Library
Sunday, May 30, 2010
Learning to Remember
By Rev. Cindy Bates
Philippians 1:3-11
3I thank my God every time I remember you, 4constantly praying with joy in every one of my prayers for all of you, 5because of your sharing in the gospel from the first day until now. 6I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ.7It is right for me to think this way about all of you, because you hold me in your heart, for all of you share in God’s grace with me, both in my imprisonment and in the defense and confirmation of the gospel. 8For God is my witness, how I long for all of you with the compassion of Christ Jesus.9And this is my prayer, that your love may overflow more and more with knowledge and full insight 10to help you to determine what is best, so that in the day of Christ you may be pure and blameless, 11having produced the harvest of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ for the glory and praise of God.
What memories stir in you when I say Memorial Day Weekend? Parades, patriotic speeches, a trip to a cemetery, picnics, or cookouts with family and friends, these are all memories I have of growing up celebrating Memorial Day. If your family is anything like mine when we get together we start telling stories, sharing remembrances. Someone will say, “Do you remember the time…?” I find it especially interesting that when I am with my four brothers and we start telling family stories; often we remember very different versions of what happened. We don’t always have the same memories even when we have had the same experiences. And yet how important those memories are because they have so much to do with shaping who we are and what we believe and how we perceive life.
This past week I have been reading Marcus Borg’s new book called “Putting Away Childish Things: A Tale of Modern Faith.” If you are a fan of Borg’s previous books, I think you will find this an interesting read as he shares his theological thoughts in the form of a novel, a very different style for him. In the opening few pages his main character, Kate Riley, a college professor, is having a conversation with one of her colleagues. They are talking about a newspaper article where people are describing an event but remembering very different details about what happened. Borg’s character says, “It raises the question of what memory is. When we remember, what are we doing? Are we going back in time so we are present once again at the event, at ‘what happened’? Or are we remembering the last time we remembered it, or told the story of it, so that memory is a series of veneers over the past?” An interesting question?
Memory can be so powerful and yet so illusive. Recently I was talking with a young woman whose mother died when she was three and I asked her if she remembered her. She reflected for a moment and said, “I really don’t know, because I am not sure if I am remembering her or remembering stories about her.”
Sometimes I think it would be interesting to chronologically write down all the memories stored in our memory bank to see what memories we have hung onto and keep going back to and what parts of our life have we perhaps tried to forget or let go of. What if we could somehow rate those memories as to how they have shaped who we are today? A therapist friend of mine once said our earliest memory is the foundation for how we live or script our lives. Have we hung onto our successes or our failures? Have we been dominated by what we have triumphed over or what has triumphed over us? Are we motivated by what we have learned or what we have learned to fear?
One of my earliest memories comes from when I was about three or four years old and I would visit our neighbors across the road. They were an older couple who were like grandparents to me and they often took care of me when my mother was working. My favorite room in their house was the front living room, a room they didn’t use much, but it was a very special place because it housed a whole gallery of pictures and memorabilia that honored their son. His name was Rex Ostrom and he was a Lt. Commander in the Navy, a pilot who was shot down in April of 1944. His plane was never found. I never knew Rex, he was killed several years before I was born, but he was a very real person to me. He was my first hero. I fell in love with those pictures of him in his Navy dress uniform laughing with his buddies around a piano and from the pictures in his cockpit where you could tell he loved to fly. I thought he was the most handsome man I had ever seen! And I would stare at the picture of his wife and two little girls who would only have their father as a memory.
These were all such powerful images for me to begin to understand the sacrifice and the reality of war and death and loss. I remember wondering how his parents could even go on living and being such wonderful people when they had suffered such a loss of their only son. I can remember going into that room drawn by wanting to look at those pictures and at the same time aching because I could do nothing to change the hurt for anyone. Who knows, maybe those images impressed on me an early calling to want to make a difference in easing some of the pain in this world. I guess I choose to remember it that way. What memories call to you, have shaped you, make you who you are?
Prolific writer and poet, Maya Angelou, writing about how she has chosen to respond to the memory of someone important in her life who has died, said: “When I sense myself filling with rage at the absence of a beloved, I try as soon as possible to remember that my concerns and questions, my efforts and answers should be focused on what I did or can learn from my departed love. What legacy was left behind which can help me in the act of living a good life?”
We know we can learn from both good and painful memories. History provides us with such powerful lessons. One of the most powerful memorials I have ever seen is the Children’s Memorial at Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Memorial in Jerusalem. As you walk into the entrance you pass through a tunnel representing the entrance to the gas chambers through which one and a half million children passed to their deaths. I cannot imagine such tragedy nor can I comprehend in the midst of those incredible death camps there could be signs of goodness and hope. Yet when the liberating Allied Forces reached the camp they found children’s drawings of flowers and butterflies etched into the walls. Even surrounded by such horrific circumstances their minds could still remember and their spirits then could still see the possibility for new life. (The choir sang a song just a few weeks ago called “Inscription of Hope” about some of those pictures and words that were left behind.)
We’ve been having some very interesting conversations in our Monday Noon Book Group as we just finished reading Jamie Ford’s bestseller, “Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet.” The novel is a love story set against the backdrop of the Japanese internment camps during WW II. During his administration President Ronald Reagan signed legislation apologizing to our American Japanese citizens for their imprisonment and authorized1.6 billion dollars in reparations. We asked one another what we as a nation learned from that part of our history. What have we chosen to remember? What will keep us from repeating past mistakes?
Those are the same questions we have to ask ourselves as individuals. In this morning’s scripture, Paul is writing to the church at Philippi, the first church founded by Paul in Europe. He is writing to them from prison, facing possible death and he is expressing gratitude, love, and a prayer for them. He says, “Every time I remember you…” He is taking his experiences from this community he is remembering and giving them encouragement and support even though he himself is suffering. Above all he is reminding them to remember Christ. I often go to this scripture when I am feeling stuck or somewhat imprisoned in my own life. It is a reminder to me that there are those things I can chose to remember that can move me from where I am to where I need to be. And then I also remember those departing words of Jesus with his friends on his last night with them, “Remember…. remember….”
This week I received a letter from a young woman I have know since she was about 13. Knowing she has had many challenges in life, her letter made me realize once again that what and how we choose to remember is so important. She said, “As most of you know, my mom died from Leukemia almost 15 years ago when I was 5 years old. It is never easy losing anyone close to you, but losing your mom when you are 5 and your sister is only 2 is a very difficult thing. With my 20th birthday around the corner I want to do something that helps others… “And the letter goes on talking about participating in an endurance event to raise money to fight against cancer. It was the best “asking for money letter” I have ever gotten! What she is choosing to remember is saving her own life.
As you celebrate this Memorial Day weekend may your memories bring you to where you need to be and help you realize where you need to go.