Word to the Wise
Saturday, September 27, 2008 - St. Vincent De Paul
[Ecclesiastes 11:9 - 12:8 and Luke 9:43B-45]Rejoice, O young one, while you are young and let your heart be glad in the days of your youth. Follow the ways of your heart, the vision of your eyes; yet understand that as regards all this God will bring you to judgment. Ward off grief from your heart and put away trouble from your presence, though the dawn of youth is fleeting.
Of my 37+ years as a Dominican priest, I have spent 27 of them working full or part time in campus ministry. While it is true that this ministry includes meeting the needs of the faculty and staff of the institutions where I have served, the great majority of the time is given to the needs of students between the ages of 18 and 25! I still enjoy this form of ministry very much, but my experience here at St. Catharine's in Kentucky has also introduced me to the other end of the age spectrum, the elderly - of whom I am becoming at 65 more and more a member! The age range of persons to whom I minister here is roughly 18 to 100! Needless to say, the perspectives on life and the pastoral needs at both ends of that spectrum are broadly different! The learning curve for me here has been with the elderly! Ecclesiastes, with its rather sobering, and some people would say negative, approach seems to speak to youth from a vantage point of age. There's a basic, "Enjoy it while you can!" or "Gather ye rosebuds while ye may!" approach with the "zinger" at the end warning them that youth is very fleeting and old age with its judgments is on the way! I know that I have told undergraduate students (and high school seniors about to enter college) that those undergrad years will be the "free-est" of their lives. Those years are not free of anxiety or stress - or free of accountability (as exams do tend to show), but they are formative in a way that entering the workaday world immediately after high school would not permit. The world of campus life is a special world of its own. But, as Ecclesiastes points out, it is not forever! Aging and the wisdom/reflection that comes with it are not as welcome in our society as in others. Our society worships youth! I think this is a great loss. Avoiding the mistakes of the past is not the goal of youth, but I think greater dialogue between generations would give the wisdom of the elders an opportunity to create an experience of mutual learning. Some students at St. Catharine College "partner" with the elderly Dominican sisters at the Sansbury Care Unit (Dominican sisters' infirmary) and it is a very beneficial experience for both the sister and the student. Although my own increasing age means I do not have the energy for campus ministry that I once had, my love for students has not decreased. My ministry here has introduced me to a different love - the elderly. Preaching to all of them requires a bit of what St. Paul says about becoming "all things to all people," but, at least I am able to bring energy and wisdom together in some small way that I hope is positive! AMEN
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