Friday, July 10, 2009

Coda: To Be/Is/Am/Was/Are

When I was a senior in college I trekked to Urbana, Illinois, for New Years to go to a ginormous missions conference with Intervarsity Christian Fellowship. It was three days packed into the Illini Dome... something like 20,000 college juniors and seniors.

At one point during one of the worship services, I looked around and thought "if this many people are here and they all believe this, then there must be something true."

As I have grown up I have become less certain about the truth that comes from religion. (And somewhat less certain about the truths of faith.) But then I realized that there is a Truth that comes from commonality, from community, from shared burdens and shared goals... aw geez, how about this:

"These are really the thoughts of all men in all ages and lands, they are not original with me,
If they are not yours as much as mine they are nothing, or next to nothing,
If they are not the riddle and the untying of the riddle they are nothing,
If they are not just as close as they are distant they are nothing.

This is the grass that grows wherever the land is and the water is,
This the common air that bathes the globe. "

-- Walt Whitman, Song of Myself

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