Category Archives: Articles

How Elders Vote

Garrison Keillor, host of “Prairie Home Companion” on National Public Radio, joked recently about elderly voters in Florida’s Palm Beach County. They can manage fifteen different boards in a beano game, he gibed, but they could not cope with their election ballot.

Like most of Keillor’s quips, this one drew hearty laughter from the audience, but (leaving aside its somewhat ageist tinge) it also prompts serious questions about voting procedures in a society that is aging so dramatically. At a time when so many more of us have  passed age 65, does that mean public authority should make changes in the places where we vote and in the ways by which we indicate our electoral choices?

Surely the answer is yes, but not because we older Americans, having become so numerous, need user-friendly voting methods. Rather, citizens of every age, even those without notable disabilities, when they go to vote need to find places they can enter easily and procedures that are user-friendly. Also, whenever voting problems arise., we need to have help readily available. Younger people may require such assistance as well as their seniors.

As to polling places, a federal law enacted a dozen years ago, the “Voting Accessibility for the Elderly and Handicapped Act,” requires them to be accessible to people with disabilities. So such access is, in the words of a lawyer friend who is expert in election issues, “not merely a good idea, but a federal requirement.”

The Secretary of State’s office in Massachusetts in cooperation with the disability commission, has recently surveyed all of the polling places in the Commonwealth to check on their accessibility. Though all the voting sites were found in conformity with regulations on designated election days, some of them are still not accessible at other  times, a situation state authorities regard as less than desirable.

Another problem deserves attention: voters are often not aware of help that is available.  Talking to Teresa Neighbor, the executive director of the Election Commission in Cambridge, I discovered, for example, that each voting site in our city has an area  marked “visual aids.” Voters who have vision problems can use the magnifying rulers and magnifying glasses available there.  But this is a service that I, a veteran voter, had never noticed or heard of.

In Massachusetts, the mechanics of voting are much more easily handled than in Florida and in other states where punch cards are still used. As Brian McNiff, spokesman for Secretary of State William Galvin, informed me, “Massachusetts got rid of punch cards three years ago.”  Some two percent of voters in this state, however, still use cards that are punched with a mechanical lever.

That move away from the old punch cards came as a result of the memorable contest for a congressional seat from the South Shore four years ago. There Philip Johnston had seemingly emerged as the winner in a very close election, only to lose to William Delahunt on the basis of a recount. In this instance the Supreme Judicial Court paved the way to the changed outcome by ruling that “discernable stylus impressions”  could be counted as genuine votes.

Residents of this commonwealth also do not have to cope with “butterfly ballots.” They have never been used here. However, voters here, as in other states, are increasingly confronted by referendum questions. Often these referenda present long and complicated texts for consideration in voting booths where lighting is often what my lawyer friend characterizes as “terrible.”

Secretary Galvin strongly encourages voters to read these questions at home before they come to vote. Otherwise, one may struggle to follow them in the narrow confines of the voting booth, sometimes feeling pressured because other voters may be waiting for their turn.

Whether or not the ballot is complicated by referenda, difficulties with the mechanics of voting often arise but not just for older people. Some voters in every age bracket have disabilities. Whatever is done to improve conditions at voting sites will benefit not just them but citizens in general. The evidence from Florida and many other places indicates that the need to reform and perhaps standardize American voting procedures has become inescapable.

Last week Secretary of State Galvin announced plans to request funds from the legislature for loans to Massachusetts cities and towns wishing to upgrade their voting systems. Even though none of them reported serious problems this year, many local governments have expressed interest in improving their equipment.

One change, recently proposed as a national model, should not be adopted. Television screens, with ATM-like features, would disadvantage many elders and other people not comfortable with electronic devices. In addition, my lawyer friend points out, “they do not create an audit trail.” Among other things, this means you could not use them for recounts.

Whatever the precise methods chosen, surely this is a favorable time for establishing greater uniformity in  procedures or, at least, making them as user-friendly as possible for everybody. As Teresa Neighbor says, “Florida serves as a good wake-up call.”  

Richard Griffin

Serenity Prayer

“God, give us grace to accept with serenity the things that cannot be changed, courage to change the things which should be changed, and the wisdom to distinguish the one from the other. Living one day at a time, accepting hardship as a pathway to peace, taking, as Jesus did, this sinful world as it is, not as I would have it, trusting that You will make all things right, if I surrender to your will, so that I may be reasonably happy in this life, and supremely happy with You forever in the next. Amen.”

These words make up the famous Serenity Prayer, used for more than fifty years by many people of faith and, indeed, by seekers of all sorts. Though often attributed to others, this prayer was actually written by the celebrated Protestant theologian Reinhold Niebuhr, a professor at Union Theological School in New York City and a man much admired for his intellectual and spiritual leadership.

“It was at a service at Heath’s Union Church that my father first spoke his new prayer,” writes his daughter, Elizabeth Niebuhr Sifton.  That was in 1943 when Reinhold Niebuhr was preaching in the small northwestern Massachusetts town of Heath, a place where he owned a house and spent much time.

At first sight the prayer seems quite individualistic. It can be read as if it is a plea for personal peace of soul. Notice, however, that it begins the request by using the plural: “give us.” This implies a community framework and it becomes a plea for a group of people, not just one

Professor Niebuhr’s intention, it seems, was to respond to the desperate situation in Europe then torn apart by World War II. As his daughter explains, “It was a prayer written by a teacher and writer who had spent a decade speaking out against Hitler.”

In a recent talk, Elizabeth Sifton called her father’s words “a prayer for collective action”  and explained that it was indeed a response to the world crisis that preoccupied his thinking.  This places the Serenity Prayer in the setting of social, not merely individual, concern.

Mrs. Sifton, a prominent New York publisher, also recalled a surprising historical fact. The prayer, she said, had been distributed to the United States Army troops who occupied Germany after the war. Some army veterans may remember having received this text and using it when stationed in that country.

Another group of people familiar with the prayer may be members of Alcoholics Anonymous. Reports of AA meetings indicate that Niebuhr’s words are often used to strengthen the resolve to keep sobriety. In that instance, the prayer may take on more of a individual than a social meaning.

In fact, the prayer in situations like AA meetings, usually drops the word “grace” at the beginning. Instead, this altered version begins “give us the serenity.” For Niebuhr the notion of grace was undoubtedly vital and a basic focus in his prayer. After all, he was a theologian who attached indispensable importance to the divine initiative at work in human life.

However, in the altered version, the prayer still holds beauty and power. It becomes the individual person’s cry for balance in the struggle to retain or regain peace of soul. It also emerges as the product of a general spirituality rather than as a specifically Christian statement.

In the context of Christian faith it expresses, not only the need for divine grace, but also the power of Jesus’ example, the value in surrender of self to God, and confidence that there is a life that goes beyond the earthly one. These are the convictions of a Christian believer that find compelling expression here.

Almost everyone can identify with the request for the wisdom to tell the difference between things that one can change and those that one cannot change. However, in practice this distinction can be difficult indeed. Going back to World War II and the prayer’s origins, one can imagine the conflicts felt by Germans who recognized the awful injustices imposed by the Nazis but honestly did not know what to do about the deadly situation.

Some paid the price for speaking out and taking action against the regime but, of course, the majority bent under the totalitarian pressure. The Serenity Prayer can therefore also serve as a reminder of the need sometimes to resist compromise in the face of evil.

Richard Griffin

Two Doctors on their Profession

“It’s so infantilizing to be sick,” says Jerome Groopman. He speaks with authority, having been a hospital patient himself, and also a doctor who treats people with life-threatening diseases.

Of the patient’s attitude, he observes: “You look for a parent to sweep you up and make it all better.” But your physician cannot be that parent, he would add, if only because the doctor is not infallible.

Dr. Groopman recently spoke at a symposium in a new series co-sponsored by Boston College and the Atlantic Monthly. This first forum bore the title “The Challenge of Medical Knowledge” and also featured Sherwin Nuland, a surgeon from Yale University and author of “How We Die,” among other publications.

This initiative of the Jesuit university and the Boston-based periodical has taken its inspiration from Cardinal Carlo Martini, the archbishop of Milan. His public discussions in the cathedral of that city have attracted thousands of people, especially the young. Following that lead, the Boston symposium has taken the overall title, “Belief and Non-Belief in Modern American Culture.”

Here, rather than focusing on the faith issues directly, I will emphasize what these two well-known physicians said about the practice of medicine. Both were insistent on the need to change attitudes both in doctors themselves and in the patients who approach them.

“As a patient, it’s critical to understand the fallibility of the doctor,” Groopman said. Nuland want even further: “Doctors are not godlike; they require constant affirmation.” He confessed to feeling responsible when patients die: “I always think it’s my fault.”

Dr. Groopman sees the root cause of physician self-worship as what he called “this tremendous intoxication with power.”

To illustrate this mind-set he told an old joke that goes somewhat like this: The place is heaven’s gate where a lot of saintly people are waiting to get in. St. Peter is checking credentials. Then a guy with a white coat and a stethoscope walks right by and passes through the gate. “What gives?” asks someone disturbed at this sight. St. Peter answers, “Don’t worry, that’s God. He thinks he’s a doctor.”

Dr. Nuland uses a World War II reference to talk about the same phenomenon, calling it “the Spitfire pilot model,” a set of prideful attitudes that take hold even before a student enters medical school and continues, unless corrected. “We have to fight our own instincts,” he says.

Physicians need more introspection, he adds, quoting the poet Auden who said that doctors are the least introspective of professionals. Nuland says that they need to look themselves square in the eye and ask themselves what their motives really are.

Nuland also sees physician attitudes as rooted in their privileged place in society. About this he does not mince words: “We become much more conservative once we become doctors. We become narrowed. Most people in my generation were brought up to be bigots.”

On this last point, he advises doctors, “Recognize the bigot in yourself.”

If all of this sounds ominous, both physicians agree that things are getting better. Nuland attributes much of this change to the benefits of the women’s movement. “There isn’t a doctor who hasn’t learned from patients,” he observes.

And Groopman, drawing inspiration from his Jewish tradition, finds reinforcement from what that tradition says about idolatry as the worship of self.  The dangers of egoism loom large in some of the rabbinic literature.

These two prominent doctors convincingly make the case for continued change in their profession , making it more responsive to patient needs. Much of what they say clearly has the ring of truth.

However, it may be important to place their opinions in context. Both these doctors work in academic medical settings where they can presumably choose their own patients and find time for reflection. As writers, they also know how to use words effectively, a skill that sometimes leads them into rhetoric that does not ring true. What they say sounds awfully good, but does it express reality?

If you asked my primary care physician if she feels like God, I suspect her response would be laughter. Instead, working for an HMO and keeping up with a heavy patient load, she is too busy to act divine. The press of her daily schedule, the need to keep track of patient records, and the effort to stay in touch with new knowledge and other professional requirements must constantly remind her that she is no more than human.

Yes, physicians still rank among the most privileged people in American society. But they are often deeply disturbed about their own profession. Many of them chafe at  the red tape and bureaucratic interference which they have to endure these days. They often need and deserve more moral support than the system will ever give them.

These constraints, along with the awareness of limits in their ability to heal, make many doctors, if not most, only too conscious that they are not God.

Richard Griffin

Radiance and Shadows

Some twenty years ago, a neighbor who then lived across the street from us made a snide remark about me that I found, at one and the same time, irritating and instructive. Like other such bad-spirited observations, this one from a fellow with a reputation for being quite curmudgeonly told me something important about myself.

The neighbors had gathered outside after dinner, and the question of my absence from the gathering came up. When told that I was talking a course at a university that evening, the fellow observed with almost a sneer: “Richard is always trying to improve himself.”

This kind of remark lends itself to an obvious retort – “ Would that you, dear sir, might do something to improve your own disagreeable personality.” But this kind of rejoinder is not the point here.

Whatever his motive, that man had correctly identified one of my main impulses. And in holding it up to ridicule, he did me the service of revealing one of my traits that, in fact, had loomed large in my spiritual history.

Of course, it was more complicated than that – I have always been interested in knowledge for its own sake, as well as whatever  learning might lead to self-improvement. But, still, his stinging remark pointed to an issue important during much of my life.

Long before that incident, in the early days of my introduction to the spiritual life as an adult, I had set out at self-improvement by systematically rooting out my own imperfections. At that point, the desire to be perfect was so strong in me that I took pains to rid myself of every fault. My constant effort was to better myself morally and spiritually.

Some journal entries from those days long ago now make for  embarrassing reading. I blush with shame when I read such passages. One sentence, written during a retreat lasting thirty days, reveals my quest for self improvement.

In a reflection after a meditation on Judgment Day, I wrote:

“I see now that the delusions of my own heart are very real and very dangerous for my future safety unless I can ferret them out from their secret recesses.” This sentence, overblown in its rhetoric, suggests that I was involved in an all-out effort to tear myself apart in searching for my own faults.

Only many years later did I become reconciled to the stark fact that I would never become perfect and would have to live like other people, with a combination of personal virtue along with a fair number of bad impulses and actions. After deciding that the quest for abstract perfection was not what the spiritual life really meant after all, I settled on becoming merely human as my ideal.

Too many Americans consider spirituality as a means to self-improvement. Such a mistake comes easily: if you walk into a book store and look for books on spirituality, you will often find them shelved under the heading “self-help.” And there is no doubt that genuine spiritual life can better our character, making us more loving and honest.

But, still, spirituality is something worthwhile in itself and using it for other purposes can distort its meaning. Elizabeth Lesser, the author of The New American Spirituality, lists three reasons why the drive for self-improvement can even prove harmful. 1)You can become morbidly obsessed with yourself;  2) it is self-defeating to try to escape your basic character; and 3) you may cease to care about the welfare of the community.

Instead of being focused on any self-fix, Lesser advises her readers: “Don’t worry about being good. Instead, discover how both good and bad live within you. Deeply accept the shadows even as you seek the light.”

Similarly, in a journal passage written years ago on the occasion of a vacation visit to New York City, I made something of the same point, not without some rhetorical exaggeration about allowing myself to behave badly.

This is how I framed the issue then: “To me, the moral dilemma of life is the fundamental choice to live by faith or not. When you do live by faith, then you can behave badly, but you will not necessarily go wrong. Trusting yourself, and the merciful love at the heart of the world, you can find your way.”

Richard Griffin

Dynamic Couple

Barbara Washburn and Brad Washburn, married sixty years, would be judged dynamic people even if he were not ninety years old and she but four years younger. Keeping up with the energetic repartee between them as I tried to recently, as they talked about their lives, proved a challenge.

The two of them are widely known, with Brad famous throughout the world for his expertise in aerial mapping, among other  things.

When she was a young mother, Barbara became  the first woman to climb Mount McKinley, North America’s tallest peak. “When I got home, Mayor Curley gave me the keys to the city,” she recalls.

Brad first climbed that mountain in 1942, and is the only person to have reached its twenty thousand, three-hundred-and-twenty-foot summit three times.

These adventures are among the many that have marked their life together. They have operated according to an activist  motto formulated by Brad: “If there is something you can do, or think you can do, do it.” To top it off, he quotes Goethe: “Boldness has power and magic in it.”

Now resident at Brookhaven, the continuing care retirement community in Lexington, these energetic partners continue to seize opportunities for new involvement in the larger world. I got acquainted with them during a recent weekend in Portland, Maine where they were giving talks at a conference of business executives. Both the Washburns spoke eloquently about their private life together as well as about their world-wide adventures.

It’s not as if they have not known adversity. “I’ve been recycled three or four times,” says Brad, referring to the triple bypass surgery he underwent in his eighties and a later aneurysm. And Barbara became desperately ill in Katmandu and had to be rushed to a medical center elsewhere for emergency treatment that came just in time.

Experiences like these have led the Washburns to adopt this as a philosophy – “You’ve got to have a sense of humor to get on in life.”

Lightheartedly, Brad attributes his initial interest in mountain climbing to a desire to get rid of an allergy. “Hay fever made me climb Mount Washington,” he claims, and at the top he found none of it.

Beside his reputation as an explorer and intrepid mountaineer, Brad is known as the founder of the Boston Museum of Science and first director, lasting forty-one years in that position. It started in a location in Boston’s Back Bay and was then known as the New England Museum of Natural History.

He takes great pride in the growth of this institution from its modest beginnings. When he started, the museum had a budget of forty-four thousand dollars. Now it boasts a budget of thirty-nine million and attracts 1.6 million visitors a year.

He first met Barbara when she applied for a job as his secretary. Before taking the job, she was convinced she could get something better. Brad, struck by her personality, had to call her for fourteen straight days before she finally agreed to it.

On her first day at work, she recalls, the great zeppelin, the Hindenburg, sailed over Boston. That was in 1937 and this airship was on the way to Lakehurst, New Jersey, where a spectacular fire would destroy it.

At the Portland conference, Brad showed slides of the splendid aerial photographs for which he is famous. He has flown over the tallest peaks on earth and made records of them much prized by geographers and other scientists. He is remarkably skilled at this art as well as courageous enough to explore forbidding heights. He boasts of having made 697 helicopter landings in the Grand Canyon.

I found these two elder adventurers not only dynamic personalities, but also people glad to share their experience with others. At the conference, they took obvious pleasure in talking with those younger than they, and joining in their social events.

Though their level of activity does not involve the risk-taking it once did, they remain vitally interested in life around them. Their minds are well stocked with the adventures of a long life together, a storehouse from which they draw readily for the benefit of others as well as their own enjoyment.

Over the years, they have received much attention in the media. As far back as 1947 Brad made a movie for RKO and their exploits have been documented in many other formats. But again, they do not seem spoiled by all the publicity. Instead, they keep at their projects, Brad writing and taking care of his mountains, Barbara playing vigorous tennis and taking long walks.

They have managed not only to remain married but they give evidence of enjoying one another’s company. The secret of their staying together in marriage? “We did a lot of things together,” they suggest.

That such vigorous people have adjusted to one another’s ways for sixty years attests to remarkable flexibility of character. No wonder conference attenders several decades younger than the Washburns listened to them with fascination as they described their adventures, public and private.

Richard Griffin

BC Forum

“There should be healing of the soul and healing of the body.” Jerome Groopman, physician and writer, quoted this line from a prayer said in Jewish synagogues every Saturday.

Only recently did he ask himself why, in this prayer for healing, mention of the soul comes before the body. He now sees wisdom in this word order: “a time will come when the body will not survive but the soul can always be healed.”

Dr. Groopman made these statements in a forum held two weeks ago entitled “The Challenge of Medical Knowledge” and sponsored by Boston College and the Atlantic Monthly. This forum was the first in a series of discussions under the heading “Dialogue: Belief and Non-Belief in Modern American Culture.”

This event has taken its inspiration from a series of public conversations initiated by Cardinal Martini, the archbishop of Milan whose forums have attracted widespread attention. Underlying these latter discussions is the view that “there is in each of us – whatever our religion; even in a bishop – a believer and a non-believer.”

Dr. Groopman’s co- presenter was Sherwin Nuland, a Yale Medical School-based surgeon who is the author of “How We Die,” among other books. He calls himself an agnostic but, at the same time, he professes a spirituality that takes inspiration from human love. Though he said “I have never been able to convince myself that life has inherent meaning,” he finds rich meaning in the human spirit’s longing for love.

Unlike Dr. Groopman, Dr. Nuland professes not to be a believer in God. At the same time, however, he admits “The wonder of the power of religion has never left me.” And he resists strongly the idea that the physician is like God.

He agrees with Dr. Groopman about the need for doctors to resist “this tremendous intoxication with power.”

In Jerome Groopman’s view, “within everyone there is a divine spark.” It is this spark that makes the practice of medicine “a truly humanistic profession.” He does not feel tension between his roles as doctor and as a person of faith. Rather, he draws inspiration from his own faith even as he quotes approvingly the theologian Paul Tillich who said, “the basis of all true faith is doubt.”

Dr. Groopman also finds inspiration in the faith of his patients. Among them was a woman named Elizabeth who died of breast cancer. In her he saw “an example of abiding faith that allowed her to pass through the storm without flinching.”

The death of a boy whom he calls Matt tested his faith, however. After recovering from leukemia, this boy died from AIDs contracted from a blood transfusion. “I found myself empty over such a horrific tragedy,” Dr. Groopman confessed.  

Dr. Nuland, for his part, feels vulnerable when his patients die. Though intellectually he recognizes that doctors cannot be godlike, he still says, “I always think it is my fault.” He adds, “There is no faith to help me in these situations.” But he wrestles with the moral issues around medical care, death and dying. Part of his approach is to recognize the biases in himself toward other people.

Returning to an earlier theme, Dr. Groopman stressed the limitations in the power of the physician. He thinks that physicians must be prepared to step back from power and finds this position strongly supported by the religion, notably in the writings of the rabbis who point out the dangers of egoism. Idolatry, after all, means the worship of the self.

Forum moderator Margaret Steinfels, editor of Commonweal magazine, asked about devising an “ars moriendi” (“art of dying”), reviving a medieval way of helping people prepare for death. In reply, Dr. Nuland said “We doctors must restore our pastoral role.” Instead of relying on technology for everything, doctors could begin by “accompanying”dying people when it becomes clear they cannot be cured.

In the question period audience members came forward to ask about prayer and evil.

Both physicians remain extremely skeptical about prayer at a distance. They do not think that someone else can help you by their prayers. Dr. Groopman calls prayer “a mechanism to look deeply into your heart and mind.” Dr. Nuland says it as a way to exalt the deity and to express love.

About evil, Dr. Groopman acknowledged our lack of understanding and quoted a rabbi who once said, “God exists where man lets him in.”

Richard Griffin

Thanksgiving 2000

The autumn leaves – muted red, pallid yellow, and crisp brown – continue to hold on precariously. One nearby tree when in sunlight still features a large spray gone from bright crimson to a kind of orange red.

Some, though, have already dropped, fallen to earth and ready to enter the ground in the unending cycle of the seasons. Who knows where the time goes?, asks the pop song now become old. We are like the leaves, gifted with a fragile beauty.

Thanksgiving, the New England holiday par excellence, has arrived once more. Old and young prepare to gather around family tables for the feast and renew bonds of affection or, at least, consanguinity. Others in their isolation unfortunately must make do, despite being left out.

My neighborhood comes together each year for a communal meal, cooked by local residents and served forth with festivity. Our school hall brings old and young alike to partake in this ritual of food and greeting. Some enterprising burghers come from other parts of the city, attracted by succulent food and the spirit of our community.

Our immediate neighborhood has much to celebrate, too. A new resident, Peter, was born two weeks ago and now graces our street. He is part of a phalanx of young children who have brought us new life. Their comings and goings offer a welcome spectacle to onlookers: Who could not love the image of the local father who carries his five-year old daughter high on his shoulders as he takes her to school each morning?

We also celebrate the memory of a long-time resident who died a few months ago. A Harvard professor of Buddhist studies, Mas brought to our locale not only diversity but a courtesy and grace that we came to value. The stylish Japanese garden around his home attests to the heritage he shared with us.

Nor can some of us forget Maud, a flamboyant personality now three years departed. Her house, up for sale for many weeks, has been reported bought by newcomers.

The modern Jewish sage, Rabbi Abraham Heschel, once wrote, “Just to be is a blessing. Just to live is holy.”   That sharp-eyed insight provides spiritual power for appreciating Thanksgiving Day. It’s such a favorable time for remembering blessings received throughout long lives.

Letting the memories roll, I review the gifts of the years. Love, clearly the most precious, heads the list, having encompassed me from the beginning. As the great painter and muralist Marc Chagall has said: “In our life there is a single color which provides the meaning of life and art. It is the color of love.”

Our Thanksgiving table brings together the family members who, not seen during much of the year, remain cherished. We share a heritage that binds us together through the joys and sufferings experienced as individuals.

Friends galore who stay scattered remain lodged in my affections. Having just celebrated the seventieth birthday of David, based in Philadelphia, I harbor fresh thoughts of his personal gifts. At the Chinese restaurant where some seventy-five of his family and friends came together in his honor, I legitimately claimed the greatest longevity of friendship. We first met in 1949, long before any of his colleagues got to know him.

I also celebrate my privileged place in later life that has allowed me to know so many of my age peers and my seniors. My affections go out to the residents of Cambridge Homes, the assisted living residence where I have come to appreciate people who are aging gracefully and with wisdom and courage. Talking with them gives an added edge to my life.

And I toast the readers who contact me to speak their minds about columns. A Mormon bishop based in Nigeria comes to mind. He emailed me from that once distant part of the world to express appreciation for an article describing a visit to the new temple in Belmont.

Thanksgiving stirs in me the instinct to appreciate all the giftedness of existence. As Rabbi Heschel said, being is blessing and holiness. The fallen leaves are signs of a world full of beauty, ever unstable, ever renewed. They can speak to us of a hope that goes beyond death toward transformation.

A whole lot is wrong with our world, and, with time, some of this wrong gets worse. Perhaps that suggests the need to feel thankful for the many people old and young, who risk much to give the deprived some chance for having reason to give thanks.

I remember my friend Brinton who could avail herself of constant comfort. Instead, she leaves academia and ventures forth into troubled parts of the world to help poor people develop the tools they need to get a fair share of the world’s goods. She will be spending Thanksgiving in South Africa with new friends, in a landscape whose leaves are not brightened by autumn but still display for her the color of love.

Richard Griffin