A Prairie of Imagination
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Archbishop Listecki


Most Reverend Jerome E. Listecki
Archbishop of Milwaukee
 

 

Yesterday was the first day of summer. As a boy growing up, summer meant warm weather, outdoor playtime and especially no school. Now, it’s not that I didn’t enjoy school, but sleeping late and no responsibilities were attractive to a little boy, and still is to this old man. Summers meant cold drinks and an occasional chilled watermelon.

As a boy, I lived in a largely industrial area; the neighborhood was upper lower-class. The park was a distance away (over six blocks), so the playground in our neighborhood became what we referred to as the “prairies.” Please don’t imagine that these prairies were vast sweeping fields with beautiful, flowing high grass. The prairies of my neighborhood were vacant city lots that were usually overgrown with weeds. Assessing whether or not the lot was close to a house or that the US Steel plant had appropriated these spaces for parking lots, would then make prairies accessible for sports activities, war games and “hide-and-seek.”

Children are creative and can turn the most commonplace articles and spaces into fantasylands. The children of my neighborhood were not children of means. Summer vacations were never taken away from the home. A trip to the beach for an afternoon picnic was a real treat and, often, that was the family vacation. But within confines of the prairies, World War II was reenacted, the World Series was replayed and one learned how to hide from an angry parent because home chores were being ignored. I loved the prairies – they were my Hamptons, my Myrtle Beach, my Pebble Beach all rolled into one. It was imagination that took us out of our drab industrial surrounding and placed us anywhere in time and in any place in the world.

I hope that the children of today are always exercising their imagination, that they make up stories, they project themselves into the characters of history and literature and that the visual technologies of today do not rob them of that precious gift of the mind that enables them to dream and enjoy their own “prairies.”

One thing which remained constant throughout the summer was the practice of the faith. As my mother would say, there is no vacation from God. With saints and angels, we are surrounded with those who support us in our journey through life. Please invite the saints and angels to the prairie of your mind and allow them to be companions with you as you enjoy the imagination of a time when God will embrace us in His love. However, until then, let us listen to Jesus as He instructs us to LOVE ONE ANOTHER.
 

Note: This blog originally appeared as the June 21, 2016 "Love One Another" email sent to Catholics throughout the Archdiocese of Milwaukee by Archbishop Jerome E. Listecki. If you are interested in signing up for these email messages, please click here.

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