Fractured

(I posted this last year and in checking found that nobody read it. Maybe nobody wanted to.  In case it was just a bad week for all of us I resubmit it for your consideration.)

In doing research for my doctoral dissertation (Character Education and the Development of Moral and Spiritual Values … Brigham Young University… [1984]) I read a 1978 address given at Harvard University by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn titled “A World Split Apart.” His address, and a book he wrote a few years before, “The Gulag Archipelago,” had a profound influence upon me. Now, thirty-three years later we are still a world split apart, we are still imprisoned—only in different ways. We are not split apart by communist or fascist totalitarianism, but we are split apart by other ideologies, by political loyalties, by religious beliefs, by unkept marriage vows and forgotten family hopes. We are imprisoned by selfishness.

When we have a broken limb we splint it, we cast it and protect it, we rest it; we don’t just automatically cut it off. Most of the time it will heal just fine. In the meantime, we do things for the person who is doing the work of trying to heal. We serve them, and when we do we come to love the object of our service.

In seeking for freedom, for expression of individual pleasures, for wealth, for ‘entitlements,’ we have lost our sense of unity, of ties that hold us together as ‘one nation, [or family] under God,’ indeed we have lost our connectedness as a human family. In fighting for our ‘position,’ or our distorted ‘identity’ we lose sight of the larger picture and our place in it.

We need to seek things that encourage our cohesiveness as families and as a nation and as a world community of people who have the same fears and aspirations, the same needs and hopes as we have. We are more similar than we are different. We all bleed when cut. We all can rest when the noise ceases and the cold is kept out, when we are fed, and we have some place to lay our head.

One thing that holds us together is our history—family history and national history. We need to learn it better. We cannot expect an individual or a family or a nation which has lost its memory to keep its vision. There may be rough brush strokes in what we paint of our families, there may be blemishes in our national history, but we are much more than the flaws—we are more good than bad. We must remember the good things and emphasize these things and hold out hope. And we must do this for others.

Things can get better; fractures can mend. Remember, “Faith, hope, [and] charity [all are needed]…but the greatest of these is charity.”

Of Maps and Viewpoints

A few years ago as my wife and I were returning on a flight from the Eastern seaboard I had a window seat and studied a slice of America from 30,000 feet. It was a clear day and I had several hours of fascinating observation and reflection. The look of the land seemed much different than the sterile maps I often pore over.

 Many different kinds of maps can accurately represent any given area, each, though, in its own limited way. There are maps that show elevations; others, highways; still others, geological formations. Plant types, population characteristics, and political boundaries can likewise be represented on maps and yet I could not see them on the geo-physical picture of ‘reality’ I was ‘seeing’. No map (or photograph, for that matter) can show everything about the area it represents, any more than what I could see outside my airplane window would reveal it to me from my perspective.

 In order to be intelligible or definitive, a map must drastically simplify things; it must leave out all but what it means to represent. Consider a few examples: Eskimos, I have read, are able to discriminate nine kinds of snow. Characteristics of snow are important to them. To me, snow is snow. Koreans or Chinese, or most other ethnic peoples of the world make sense of spoken sounds that are meaningless to me but are very understandable to them. Meteorologists can see a storm coming when certain kinds of clouds are far away on the horizon or even beyond the horizon, but most people can see only the clouds. What Eskimos, Koreans and Chinese, and meteorologists thus clearly perceive as significant is, in a sense, invisible to others.

 A cartographer in making a map wants to accomplish a certain purpose with his map: he includes in it everything that will promote or define this purpose and exclude everything that’s irrelevant to his purposes.

As our airliner flew over the vastness of America I felt I was seeing a synthesis between a land, which scriptures from my Church call “choice above all other lands,” (mountains and plains, forests, rivers and lakes and natural resources) and what man had made of it (farms, roads, cities, smoke—economic and recreational opportunities).

 For a person with one preconception of potential (a land of freedom and security, “choice above all other lands”—a scriptural definition) I looked at it one way; and for another passenger flying on this same airplane with a different preconception of potential it could be regarded quite differently (one giant pool of resources to exploit for gain). But instead of being two dichotomous ‘pictures’ of reality viewed through different portholes, or an antagonism or tension between two potentials, could not what was being observed better be considered simply two different ‘viewpoints’ based on different values?

 A similar statement can be made about any person’s system of knowledge or world view. It is like a map in that it is selective; that is, only certain things are represented on it while others are left out—by design or by ignorance. It represents and reveals those things that are familiar to the person’s background, interests, desires and goals.

 Some of the inclusions on a person’s individual ‘map’ or outlook are those typical of his family and society as he grows up under the influence of parents, teachers, and peers, as he learns their language, history and customs. Thus he tends to adopt their ways of seeing the world as his own. He becomes ethnocentric. But in addition to this social factor, education also plays an important part in the development of the person’s ‘map’ of reality. So powerful is this individual factor that two people having different desires and attitudes and education can grow up in the same environment and yet have strikingly different ‘maps’ based on the breadth of their understanding and thus arrive at different destinations. So, maps are important.

What makes the difference, then, between peoples’ governing or driving outlook on life—or their ultimate destination? It is, in large part, what they have been exposed to, what they focus on, and what they value—and the accuracy and completeness of their set of maps.

 It makes sense to me to try to accumulate many types of maps to help us sensibly negotiate life’s landscape. A single distorted, incomplete, or inaccurate map will not do.

Sport is . . .

In my part-time work at a resort golf course I take my lunch in the employees’ dining room. The television is always on and the channel chosen, by someone, is almost invariably on a sporting contest—golf, basketball, soccer, football, etc., and most of the diners are also watching the athletes. As I do my work on the golf course I watch the efforts of typically 150-180 golfers per day. I also see, off the course, the exertions of surfers riding the waves. I see bicyclers by the dozens, kite flyers, Frisbee throwers and skate boarders.

I, myself, have engaged, taught, coached, and spectated in innumerable hours of time on the field, court, course, mat, stream and trail.

So, what is going on with all of us thus engaged?

Here is something I found in my college notes that may give some philosophical insight to all this sweat, cheering, cheating, pain, exuberance, ‘thrill of victory and agony of defeat.’

“It is competition; composure; memory; anticipation. It is play for many and work for a few. It is what no one has to do and almost everyone wants to do. It represents, on the one hand, challenges willingly accepted—and, on the other, gambits willingly declined. Its colors are as bright as a cardinal’s feathers; as soft as mid-night on a mountain trail. It is as loud as Yankee Stadium at the climax of a World Series—and as quiet as snow. It is the jingoism of inebriated onlookers and the jaundiced reports of journalists. It is exercise and rest. It is man exuberant and man content. It is the dreams of youth still alive within us. It is an awakening that brings a family together –on a boat or beach, skiing weekend or camping trip It is as tangible as a baseball bat and as intangible as a frosty morning at the top of the mountain before the downhill run; as exciting as a photo-finish in a stadium with thousands of onlookers, and as serene as waiting on a board on a still sea for the next big wave.”

It’s point? Notwithstanding the reality that sport is ‘the voluntary attempt to overcome unnecessary obstacles,’ sport is the faithful (without Faith) image of the struggle of humanity toward perfection –spirit and body together striving to accomplish the age-old aspiration of mankind—Citius, Altius, Fortius,‘faster, higher, stronger.’ Or, for most of us, as Pierre de Coubertin, founder of the modern Olympic Games, has said, “The most important thing is not to win, but to take part.”

Still, 'Let's win one for the Gipper!"

Let the games begin.

Uncle Tom's Cabin

In the mid-19th Century an American woman, Harriet Beecher Stowe, wrote a book that may have been as influential as any written in the next 100 years. Abraham Lincoln was reputed to have said, “So this is the little lady who started this great [Civil] war.” It was, in fact, after the Bible the best-selling book of the 19th Century.

I have read this book and can see why it should be on every American’s must-read list even now. One’s education is incomplete without it.

One of the things I appreciated about the book—and was criticized, of course, as being naïve by our sophisticated skeptics—was the clear demarcation, the black and white contrast, so to speak, between the philosophies and attitudes of morally driven versus secularly or selfishly driven people. In the case of the overarching theme of the book, it was the abolitionists verses the sympathizers of slave-holding. But it was also a depiction, vis-à-vis of two entirely different approaches to life and living and the values associated with the circumstances people find themselves in, or, for those who have a choice, choose to embrace. In the process of creating characters, stereotypes were created, but an honest evaluation of Mrs. Stowe’s purpose shows that they were done for good reason, precisely not to create prejudice or deeper discrimination.

The interaction and contrast between two minor characters of the novel clearly shows an example of polarities that exist between people, why they arose, and the consequences of diametrically different world views. Marie St. Clare, the pampered wife of a slave owner, and Miss Ophelia, the slave owner’s new-England bred cousin give voice to two markedly different attitudes. Hear their interchange:

Slave owner’s wife Marie: “You don’t know what a provoking, stupid, careless, unreasonable, childish, ungrateful set of wretches they are.”

New England cousin Ophelia: “Don’t you believe that the Lord made them of one blood with us?”

Marie: “No, indeed not I! A pretty story, truly! They are a degraded race.”

Ophelia: “Don’t you think they’ve got immortal souls?”

Marie: “ O, well, that, of course—nobody doubts that. But as to putting them on any sort of equality with us, you know, as if we could be compared, why, it’s impossible! “[Take my servant Mammy, she] has a kind of obstinacy about her, in spots, that everybody don’s see as I do.”

Ophelia: “Has she children?”

Marie: “Yes, she has two.”

Ophelia: “I suppose she feels the separation from them?” [She was sold and taken away from her husband and children.]

Marie: “Well, of course, I couldn’t bring them. They were little dirty things—I couldn’t have them about; and, besides, they took up too much of her time; but I believe that Mammy has always kept up a sort of sulkiness about this.” “Mammy couldn’t have the feelings that I should…as if Mammy could love her little dirty babies as I love Eva! You’ll find, when you come to manage, that there’s no getting along without severity,--they are so bad, so deceitful, so lazy.”

Ophelia: “I think you slaveholders have an awful responsibility upon you. I wouldn’t have it for a thousand worlds. You ought to educate your slaves, and treat them like reasonable creatures—like immortal creatures that you’ve got to stand before the bar of God with.”

Marie: “As I said before, they are a degraded race, and always will be, and there isn’t any help for them; you can’t make anything of them if you try.” “There’s no way with servants but to put them down, and keep them down.” “You must make ‘em know their place!”

Well. Though this book is not de Tocqueville, it is a critique of American society that every American must come to grips with.

As with many things, if one strips away the gray subtleties and self-justifications and excuses and rationalizations, there is black and white, good and bad, right and wrong and we all, at the core know it.

Taxes

A less arresting title for a weblog entry I can hardly imagine. And yet, it is one of those things that compels my attention from year-to-year. I finished my taxes yesterday and really didn’t feel badly about them even though I had to pay out a sizable sum. Why do I not feel put upon? Let me explain.

I am an American. A moment’s reflection reminds one that citizenship comes with a price. A clause in the Constitution notes that government exists, in part, to “promote the general welfare,” an economic as well as a social connotation. Government cannot promote, or more accurately provide, without revenue. My welfare is promoted by the services that are provided for and used by me every day. I’m glad there are roads upon which I can drive, stop lights and traffic laws and road crews to repair the potholes. I’m glad for police and fire protection, national defense, radio and television signals, air traffic control, dams and sanitation services, bridges, public health services and basic education for myself and family. I do not resent paying my fair share for these benefits.

Since we all are beneficiaries of these facilities and services I am in favor of a flat personal income tax (with very limited deductions) for all Americans capable of earning a living. I am also in favor of ‘use’ taxes for consumer items and of what used to be called ‘sin’ taxes. The so-called ‘sin’ tax revenues (on things like tobacco, alcohol, maybe even things like obesity-promoting foods) can be well-used for the medical treatment that is inevitably needed for these users. The reality, I have read, is that a huge percentage of Americans pay no income tax at all—and these are not the mega-rich as the media would have us believe. It is the low to low-middle income individuals and families who take and enjoy the benefits but make no contribution whatsoever to their own welfare or maintenance.

If we have an investment in our own maintenance we will not, if we have any integrity, take these blessings as American citizens as an entitlement (we used to say ‘for granted’) and will better learn, it is hoped, that there is a price to be paid for all benefits. Somebody will pay. The moral question we must all ask ourselves is, ‘Is it right that I should be the beneficiary of benefits that are provided for me by money that is extorted from others beyond what is their fair share contribution for the general welfare or public good?”

I believe in paying our own way, contributing fairly to the public good and then being charitable to others, without being compelled to be, out of the dictates of our own conscience.

Amounting to Something

A recent prophet of God, Gordon B. Hinckley, wrote a book not long before he died, titled 'Standing for Something.' I like that title. A related notion, though I’ve never seen a book with this title, could be 'Amounting to Something.' I remember, as a kid, hearing my dad say something like, ‘if he would apply himself he could amount to something,’ and ‘he’ll never amount to anything.’ If so, how? If not, why not?

I have though a lot about standing for something and amounting to something. A good and continuing education can help with both.

To become educated, we must surrender ignorance. To move forward we often undertake a course of study and yield to teachers who are probably wiser and certainly better educated than we are. When we pay money to go to school we usually don’t balk over the process. When we go to a physician to get healed we usually submit to the treatment. Yet when we are encouraged to voluntarily engage in practices that could help us in our quest to ‘amount to something’ we often do not fully engage ourselves or invest ourselves or discipline ourselves to ‘go the course’ or take the medicine. We may get distracted from our goal, or resent the expectations of our guide or mentor or maybe just get lazy. Self-improvement, for many, is hard to sustain.

Let me suggest that if you want to ‘amount to something’ more than you currently are, you don’t continue to go it alone. Make a contract with another person (or better yet, a covenant) that will make you accountable and then resolve to ‘endure to the end.’ Check in periodically for ‘progress reports.’ Engage another person in the pursuit of your quest. Don’t be afraid of correction along the way. Even the best of athletes, musicians, performers and presidents have coaches, mentors, and advisers to help them.

Here is a favorite metaphor that illustrates this, by a favorite author, C. S. Lewis:

“Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on; you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently He starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of—throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were going to be made into a decent little cottage; but He is building a palace. He in intends to come and live in it Himself.” (Mere Christianity, Book IV, chapter 9)

If we can come to a belief that we are a child of God, a child of Royal birth, that He wants us to ‘amount to something,’ and that He wants to help us in the school of our mortality, even though some of the courses and tests may be hard, then there’s no telling what great things that can be done with our lives. He can make much more of us than we ever could on our own. If we don’t believe that, then we’ve got a problem with pride.

Usually before we rebuild we must tear down or clean out. In investment language it is called divestiture; in religion it is called repentance.

As a bumper-sticker stated: If you think education is expensive, try ignorance.

Family Matters

Take the title of this piece either way; I believe strongly in both.

As I have reviewed the titles of the nearly 150 weblog entries I have written in the past 21 months or so I am surprised that I have not written specifically about fathers and families. I have always taken my role as a father very seriously and family certainly does matter. For today’s thoughts let me suggest some things pertaining to fathering that I strongly believe in.

• For a man, being a good father is a great honor and the greatest of all responsibilities. And perhaps the best thing you can do for your children is to love their mother. Love at home is the best gift, the best memory, and the best inheritance a child can receive.

• There will never be a journey as important as the one that takes you home. Spend as much time as you can with your family in the knowledge that they will be the only ones that will still be yours when your career is over. The greatest work you will ever do is within the walls of your own home.

• I have learned (a few times by sad experience) that all you’ve really got to do to help your children see themselves as being of great value is to praise them. Sometimes we are too critical and too impatient. They need a promoter, not a critic. Be a positive undistorted mirror for them.

• Almost anything your children get to do with you when you are in a good mood is fun for them—even if it is work. The children are always more important than the activity. If you really want to get work out of them then be with them while they are doing it and work with them.

• Give your children time to talk with you. That means, do more listening than talking whenever possible. Take the time to let them get to what is really on their mind. They set the agenda.

• Teaching doesn’t mean teaching lessons or ideas; it means teaching people.

• Save your best and friendliest behavior for home.

• Let your children know you love them. Tell them in spoken words. Tell them also in notes or letters some times. But tell them often.

Charity suffereth long and is kind. Charity never faileth—especially at home.