It’s been a gorgeous New Hampshire June morning, after 3 days of clouds and cool intermittent showers in the lakes region here. I’ve happily busied myself inside, cleaning the log cabin that will be the summer residence of 10 of my brothers and several visitors, as this Camp Marist property prepares to kick off it’s 58th season, June 24th , when some 200+ campers, ages 6-16 arrive “for the best summer of your life,” as the camp slogan goes.
In between scrubbing the rust rings out of toilets and “Murphy’s soaping” the furniture, I’ve been swimming with six of the younger staff who have also arrived two weeks early to take a Red Cross life guard training course. Two of them are strong swimmers, accredited by Australian and English lifeguarding associations. They are taking the American course for the first time along with the others. I’m recertifying my expiring credentials, trying to keep up with young adults, some 40 years my junior. It’s been a physical challenge for me. Almost makes me swear off the ice cream and potato chips that have padded this body over the past year. Considering the area’s several superb ice cream stands, that isn’t likely…I’ll take the short term suffering; “life is too short, etc. The lake has been New Hampshire frigid these early summer days, especially as the unsettled weather has kept the temperatures from reaching beyond the lower 70’s. Not exactly beach weather. Still, so far, so good, after a week on such concrete tasks as cleaning and nearly completing the professional lifesaver’s course. And, I know the summer will get better… Our advertising promises it!!
As such preparations have taken place in this corner of the Marist world, the past weekend also saw the U. S. Province’s Jubilee celebration of 15 of my brothers, feted for their generous service of the church through their sharing of the life and ministry of the Marist Brothers over the last 60, 50 and 25 years. I’ve heard it was quite the evening, as family and friends joined them and other Marists for a joyful Mass of Thanksgiving and a wonderful meal afterwards. It’s always worthwhile to recount and enjoy such lives well lived, before we ultimately do so for individuals at a wake service or a funeral. I’m sure they heard our affirmation and appreciation for the individuals they are and their lives among us. “Deo Gratias“ and “Ad multos annos” I pray for these men who have so graciously given of themselves to young people in the United States and worldwide. Personally, it’s been a pleasure and a privilege to know and live with most of these “survivors and superheroes” of the groups of ’47, ’57 and ’82.
Praying about them earlier in the day put me in a reflective mood about “lives well lived,” and what makes a life “worthwhile” amid the daily scrubbing and struggles to keep our head above the water. Painfully aware these days that I am growing older, and that my mortality has rocketed much nearer than when I was 18 (see paragraph two above), I reflected upon questions that all of us might do well to answer, at least to our own satisfaction, by the end of our lives. I offer them to you here…for your summer existential reflections…
Some might ask, “Who or what is it that makes my life worth dying for?” Others might ask, “Who or what is it that makes my life worth living for?” “For what would I give my life?” or even try to answer Jesus’ questions, “What profit would there be for one to gain the whole world and forfeit his life? Or what can one give in exchange for his life?” (Matthew 16: 26) The men whose lives we celebrated last week have given their answers. What say you?
