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A thoughtful and thought provoking response to last month's essay......

Dear Larry,

Thank you for your insightful and optimistic thoughts about 9/11. They resonated strongly for me. Your hope that the crisis could produce a kind of death experience (at least of our naivete) that would initiate our society into a new, more mature, and more globally responsible understanding of itself could indeed be a valuable silver lining to the clouds of September 11. My reflections on that hope took a disturbing turn, however, which I offer here for your further consideration.

My first thought after reading your essay was to send it to the many good, honest, and civically committed men I know. Your call for "eldering" struck a chord in me and I wanted to augment the resonance by stimulating it in others. A funny thing happened, though, as I thought about the men I naturally would send it to. I wasn't sure they would understand. I am not active in the men's movement, but I am blessed with a number of good friends who share a comfortably well rounded sense of their masculinity and an active social conscience. Responsible as they are, I wasn't sure how they would relate to ideas about initiation, transformative death experiences, values "beyond survival in the marketplace," and life "without insurance," at least not without reading your book first. I could be selling my own friends and colleagues short, but I only forwarded the article to five people, my two sons, a male friend, and, I hate to admit, two women. The women might not understand men, but they've had enough unpleasant experience with adult male adolescents to like what you said.

Why, I wondered, would your words sound strange to socially responsible men and spiritually conscious men? More importantly, why could I think of no one with whom I was certain the concepts would resonate? And why, after thinking about it, could I not see these men as tribal or community elders? The answers lead me to doubt that your call for eldering will be heeded. Simply put, our society doesn't recognize elders. Men are not given positions of influence based on their wisdom about the psycho/social/spiritual needs of the community. I don't see them anywhere as advisors, not on corporate boards, city or community councils ...and we certainly don't see them in Washington. Undoubtedly there are some clergy who could qualify as elders, but even their roles are defined and circumscribed by institutional churches, each with its own competitive, material, and self-serving interests. We have plenty of political and economic advisors, but if by elders we mean men who no longer hold the reins of power in our society, but instead are sought for the deeper understanding they have cultivated from age, experience, and freedom from the pressures and responsibilities of production...if that's what we mean by elders, I know of very few.

Could this conclusion possibly be correct? How could any society not want elders? How could a culture survive without them? Your essay calls on elders to nurture the transformative potential of the September 11th deaths, both biological and ideological. This is a terrific idea. But there are no elders with voice in our society. We don't give such people standing to tell us who we are as a community and what we need to do to advance our moral or spiritual well being. We don't trust and empower them to take our boys away from the comforts of home and initiate them into a community of men who recognize that their responsibility to the community transcends their personal material and narcissistic interests. And we certainly don't give amplification to any voice that would tell us that our society needs to limit its own material growth or standard of living for the sake of larger world community interests. That any man who would say such a thing could be taken seriously is almost unthinkable.

How can this be when nearly every historically recognized spiritual leader and every faith tradition has taught the importance of self-sacrifice, humility, charity, and the oneness of all humanity? How can a society as advanced and thriving as ours not care about its soul? I think because we have never had to. Unlike most societies throughout history and the world, we have not yet had to accept limits. We've never been brought to our knees by drought or conquering armies, or driven by overwhelming circumstances to question capitalism's materialistic answers to whatever psychological and spiritual question we might ask. As you frequently point out in your writings, Wall Street and Madison Avenue tell us constantly what we need to be successful and happy; if you think it can't be afforded, don't worry, we can always open new markets and borrow against the future. For better and for worse, we are an ambitious, successful, and confident people. The very idea of limits is almost un-American.

Thus, ours is a culture without real appetite for the lessons you urge from September 11. Even now, rather than searching our national soul for deeper understanding of the causes and meaning of these shocking world events, we react as angry, determined, and righteous victims seeking retribution. Instead of looking for moral strength with which to re-approach those peoples with whom our relationships have been ambiguous and strained, we turn to our military strength. This seems to be our way; and as long as people believe this way is keeping us safe, and is maintaining our control over vital world resources, there is little pressure to ask the deeper, more challenging questions. To be sure, many individuals have suffered hugely from 9/11, and many might well be changed profoundly as a result of their loss and pain. But already many property owners, larger business people, and the hero firemen--the high profile victims of 9/11--are being "compensated" with large payments from all our donations and from Congress. One might say the marketplace will not allow those with influence to suffer or to doubt the power of our economy to heal them.

Could elders change society? Could they call us to bring our lived political and economic values more in line with our espoused Judeo-Christian and humanitarian beliefs, or even with our highest sense of ethics? Could they challenge us to act with greater courage in our private and public affairs, or to forsake personal advantage in favor of community benefits? Could they guide us into, through, and out the other side of a death/loss experience, as you suggest? Maybe...if we would let them. Unfortunately, I see no social infrastructure of elders in a position to try. I'm afraid there is no role in this society for the kind of village elders you describe. They are not sought and respected as wise guides, but ignored as irrelevant or, worse, silenced as dangerous.

I am typically an optimistic person. I don't usually stay in such a dark place as I now find myself on this path of reflection. In the spirit of accepting death, however, I will stay here awhile in hopes of finding some genuine path through it to another side. If I do, I certainly will share it.

Sincerely,
Robert Rack

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