Lifesavers
Paul Ellie’s, The Life You Save May be Your Own, An American Pilgrimage, for me has become a baton. As I turned page after page I saw a runner gaining speed, getting closer, until at last my hand clenched the message and set my feet running. Ellie eloquently illuminates a frame-by-frame replay of that portion of the race that belonged to four mid 20th century American writers – Dorothy Day, Thomas Merton, Flannery O’Connor, and Walker Percy.
These writers, like you and like me, were often uncomfortable in their skin, they were individuals who, nonetheless, pressed into and acted upon a nagging burden to influence humanity with the talents that had been bestowed upon them. Looking back, they glimpsed the batons of their forbears stretched out to them – Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Dickens, Blake, Kierkegaard, James, Melville, Hawthorne – they reached, made the connection, and set off on a unique forward direction, each believing that his voice would positively influence a weary world, and in fact, save lives, hence Ellie’s title, borrowed from Flannery O’Connor.
Ellie hit the mark. Day, Merton, O’Connor, and Percy were truly men and women on a pilgrimage, they were writers honing their skills for the single purpose of carrying and indomitably passing the baton in the race set before them. Ellie says, “A pilgrimage is a journey undertaken in the light of a story. A great event has happened; the pilgrim hears the reports and goes in search of the evidence, aspiring to be an eyewitness. The pilgrim seeks not only to confirm the experience firsthand but to be changed by the experience” (Prologue, On Pilgrimage, pg. x). I will go a step further and suggest that the pilgrim, once transformed, must grab a baton, join the race, and pass the message to all who will open their hand. Passion is infectious, if we allow it to seep into our being.
Ellie suggests that these four individuals were heralds who courageously sought to challenge readers to embark on a pilgrimage of their own. While each of us has been designed for a specific purpose and inwardly yearns to embrace and develop that purpose, we dwell in a culture that values conformity over imaginative choice. Unselfish authenticity, like that modeled by these heralds, is an audacious move but perhaps the only move that will get us out of the blocks and into the race. Sadly, many of us will live our lives without embracing our innate design, our true self. Ellie’s book is a challenge to not only get in the race, but to do the hard work of training to become the specific racer that we are destined to be, regardless of the cost. He reminds us that Dorothy Day, Thomas Merton, Flannery O’Connor, and Walker Percy are holding out a baton, will you clutch it and run?
These writers, like you and like me, were often uncomfortable in their skin, they were individuals who, nonetheless, pressed into and acted upon a nagging burden to influence humanity with the talents that had been bestowed upon them. Looking back, they glimpsed the batons of their forbears stretched out to them – Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Dickens, Blake, Kierkegaard, James, Melville, Hawthorne – they reached, made the connection, and set off on a unique forward direction, each believing that his voice would positively influence a weary world, and in fact, save lives, hence Ellie’s title, borrowed from Flannery O’Connor.
Ellie hit the mark. Day, Merton, O’Connor, and Percy were truly men and women on a pilgrimage, they were writers honing their skills for the single purpose of carrying and indomitably passing the baton in the race set before them. Ellie says, “A pilgrimage is a journey undertaken in the light of a story. A great event has happened; the pilgrim hears the reports and goes in search of the evidence, aspiring to be an eyewitness. The pilgrim seeks not only to confirm the experience firsthand but to be changed by the experience” (Prologue, On Pilgrimage, pg. x). I will go a step further and suggest that the pilgrim, once transformed, must grab a baton, join the race, and pass the message to all who will open their hand. Passion is infectious, if we allow it to seep into our being.
Ellie suggests that these four individuals were heralds who courageously sought to challenge readers to embark on a pilgrimage of their own. While each of us has been designed for a specific purpose and inwardly yearns to embrace and develop that purpose, we dwell in a culture that values conformity over imaginative choice. Unselfish authenticity, like that modeled by these heralds, is an audacious move but perhaps the only move that will get us out of the blocks and into the race. Sadly, many of us will live our lives without embracing our innate design, our true self. Ellie’s book is a challenge to not only get in the race, but to do the hard work of training to become the specific racer that we are destined to be, regardless of the cost. He reminds us that Dorothy Day, Thomas Merton, Flannery O’Connor, and Walker Percy are holding out a baton, will you clutch it and run?
posted by I'm Me at 11:29 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home