78

 

Old men ought to be explorers                                                                                                  

Here and there does not matter                                                                                                    

We must be still and still moving                                                                                                

Into another intensity                                                                                                                

For a further union, a deeper communion                                                                                  

(T.S. Elliot, Four Quartets, "East Coker," V).                                                                            

Birthdays come predictably, on schedule, year after year - until, of course, they simply stop coming.  With each increasing year, the number of birthdays to be celebrated in the future inevitably becomes fewer, which to my mind makes each presently occurring birthday so much more precious, to be cherished that much more.

Today, I celebrate the completion of 78 years on this planet, 78 years of life lived more or less well, more or less interestingly, more or less faithfully and devoutly, a "Boomer" both technically and truly. 

At my age, I suppose, one ought to be profoundly grateful just for having made it thus far - grateful for antibiotics and vaccines and the multitude of modern marvels that have made longer, healthier, and easier lives possible and even probable. Of course, the history of progress has been mixed. I am inclined to agree with Stefan Zweig, who famously wrote in The World of Yesterday, "Never until our time has mankind acted so diabolically, or made such almost divine progress."

That said, I am admittedly of an age when the personal takes precedence over the political. Like so many of my contemporaries, I increasingly feel I cannot do all of the things that I used to do, and I can no longer confidently aspire to have the opportunity to do so many of the other things that I might still wish to do - or that maybe that I would wish I had done but that I never quite got the chance to do. (I often think of that lovely line in the Anglican General Confession: We have left undone those things which we ought to have done.) Health is relative, of course, and lifestyle limitations vary from the extreme to relatively modest, but anyone can safely predict that, at this age, opportunities diminish and choices increasingly narrow, as does whatever confidence one still has in one's future possibilities.

There is a plus side to all that, which is a certain simplicity and the freedom that comes with that. Life is surely simpler when one has less to do. (Unfortunately, it may also be more boring!) It is always better by far to have purpose and remain active. There is, however, certainly some comfort in not having to care anymore about  everything - and certainly not about some things. In a public-facing vocation, one's appearance obviously matters a lot. Things like clothes and style matter much less, however, when one's age automatically makes one both less interesting and less noticed. Simplicity brings with it a certain freedom. How much freedom may inevitably vary from person to person. There is, for example, freedom from the imperious demands of contemporary technology. I have a smartphone, and I use the internet (both probably more than I need to). But age frees me from needing too much more. It frees me in regard to how much technology I am actually required to be mastered by. So I don't do Tic Toc. I don't create videos. I don't keep up with the latest AI innovations. I just don't need to do any of that, which, maybe if I were younger, I might feel much more compulsion to do. In that simpler life, there is some real freedom.

Aging also encourages empathy. In years past, perhaps I might have felt impatience when, for example, a bus was delayed by a handicapped person getting on or off. Of course, I was too well brought up to show any external sign of such selfish feelings, but inwardly I could and did feel impatient at being delayed. Now I not only feel no inner resentment at being delayed, I increasingly don't worry at all about the time it takes to get from place to place!

Unavoidably, of course, aging goes in only one direction. Diminishment goes in only one direction. Everyone inevitably must face the increasing closeness of the end. What one sees and observes on a birthday is the passing of another year. What one feels - and fears - is the inevitable passing of oneself. Who wants to end?  What did the Prophet Isaiah say? We have all withered like leaves, and our guilt carries us away like the wind [Isaiah 64:6].

Of course, faith gives life's inevitable end a meaning it wouldn't otherwise have. But it also uniquely injects its own anxieties. What did Isaac Hecker say? There was once a priest who had been very active for God, until at last God gave him a knowledge of the Divine Majesty. After seeing the majesty of God that priest felt very strange and was much humbled, and knew how little a thing he was in comparison with God [Quoted in Walter Elliott, Life of father Hecker (1891)].

When confronted with such sobering considerations, I just fall back on trust in that old medieval axiom, Facienti quod in se est, Deus non denegat gratiam (To one who does what is in his power, God does not deny grace.)

As for the inevitable regrets about opportunities missed and friendships lost over the years, I find myself also increasingly attracted by the notion of an eternity of mutual forgiveness. There is a famous homily by Saint Fulgentius of Ruspe that we read very year in the Office on the feast of Saint Stephen about the eternal reconciliation between the martyr Stephen and his persecutor Paul,  in which he imagines how  "love fills them both with joy." When one recalls one's many mistakes in life, an eternity of mutual forgiveness seems increasingly appealing!

Equally appealing is the idea that it has all already begun.

As the Jesuit John Lafarge famously observed some six decades ago: "When it's all over and we look back at our old age as we now look back at our earlier life, we may apply these same words [Oh, how foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared! (Luke 24:25).] to ourselves and wonder why it was that we did not see the risen life already operating with us during the hours of darkness or suffering. The moments when that life was most evident were those when we imparted a bit of it, through love, to our neighbor. In those moments, we are joined, as it were, with the countless people in God's Kingdom who are lighting the torch of the resurrection." [The Precious Gift of Old Age (Doubleday, 1963; Sophia Institute Press, 2022] .