Okay, don’t panic, this is not about Revelation. Well, it is to the extent that it reveals a little something about us all perhaps. I both love and hate the end of a semester. I love it because I need a break from the students, just like they need one from me. I hate it because the begging and whining about grades and work gets old fast. College students often have this insane idea that they can wait until finals week and begin turning in work from the entire semester. Then they are indignant when they are told no.
I was raised by parents who grew up in the Great Depression (not the same one that is the result of the current election) and they decided that their kids were going to have it better than they did, so they labored long and hard to give us Baby Boomers all they could. Then we became parents, we who have had so much, and we just went ahead and did it for our kids and that is where the problem started. How could we possibly give them more, when we already had so much? But, we did and now we wonder why our kids feel entitled, lost, and unappreciative. We should have taught them thankfulness instead of greed. Hospitality instead of materialism. Community instead of individuality.
When Jesus spoke of the end times, he was clear, no one knows. He tried to tell us that we should live each day as if it were the last. No matter how hard they pressed him, he would only speak vaguely about the “signs”. He was all about the journey of our lives in God, not the destination. This is what we did not teach our kids and this is what we seem to have forgotten ourselves.
Today is the end of time. It is also the beginning. It is everything in between. We go to church, often, as a means to an end. Millenials have no respect for us because of that. We are so worried about missing out on the great reward at the end that we follow every rule, but never live out the rule. Millenials are tired of us telling them all the rules and making demands, when what they see is us not doing the same. We should have taught them the law of Love. We should have lived out the parable of the good Samaritan. We should have taught them thankfulness, hospitality, and generosity.
My abbey, in fact all abbeys, are “schools of love”. The Rule of St. Benedict teaches us to live in harmony, love and grace with our community. To forget about getting and live out giving. It is all about the journey. The “end times” are every day. We should live as if that is true. Our children and grandchildren will change the world if they have such an example as that.
TMM