nobodysgod

I just came across a piece I wrote some time ago about the "American dream." I have no idea what the occasion was, but it doesn’t take a huge incentive to get me talking about this country. I’ve got a love for America that I suspect I was fed with my mother’s milk, because to both of my parents this was the Promised Land.

Given that, what I said there about the "American Dream" didn’t surprise me. What did surprise me was how intimately my thoughts about making that dream a reality in one’s life relate to another cherished part of my life. I’m talking about faith.

In the piece that fortuitously came into my hands, I wrote that the American Dream "is not something you have at night, it’s something you do, day by day." That could well serve–and serve well–as a description of how I think about faith. How I experience it.

To me, faith, like the American Dream, isn’t something you have. It’s something you do. That right, day by day. As the American Dream requires rigorous effort, so does faith. At the outset, for both, we can, if we’re inclined to be attentive to the world around us, find. . ideas. . .people...actions. Little pieces that we can work with, which may turn out to connect readily–or with sweat-producing effort–to each other. Eventually, perhaps, to shape into a way of life that is rich with possible joy It can’t happen overnight–obviously–because, as I said, it is not something that happens when you’re asleep. So it takes wakefulness, work, time.

Which is why, understandably, for almost all of us, there is a sporadic temptation to give up on the American dream–or on faith. The daily effort required turns out to be more than we think we can bear–or, certainly, feel like putting out when the outcome isn’t even guaranteed. We decide to give up on the dream, or on faith, and move on. But dreams and faith can both be stubborn. You may let go of them, but they may not let go of you. They may insist on your attention. And, eventually, that you renew your intention to make them come to life.

My folks willingly–enthusiastically–took on the hard work of making the American dream a reality in their lives. Once my father thought he came this close–and it collapsed on them. But, painfully slowly, my mother and father emerged from the rubble and tried again. And again. They never brought the whole dream to life, but neither did they give up trying. And, it seems to me, that the trying itself may have tasted to them a lot like the dream fulfilled would have. After all, it’s called the American Dream because it could only happen here. Here, the place they called, without irony, the Promised Land.

With faith, it seems to work something like this. If–when–we give up on it, faith seems to drift easily away, in no time becomes quite distant. And yet, it can return at any time, tap us on the shoulder, or kick us in the butt–announce itself as present. Let us know, in no uncertain terms, I may be small, but I’m here. And you really ought to consider letting me into your life again.

Building a life where faith is the everyday reality can be as hard as my parents’ experience of America. But–no, and–every bit as fulfilling.

Truth is, I’m counting on it.