Late yesterday afternoon, something happened that gave me renewed hope for the future. No, not the return of guilty verdicts in Donald Trump's NYC hush money trial; I'm still processing that bit of information, which will leave me with a huge mix of emotions.
No, for renewed hope, I highly recommend having dinner with a group of college students who are about to spend their whole summer as camp counselors. In some ways, it will be idyllic, spending a summer in nature, around campfires, singing and talking about God and the best ways to live life. In many ways, it won't be idyllic. They will live in rustic cabins and even more rustic platform tents. They will eat foods like corndogs and other food that is beloved by 8 year olds, but less so by grown ups.
And they are so excited.
Many of them come to this summer of camp counselor employment because they, themselves, were campers. That's a great testimony to the power of camp. Half of them have been camp counselors before.
The group of people who live in the houses at Lutheridge and the camp counselors have dinner a few days before the first campers arrive on Sunday. Many of us will live here will volunteer through the summer in a variety of ways. But I don't expect the counselors to memorize our faces. Similarly, it's a huge group, and I'm not going to recognize a non-counselor college student, should one appear during the summer.
No, the reason we do this is so that both sides can remember what a team effort camp is. I like having a chance to talk to the next generation. We had a great dinner conversation about musical theatre, about fairy tales, about feminism, about Shakespeare. But even better, I got to hear about an even wider variety of interests that they all have. One student is a double major in equestrian management and drama, for example. It was interesting hearing about her typical day.
Today is the feast day of the Visitation, which adds an additional layer to my thoughts this morning. This day celebrates both Mary, the mother of Jesus, and Elizabeth, the mother of John the Baptist, and their time together, both improbably pregnant, both facing the future that will take them in places they can't fully imagine. And so, they spend time together, in solitude, yet together.
I love this view of community, the one offered by Mary and Elizabeth, the one offered by our dinner last night. Some of us are older, but we are not yet finished with our glorious lives. Some of us have the enthusiasm of those just starting a journey. Some of us have prior experience, which may or may not equip us for what is to come.
But together, we can make a better world for the generations that are coming behind us, both the generations that we can meet, and those yet to be born.
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