Yesterday’s blog about my being wrong about which Chicago team Pope Bob (Leo XIV, for you non-Bobs!), flashed me back to an event that occurred over 50 years ago…

I was on a 6-man crew tracking satellites from a base in eastern Turkey back in 1970. At Christmas we got into a discussion about who wrote “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.” I had seen a TV show a few years before that introduced Johnny Marks as the composer of Rudolph and a number of favorite (secular!) Christmas songs.

So I was confident. I knew exactly who wrote Rudolph. But not as confident as my crewmate Willie who was even more convinced that Gene Autrey wrote it. Actually, Gene Autrey recorded it, and it was a huge hit for him. I told Willie I had seen Johnny Marks on TV, etc. Nope. Then I scrounged around for a Christmas record (remember records?). The label contained not only the list of songs on the record but also who composed each. And there it was:

Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer by…Johnny Marks

Done, right? Of course not. Willie said something like, “I don’t know what all that stuff means on the label, but it can’t mean that Johnny Marks wrote Rudolph since everyone knows that Gene Autrey wrote it.”

Reminds me of the flat earth story I shared back in January.

Let’s be teachable, shall we?

He who is often reproved, yet stiffens his neck, will suddenly be broken beyond healing. (Proverbs 29.1, ESV)

No cure for intentional blindness, I’m afraid – Seth Godin