, “I hope you have the best runs ever played and there's nobody there to see you.”

And I looked him in the eye and said, “God will be.”

He looked at me again. Absolute last time we spoke.

Gloria Foster

How has Grace been important to you in a time of trial?

Ed Simmons

Pastor James got me involved with the lectionary class.

Gloria Foster

Isn't that an amazing class?

Ed Simmons

Yeah it is.

Gloria Foster

I liked your idea of having retreats and I hope we are able to do that, it would be this fall.

Ed Simmons

Yeah, but I would hope so. Yeah, I I think everyone would just say we just get started sometimes and onto something and they think it's over.

Gloria Foster

Oh, I think so.

Ed Simmons

Yeah, time schedules. Yeah, like if you're retired, you're not concerned about that time, but the majority class or half of it is. They're not retired and so, and that's hard.

Gloria Foster

Yeah, that's... that is hard. I kind of forget that when I'm with people you know they have time constraints and I don't anymore.

Ed Simmons

Yeah, well we had one grandson this year who finished college up at New York State, and last year we had four graduate from college. It's funny story. We had three daughters and the middle one is 1. See the picture over in the corner. She's the one that passed away. She had twins and then apassion child, we call it a surprise. And all three girls were on medications to induce pregnancy and they've been out for a couple of years. But then two months, all three of them quit. It was in same year. And then… 3 kids in one year. Out of four we had the twins, Christine, the oldest, and Evan and the one who is legally blind. He'll never drive, but he's smart as a whip. He graduated, and then his brother graduated next year. So we have one granddaughter, Jenna will be in the ninth grade starting high school and. She struggles. She's the one that was left without her mother.

Gloria Foster

'cause she was the youngest.

Ed Simmons

Yeah, like I think she was four when Jane passed, we don't have much, never had much of a relationship with the father he was… he's a hoarder. And he’s never wrong.

Gloria Foster

And that's an illness too.

Ed Simmons

Yeah...

So when her two sisters graduated, they left because they didn't want to become “generous“ mother. So they're both there. One is waiting tables and house sitting. She's the outgoing one, and Julia is the quiet one; as smart as a whip. She went to University of Delaware to be a computer scientist and she's working virtually—she just moved to Pittsburgh doing all of this work for some firm in Fairfax County, which is a suburb of Washington DC.

Gloria Foster

Because that's where they mostly grew up, was there?

Ed Simmons

Oh yeah. When we left. Washington DC, the one daughter, Jean, was teaching kindergarten and she ended up going through third grade and when we left, Fairfax County had 19 high schools. And the appropriate middle schools and elementaries. When she passed away Fairfax County had 39 high schools about seeing over a million kids today. Richest music county in the country and they charge rental fees, and all the money goes back in to reinforce the program to buy new instruments to repair and so forth.

Ruth made a huge cloak. They asked her, when she passed away, and that took her a year to do it. And it's hanging in the library at the elementary school. And a good friend of ours—that we met at her wedding years ago—bought tehn of Janine's favorite elementary school books that the library didn't have. And we photocopied their covers so we could put them on material, and the quilt features those ten books with a picture of her.

Gloria Foster

That is wonderful. How nice.

Well, that's a real treasure.

Ed Simmons

Anyway and so that’s where we are now. We’re enjoying retirement.

Gloria Foster

Do you think Grace lives by our mission statement?

Ed Simmons

I think most people try to. I am certain the pastor does. Unfortunately I can't find things that I want to disagree with just for the pure sake of argument.

Gloria Foster

Well, we have our retreat. We could do that.

Ed Simmons

We could do that. Yeah, yeah.

Gloria Foster

I like a little argument too.

Ed Simmons

Well, I do too, huh?

If you want to become political, that's what democracy is about. You can sit down here and have a heated argument between two people or a small group. With no name calling, and laugh when it's over. Come back next time and we'll still be friends. Now what's happening in DC? That’s not so.

And you know I've, you know, seen enough, up close, of reactions of particular senators, and occasionally some representatives and the White House, and their arrogance in their attitudes...

I've seen Lindsey Graham up close and he's not a nice person.

Gloria Foster

I've been—and what about McConnell?

Ed Simmons

Back then he was OK.

They've had the biggest change in parties right after Kennedy was assassinated. Lyndon Johnson, after he was elected, started a private group—he and ten others either from the house or the Senate, and it went on every Tuesday from 4:00 o'clock and you had to be there until it was over, maybe 11:12 o'clock at night. They'd have cocktails for an hour and a half. Go into the green room with the doors locked. And maybe come out three hours later, some of them white as sheets. Angry. And that would be Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. For a year.

Gloria Foster

And what was that drink?

Was it the Vietnam War they were talking about or what?

Ed Simmons

No, it was convincing them that Kennedy was gone. He was in charge and he was pushing for full control of all Democratic funding and how the funds were being dispersed for elected Democrats. He came within two votes of knowing that.

Trump has control of them right now completely. That's why they're afraid of him. They shouldn't need his money, but they don't even know how he's spending it.

Gloria Foster

Well, I don't think he has any personal money. New York State is going to get every penny he has if.

Ed Simmons

Probably. I hope so.

Gloria Foster

Unless he becomes the next dictator.

Ed Simmons

That's my turn.

You know, I've... right in high school with just a few passages that were explained coming out of Mein Kampf. And there's where the quote is from Goring, that you tell a big enough lie to the masses, often enough, they’ll believe it. He's a spitting image. So I put Lindsey Graham is Goring, McConnell is Goebbels, and Cruz is the evil doctor who did all the experimentations.

Gloria Foster

Yep, that fits.

Ed Simmons

So head and, like they say when you forget history… and right now we're going right back. There with a cartoon in the local paper: man, semi-man, caveman.

Gloria Foster

Oh, I just yes yes.

Ed Simmons

And when we forget the past when we resort to... That was cute.

Gloria Foster

I thought yes, that is very good.

What could Grace do better?

Ed Simmons

I don't have an answer to that. I really don't. We can't go out and canvassing neighborhoods like they used to do or like Jehovah's Witnesses do, huh? That just turns people off. I think we have to continue being ourselves and being honest when we see new people. This is as patient and open as we can be. Don't give up hope, because we can only be so large, but our attitudes can always expand to be better.

Gloria Foster

That is a great quote.

Ed Simmons

Don't shut down. You give up hope, you might as well lock yourself in a closet, to me.

Gloria Foster

How are you feeling and thinking about coming back after reopening?

Ed Simmons

Anxious. Excited. I wish we were doing it right now. But I will err on on the side of people with medical conditions. I will err on the side of medical recommendations, not political input.

Gloria Foster

Absolutely, politics shouldn't have anything to do with this.

Ed Simmons

No, unfortunately they're trying to maintain everything.

Gloria Foster

And that yeah. Though I wish there was some way that we could have cards to know that everybody getting on the plane with has, you know has had their vaccine.

Ed Simmons

Yeah, and if they say yes, there are just enough… vile people out there that will lie. We see it every day with mass shootings. We see it on the airplanes. We see it, more than anything else, in the United States Senate. Which is sad.

They seem to forget. We're the ones paying their salary. We're the ones they should be listening to. Not that not them telling us what we need.

Gloria Foster

We should be telling them what we need, what we need.

Ed Simmons

They're not listening because they're the demigods. They have got everything backwards. I'm sorry.

There's a quote in this book called The President's Wit and Wisdom that my girls gave me. We have one president saying, “I truly believe in the two party system.”

That's what democracy is all about. When you become president of the United States, you stop representing a party and you are now representing all of the people of the United States.

Gloria Foster

And that's exactly what Biden said.

Ed Simmons

Do you know who he’s quoting? A Republican. President Lincoln.

Gloria Foster

Oh, Lincoln.

Ed Simmons

The other one that said a little more strongly was Teddy Roosevelt. “It is treasonable as any government employee to question a citizen who is paying their salary their right to criticize.” That is democracy. That makes sense. Another Republican

Gloria Foster

OK. What would you tell a non member about Grace Lutheran Church?

Ed Simmons

Feel free to ask questions. And we'll try to answer them and don’t always judge the book by its cover. Get to know somebody first.

Gloria Foster

Sure, do you feel part of the community of Grace? If so, why?

Ed Simmons

Yeah, or I wouldn't be involved in what I'm doing right now. I'm not sure that I'm qualified to go any further than that.

Gloria Foster

Entirely up to you.

Ed Simmons

Yes, yeah I do, I do. I just feel comfortable. One person I would like to get to know better because they’re very, very quiet, but when the wife speaks, she says a mouthful. And that's Rose Applegate.

Gloria Foster

Oh yeah.

Ed Simmons

And I'm sure they're Republican. Maybe not, but. I'm a registered Republican, but I refused to keep my head inside a box.

Gloria Foster

Yeah, it's the registered Republicans are the ones that need to.

Ed Simmons

Yeah, open up.

Gloria Foster

Open up.

Ed Simmons

And there was a piece that Rose came across on Evangelicalism, and then there was a piece in the living Lutheran about the term. And it's a pretty rotten, wild term: Evangelical. Because there's too many churches split and become another sect of Evangelical. And right now the far right side of conservatism is they want nothing to do with homosexuality or abortion, et cetera et cetera. Where we would be considered on the far left, because we would support all of that one way or the other.

There's a big if with abortions, but my wife had a thing that she came up with, and her question was: Can you have a life without love? No. Can you have a life without a family? No. Can you have a life with an education? No. Can you have a life without friends? No. Well, then you don't believe in abortion you believe in the right to birth? Not the right to life because you're denying those other four things when you have to deal with a child that would come from a rape. When the child is going to be deformed and probably cost thousands and thousands a year just to keep it alive. There is some law there, but there is no life or anything else and the child is never going to know it. That her comeback for it.

We had one time back in Maryland. Two of us were started a class on Sunday. And now came human sexuality. We had a class on that. It had never been done before, so we weren't really aware or sure where to start. The first Sunday we had to meet in the kitchen or the door closed, but that's what the parents wanted. That Pastor didn’t want it, or the wife. And then the class was just about balance. And I think the first question was out of one young man. I think he was 15 or 16. He said, it's going to be a funny question and in my mind I knew what he was going to ask. And he said “Is masturbation OK?”

I started laughing and so did my wife. I said, “What do you think?” And I'm told it’s sinful. (We’ll just call him Jonathan) It's part of growing up. The only thing the church says—and this church here says—that it's only a sin if you're thinking of your mother when you're doing it. That was the American Lutheran Church. Otherwise, it's growing up. If you think you need forgiveness, say a prayer. But the whole world does it. So don’t worry about it. You’re not going to go blind or die. Right? And then more of the girls started giggling and said “I feel better already.”

And this went on, on and off, and there were a lot of questions being asked that parents never dropped the time to answer. I’d always been very frank with my girl that I wanted to grow up not to be dependent on men. Be self-sufficient, And they did.

My middle daughter, who turned out to be a teacher, in high school and a kid grabbed her and pushed her into a doorway. And he's trying to feel her up. But just when he started, he collapsed on the floor. Glad she did what I told her to do. The easiest thing was bringing your knee up as fast as you can. And he was in the hospital for a couple days.

Gloria Foster

She was good at it, then. She was a strong woman.

Ed Simmons

Oh yeah, she's a swimmer.

And unfortunately, it turned out he was black. And the mother was a school bus driver. And the principal was black. And I was called in and asked, “Is this something we really need to pursue?” I said well of course it needs to be sued. It was a violent act. They said, only by your daughter. I said, “Don't ever say that to me again. She defended herself. And the parents are responsible for not teaching him how to behave.” And I said I'm not going to make any recommendations. Bring my daughter in here and let her make the recommendations. She was the one who solved an attempt at being violated. She looked to me and I said, it's your decision and I'll support it 100%. And she looked at the principal, and the counselor, and the mother and said, “Get him some help. Mental health. At least six months of it. And then after that I'll make my decision.”

And she walked out.

Gloria Foster

How old was she when? That was a very wise decision for a young lady.

Ed Simmons

And that's what made my younger daughter want to go into criminal justice because she couldn't believe in her eyes all of the injustices being done between white and blacks by school system, and each school. How the whites were getting away with anything, and the blacks for the slightest infraction would be expelled or arrested. And that's why she wanted to went into justice.

And now she's in the law system, hired at a major employer, it's been rated the top two employers in the country for the last 10 years.

Ed Simmons

It's called Wegmans. It’s a major grocery store chain in the East. A family owned, on the stock market. Totally non-union. Because all of the employees have voted the unions out every time they want to. And they've expanded it now into parts of Pennsylvania and Virginia, and in Maryland. And everywhere they go, they contract for the local farmers so all the produce is fresh. But they're open 364 days a year. They're closed on Christmas.

But they hire the children of employees. They pay 100% for all full time employees, all expenses. Medical, dental, vision, health care, their employees have to pay nothing.

And if their children do well enough, they're the first to be employed. Their jobs are always open for him when they come back from school. And they're paying him $15-17 an hour. To work at... baskets, cleaning up or teaching them how to be a checkout clerk. One of those stores would have 24 checkout lanes.

Gloria Foster

If you could make the decisions about the Fox gift, what would you like to see?

Ed Simmons

It would be nice, only if we had the right professional personnel within the church, to do it on a volunteer basis, to perhaps build and manage a senior care facility. Not only people from Grace, but for other denominations, or people in need, and have it maintained on a first class level. Not like too many of the nursing homes that are just for the money. This is not about money, it's about people and their well being.

Gloria Foster

So make it a non profit.

Ed Simmons

Right, right. But have the qualified people to do it. Because if you're going to have to spend more money on hiring and managing it, it isn't worth the church's time to do it.

You can get a lot of donations from families if you have to. But I know there's one lady I play Bridge with who thinks we should give the entire amount to Lighthouse and not worry about it.

Gloria Foster

Oh, I don't think so. Yeah, I don't think that's what the donors anticipate.

Ed Simmons

No, I don't either. Because we have qualified people who know how to handle that money. She's a very smart business woman. She was in real estate.

Gloria Foster

Or was she in real space, yeah?

Ed Simmons

Yeah I would like to see a little better ownership…

I understand this past year and the difficulties many of the families probably had with containment, lost their jobs and income. But it's been a perpetual problem of not meeting budget year after year. If you’re going to pledge an amount. Do it. We're not wealthy, but I've made sure of that. I didn't appreciate all of this in the military because we never got paid. Others probably making, at the senior enlisted, you could be $25,000 year when I got up in ‘90, which is not a hell of a lot of money. But the medical benefits now that...

Gloria Foster

You have Champus, is it?

Ed Simmons

Ah, we had the Express Scripts for prescriptions and we have Tricare. And between the two of us when I had my open heart surgery 20 years ago, we left Swedish with a bill of, I think, $6.95.

Gloria Foster

Yeah, yeah, so that's been really good for you.

Ed Simmons

Otherwise, because I saw the bill was $68,000.

Gloria Foster

Yeah, it's amazing how much medical care can be?

Well, is there anything else that you would like to share right now?

Ed Simmons

I enjoy Bergen. He feels—you’ll understand this—some others understand this, he feels like an old glove.

Gloria Foster

Yeah, very easy to be around. And does it very clear job, he's very clear.

Ed Simmons

That's what I like about James too. They're not trying to impress people. With their education.

Gloria Foster

They're just genuinely good people, and you could tell your children now that somebody.

Ed Simmons

Yes, a role model.

Ed Simmons

Yes, and Bergen is the same way.

Some people would take offense to the way he dresses. But hey! Who cares? It's what's in here and what's in here? Those are the two important things.

Gloria Foster

But I love that that he wears tennis shoes that match the liturgical shoes.

Ed Simmons

Yeah yeah, yeah. It's cute.

Gloria Foster

Yeah, no, he has his own personal happiness.

Ed Simmons

Oh yeah, I think that's a trait that James has. Yeah, and I think that's one of the traits he's looking for when he interviews interns.

Gloria Foster

We've had excellent interns.

Ed Simmons

Yes, unfortunately the last two I'd like to know better. Or last three, but.

Gloria Foster

Well, we get to know them pretty thoroughly in that Lectionary Study. That's where you really get to know them.

Ed Simmons

Exactly, yeah yeah.

Gloria Foster

Right I I can't think of a group I've ever loved as much as I love.

Ed Simmons

That group. I do too, yeah.

Gloria Foster

And I I learned so much emotionally. I get so much out of it.

Ed Simmons

Right?

And there's nobody in that group who is trying to be forceful that my opinion is the only way to think about it.

And that was a problem I had with Pastor John. He did things the authoritarian way, and he made no bones about it.

I just think that the group is in that spot, right? It's about being nice, personal, people caring for people. It's hard... but I'd like to see more young people.

We're not going to be around that much longer. Right? Yeah?

Gloria Foster

And we need to make way for them. We don't need to carry everything, we need to get out of the way and let them start to move over.