Blog | Subscribe | Free Trial | Contact Us | Cart | Donate | Planned Giving
Log In | Search
facebook
rss
twitter
  • CURRENT
    • Spring 2022 PDF
    • Spring 2022 Articles
    • NEWSworthy: What’s Happening and What It Means to You
    • Blog
    • INSISTING ON LIFE
    • Pastoral Reflections
    • About Us
    • HLF In The News
  • DINNER
    • GREAT DEFENDER OF LIFE DINNER 2021
    • Great Defender of Life 2021 Dinner Ticket
    • SPONSOR a TABLE at the Great Defender of Life 2021 Dinner
    • HOST COMMITTEE Great Defender of Life Dinner 2021
    • DINNER JOURNAL ADVERTISING 2021
  • ARCHIVE
    • Archive Spotlight
  • LEGACY
    • Planned Giving: Wills, Trusts, and Gifts of Stock
  • SHOP
    • Cart

A Pastor's Reflections

0 Comment

A Beautiful Problem

29 May 2020
W. Ross Blackburn
families, plans, rights
Print Friendly, PDF & Email

Our family has a dear friend, Hannah, a young woman in her late twenties who moved to Moscow to learn the Russian language roughly six weeks before the country went on lockdown due to COVID-19. Her host family has made her feel welcome, but neither Russian nor English is their principal language. Uzbek is spoken in the home, which makes Hannah feel somewhat isolated during dinner conversations. She spends the lion’s share of her time alone in her small bedroom studying Russian online. As a stranger in a strange land during the time of the pandemic, she has held up remarkably well. But it has been difficult.  

She emailed me several days ago with the following report:

“Hope” is the youngest daughter of the family I’m living with. She’s 13, and she pretty much made friend status with me this past week. Recently she acquired the card game version of Settlers of Catan, and Wednesday and Thursday, from as soon as I was available until well past my bedtime, that’s all we did. Friday night we watched a movie together (the other girls weren’t interested) and Saturday evening she prevailed upon me and did my hair and make-up, which she thoroughly enjoyed, and I more or less quietly endured.

My “to-do list” was neglected, but Hope and I spent HOURS together every day since Wednesday, and it really helped me to get my balance or something. It was a great moment when she came to me at 11:30 am on Thursday wanting to know why I wasn’t done with Russian yet, and when could I play. Suddenly I have a social life, and the blessedly normal problem of explaining to someone that I can’t come right now, but at such-and-such a time we can do the game, or the movie, or the makeup, or whatever it is . . . and regardless of the fact that I’m not that into games, or movies, or makeup, life seems more real. 

What struck me about Hannah’s words was how human they are. Our world is very concerned with planning, goals, and rights. In their place, each is important. It is a blessing to be able to set goals and make plans, and certainly a blessing that we enjoy rights which allow us to do those things. But how easily life can become all about me—my goals, my plans, my rights. Yet life, in general, often seems to care nothing about either my plans or my understanding of my rights. And sometimes, neither do the people who are close to us. 

In the end, Hannah’s email was about family, and how we impinge upon one another’s time and desires. When we are asked to do things we don’t really want to do, we often do them anyway simply because we ought to do them. We take joy in letting a little sister apply makeup because she is enjoying it. In other words, the way we impinge upon one another is sometimes unwelcome, but it is nevertheless a good thing. Even a beautiful thing. For it is only as we willingly allow ourselves to be impinged upon that we learn to take joy in the joy of others. Insisting that the world make way for me and my plans, without regard for others around me, makes for a dark life indeed.

Our cultural obsession with planning and rights comes at a cost, the greatest of which may be our humanity. 

 

146 people have visited this page. 1 have visited this page today.
About the Author
W. Ross Blackburn

Dr. Ross Blackburn has been ordained for 20 years and has served as Rector for Christ the King for the past 10. He earned a Master of Divinity at Trinity School for Ministry, and a PhD in biblical studies at the University of Saint Andrews, Scotland. He and his wife Lauren have been married for 23 years and have five children.
As a member of Anglicans for Life's Board of Directors, Dr. Blackburn is a regular contributor to AFL's Lectionary Life App series, and writes for the Human Life Review as well as  Christian Publications.

Social Share

  • google-share

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Comments will not be posted until approved by a moderator in an effort to prevent spam and off-topic responses.

*
*

captcha *

Get the Human Life Review

subscribe to HLR

Recent Posts

ROE OVERTURNED

24 Jun 2022

Amid Possibility of ‘Roe’ Overturning, Pro-life Centers Face Threats and Attacks

15 Jun 2022

What New York’s “Limited Service Pregnancy Center” Bill Really Represents

14 Jun 2022

CURRENT ISSUE

Anne Conlon Anne Hendershott B G Carter Brian Caulfield Christopher White Clarke Forsythe Colleen O’Hara Connie Marshner David Mills David Poecking David Quinn Diane Moriarty Dr. Donald DeMarco Edward Mechmann Edward Short Ellen Wilson Fielding Fr. Gerald E. Murray George McKenna Jane Sarah Jason Morgan Joe Bissonnette John Grondelski Kathryn Jean Lopez Kristan Hawkins Laura Echevarria Madeline Fry Schultz Maria McFadden Maffucci Mary Meehan Mary Rose Somarriba Meaghan Bond Nat Hentoff Nicholas Frankovich Patrick J. Flood Peter Pavia Rev. George G. Brooks Rev. Paul T. Stallsworth Stephen Vincent Tara Jernigan Ursula Hennessey Victor Lee Austin Vincenzina Santoro W. Ross Blackburn Wesley J. Smith William Doino Jr. William Murchison

Pages

  • Issues
  • Human Life Foundation Blog
  • About Us
  • Free Trial Issue
  • Contact Us
  • Shop
  • Planned Giving
  • TOPICS

Follow Us On Twitter

Tweets by @HumanLifeReview

Find Us On Facebook

Human Life Review/Foundation

Search our Website

Contact Information

The Human Life Foundation, Inc.
The Human Life Review
271 Madison Avenue, Room 1005
New York, New York 10016
(212) 685-5210

Copyright (c) The Human Life Foundation.