The Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Salem, Oregon

UUCS Sermons

The early 20^th Century American novelist Thomas Wolfe surely had it right when he said that “you can’t go home again.” (This is the title of his best known novel).   Time changes everything --even if you do go home again, home will have changed so much the home you once knew will no longer be there.   Yet there is a trip back home you can take by traveling down memory lane to those times and places you once knew and loved.   It’s a good trip to take every so often.   Memory plays a vital role in orienting us, reminding us of what is good and true and beautiful, and yes, also what is not.  That’s why we remember the wisdom stories and the teachings and the sacred writings and the honored traditions of those who have gone before us.  They can, if we remember to use them with discernment, help orient us in our spiritual and religious lives.   Our personal memories play a vital role, too.  You might be surprised to realize how good old, simple salt of the earth type memories can send forth shafts of light that illuminate the present. 

            Some of my favorite memories from my childhood are of the days when summer vacation began.  One especially nirvanic memory stands out – my friends Johnny, Robin and I gathered together in the woods the day after we had finished 7^th grade.  The entire summer – an absolute eternity – lay before us.  We piled several of our school workbooks – ones we had written in that couldn’t be re-used--on some sand by a creek.  We struck a match and set them afire.  Scolds might raise their eyebrows and say we were playing with fire and destroying school property.  Those with deeper spiritual insight would realize that this was a ritual of purification.  We knew we were breaking the rules – which was part of the fun, but we weren’t stupid.  We knew how to control the fire and made sure it was put out and didn’t spread.  The old workbooks - that would have tossed away if we had not burned them - symbolized the academic bondage that had kept us away from the glories of nature.  Yet, now, it was summer.  We watched as so many cares and concerns were burned to ash.   We were free.

            We knew how to enjoy our freedom.  A perfect day began when my friends and I would gather after breakfast for our four mile hike through narrows paths in the woods - where adults were never seen - to Flat Rock Creek Park , just outside Columbus , Ga.   We would take breaks along the way and peer down into the flowing creek where sunlight streamed through the shady trees overhead down through the water where little minnows swam and frogs hid under the mud - such a calming, restorative sight. Then we reached the railroad trestle.   We went underneath to the creek that ran below and caught some bream – aka sunfish.  Later, we would fry these up for lunch - that is, if a water moccasin (aka a cottonmouth, a poisonous snake common in the south) or a snapping turtle didn’t eat them off our stringer while we weren’t looking. 

            To get to Flat Rock Creek we had to cross over the train trestle – a daunting challenge.  God help you if a train came around the bend while you were standing in the middle.  Hard rocks lay fifty, sixty feet below.   We always made it.   Actually, trains hardly ever came by – we never saw a single one, but facing this element of danger was a rite of passage for us.  

            At the end of our four mile hike was Flat Rock Creek park – locally famous as a good place to slide down slick rocks into a cool pool.   After sliding and swimming we would cross over out of the park to another secret pool we had discovered nearby.  There we would swim some more, fry up our fish, eat them with our peanut butter sandwiches, watch blue striped lizards sunning on the rocks, explore, run, play, dream, loaf, invite our souls.   I just loved being out in the woods.  We had a wonderful time.  Actually, there was no sense of time – there was just the wonder of each present moment.   Finally, we could tell when the sun began to move to the westward horizon that we should wend our way home, exhausted but happy.   

            Such marvelous memories - those carefree summer days.  Surely, many of you here have similar memories.  Conjuring them up is more than a nostalgic indulgence.  These memories serve as a useful yardstick against which to measure the summers and play time our youth today enjoy.   Yes, I know that our memories tend to airbrush out some of the harsher aspects of the past, but still many of us – I know I’m not alone in this – feel that something has gone awry, that we’ve taken some wrong turns in the road and taken away something precious from our youth.   My summer memories make me especially conscious of this.

            One telling quote from a young fourth grader in San Diego speaks volumes:  “I play indoors better ’cause that’s where all the electrical outlets are.”   I live in a neighborhood full of children – hundreds of them.  But I rarely see any of them, except going and coming home from school.  This is not just some purely local, anecdotal observation – studies and statistics abundantly confirm that a divorce seems to have been declared between children of our country and nature.  They just don’t see each other that often.   Does it really matter?  Is wanting to see more children out playing simply  nostalgic, yearning for a past time that is forever gone?   No, it isn’t.

            Today, many people recognize how cruel it is to have zoos.  Animals belong in their natural settings, unless there is a need to protect some endangered species that will only survive in captivity.  Yet what we have allowed to happen to our children – being separated from natural settings and unstructured, carefree play times that promote mental, physical and spiritual health – is, to my mind, much more disturbing.  

            There is a mounting body of evidence that our children are suffering the consequences of this divorce – there is the epidemic of childhood obesity and the implications for long term health concerns associated with this, and there are various mental health concerns ranging from attention deficit disorder to depression and worse.  Then there are hidden spiritual and emotional costs that cannot be easily calculated.  The concern that children who rarely, if ever, get to have their spirits expanded by communion with the infinite glories of nature has grown to the extent that there is talk of widespread nature deficit disorder among young people today.  

            We know why this has happened.  It’s not just one thing, but a confluence of social, technological and economic factors that has led to this unfortunate breakup between our children and nature. 

            Most obviously, there are the marvels of technology – widescreen HDTV, computers and computer games, the internet and fathomless realms of cyberspace.  I watched way too much TV when I was a kid, but there were only two stations in Columbus , Georgia , and there were great blocks of time when there was just nothing I could bear to watch. So I got out and played.  Today, there is no limit.  If there’s nothing entertaining on one medium there will be on another.  And you can take it all with you now – watch a movie on your cell phone or the back of a van, listen to music on an ipod while hiking in the mountains.  It’s ubiquitous and overpowering.   Nature is subtle.  It’s not like some slickly edited movie, it’s not as immediately engaging as a video game.  These technical diversions are so fast paced, slick – they grab children’s attention, don’t let it go – it’s literally addictive for many youngsters.   Children are led deeper down the corridors into the world of virtual reality and become ever more disconnected from reality.   As technology advances this world of virtual reality will draw more children in, deeper and deeper, farther away from this world.   Few bother even to challenge this.  Technology usually calls the shots, not us.

            This is but one dimension of what is called “silicon faith” -- the techno-evangelical faith that computers (with their silicon microchips)  can educate our youth and solve all matter of other ills.  Don’t get me wrong – I’m not a neo-Luddite advocating a return to a pre-industrial era – computers can be useful.  They’re truly amazing.  But they do not automatically produce literate, socially conscious, well informed youth.  They can be used and abused.   Some are beginning to say that we way over-invest in such technological solutions at the expense of proven solutions – like the arts and music.  Then, too, there is mounting evidence that too much TV and too much computer use are not good for young developing minds.  

            Then there is the fear factor.  The world is no more dangerous for our children today than it was when I was young.  In fact, it may be safer.  But the perception is that it is more dangerous because sensationalized media coverage makes us more aware of what happens everywhere in the nation and the world.   This skews our perceptions, and perceptions drive reality.  Crime rates tend to drop while fear goes up. Child abduction by strangers is an incredibly rare phenomenon, but when we hear of one incident on the other side of the nation parents began to believe a child molester is hiding behind every bush.   We’ve become afraid that the children we love so dearly might face harm.  We want to protect them, so we keep them close by – indoors, mostly.   The allowed roaming distance for children has shrunk about 90% over the past few decades.  Yet it may well be that because of the threat of childhood obesity and other physical and mental health concerns related to the sedentary habits of this wired generation we have unwittingly placed them more in harm’s way than if they were out climbing trees and running through the fields.

            But of course, if our children did run through fields today, they might well run afoul of some law or regulation.  There are fewer places for children to engage in unstructured play.   In many communities, because of the fear of lawsuits and a growing obsession with order, there are a growing body of well intentioned rules and regulations that virtually outlaw unstructured outdoor nature play, and even if there aren’t any such rules the common perception is that there are and this inhibits children. 

            But who has time for unstructured play anyway?   Increasingly, we’re a nation of workaholics – there is less and less down time.  Our children feel this pressure to achieve, to be busy.  Many have even had their recess taken away so teachers can prep them for mandatory testing.   The value of simply being, without any agenda other than being in a natural setting strikes many as “killing time,” an unproductive indulgence.   

            I could continue in this vein, but the point has been made.  Our children have been largely separated from nature.   It’s not good for them, it’s not good for the future of a  planet who will need stewards who truly love it, who have had direct experience of its wonder.  This separation is not some subtle shift in our lifestyle – it’s a dramatic shift that has happened in a fairly short period of time--it is one change that needs to be challenged.

            It is beginning to be challenged.   Forces are beginning to coalesce and challenge the fatalistic acquiescence of those who think there’s no cure for these summer time blues that we must simply accept whatever comes along, we have to adapt to new realities. 

            It’s not true.  Not so many years ago a critical mass of people realized that cigarettes are deadly and a great deal has been done to reduce the number of smokers in our society.  When something is perceived as a clear threat, we can move into action.  I would urge you to be part of this newly emerging movement to reconnect our children with nature. 

            It’s important for those of us old enough to remember a different time – a time when we could connect, in our own way, in our own time, with the greater world around us.   It’s important for us not to lose our memories and dreams of precious times in the past.  They are not merely memories.  They can remind us of what is truly precious in life, so precious that we dare not throw these memories away into some landfill there to be buried and forgotten in a modern wasteland devoid of the grandeur that is our common heritage across the generations.