#137 Musings Beyond the Bunker (Tuesday September 7)
Good morning,
Happy Rosh Hashanah, both to those who celebrate and those who don’t! Let’s celebrate all the new years days—Persian, Chinese, Jewish, Muslin—whatever—it’s another chance to start anew.
Any new year offers us the chance to consider the past and contemplate the future. But contemplation isn’t enough. Too often we think about the future and fail to act in ways that could shape that future. When we look back in history, it all seems inevitable, yet is not. Real men and women have greeted each new year with hope and anxiety. Some used their hopes and anxieties to help shape how they would improve themselves in the coming year; others to help shape how they would improve the world. Most did nothing.
We are presented with signposts throughout our lives that remind us that we are embarking upon a journey, the destination of which often is unclear—new years', birthdays, graduations, weddings, births of children, new jobs. At each of these junctures (and even on many “Hallmark holidays”), we are reminded to take stock of our lives and set goals.
I think about the greatest trends in human development and how they are “large scale re-boots” and are described as such—but not as something new as much as something being “reformed” or “recreated.” After all, we’re never starting from scratch:
· The renaissance. It means, literally, “rebirth.” An explosion in the arts and sciences, a new way of looking at the world and our place in it.
· The Reform movement. The Jewish movement to which I belong, which purports to bring the ancient verities of our faith into the modern world.
· Reconstruction. A noble attempt post-Civil War to “reconstruct” our democracy, institutions and body politic, successful in many ways yet doomed to fail until in later generations its principles were revisited and carried forward.
· The Reformation. A rethinking of the Christian church that led to Protestantism, the counter-reformation and advances on both sides of that debate.
· The “Reopening.” We have been “reopening” society as we emerge from the ravages of the COVID-19 pandemic. It has been in fits and starts (a sort of two steps forward and one step back process, exacerbated by the digging in of heels by anti-vaxxers, conspiracy theorists and free riders). But we are—and will—reopen. The questions, of course, are “how” and “what have we learned” and “how will we change?”
While every new year (whether secular, religious or even imagined) offers us the opportunity to reflect and grow, this one seems like a big one. This year, we have had to cope with a public health emergency unlike anything else in our lifetimes. This year, we have seen the extent and severity of our housing crisis. This year, we have witnessed the failures of our public school systems. We have seen the disparities of wealth the effects on society. We have witnessed profound weather events that suggest—even to the most skeptical—that we have work to do to reduce the strains humans have brought to the environment. But there is a next year and a year after that. We can’t just sit still. The question is whether amongst our other resolutions for a new year, we consider and act upon our anxieties and fears through hope and action.
With wishes for a happy and sweet new year,
Glenn
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