‘Welcome children. Welcome to another episode of Reverend Al cooking up cost saving recipes for all the poor folk out there. Now, you don’t feel bad about that. More and more of us are having a hard time feeding ourselves and our families. Now, today we’re going to have a cheap meal packed with protein, fiber and nutrients. A little bit of everything you need to keep going’.

‘Beans on toast!’ Reverend Al declared with a big smile. ‘One of my favorite meals. Oh, when those beans soak into the toast. Um, um, um. Now that’s good eating. And a can of beans cost less than a dollar at the discount store. Oh my, let’s get at it. I can’t wait till those beans are ready.

‘Now children,’ Reverend Al continued. ‘As always I have little Johnny from across the hall performing the cameraman duties with his cellphone. Johnny makes the show good and exciting by following me around the kitchen while I’m chopping things up here, or cooking something else over there. He’ll be right beside me, so you can see the sparks fly off my knife as I demonstrate my culinary skills. Then when the food’s cooking, he’ll be right in there with the camera, showing you what it’s supposed to look like’.

‘Now isn’t that exciting? Today we’re going to start by opening a can of beans, and putting them in a pot and then setting the pot on the stove at medium heat. That’s right, it’s that easy. Then you just wait for them to start to bubble. So let’s get started, cause I have to tell you, once you have beans on your mind, you just have to have them.

‘Now Johnny, maybe you’d like to get those beans in the pot, while old Reverend Al sits here and tells a story.

‘I’m the cameraman,’ Johnny exclaimed.

‘So?’

‘So, You’re the cook and I’m the cameraman. You do the cooking.’

‘Well, that may be so in most cases, but my rheumatics are acting up today. It's my condition that’s keeping me from getting up and pouring those beans myself’.

‘Mom says your only condition is laziness,’ Johnny replied.

‘Well now, it’s a lot better than the condition you’re afflicted with, which is sassiness. Now get over there and get those beans on the stove. Leave the camera here, and I’ll get to pontificating.’

Johnny relented, strictly because of the hell he’d catch by his Mom if he didn’t. Reverend Al would squeal on him every single time Johnny wouldn’t do what he told him to.

‘Now children, today, I want to tell you about the Counterculture of the sixties. Old Reverend Al was right in there with the rest of them marching for our rights, and fornicating in the most peaceful and loving way. And don’t forget about the drugs. The drugs of the Counterculture were mind expanding, not something that can kill an elephant. Oh, it was a grand time for old Reverend Al, but that’s not what we’re talking about here today.

‘We’re going to talk about the Counterculture, but before we do, Johnny run over with the camera and show the folks what those beans look like sitting there on the stove’.

Johnny looked at Reverend Al in disbelief, ‘I’m pretty sure everyone knows what a pot of beans looks like’.

‘Now go on and show them those beans. This is a cooking show, and get rid of that attitude while you're over there. You’re starting to interrupt the gentility of my show with your general contrariness. Now get!’ and then the thought occurred to him, ‘Or I’ll be having a talk with your mother.’

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With another huff, Johnny got up and stormed into the kitchen. Reverend Al disappeared from view, and the audience watched the floor while Johnny made his way to the stove.

‘You suck Reverend Al,’ Johnny said, as he held his cellphone over the pot of beans. Then he gave the beans the finger, so the audience fully understood his outrage.

‘Why you,’ Reverend Al proclaimed, making a gesture to get out of the chair and shake the boy, but he decided against it on account of his rheumatics, and the thought of walking all the way into the kitchen. But that’s how mad he was. ‘I wish I had a switch. I’d show you some manners. You know, if I had half a mind, I wouldn’t pay you for this episode’.

‘You don’t pay me for any episodes!’ Johnny exclaimed, this being a particularly sore spot in their relationship. ‘Mom makes me do it out of charity’.

‘Well, I was thinking about it. I was thinking about paying you, but now I changed my mind. How do you like that? Now get back here. They’ve seen the beans long enough. Everyone knows what beans look like’.

‘Now then children. The Counterculture was not simply a response to the war in Vietnam. It started before the war with the Civil Rights Movement, and that tells us what was behind the movement; repression of basic human rights. It wasn’t just the blacks who were finding themselves disenfranchised. The system had become old and corrupt, and many groups found themselves on the outside of society. Youth were being forced to listen to Lawrence Welk, and women and minorities were treated as second class citizens. Then came the war and the youth of the nation had no rights at all. Many were forced to fight a war that no longer reflected their values.

‘All kinds of common issues were assailing the majority. The environment was already an issue. Nuclear war was a very real threat. Policing had become authoritarian. Enough people had had enough of an antiquated, out of control and abusive system and they rebelled.

‘Change was in the air. It could be heard in the music of the 60’s. It could be found on the open highway. Information and ideas were being transmitted over more accessible channels of communication. The world was getting bigger and smaller at the same time, and the Counterculture embraced the freedom and expanded democracy it promised.

‘Now children we’re right back at that exact same spot today. The environment alone is disenfranchising entire generations just for being born during these times. Many of us face financial instability. A World War could break out any day. The blacks and women are still fighting for their rights. People are becoming disenfranchised at a growing rate, because we are being denied our basic human rights.

‘Children, we look to our past to see our way forward. History shows us our momentum as a civilization, and that is to define our basic human rights. The times and the counterculture produced a great wave of democratic awareness. It was not possible without expanded communication through radio, television, movies, and the spirit of an open road. All this gave us the ability to organize on a meaningful scale.

‘A new wave of consciousness has descended upon us, children, which is expanding even further, our ability to organize on a meaningful scale. There’s a new open road. It’s traveled on the internet. Now we communicate at the speed of life; real time, and we’re talking. Use this tool children. Use it to bring a new democracy to all of us.

‘Can I get an Amen?’

‘It’s time for God’s children of all religions to gather together and take possession of the eternal bounty that we can see before us. Let us end this suffering children of God, and live in harmony.’

The spirit was starting to move old Reverend Al. So much so, he got up and started running back and forth being filled by the spirit of change, and such, but then he caught a whiff of the cooking beans, and this prompted him to go have a look at them.

‘Alright Children. Old Reverend Al is feeling better now. We’re filled with the spirit and we know what to do. Johnny, why don’t you run over to your Mom’s and get some bread. I’ll show our friends here how to make toast and then demonstrate me eating these beans. Bring some butter too, if you can find some. Oh my, I can’t wait to get at those beans.’