DREAMS OF MY FATHER -- PART TWO

DREAMS OF MY FATHER – PART TWO

            Caroline and I were blessed to be with our children David and Susan over Father’s Day weekend.  I was reminded of the gifts of parenting and grandparenting – thank you!  As I noted in last week’s blog, I did not know my father except in his absence and neglect, so as I celebrate Father’s Day, I am aware that not all of us are fathers and not all of us had great relationships to our fathers.  My father died over 30 years ago, but I still carry his neglect in my heart and soul.  So, the father with whom I wrestle is not my biological father, but the one I carry in my heart.

            Father’s Day (and Mother’s Day) is a time that calls us back to our origins and to the meaning of our lives.  Biology is fate, but it is not destiny.  We have certain limits within which we must live our lives, but not all is determined for us.  Not all of us are fathers or mothers, but all of us had fathers and mothers.  Whatever our relationship is to our parents, we are called to live our lives in a way that we bring mothering and fathering to those we engage.  This is certainly what happened in my life, as recently as last week.  After reading last week’s blog, one of my older colleagues and friends, Gayraud Wilmore, mailed me to say that he wanted to be my substitute father, and I said “yes!”  In that great image from Isaiah 58:12, many men (and women) have stepped into the breech of my absent father for me, and I am truly grateful to them.  I have tried to do that also in my ministry, with some success and some failures, but I have tried to be there for those who have not known their fathers or have had terrible relationships with their fathers. 

            I have counseled many people in my ministry, and although I try not to project too much of my story onto theirs, I have noticed that an overwhelming number of people are dominated by anxiety and feel unworthy of being loved.  I know that story!  I have sought to be a vessel of God’s love to them.  I hope that I have helped them to hear that God wants our passion, not our perfection.  I have certainly heard this from those who have shared the power of God’s love for me.  I recently assisted the Open Door Community in moving from Atlanta to Baltimore.  As I was driving in the moving van with my good and longtime friend Ed Loring on the way to Baltimore, we talked of theology, politics, compassion and other subjects.  As we got to the question of whether our personal identity would survive death, I indicated that one reason that I hoped for it was that I wanted to know, finally, that I was loved and not abandoned.  In the middle of my sharing, Ed blurted out:  “Nibs, your father’s not coming for you!  He’s dead!  But, you are loved!  I love you, and many others love you.  Live out of love, right now – don’t live out of anxiety and abandonment.” 

            And, that hit home.  It will take awhile to sink down into the lower depths of my soul, but I am grateful to Gay and Ed and many others who have demonstrated and shared their love and God’s love for me.  As I reflect on Father’s Day and the  opportunity it provides to think about the power of love and pain in our lives, I return to President Barack Obama’s first book “Dreams From My Father,” where he wrestled with his absent father.  In his newer (2004) introduction to that book, President Obama (don’t we miss him now!) wrote that if he had to write that book again, it would be “less a meditation on the absent father and more a celebration of the one who was the single constant in my life.”   I know that part of the journey.  For most of my childhood, I was dominated by the absence of my father, and I rarely ever consciously considered the loving presence of my mother.  I remember one of my great therapists asking me:  “You know, Nibs, I’m wondering why you choose to center on the absent father in your life.  Why not center on your mother, who stayed with you and loved you and nurtured you.  Why live out of absence and anxiety rather than out of presence and love?”  I am grateful to Robby Carroll for sharing this insight with me years ago, giving me time to begin to turn the ship around – and to let my mother know it too before she died. 

            So, to close out these Father’s Day blogs, I’ll paraphrase Carl Sandburg’s poem “let joy kill you – there are enough little deaths.”  I give thanks for those who have loved me and fathered me in joy and who have taught me joy, even as I have longed to live in fear and anxiety.