Virtue

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Grandparenting

Grandmas — and sometime grandpas — have to be as good as it gets this side of heaven. Yesterday a friend’s account of her time with her grandkids at the shore drew me back to fond memories of my own Grandma Wieseler.

Theresa had just returned from a week with her seven grandchildren. The kids are scattered all over the U.S. so she gathered them at their house on the shore for a week of family togetherness. Yes, this would provide terrific bonding-time for the cousins. But Theresa was also indulging her own deep affection for them — there was plenty of healthy self-interested “grand-mothering” in her plan as well.

Although she was grateful that one parent was present at the beginning and a different Mom came at the end of the week, Theresa mostly wanted the grandkids to herself. Her rationale will be obvious to all of you who have grandkids. It was an Aha! moment for me! She explained, “Kids are just different when parents aren’t around. We have more fun and get to know each other so much better when they are out of the picture.”

Of course, some aspects of being an uncle — and now grand-uncle — prepared me to understand what Theresa was saying. But I also recognized she was speaking of a deep, intimate bond that I will never know. All the more reason to treasure the enduring love my siblings and I experienced with our Grandma Wieseler.

Perhaps the difference comes down to the necessary and appropriate roles parents must play. They need to discipline, proscribe, direct and say “no” as often as “yes.” Grandparents are free of responsibility to be that kind of authority figure. Grandparents are allowed to be much more about love, pure and simple!

Theresa and I mused a bit about all this. Then we wondered whether our experience of God is more like a Grandma or like a parent. Hmmm! Of course, we knew which we wanted it to be. But really, which is it? This seems pretty important for Christians to figure out. Jesus, after all, taught us to call God “Father”, abba, papa.

I have long claimed that my first and best introduction to God was my Grandma Wieseler. She was unconditional love personified. Yes there is a need for discipline, proscriptions, direction and “no” in the practice of our faith. But that’s early on, when we are children. We are meant to grow-up. Isn’t that the point of good parenting?

One day, some of us even become grandparents — in this, God is pleased!

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Giving It a Rest

Lighten up! Give it a rest! Chill out, would you?

Okay, I hear you. Yes, the last few post have been pretty “heavy”… diminishment, suffering, excoriating an Archbishop. If Kneading Bread had an editor (maybe it needs one!), I would likely be cautioned that such serious fare is sure to kill readership — as if our cultural gospel truly is “Don’t worry; be happy!”

But we cannot get away from the big questions, can we? Life just keeps happening, prescribing a menu not of our choosing. Even the spiritual-but-not-religious types cannot avoid what the Buddha taught in his Four Noble Truths — the first of which is essentially, “Life is suffering!”

Dukkha is the Buddhist term commonly translated suffering, anxiety or stress. The Buddha is reputed to have said: “I have taught one thing and one thing only, dukkha and the cessation of dukkha.” So much for those who want to bail on Christianity because all this stuff about “the cross” is such a downer! Well folks, it seems that “unsatisfactoriness” is here to stay and we better learn to deal with it!

An encouraging thing happened yesterday in the form of a comment made to my post. It really brought a smile to my face, delighted me, really helped me lighten up! My nephew, Terry made more than a comment to my post. His comment expressed the heart of what I was trying to say, and he did it much more simply:

I am glad I persevered to the end. Rohr describes the absolute bedrock of faith where one can voluntarily leap into the unknown sea of suffering. Fearless! If the human condition (suffering) is only a mask, than what lies beneath? I believe Rohr would say God’s love, unflinching and unchanging. Perhaps others would say darkness or nothingness. When it comes to this universal question of meaning, I am comforted by the writings of the two Richards above. Vielen Dank! (that’s German for “Thank you very much.”)

When I was a kid, my parents taught me — and my nephew Terry’s mother — a prayer that asked God to give us a break from life as “this vale of tears.” That’s certainly not in vogue any longer in our 21st century spiritual-but-not-religious or don’t-worry-be-happy culture. Isn’t there a consumer good to satisfy our every want, a pill to alleviate every discomfort?  If there is not, we want there to be one.

Sorry, folks! Life is pretty much what Jesus, the Buddha, my nephew and all the great wisdom traditions have been saying.  Our choice is pretty much what we make of it!  What is our response? How will we live? What is beneath all of this? Love… unflinching, unchanging? Darkness? Nothingness?

I’m putting my bet on God. Not as a life insurance policy! Not as deus ex machina. Not as a begrudging, reluctant savior who condescends to pull us from the muck! But on a God alive, manifest in creation. A Word made flesh. God-incarnate. Emmanuel, God-with-us. One who gets up, close and personal, in whose image is made very single person on this earth — no exceptions!  My bet is firmly placed on Love.

When it comes to all this, the simple Shakers had it so very right…

My life flows on in endless song;
Above earth’s lamentation,
I hear the sweet, tho’ far-off hymn
That hails a new creation;
Thro’ all the tumult and the strife
I hear the music ringing;
It finds an echo in my soul—
How can I keep from singing?
What tho’ my joys and comforts die?
The Lord my Saviour liveth;
What tho’ the darkness gather round?
Songs in the night he giveth.
No storm can shake my inmost calm
While to that refuge clinging;
Since Christ is Lord of heaven and earth,
How can I keep from singing?
I lift my eyes; the cloud grows thin;
I see the blue above it;
And day by day this pathway smooths,
Since first I learned to love it,
The peace of Christ makes fresh my heart,
A fountain ever springing;
All things are mine since I am his—
How can I keep from singing?

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Questioning the Inevitable

You have probably noticed. Regulars here will remember that I turn 65 in August. I’m wrestling with that inevitability. Mostly, how can this be? Once again “old people” were right — it descends upon us faster than we can imagine.

Getting an AARP card at 50 is dismissed as a playful hoax, especially now that the organization has dropped “association of retired persons” from its moniker. Most 50 year-olds are at the height of their careers. Many parents are paying far more in college tuition for their kids than contributing to their IRAs.

Even at 60 I was full-throttle in my career. The occasion was marked with a great celebration in our back yard with 60 of my closest and dearest friends. Awards were given to the top five winners of the “How Well Do You Know Richard?” trivia contest. Organizers regaled us with a hilarious skit, “Richard, This is Your Life!”

But 65 is different! More and more people in elevators, fellow customers in stores, even neighbors out walking with their dogs now unreflectively refer to me as “Sir”! I can no longer claim to be taking “early” Social Security. And try as I might, I must not ignore those infernal mailings from the federal government assuring me that I am being automatically enrolled in Medicare.

Don’t get me wrong! I want to be 65! The age is not the issue. It’s just that tables are turned on us so fast. No longer do I feel a creation of my past. As more trappings and traits of who I was are stripped away I discover the irrefutable truth of who I am at my core. It’s as if the future has grabbed the initiative and is now apprehending me like an unknown suitor I am powerless to resist.

My perfectionism and need to “control” will surly be one of my last personality traits to succumb. Even aging is something I want to do well, as it should be done, perfectly if that’s possible. With that in mind I was drawn to a six-month project by writer John Leland who will chronicle six New Yorkers over the age of 85 as they move into their futures. [link]

Leland recounts the popular schtick — old age is presumed to be “a problem to be solved. People’s bodies broke down, their minds lost function, they drained billions out of the health care system.” That more than a stereotype, its my fundamental fear.

About five years ago I started to resent people who would say something inane like, “You don’t look 60!!!” I retained my composure by quietly telling myself, “They don’t know of what they speak! What is 60 supposed to look like?”

Here’s what I’d really like… to be part of a massive rewrite of cultural presumptions. As Leland’s series intends to chronicle, what if we began thinking of our elders/ourselves “not as a problem, but as an asset, a repository of memory and experience?”

Research actually shows that people in their 70s and 80s, far from wallowing in despair, are happier than their younger counterparts. What do “we” know that younger people do not? For almost all of human history, societies turned to the oldest people for advice and wisdom. Now, that wisdom too often sits unheard, devalued, unexpressed.

Rather than seeing ourselves as “old”, what if we initiated a cultural movement — one by one — to reclaim our full stature as wise elders? Note well, I am certainly not suggesting that we perpetuate the status quo in which too many of us pretend to be “young.” That’s precisely the trap which holds us bound and the foolishness that’s sure to frustrate.

Growing old isn’t easy! Some wise elders have even counseled me that it was even harder than they had imagined.  But still, how do we choose to proceed? No one does it perfectly. One requirement appears to be yielding control, as hard as that is for my personality-type.

Of one thing I am pretty certain, growing old well and embracing an invitation to become a true elder, is not essentially a medical problem or even determined solely by our psychological makeup. Rather, I am convinced it’s fundamentally a spiritual challenge, invitation and opportunity.

As I hurdle toward my birthday in August I am increasingly drawn to a prayer poem by the late Elizabeth Rooney, an Episcopalian from Wisconsin who seems to have fully embraced her elder-hood. I intend to take her spiritual wisdom with me into the years ahead:

Oblation

I hope each day
To offer less to You,
Each day
By Your great love to be
Diminished
Until at last I am
So decreased by Your hand
And You, so grown in me,
That my whole offering
Is just an emptiness
For You to fill
Or not
According to Your will.

_______________

You may learn more about Elizabeth Rooney, a “late-in-life poet” [here].

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More than Happiness, May They Know Love

Exhausted but so very content, grateful and filled with hope… awash with memories!  After a morning at the Science Museum and a picnic lunch we said our goodbyes.

Tom, Cheryl and the six kids then packed into their SUV for a long drive to Canada. Parental strategy was to get the kids really tired so they’d be content sitting engrossed with their digital devices until falling asleep for the remaining seven hours en route to Winnipeg.

Our time together was less than 48 hours but the experience provided stories that will be recalled, retold and perhaps embellished for years to come. You heard one about 6 y/o Claire expressing sadness about her Grandma Karen’s death in my post yesterday. Here are a couple more:

With watermelon juice dripping onto our backyard deck I asked, “Where are you staying in Winnipeg?” One classically adolescent response flashed forth, “In a hotel!” Then Martha, who will be nine in August claimed her ground in the conversation, “Do you mean that literally or metaphysically?” Before I could close my gaping mouth twelve-year old Aidan harrumphs, “I think she meant metaphorically!” Honest to God — you cannot create better dialogue than this! My jaw is still ajar.

The kids requested Asian food for dinner so we headed off to our favorite buffet. The selection never disappoints; the colors are tantalizing; seeing is so much easier than reading a menu; and let’s get real, the price is right. After surveying the many heaping plates spilling onto our table, I randomly glanced to the left. There at the end was 4 y/o Evelyn adeptly digging into her choices with chop-sticks! Honestly! At her age I didn’t know rice came any other way than pudding with cinnamon — and you ate with silverware!

Saying our goodbyes, Tom again reiterated his request for us to come to Omaha to celebrate my 65th Birthday with them in August. That conjured a sobering thought I had quieted numerous times these days. I love these kids! Yet as I wipe watermelon from my chin, delight in their dexterity with Asian cuisine or stand in awe of Aidan and James building a geodesic dome (without instructions) at the Science Museum; I struggle with the fact that I will not live long enough to see what truly becomes of these children who mean the world to me.

All I have is hope! I have hope because there are families and children like these. I have hope their global awareness and insatiable curiosity will make the world a more peaceful and just planet than the one my generation is leaving them.  More than happiness, I hope they know love.

I hope they will learn every bit as much as they can. Then, I hope they use their considerable intelligence to serve others and not just themselves. I hope they become so grounded in their family, neighborhood, school and churches that they spontaneously create better cities, nations and a global community in which each and all have a place at the buffet table.

Personally, I hope — I really do hope — that I can remain intellectually curious, psychologically nimble, embracing of a changing world, letting go of my need to control, define or judge. I strive to embrace something more than optimism — rather, I hope always to rest in the assurance that others are now in charge.  Someday, I hope to yield to the One who is the Other.

Finally, here is what I really hope these children know more and more throughout their lives:

If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge,and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Love never fails… now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love. (1Cor 13:1-13)

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Powerful As the Stream

Observation leads me to conclude that I am not alone in wanting to be in charge. Others seem to share my control issues as well. Yes, I like to feel important. Much to my chagrin, family and friends have plenty of evidence to counter my feelings of superiority and perfectionism.

A conversation after posting Perfection Unbound [link] last Sunday showed there was need for clarification.  You may recall that I wrote: “Despite my delusions of grandeur and flights into self-sufficiency, I’m not as special as I think nor as singular as I want to imagine. My friends and family simply know how to slip beneath my well-defended public persona.”

I then went on to suggest that too many of us easily and willingly “fall into one of religion’s most subtle and seductive pitfalls — using spirituality to comfort our egos or to validate our pre-conceived view of the world. We pervert Christianity to serve our needs rather than affirm its core assertion that salvation comes through dying to our over-sized egos.”

That generated some blow-back as well it should. Too many people walk around having been shamed into thinking too little of themselves. Abuse of power by folks who like to be in control or have an exalted sense of their own rectitude and virtue — typically an over-compensation for their own poor self-esteem and feelings of powerlessness — can really victimize other people.

I’m grateful for the blow-back because it allows for an essential clarification — between a healthy self-worth and appreciation for one’s inalienable dignity on one hand, and an unbridled individualism, trust in self-interest as a reliable moral guide and pursuit of only slightly veiled ego-gratification on the other. Here is the essential distinction: there is a huge difference between un-redeemed egos and healthy self-worth.

Here’s the rub as I see it. As I wrote on Sunday, there’s too much contemporary preoccupation with shallow, feel-good, power-of-positive-thinking “spirituality” being marketed to ego-driven consumers. Sadly, this also comes from “Christian” sources as well as pop-culture.

Virtually all world religions are unanimous in teaching that we must put our ego-selves to death! Trust me, this is very hard to do when you’re already “perfect”! None of us — again, not one of us — want to hear that.  Too often our churches don’t want to hear or teach that message either.  Rather, they maneuver to be in charge as arbitrators of “truth” and assert control by enforcing their preferred definition.

Some of the responses to Sunday’s post expanded upon and expressed better what I was struggling to say. For example, I had cited Buddhist master, Chogyam Trungpa’s invitation to consider pouring tea into a cup. The cup must be lower than the teapot. If the cup is not lower than the pot, the tea will not end up in the cup.

A friend generously shared another citation that offers more than enough food for thought for those of us who wrestle with our need to be in control or want to be in charge:

All streams flow to the sea because it is lower than they are. Humility gives it its power. If you want to govern the people, you must place yourself below them. If you want to lead the people, you must learn how to follow them.

To this, let the Church say… AMEN!

________________

My friend who shared the final quote indicated it was from “Tao Te Ching: A New English Version” translated by Stephen Mitchell.

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Perfection Unbound

Only my very dearest friends and some intimate family members can get by with it. Only they have garnered sufficient trust and credibility to speak the truth to me in love. Still, they choose to speak the truth in riddles.

Sometimes it comes out as sarcastic humor… “You know what’s wrong with you? Nothing, you’re perfect!” It has taken me nearly 65 years to recognize they are not joking, to decipher the loving yet urgent message they are trying to pointedly deliver.

Despite my delusions of grandeur and flights into self-sufficiency, I’m not as special as I think nor as singular as I want to imagine. My friends and family simply know how to slip beneath my well-defended public persona. My guess is I am not alone in such exalted self-assessment. This must make it very hard for God to be God!

Consider this… In cherishing our faith and dutifully practicing our religion we easily, willingly and all too frequently fall into one of religion’s most subtle and seductive pitfalls — using spirituality to comfort our egos or to validate our pre-conceived view of the world. We pervert Christianity to serve our needs rather than affirm its core assertion that salvation comes through dying to our over-sized egos.

With a lifetime of practice, my defenses handily domesticate much of what I claim to profess. I squirm at the preposterous proposition that I may have faults. I deftly shift responsibility, “Someone else died for me, so I don’t need to!”

Sorry, it doesn’t seem to work that way! Despite the contemporary preoccupation with so much shallow, feel-good, power-of-positive-thinking “spirituality” virtually all world religions are unanimous in teaching that we must put our ego-selves to death!  Trust me, this is very hard to do when you’re already “perfect”!

Western culture does not take easily to the heretical proposition that there is anything greater than the “self”, a moral code other than self-interest, or question the sufficiency of material goods to satisfy. All the more reason a deceptively simple and homey image disarmed me with its invitation to grow in humility. It will challenge any whose family and friends might want to lovingly suggest we can be “full of ourselves.”

The story is attributed to the Buddhist master, Chogyam Trungpa. The master invites us to consider pouring tea into a cup. The cup must be lower than the teapot. If the cup is not lower than the pot, the tea will not end up in the cup. It could just as well have come from Jesus — if we would be “perfect” we must deny ourselves, the one who would be greatest will become least.

Stealthily family, friends and other religions conspire to reveal what it is about my own faith I am so reluctant to profess.

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I came upon the story attributed to Chogyam Trungpa in The New Monasticism: An Interspiritual Manifesto for Contemplative Living by Rory McEntee and Adam Bucko.  Orbis Books, Maryknoll, NY: 2015., p. 29.

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You Decide… You Really Do!

YOU be the judge. I could too easily come across as cynical. Who wants to put up with my cynicism?

Here are two news stories that greeted me this morning. They came totally independent of one another. Yet, they collided big time in my morning waking to consciousness.  I’d be curious to know if you see any connection and whether you see any reason for concern.

The first story came from my hometown newspaper, the Omaha World-Hearld. Though I moved from Omaha in 1978, it will always be home and I enjoy staying connected with what’s going on there. Today the paper reports that the buy-out for fired University of Nebraska football coach, Bo Pelini will be $128,009 for the next 46 months.

I guess the sum seems smaller if reported in monthly increments rather than a lump sum ($5,888,414.00). The positive spin on the story is that this is less than it might have been — I guess that’s good news!

Because Pelini got a job coaching at Youngstown State in Ohio, Nebraska will “save” $21,991 each month on what the Huskers would have had to pay if he’d not landed another coaching job. Whew! Saving nearly $22,000 each month is a really good thing, right?

Yes, Coach Bo got fired last year even though he again led the Cornhuskers to a 9 and 3 season! If my memory is correct, the team won at least nine games in each of the seven seasons that Pelini coached the team.

Nebraskans take their college football serious! Nine wins for a team in the Big Ten Conference which can boast of the #1 national championship team just wasn’t good enough! Sadly, Nebraska fans are neither unique nor exceptional!

Then comes a seemingly unrelated story, not from the World-Herald but from completely different source. New statistics from the Pew Research Center show that between 2007 and 2014, the number of Americans who identify as Christian dropped by nearly eight percentage points, from 78.4 percent to 70.6 percent. Yes, an 8% drop in seven years!

At the same time, Pew’s 2014 U.S. Religious Landscape Study [link] found the number of people who are religiously unaffiliated — either atheist, agnostic or simply “nothing in particular” — has grown by more than six percentage points, from 16.1 percent in 2007 to 22.8 percent in 2014. Yes, fast approaching one-fourth of the population.

You be the judge! Do you see any connection between these two stories? I don’t mean to suggest that football causes one to loose one’s faith — though on football Saturdays in Lincoln you might very well get that idea! I remain curious, however, whether these two seemingly unrelated reports might be pointing at the same social phenomenon! Are they two sides of the same coin?

Again, no one wants to read a cynical rant! So, I leave the ball in your court (mixing my metaphors!) with a final observation. We are currently building a new football stadium in Minneapolis for the Minnesota Vikings at a cost of more than $1,000,000,000.00 — yes, more than a billion dollars!

It’s hyped as a catalyst for economic development. In fact, a new urban park in the heart of the city — dubbed The Yard — will provide a grand approach and view of the imposing architectural monument. The park is being praised for providing a terrific venue for the many pre- and post-game rituals associated with NFL football.

Time was when Cathedrals were built on the town square! Omaha’s St. Cecilia Cathedral — my family’s church and where I went to grade school — sits atop the highest geographical ridge in the city and is visible from as far as thirty miles away. The Cathedral of St. Paul is similarly perched above the Minnesota State capitol.

You judge! What are our core values? What’s important to Americans? Honestly speaking, where do we choose to worship on weekends? Who is our god?

 

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Beyond Grateful

Gratitude is overrated! Pop spirituality spouts trite phrases like “Gratitude is the Attitude!” Pious platitudes like, “No matter how bad you’ve got it somebody has it worse.” turn my stomach.  Even wise Biblical injunctions like, “In all things give thanks, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.” (1Thes 5:18) can’t bear the weight we often place on them.

Item: Yesterday!

Sitting in my chair savoring a first cup of coffee I anticipated the day… a walk to the creek with Jeb the Dog, solitude to pray, time to do the last laundry leftover from our trip to Florida, an early afternoon walk along the Mississippi with my nephew. Though I did not know it at the time, the day also provided a late afternoon movie, a rare dinner of New York strip steak from the grill and baked potato with plenty of butter.

I’ve been retired for a year and a half — Sundays don’t carry the same poignancy they once did. Yesterday I recognized that I’ve settled into a “new normal.” A certain complacency seems to have taken hold such that days seem to fade into a predictable and presumed routine. Could it be a sense of passive entitlement has seeped in?  Am I to be grateful for this?

Yesterday I caught myself! Where’s the gratitude? Morning coffee generally includes an iPad survey of world news. There were plenty of reminders that others are much worse off than me… earthquake survivors in Nepal, dramatic rescue of Nigerian girls being held by Boko Haram. Trite phrases and pious platitudes prove insufficient to shake my complacency and self-satisfaction.  I catch myself more apathetic than apologetic.

Gratitude proves insufficient to the task at hand. Recognizing how good I’ve got it did not lift my stupor. What’s happened to my sense of wonder, my savoring of weekend mornings? Yes, gratitude is an essential ingredient but alone is insufficient protection from becoming tepid, lax, complacent, settled in predictability.

Yesterday I rediscovered that the necessary precondition for gratitude — perhaps all of life — is sheer awe, unbridled amazement, the sort of utter incredulity that Denise Levertov captures in her poetry:

The yellow tulip in the room’s warmth opens.

Can I say it, and not seem to taunt

all who live in torment? Believe it, yet

remain aware of the world’s anguish?

But it’s so: a caravan arrives constantly

out of desert dust, laden

with gift beyond gift, beyond reason.

Item: a yellow tulip
opens; at its center
a star of greenish indigo,
a subtle wash of ink
at the base of each of
six large petals.
The black stamens
are dotted with white.
At the core, the ovary,
applegreen fullness
tapering to proffer—sheltered
in the wide cup of primary
yellow—its triune stigma, clove
of green and gold.

That’s one, at nightfall of a day which brought

a dozen treasures, exotic surprises, landscapes,

music, words, acts of friendship, all of them wrapped

in mysterious silk, each unique.

How is it possible?

The yellow tulip in the room’s warmth opens.

____________

Levertov’s poem, A Yellow Tulip may be found in her collection, Sands of the Well. A New Directions Book, New York, 1994, p 123.

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Remember to Breathe

We’ve all had weeks like this — the kind where you are racing around wondering how things got so busy and how we will juggle it all.  It’s like that for me and will remain so until Tuesday morning.

Today’s post by my friend Susan Stabile on her blog, Creo en Dios could not have come at a better time.  She offers a running list of strategies for handling stress.  Here is my simplified version with a couple of additions in no particular order:

  • Keep an ongoing “grocery list” of gratitude.
  • Get enough sleep. (Obvious but we need constant reminder!)
  • Exercise! (Good intentions don’t count)
  • Learn to say, No!
  • Pray the Serenity Prayer, especially the part about accepting what you cannot change.
  • Laugh — often, for any reason at all and fake it ’til you make it!
  • Befriend the benefits of stress like ability to remain focused and on track.
  • And my personal favorite — BREATHE!  Too often I catch myself holding my breath.  Breathing in and out really helps!
  • Try to keep an even keel — one way might be to consider the alternative!

Add to this list as you find helpful.  I am grateful for my friend Susan, one of the busiest and most productive people I know.  You may access her post [here].

 

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Being of Some Earthly Good

Back when I was doing ministry with the Lakota on the Pine Ridge Reservation — could it really have been more than 25 years ago! — bands of mostly young people traipsed through on service trips. Most came at this time of year with eagerness, generosity and a good dose of naïveté. With a critical attitude that frightens me today, I came to harshly judge the value of such trips smacking of cultural imperialism.

I ranted about others painting Grandma’s house when the responsibility really belonged to her own kids. I cynically dismissed the students for coming from privileged suburban schools to further polish their already exaggerated egos at the expense of people I had come to know as colleagues and friends.  Yes indeed, I could be pretty cynical and harsh!

Such angry judgments embarrass me now.  They have also been found to be unfair and unfounded. There is solid evidence for the power and potential of service. Michelle Sterk-Barrett, at the College of the Holy Cross, is an expert on the issues of best practices in preparation, execution, and the processing of often life-changing encounters.

Sterk-Barrett’s research shows that service experience has a huge impact on both faith formation and citizen engagement. She’s found that service changes students’ world views and self-concepts in critical areas:

  • Students who perform some kind of sustained service during their education discover that social problems are far more complex than they’d previously assumed.
  • They develop a powerful sense that an individual can improve conditions for those who suffer and can influence social values.
  • They discover a level of social concern that changes them into people who identify themselves as engaged, potential community leaders who want to make constructive change.

In contract, Strek-Barrett’s study found that students who did not engage in service experienced no change in these qualities, values or characteristics.

Rather than harshly dismissing well-heeled kids from the ‘burbs, Sterk-Barrett helped me see their generosity as an “eye-opening experience” for them. She states what we all know:

[Many parents] have made decisions that prevent our children from knowing those facing injustice in the world. In a desire to have our children have access to the best educational opportunities and minimize the potential for them to live in unsafe environments, we have collectively segregated ourselves, so that it’s nearly impossible to know and build relationships with people living in poverty.

The result of this segregation?  Stereotypes that perpetuate the misconception that people in need are fundamentally inferior to those of us who have been “successful” in traditional terms.  Service, if done well, has the power to change individuals who change the world.

My conclusion 25 years later? We need many more, and better, service opportunities — and not just for students, but for seniors and every citizen in between! It’s never too early or late to start.  Let’s all get out there and “be of some earthly good.”

Doing something for others — for which we do not get paid — has been shown to be a pretty good indicator of human character!

______________

This reflection is heavily dependent upon an April 10 article on the website Crux by Kathleen Hirsch. I heartily recommend her article which you may access [here].