Two clerics of different faiths meet for a cup of tea, and discover that they share an infirmity common to men of a certain age, particularly those whose vocation involves a lot of kneeling.
As they part, each of them pauses briefly in thought, then takes a second with his smart phone to order a surprise gift for the other — knee pads that can be worn under clerical vestments to cushion aging, pain-wracked joints made brittle through daily acts of devotion.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ouu6LGGIWsc
This vignette is presented in a commercial for Amazon Prime touting its one-click delivery service. Sure, Amazon places profits before prophets — yet in doing so it demonstrates how commerce breaks down barriers that the political class is determined to build, or fortify. This is true even of long-standing animosities between Islam and what was once called Christendom.
As Zachary Karabell documents at length and in detail in his splendid book “Peace Be Upon You: Fourteen Centuries of Muslim, Christian and Jewish Conflict and Cooperation,” even during the depth of the Crusades, Christians and Muslims traded with each other, dealt with each other as neighbors rather than enemies, and protected each other — even as their rulers insisted that amicable coexistence was impossible.
In addition to being a useful dramatization of the healing power of commerce, this Amazon Prime ad is a very effective sermon on a universal theme: “He has shown you, O man, what is good; And what does the Lord require of you but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God?” (Micah 6:8)
