Dear John ~ 6 September 2017

Dear John,

On Monday, I had every intention of getting a letter of to you, but you beat me to it. What kept me from writing my dear ol’ friend in Colorado? The City of Charlottesville, that’s what. We got a letter in the mail from one of our street inspectors giving us 10 days to trim back a long row of runaway Rose of Sharons that have been spreading themselves too generously out over our little lane. They were running wild, I’ll admit. And they were causing a problem on our narrow lane, skinny as it is. Even without the forest intruding onto the asphalt, two go karts would have to suck in their tummies to squeeze past each other without scraping paint. Did you know that in England, lots of the little avenues are referred to as a “close”? Like instead of Mulberry St., it’s Mulberry Close? Those Brits say what they mean; everything on those streets is in close, for sure.

Anyway, I had planned to trim the Rose of Sharons in a month or so when legitimate Fall weather hits, as I’m told that then I can prune away without fear of butchering them into oblivion. However, the inspector man said they had to go, butcher or no butcher. He obviously has little concern for our horticultural dilemma. I’d planned for the job to take an hour. Six hours later, I dragged my weary self into the house and called it a day.

You know, though, how Charlottesville has been syphoning off so much of my energy in so many other ways lately. Our dear, broken town has been splayed across the news, and it’s not going away–last night CNN had a link to a livestream of our town’s City Council meeting–can you believe that? In the middle of Hurricanes and DACA breakdown and North Korea shooting nuclear missiles, there sits our town council with a lead-in from Wolf Blitzer. John, I tell you, on August 12th, I experienced the most vile and vicious ways we degrade ourselves and others. I know racism and antisemitism is still very much with us, but I’ve never seen it bare its fangs– so brazen, without any twinge of conscience. And then, later, I stood between two groups of people spewing the most evil, dehumanizing words at one another. I will never forget that. Never. And though I would never want three people to die to be able to get to this point, I am grateful that now our wounds, festering so long, are in the open, that we simply cannot ignore them. I hope that now we can embrace serious national repentance. I hope that we can truly become brothers and sisters, that we can make communities where everyone truly belongs.

You talked about the In-Between. I feel that all the time. I feel it, for instance, in trying to navigate how to live well in a time where we cycle from one crisis to the next, rarely without any moment to catch our breath or think deeply, certainly no time to think clearly. One downside (of many) to the 24-hour news cycle and firehose-style social media is that we are tempted to believe we can have (or should have) our finger and our mind on every issue, every crisis, every worthy concern. But we can’t. Only God can do that. If we think that we have no responsibility to engage the sorrows and injustices of our world, we need God to expand our heart. However, if we think that we are responsible to confront every sorrow and injustice of our world, we need God to chasten our bloated (and destructive) delusions.

Of course, for many of us, our overblown sense of responsibility comes from the shame blasted out from those who like to sound like God, only with a heap of self-righteousness poured on top. A long time ago, I gave up giving someone else that level of authority in my life. I’ve got my hands full trying to follow Jesus’ voice; I can’t tune in to the million-voice siren call on Facebook too.

All this reminds me of Ignatius who often signed off his letters with this inspiring jolt: Go set the world aflame! That’ll get the blood flowing, won’t it? We do need more people striking their match. However, Ignatius also regularly insisted on our need to foster a Holy Indifference. This Holy Indifference was Ignatius’ way of describing an abiding trust in God that keeps us from getting swept away in the emotions and demands of those things (and often good things) that simply take over more energy than they should. It’s not a call to apathy, not by any means. However, it is, as one writer put it,”peaceful acceptance, realistic expectations, and careful consideration.” If we have indifference but no flame, we’ll waste our life. And if we have the flame but no indifference, we’ll just burn, burn til there’s nothing playful or hopeful or curious left in us at all. 

I know saying goodbye to the kids was hard. I wish Miska and I could have walked over to check in on you and Mer after the farewells. I see those days coming toward us over the horizon. I’m going to be a blubbering dad when it’s our turn. But before then, Miska and I are celebrating our 20th. And we’re doing it in style. We’re heading to Ireland on Sunday to do a walking tour of the Kerry Way, just the bags over our shoulder, the mist on our heads, the green clover under our feet. We’ll walk from village to village. I can’t wait. I plan to practice a little Holy Indifference on the trail. 

Your Friend,

Winn

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