As a college sophomore, I was a wise
fool. Such is the fate of the young to
be filled with a confidence to forge ahead and assume they have enough wisdom
and energy to deal with the problems of the world without making the same
mistakes that have been made before.
Energy there may be. Seething
torrents of it. But wisdom? Well, they do have the wisdom of the
young. Wisdom to claim happy
endings. Wisdom to believe we could be
doing better. Wisdom to face walls as
obstacles rather than necessary additions to the land scape. So you see the
paradox. There is great wisdom and power
in these possibilities. And there is
glory. Ah glory.
So, armed and shackled with this paradox, I
went forth from the ivory tower to face the bastion of entrenched darkness,
home. So the foolishness shows its gory
face. I wasn’t horrific, but close to
it. My parents looked forward to having
me come and breathed in relief to have me go. My local congregation had arranged a ‘Folk
Service’ led by the ‘Young People’ complete with a ‘Dialogue Sermon.’ Talk about foolish. It was 1967/68. They were desperately trying to be
relevant. They were trying to see the
upheavals around them with some perspective other than fear. The stench of their burning center city was
still fresh in memory. The war in South
East Asia was becoming a wound. The
young were not staying on the tracks so lovingly laid for them. And the cacophony of Rock and Roll was
swamping The Rat Pack, Rosemary, Bing, and Big Band Music in pounding rhythms
and feedback. Slick and pretty had
become shaggy and bra-less. Scotch and
soda had been traded for pot and LSD.
And worst of all, the kids were protesting everything from cutting down
trees to supporting the boys-over-there.
They had stopped being American.
Perhaps these church leaders who planned the dialogue service were a bit
sophomoric themselves. Or they were
trying to build bridges. It was a deep
chasm.
The place was packed. We played our songs, even had a sing along
without incident. But the dialogue
sermon was loaded with tension. The kids
actually got honest about the war and a pervasive judgment on their life
styles. Finally one of the ‘older guys’
stood up and almost cried, “Why don’t you love your country anymore?”
The room went silent. The question was loaded. He wasn’t only raising a question about our
patriotism but about our identity, about our value systems, and most about our
relationships with these people who were struggling to have a clue about who we
had become.
Everybody looked at me. I had the longest hair, I played the guitar,
I was a minister’s kid, and I had said I wanted to be a minister. So obviously I was the one to field this land
mine. Hey, I was a sophomore. The motto of my college is “Why Not?” So I forged ahead toward…
“I do
love my country. I consider myself a
patriot.” I let that one sink in for
effect. “We are the best educated
generation in the history of this nation, because of the schools you have
built. We’ve studied more history and
American history than any generation before us.
Thomas Jefferson is one of my heroes.
So is Ben Franklin and George Washington. These guys were revolutionaries. Their vision of what this nation could be is
revolutionary. It’s nuts. It makes room for everybody. The Bill of Rights is off the wall. It offers an equal footing to anybody. They were crazy enough to believe it was
possible, not probable, but possible. It
still is nuts. Jefferson thought we were
going to need a good revolution every 20 years or so, just to keep the dream
from getting bogged down in the power plays that have defined history since it
began. So, Jefferson was right. We’re having a revolution. No guns.
Just Jimi Hendrix. We’re fighting
for your country too, for its soul. You
taught us to do that. We don’t expect you to approve. Why should you? Just listen, listen with your hearts and
believe that we’re not totally nuts. And
love us. We need that. We’ll grow up. Then you can retire and let us fight with our
kids.”
Pretty good speech, huh? Somebody recorded it with one of the old reel
to reel machines. My mother cried. My father was preaching at another church and
asked for prayers for the congregation where the dialogue service was happening. God listened.
The last line got a laugh. To
this day I have no explanation for the content, except for the Holy Spirit. It’s what I’ve come to believe, but
then? Gimme a break. I was a sophomore. But I guess I was a patriot, even then. Peace bro’.
Happy Fourth of July.
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