Looking Forward to 2014

Looking Forward to this New Year of 2014

Written by Dan McDonald

 

            I suppose we all sort of set goals as one year morphs into another year, as we learn to write a different number in the slot for year on forms or checks upon which we write.  Some create elaborate resolutions for a new year, some don’t make any resolutions, and yet I suspect that most of us even when we don’t make resolutions think some thoughts about what we would like to do differently this year than last year.

            I hope whether you make formal resolutions or simply think a thought about how you would like to face this year a bit differently from last year that you meet with some success in turning such hopes and resolutions into pieces of reality that add fullness to your life.  So to that end I’ll write with some hesitancy about my desires for this year.

            Last year I wrote an article about how I need to be better connected with this world in which I live.  Not everyone has the opportunity to travel and see natural marvels or different portions of this world in which we live.  In fact, if one does get to do that it may be a thing of privilege to be able to do that.  But sometimes many people have the ability to do so but never do.  This year I want to make sure that I take the opportunity to make a trek to see a marvel I have not yet seen.  My goal , for the year, is to  go where I can put my fingers on the bark of a Giant Sequoya.  I have never seen that natural marvel, to behold it, and to look heavenward as I experience seeing these great marvels of nature.  I believe to do so would make broader and deeper my appreciation of life.  I spend too much time in my house or on my job.  This trek would be a privilege that some will never have the opportunity to do.  But sometimes one of the ways to honor someone who is not privileged is to make the most of the privilege we are given.

            Do you understand what I am saying?  I know that some of the people who will glance at my blog are themselves writers and bloggers, and are also avid readers.  Many of you described in this last sentence are privileged, even if you don't think of yourself as privileged.  You might have grown up in a family where you had parents and siblings that wanted you to learn to read, write, and explore the nooks and crannies of what can be learned about life and the universe around you.  You had the opportunity to study whether in a public, parochial, or home school environment.  I know a Mexican, now an American citizen, one who became a citizen through the Reagan administration’s amnesty program.  He tells of how he was the first one in his family who ever went to school.  He tells this, not about going to a university, but to a basic primary school where children learn their alphabet and how to read the words of their own spoken language.  Those of us who had the opportunity to become literate are privileged.  How do we, who have been given a privilege, honor those who don’t have the same privilege?  We don’t honor them by refusing to make use of the privileges we have been granted.  We honor those who never had the opportunity by first making use of the privilege we were given, and then by making use of our privilege so as to give a blessing and benefit to those who have never had such a privilege.  We honor those without privilege by first of all realizing a sort of noblesse oblige (an obligation of nobility) that comes upon us who have been granted privilege.  The first responsibility of privilege is not to feel guilty that we have been granted something that has not been given to every one, but to take the privilege we have been granted to be turned into a benefit for those around us.  There is no honor in someone who has been given food to refuse to eat because some people are without food; rather the goal spoken of by the Gospel is for those who have been given food to share with those who have none, so that whether privileged or impoverished all may eat.  So instead of denying we have privilege or refusing to live life fully in the privileges we have been granted, our goal ought to be to take advantage of the privileges we have been given that more people might be given a share of what we have been granted to experience and reap which has not been granted to so many others.

            I will continue to blog in 2014 and I have been learning how to do this in 2013.  I have read other blogs and have had opportunity to read things that I love and things I disagree with, and to realize I needed both sorts of readings to confront and transform me.  But in that process I have learned that beneath our labels that describe what we believe, are human beings.  We are, each of us and all of us, on varied spiritual journeys through life.  We are: whether conservative, liberal, progressive, patriarchal, feminist, egalitarian, or whatever label we choose to wear, first and foremost mortal human beings who never see more than a sliver of reality.  We take that speck of reality we see from our finite spot of locality in a universe beyond our comprehension, and then we boldly build a worldview and philosophy of life from that glimpse.  From that small local spot in a huge universe we declare to one another what we believe.  We must, if we understand this, see ourselves as humble finite persons whose views are those of souls journeying through a maze that we haven't fully comprehended.  So it is best if when you have discourse with another human being that you remember the advice once placed on rental VHS tapes, if you can remember back to those days, when the label said “Be kind – rewind.”  You and I should learn to say the things we believe in such a way that another may take what we say and use it joyfully for their lives.  I want that to be a goal in my writing this year.  We ought to speak firmly of what we believe, but our speaking firmly should be in honor of our fellow travelers on the journey of life.  We have each seen and experienced differing things and can hardly expect to agree on everything and sometimes we should not expect to agree on much of anything.  But when we speak of what we understand or believe, it should be with respect and honor to our fellow traveler in the journey of life.  Let me learn, O Lord, how to write in a way that acknowledges to you the privilege I have been granted; and let me learn O' Lord in humility to share with those fellow-travelers whom you have created and loved the blessings of the fruit of those privileges.  For are not all things from thee, in thee, and unto thee forevermore?

            That leads me to my final point of focus for me in 2014.  I will write.  I love to write.  I want to write with integrity.  There are times I don’t write things because I think people will quit reading me if I am honest with what I believe.  That doesn’t mean I should write everything that pops into my head simply because I believe something.  There are times when I don’t write things because I am afraid that people will stop reading me, when what I need to be thinking is that I shouldn’t write those things because I haven’t been given the wisdom to address such a matter with enough wisdom to be loving and helpful in what I write.  But sometimes I should write something I believe that I know will not be popular, because if we are not honest in dialogue with others then the value of our dialogue is cheapened and minimized.  There are difficult matters that need to be spoken of rather than ignored.  So I will write, hopefully with honor and integrity, hopefully in respect of my readers, and hopefully in honor of the one who has created me, sustains me, and is my hope.

          I’d love to hear something of your vision for this year, and something of the privilege you think you have been given.  I want you to not flee from that privilege you have been given, but grow in it that you might from your abundance share with those whom you have opportunity to bless.  I would love to hear from you that you understand a part of your life that is a privilege you have been granted that might be transformed into a blessing for others because you have been granted such a blessing.