"Two of My Favorite Quotes about Faith and Spirituality" by Elder Debuli

 i

Iona, Scotland, is home to one of the oldest religious centers in Western Europe.
Image by TLMDesign from Pixabay

"An essential feature of rebirthing within the Christian household will be to remember that the well of truth is not ours.  It is deep within the earth and deep within the heart of humanity.  Our role is to be a servant at that well.  --  John Philip Newell, a poet, scholar, teacher, and former Warden of  Iona Abbey. 

Image by Rebecca Scholz from Pixabay

"We can only get rid of anxiety by being content to miss something in almost everything we do.  If we are too eager to have everything, we will almost certainly miss the one thing we need." --Thomas Merton, American Trappist Monk and writer (1915-1968)

submitted by Elder Debuli

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"A Voice Loud and Clear" a poem by Elder Myster E

I had a dream.

I was in a house of God

where Christ's Word was heard

loud and clear:

"Love your neighbor

Resist your greed

Fight injustice

Help ones in need

Oppose all violence

Care for the Earth . . ."

I woke up

in a world loaded

  with lies and hatred

with hope.

--by Elder Myster E

Photo by sspiehs3 on Pixaby.com

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"Dying Parents and the Legacy of Love" by Elder D

 

A few months ago, my mother (photo on left) passed away unexpectedly.  She had fallen and hit her head, causing a brain bleed.  After a few days of going in and out of consciousness, she was taken off life support and died peacefully, surrounded by family members and her pastor.  It was a good death, a peaceful death, something she was ready for at the age of 87.  I just don’t know if I was ready for it.  

Our family has been blessed with good health.  No one in my family of origin had died or had a serious illness.  We took our good health for granted.  

As a family, we all get along, keep in touch, and visit one another regularly.  We were six kids and mom and dad, all coming together occasionally from all over the country, celebrating holidays and special occasions.  And then it changed in an instant.  

It caught me off guard at how much life changes when the glue that was mom is no longer around.  No pep talk phone calls, no cards in the mail, no shoulder to cry on.  No good advice on how to continue raising my own adult kids.  

How many of my own friends "of a certain age" have lost their parents? Most all of them have lost at least one parent. I have been sympathetic, but I couldn’t really imagine the hole that it can leave in your life. 

Now it is "us kids'" turn to take care of dad.  This pillar of a man--take charge, work hard, good provider--has been reduced to a shell of his former self.  He is lost without her.  His ache is palpable. 

We six take turns to stay with Dad for weeks at a time, so that he is never alone.  It’s what we do as a family.  And in doing so, we sadly see a near future when we will become orphans, and what will need to be done to dissolve the family home where so much love and life was shared. 

It has made me more conscious of what I need to do and plan for my own kids upon my passing.  They will have each other, and for that, I am grateful.  I will do my best to prepare them for a world in which they become "the elders" and carry on our family legacy.  

I am grateful for the life I have been given, and for the promise and hope of reuniting in heaven--continuing the legacy of love through eternity.  

--lovingly submitted by Elder D   

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"... her name, Mother of Exiles" from the poem "The New Colossus" by Emma Lazarus

 

"Liberty Enlightening the World" or "The Mother of Exiles"

The Statue of Liberty has always seemed sturdy and comforting to me.  Like a mother who protects and loves all her children.  Even the adopted ones who show up at her door. When my immigrant ancestors' ship encountered the giant statue in New York Harbor in 1892,  I hope they got to see it.  However, considering they had been packed into steerage like human cargo, I'm not sure they were allowed to stand on the deck and take part in that spectacular moment.  

French sculptor Frederic Auguste Bartholdi named his 151-foot copper colossus "Liberty Enlightening the World" to commemorate the one-hundredth anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. He added something more. Beneath one barefoot of the statue, he fashioned broken chains and a shackle, reflecting our nation's abolishment of slavery.  Our friends, the French, took great pride in that moment in our nation's history.  Lady Liberty was a generous gift from France, but the US had to pay for a gargantuan pedestal, which added about another 150 feet and would cost nearly $250,000 (8.4 million today.)

For a fundraiser, Emma Lazarus wrote a sonnet titled "The New Colossus." I prefer her phrase "Mother of Exiles" for the title.  But I suppose the poet was in awe of the statue's giant hand and 29-foot flame on display in Madison Square Park from 1876 to 1882.  Certainly a colossus!  Lazarus died before the poem was inscribed on a bronze plaque and affixed to the statue's base.

The most quotable phrase in Lazarus's poem is "Give me your tired, your poor, / Your huddled masses yearning to be free," which has lost its luster for many Americans in 2025.  

 

   

"The New Colossus" Sonnet--original document 

The New Colossus

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,

With conquering limbs astride from land to land;

Here at our sea-washed sunset gates shall stand

A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame

Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name

Mother of Exiles.  From her beacon-hand

Glows world-wide welcome;  her mild eyes command

the air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

"Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she

With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

Emma Lazarus (1849-1987)

Top photo by StockSnap on Pixabay; Document of the handwritten poem and photo of Emma Lazarus found in the Library of Congress. 

--Submitted by elder Pappy Stargazer

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Before childhood vaccines: "Our Darling" Cemetery marker (1924). Photos by elder CD Burr

 

"Our Darling" Inez Pearl Daniel

My great-grandparents buried three children who might have lived if vaccines or antibiotics had been available.  I'm not saying a lack of vaccines killed Inez at five months--a virus killed my grandpa's baby sister during one of the epidemics raging through Tennessee that year (influenza, measles, malaria). Most healthy kids today might survive these diseases without vaccines, but why risk extremely high temperatures, encephalitis, and pneumonia? Or spread a potentially deadly virus to others with compromised immune systems? Please vaccinate your children and yourself and help prevent the spread of deadly diseases.

"We Will Meet Again"  Anita Ann Daniel

"In heaven there is one angel more" Bobbie H. Daniel

Penicillin and antibiotics might have saved Bobbie, who suffered from a series of kidney infections and "bad tonsils."

All photos taken at Cedar Valley Cemetery (TN) by CD Burr

For an updated version of this essay, see Author's blog:  CD Burr 

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"An Inspiring Day at the Kansas Capitol" by Elder Myster E

 

January 29, 2025  

What an inspiring day! It was Kansas Day at the capitol and the unveiling of the new mural by Phyllis Garibay-Coon, a Manhattan, Kansas resident, honoring the Kansas suffragists. 

Women from the League of Women Voters of Kansas had done the preliminary work for the new mural for several years. Yet it was Phyllis' artwork that created a masterpiece. 

The mural captures the pioneer and rebellious spirit of thirteen women and each one is depicted in her own unique way.   Because of the work of suffragists, Kansas was the first state in the union to hold a referendum in 1867, on a proposed constitutional amendment to grant women the full right to vote. 

Phyllis certainly did her historical background work in depicting those women. And her artistic talent is impeccable. She is the first woman painter to have a mural in the state capitol.  She and Governor Kelly gave inspiring talks, emphasizing the need for women today to exhibit the same fighting spirit for their rights.

This event gave me and my wife the opportunity to visit around the capitol building and marvel at the magnificent artwork. It reminded me of the US capitol in Washington D.C.  and made me think of the importance and the sacredness of such a place and made me feel proud of being a Kansan. 

And then images of January 6, 2021 came to mind and I wondered:  How could any true patriot who loves his state and his country, defile and damage such a place?! Is it not time to revive the passionate spirit of the suffragists?!

--Myster E

To read more about the mural, copy and paste this link:   https://www.kssuffragist.org/

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"Content in Knowing," a poem by Elder CD Burr

 

Beyond a gnarled broken oak branch

     blackened and decayed on forest floor,

amid tatted ferns, drifting leaves, and lichen,

beneath outstretched grandmother-oak arms 

among a community

     of ash, elm, and sycamore,

a cluster of lemon-yellow blossoms

basks in a stream of evanescent sunlight

content in knowing

it is enough.

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Grandma Burr warned “Never Trust Russia!” by C.D. Burr

 Grandma Burr's brothers: Gottfried and Friedrich Bamesberger, 1896 

Until she died in 1967, my husband's Grandma Marie Burr occasionally shared old photos of her handsome brothers in their Russian uniforms. She described her anguish at their disappearance around 1913 and the hard times she experienced as a young mother in Russia (now Ukraine).  She recalled the tensions of the early 1900s -- how the Russians took their land, dissolved their German community of Klein Neudorf, and sent her brothers to the salt mines with life sentences. 

In the early 1800s, Russia promised hundreds of German immigrants free farmland, autonomy, and no compulsory military service.  However, several generations later, after the 1905 Russian revolution, updated policies displaced thousands of families like the Burrs and Bamesbergers. In a heavy accent, Grandma Burr ended her stories of life in southern Russia with a warning:  "Never trust Russia!"

Marie was pregnant when she migrated to the United States in 1913, debarking on a ship from Hamburg, Germany.  Accompanying her were her husband Michael and six children--a seventh deceased child remained behind in a grave.  Six more children were born in Cheyenne County, Kansas, including my father-in-law Albert and her last child, a son who died in infancy.  Marie was a widow in February 1925, when she buried the infant on a wind-swept hill in a cemetery next to the Salem Lutheran Church. Michael had died four months earlier. 

Twenty years before the Burrs arrived, my Zimbelman ancestors, with four sons and three daughters, emigrated from Rohrbach, Russia/Ukraine. Michael and Katherina had buried seven children on Russian soil and moved before their oldest son turned 21, the age for conscription into the Russian army.   The Zimbelmans settled in Cheyenne County in 1893-- each son eventually cultivating substantial farmland with Russian wheat seeds.  

I am grateful for the sacrifices our ancestors, immigrants from a hostile land that is once again filled with people suffering from Russian aggression.

I pray  . . .

            --for peace in Ukraine, home of our ancestors, Michael and Marie Bamesberger and Michael and Katherina Zimbelman,

            -- for all displaced persons who have emigrated from violent homelands,

            -- for compassionate government immigration policies because through our ancestors “we were once strangers in a strange land.”  (Leviticus 19:34)

--Gratefully submitted by CD Burr 

This essay also appears on the author's website.

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The House Across the Street, A Poem by Imogene Bolls

 

Elder RiverSoul, emeritus professor of biology, keeps the memory of his deceased wife Imogene Bolls alive through poetry readings at a local retirement community and submissions on Elders Speaking.

 "The House Across the Street," appears in  Earthbound (Bottom Dog Press, 1989).  The house depicted in the poem was one of several homes torn down after the First Presbyterian Church of Manhattan, Kansas bought the rest of the block in hopes of building a new Church.

The image by Gordon Johnson from Pixabay is a representation of houses built during the same era as the home mentioned in the poem.  

The House Across the Street

 

in my hometown is gone.

So is Widow Bonham,

with her white hair tied back in a bun,

swaying in the wide green swing

on the wide white porch all the long

lavender evening I was young.

 

The widow and her house belonged

to the block the way one comes

to expect the sun. Now there is grass

leaning wind clear to the corner, and

I have learned to expect less.

 

All the floors of my first farmhouse

have fallen in; cars park in

my wedding home; last year the fishing

cabin was torn down….

 

Tonight while wind strains hard

at the shutters, I think

of Widow Bonham and, carpenter of mind,

rebuild my castles board

by board, and brick by brick,

and stone by stone.

-- Imogene Bolls poetry, submitted by RiverSoul

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Books that Shifted My Thinking by Elder C.D. Burr

 

Opening a book for the first time often fills me with a subtle wave of adrenaline, similar to the excitement I feel at my team's first game of the season kickoff.  Unlike a sporting event, my book and I are alone as I cozy into a chair and focus on the first sentence. I'm eager to establish a new relationship with the author through his or her words, someone who has dedicated years and sometimes decades to write and publish ideas, descriptions, and storylines.  I learn something from nearly every genre — ranging from the classics and entertaining mysteries to poetry and nonfiction tomes with extensive footnotes. 

Occasionally, a book will cause a major shift or transition within me, and I can no longer hold on to an old way of thinking.  Although dozens of books have created shifts, the five books below (three pictured) have firmly established themselves in my psyche.  I often think of these books while writing or making everyday decisions, even though I read two of them over forty years ago.

LET'S HAVE HEALTHY CHILDREN By Adelle Davis. My first reading was in 1979 when I was pregnant with my first child. (Not pictured in this blog.)  Davis, described as a "food expert," gives the vital nutritional dos and don'ts for expectant mothers, babies, and growing children" (1972). I never adhered to Davis's stringent focus on supplements; however, I was impressed with her evidence that sugar caused many health and psychological problems. To the dismay of my grandparents and other relatives, I shielded my toddlers from candy and sodas, allowing cookies only after meals. I also avoided buying foods containing dyes and preservatives as much as I could. By my third baby in 1986, I occasionally caved to my three children's love of boxed mac and cheese and fruit roll-ups. After the busyness of life with teens and a full-time job, I lost focus on our diets and my health suffered. While I still have issues with some of her suggestions, Davis's book instilled in me a decades-long mindset to observe my body's reaction to foods and to read labels--activities that have aided my slow recovery from chronic illness.  (See my upcoming essay, "My Thirty-Year Return to Good Health.")

TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD by Harper Lee (1960).  I saw the movie in 1964 and read the book three times since 1980. (Not pictured.) This novel laid the foundation for my interest in social justice issues when I was nine years old.  I could relate to the little girl Scout's curiosity, but it was her father Atticus's courage in confronting racism that continues to inspire me to advocate for equality and justice.

THE NEW INTERNATIONAL STUDY BIBLE (1985). I  have read, studied, and contemplated scriptures and notes in the NIV since I bought it in 1985. (Pictured.) This study bible introduced me to the power of scholarly notes accompanying Judeo-Christian scriptures.  Notes by historians and an ecumenical group of theologians provided me with a deeper understanding of the original meanings. After nearly four decades, I have discovered diverse lenses through which I might interpret the words of numerous biblical voices and writers.  The lens I choose to uphold is that God is the god of love, social justice, healing, and inclusion--connecting with each of us -- rather than a god of retribution who glorifies hate and the killing of innocents.  The Love-Thy-Neighbor lens becomes not only a litmus test for the soundness of a Biblical verse but also the way I want to live my life.  

QUIET: THE POWER OF INTROVERTS IN A WORLD THAT CAN'T STOP TALKING by Susan Cain (2012).  I read this book in 2017. (Pictured.) One powerful cultural message I received growing up was that only extroverts can succeed socially and professionally.  This book allowed me — an introspective, rather timid, and sensitive woman who has never been able to tell a joke in a crowd of friends — to embrace my quiet traits.  After reading this book, I've become more accepting of my tendencies to live a simpler life. Interestingly, acknowledging the power of my introversion has also made me more comfortable conversing with others. 

THE POWER OF NOW by Eckhart Tolle (2004 edition).  I first read this book in 2002 when I was suffering from a debilitating illness.  (Pictured) I found it interesting but perhaps too simple for my needs. However, twenty years later, in 2022, as I listened to the book while walking on a nature trail, the message created a shift in my awareness.  It offers a practice that calms me when the world seems on fire and calms my chattering monkey brain.  For the first time in years, I no longer need a sleep aid. Being present has created awe-filled moments during my nature walks, and I listen more attentively when others speak.  The beauty of this practice is that it can coexist with my deeply rooted-Christian faith. My practice deepens as I continue to read books by Buddhists that have inspired Tolle.  

Which books have shifted your way of thinking?

--C. Burr

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"Big Old Cottonwood" a Poem by Imogene Bolls

        Elder RiverSoul, emeritus professor of biology, keeps the memory of his deceased wife Imogene alive through readings of her published poetry.  

      RiverSoul explains the inspiration for "Big Old Cottonwood" comes from "the house my parents bought, moved onto a lot in Onaga (Kansas), under a huge cottonwood tree, and completely renovated.  When the tree blew down in a big wind and rain storm, I counted 99 annual growth rings.  Mother lived many years of her widowhood in that house. "

                             

                             Big Old Cottonwood 

                            They bought the lot because it stood

                             to shield them from Kansas storms.

                             Little did they know how much

                             there'd be to shield against.

                             Sturdy-trunked, rough-barked, its

                             dark limbs climbing one another

                             through light shimmer of leaves:

                             no other tree grieves quite so well.

                             Framed by this sill stark

                             as a Wyeth window, it stands

                             against the losses of a lifetime:

                             a skeleton of tree-house hanging on;

                             the skin off bold, young knees, now grown...

                             to the death-closed mouth of him

                             who chose and loved and cursed 

                             all in the same breath

                             its very size that defies pruning.

                        

                             And now, still, even in this gentle

                             summer breeze, it moves as if to shelter

                             her who, mourning, stands bereft, alone

                             against uncompromising sun, the wind

                             and rain and hail: the sting of days.

                             Life asks enough, even of trees.

                             

--submitted by Elder RiverSoul

"Big Old Cottonwood" appears in Earthbound, Bottom Dog Press, 1989. 

Image by Lynn Greyling from Pixabay    

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"A Winning Mom" by C. Burr

 

Image by Daria Głodowska from Pixabay

 

I met my friend "Moriah" over two years ago through Thrive!-- a local nonprofit organization "dedicated to reducing poverty by building skills and relationships that strengthen families and individuals."

 She is a single mom working up to fifty hours a week while raising four children, ages 10-14.  She grew up in foster homes, achieved her GED, works for less than $15 per hour, and was recently accepted to receive a House for Habitat home, which will require over 200 hours of her help during the construction.  All her children plan to go to college and maintain As and Bs.

Recently, Moriah texted me about her 7^th-grade daughter “Serenity,” who wanted to quit track after two days of practice:

Serenity don’t like doing [track] every day. She asked to quit but I told her since she started, I’d like her to finish. 

She said, “Okay Mom, then I’m going to lose every race!”

            I said, “Okay. I’ll still cheer for you!” 

She asked,” Y’all cheer for a loser?” 

I said, “Yes.  You’re my daughter and you’re a winner in my eyes.  You tried.”

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For more information on Thrive copy and paste: https://www.thriveflinthills.com/

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Elders Respond: "What are You Reading and Why?"

 

The photo is of books recommended by elders who meet in a study group called "Theological Reflections."  Other elders and regular readers of this group blog responded to the question "What are you reading and why?"  Some have provided succinct reviews after the titles.  Others have elaborated on books that have inspired them over the years and have written lengthy reviews.    For more book reviews, see "Contributors--"BOOKS WE READ."

Myster E

The Greek Way by Edith Hamilton. I got the idea to read this book after I read that Jackie Kennedy gave it to Robert Kennedy after JFK's assassination. The passage that was relevant to the events then is by Aeschylus: "God, whose law it is that he who learns must suffer. And even in our sleep pain that cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart, and in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom to us by the awful grace of God."  

It is a fascinating book that describes the beginnings of our Western culture.  Here is an excerpt:  "We think and feel differently because of what a little Greek town did twenty-four hundred years ago. What was then produced of art and of thought has never been surpassed and very rarely equaled, and the stamp of it is upon all the art and all the thought of the Western world."

Elder Debouli

Rough Sleepers, 2023:  This is about a physician, Dr. Jim O’Connell, who worked with the homeless in Boston for over 30 years.  It opened up a world for me that I have only touched on the fringes.  It is inspiring in its humanity.  One of my favorite authors Tracy Kidder followed this doctor for months before he wrote the book.

The Book Thief, a novel by Markus Zusak, 2005.  This story is about a young girl who couldn’t read in WWII Munich, Germany, and started stealing books.  It gave me tremendous insights into what it was like for poor families in Germany and how they were also victims of Hitler’s war machine.  Her family hid a Jew for many months and he taught her to read.  Incredibly well written.  I couldn’t put it down.

Modern Loss:  Candid Conversations about Grief.  Beginners Welcome by Rebecca Soffer and Gabrielle Birkner, 2018.  This book covers many forms of grief through stories and pictures.  I read parts of it after a friend's daughter-in-law died at the age of 41.  It is a fresh approach to grief. 

Breath by James Nestor, 2020.  My daughter-in-law who is becoming a myofunctional therapist highly recommended this.  It talks about the importance to our overall health of how we breathe, and how many of us have poor health because of how we breathe.  It has good ideas for persons with asthma and respiratory illnesses but is very applicable to all of us. 

The Little Liar by Mitch Albom, 2023.  A great novel by a well-known author.   This is about the Jewish community of 50,000 persons in Thessaloniki, Greece, in WWII.   It was the largest community of Jews from the diaspora at the time.  Only about 1500 Jews are living there now.  I read it because my husband’s aunt’s family was killed by the Germans in WWII (she was saved by my husband’s uncle).  She never spoke of this or her Jewish heritage even to her children that we have remained close to.  The story is fiction but rich with the culture of Jews in Thessaloniki at that time.  

Note:  Two of Elder Debuli's book reviews appear in another Elders Speaking blog post -- Autism in Hells and Unmasking Autism: Discovering the New Faces of Neurodiversity.  Her review on Great Bones: Taking Control of Osteoporosis by Keith McCormick will appear in a future post.

Elder D.C. 

The Book of Lost Friends by Lisa Wingate.  A story of women dealing with the harsh realities of life following the Civil War, and how it impacts modern reality in a poor Southern town.  

Elder K, L.  

I am reading Think and Grow Rich (by Napoleon Hill) with my son to help him expand into his greatness (because that is the richness we are going for.)

Pussy: A Reclamation (Regna Thomashauer) because I think that the feminine power is the power that will heal the world and the more that we can tap in and share our gifts with the world, the more the human race can step into the next evolution of being.

The Go-Giver  (Bob Burg and John Mann)  The book is short and on my list of good reads. 

Elder Wren-Wren said the following book made a big impact on her: 

Fever in the Heartland: The Ku Klux Klan’s Plot To Take Over America, and the Woman who Stopped Them.” By T. Egan. 

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"I'm reading: The Fourth Turning is Here" by Elder Grateful Seeker

Photo by Elder Grateful Seeker

WHAT I AM READING – The Fourth Turning is Here – What the Seasons of History Tell Us About How and When This Crisis Will End   (July 2023) - by Neil Howe

WHY I AM READING IT – I have three children and eleven grandchildren that I love deeply and unconditionally.  I am amazed at the love and creativity and dedication they put into crafting their life paths in this changing landscape.  It would be good to gain a sense of the complex matrix of landscape in which each generation sees itself, with the bonds of love, the limitations and advantages they see in their decision-making. I feel we are at a tipping point – a decision point for what kind of life we choose for our future selves and for the generations beyond.

Neil Howe (and his former partner William Strauss) studied politico-sociological patterns in this country, and arrived at the conclusion that we cycle in 4-generation periods, which they name Saeculae.  Each Saeculum lasts a generation, and is associated with a season of the year.

AUTHOR’S PREMISE

The most recent “Millennial” Saeculum began right after World War II.  The nation was welcoming home its conquering heros, the women who supported the war by producing airplanes, bombs, guns and other things necessary for the war returned home.  Returning soldiers had the GI bill for college education or returned to work producing the new homes, appliances, automobiles and other amenities available in the United States.  And they built the interstate highway system.  This was the SPRINGTIME phase.  In the Howe-Strauss model, the adults of the generation were deemed “Hero” generation, protected and praised by their parents and peers.  (Rising adulthood 1929-1946)

The next generation settled into the roles established during the “Hero” generation, and just played along. This was the generation that benefitted from their parents’ unionization and stabilization, and benefited from lifelong employment at a company with pension and health benefits. Howe dubs this the “Lost” generation. (Rising adulthood 1946-64).  This was the SUMMER phase.  The importance of the individual was becoming more important, people were becoming more individualized and cynical and national pride was diminishing.  Howe names this the “nomad” archetype, abandoned by their elders: personally tough, and not necessarily bound to an ideology.

The next generation was the Boom generation, who questioned the status quo and shook things up with the civil rights movement, feminism, the protests against the war in Viet Nam.    During the early part of this period, people started to question the role of a strong central government, and push back against it.  In the late part of this period, central government had been weakened during the Reagan years, and Corporations, including Multinational Corporations became dominant through IPOs, corporate mergers, the dominance of the stock market, the view that the customer was the stockholder, not the purchaser; and then that the primary beneficiaries were the CEO, CFO and Board of Directors, not the stockholders, the employees nor the customers.  This was the FALL Phase. (Rising adulthood 1964-84) Howe deems this the “Boom” generation.  The fallout of this generation is extreme economic financial polarization, with personal wealth being skewed to a few thousand billionaires and hundreds of thousands of homeless persons trying to survive in towns and cities across the nation.  Howe dubs the leaders of this period the Prophet archetype, indulged by parents.

The next generation is the Gen X generation (Rising adulthood 1984-2008)  This is the WINTER phase. This generation is studying about the middle class and saying “Where is it? It has disappeared.  It is gone.  We need to build it.”  The author Howe says WINTER started with the attack on the World Trade Center on September 11 2001.  Since that time we have been engaged in multiple military conflicts that have not advanced the mission of ending the WINTER of Global Economic, Religious, Ethnic, Political, Environmental, Diplomatic and Military conflicts.  This is a global challenge, and also a local one in our own United States.  The most recent Biden administration has taken steps to move toward rebuilding the middle class and correcting the injustices made to minority groups in past decisions.  There is much to be done.

How will WINTER end? In the United States, the author Neil Howe says we are now faced with a choice.  We can either choose to fight at the ballot box for values we can verify as true, or the alternative is a war in a form we have not yet seen on this planet.

That’s my interpretation of what I have been reading.  Feedback welcome.

--Elder Grateful Seeker

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