Value In Being
I knew two of my grandparents as a kid. I grew up in my maternal grandfather’s house - that was where my mother lived, as well. I don’t remember much about my grandfather - he passed away when I was about six or seven years old - but I knew him to be a kind and wise man because many were the people who came to him seeking his counsel or advice on a whole range of issues. My paternal grandmother lived about three city blocks from my maternal grandfather’s house and so we walked to her house almost every day to hang out with other cousins and family members. Her house was always busy, filled with people and with lots of food.
Both grandparents were repositories of wisdom. In fact, many of the grandparents that I have had the chance to meet over the years, both in Ghana and in the United States, are repositories of wisdom. I have met a lot of people with grandparents who are wise.
As best as they can, and in varied circumstances, they share the wisdom that they have accumulated over the years with their grandchildren. The goal has always been to offer the kind of guidance that will help these grandchildren to grow into successful, content, joyful, faithful, and loving adults who find pleasure not in how useful another human being is but who find value in the presence of another person. It is about passing on a legacy of values that have served them very well to the next generation.
A grandparent’s duty may not necessarily be about doing something but instead about being something - just being.
Last Saturday, I had the blessing of leading the Lenten Reflection Day retreat. Over the years, there have been two people, Denis and Cindy, that I have always known to participate in Advent Quiet Day or Lenten Reflection Day. I asked Ellen, our Spiritual Life Commission leader, where they were. She told me that they had traveled to New York to take care of their grandchildren - what a blessing! I also know that Ellen babysits her three grandchildren, and when Charlie was with us, the two of them took care of their grandchildren, and Charlie worked with the boys on a train line in their basement. My mother babysat my children when they were kids, offering an opportunity for me to do further graduate studies. Harolyn, her daughter, and her granddaughters have the same style of dresses that they wear together on occasion - I think it's during Easter. Suzanne holds a family Vacation Bible School for her many grandchildren. Don and Carolann pick up their granddaughter at BWI and also drop her off there when she’s on recess from Indiana University.
I can tell many, many stories of grandparents who are doing and not simply being. There are many of you who do extraordinary things for your grandchildren and, in fact, continually stay present in their lives. It hasn’t always been about doing something but just being something - just being.
The honest truth is that there is great value in being. We don’t always have to do something in order to be found or deemed valuable. We don’t derive value from our ability to do something, we derive value from just being.
My first experience with assisted living facilities was in Atlanta. It was a culture shock for me to many old people living by themselves in a community. Yes, they did have support and all but it felt a little strange to me at first because we do not have that kind of community in Ghana.
Over the years, I have come to learn the value of these communities. Some are thriving communities where our grandparents find a new zest for life. But I am afraid to say that some of these places are neither about doing something nor is it about being - because the quality of life doesn’t support the idea of being.
Sometimes it hurts me greatly to have others want to make us believe that there is no value in being old because one’s level of productivity has gone down or it’s even non-existent. For some of these people, value is dependent on productivity or a perceived benefit.
I believe that there’s more to growing old than simply wasting away, as some claim. These are the three things that I have learned from the aging process: 1. Wisdom, 2. Mortality, and 3. Humility.
Wisdom - when I was called to my former parish - St. Paul’s Chestnut Hill - Cliff, the rector, once asked why I decided to work with him. I responded with a story I was told by a priest many years ago. The priest said, “You should always look to work with an old, wise priest.” That thought never left me, and my experience as a priest in the Episcopal Church opened the way for me to understand the wisdom behind those words. The old, wise priest was an embodiment of experience, guidance, direction, thoughtfulness, and pastoral leadership. He had worked the vineyard and had more than enough scars to prove their worth. And for him, it wasn’t about doing something for a young priest but about being there for them. It was about the value of being, the value of presence.
Mortality - this past Sunday, I paid a visit to one of our parishioners, Chuck, who is in hospice. Visiting him were his daughter and three grandchildren. We gathered by his bed and, together with Paula, shared the Holy Eucharist. What I found to be a powerfully holy and sober moment was the acknowledgment of our common mortality. These grandchildren were confronted with mortality in ways they possibly hadn’t experienced before. And that is the gift of that moment - from a grandfather to grandchildren. He didn’t have to do anything; he was simply present. And the gift that he offered was about his being, his presence, that even as sleepy as he was - we all care about him and his presence in our lives, and his value to us isn’t about what he was doing for us, it was about his being, his presence.
Humanity - we can’t talk about humanity and not be drawn to mortality. We are fragile. And we are fragile to the point where we become so helpless that we can’t do anything for ourselves. We tend to forget how fragile we are - like an egg that breaks upon contact with a hard or sharp surface. We go through the same trials and tribulations, joys, and triumphs. Your situation may not be terribly different from mine. It is simply by the grace of God that we are what we are, St. Paul doesn’t hesitate in reminding us. Experience with old age reminds each of us about humanity’s enduring cycle - birth, growth, and death - which we all share in common. In view of this fact, looking at someone who is aging or older should remind each of us that there will come a time when we won’t have to do anything to be valued, and simply being is enough to be valued.
During the season of Lent, we give something up, we deny ourselves, and we self-sacrifice. My invitation for you this Lent is to reflect on this question: Do my parents, grandparents, or any senior citizen have to do something in order for me to believe that that person has value? If not, can they simply be, and yet still be of value to me?
May you always remember that it is not what we do that brings us value, but simply being is as valuable, if not more valuable.
Manny+