Category: culture

10 Things to Remember on Memorial Day

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Memorial Day, like many holidays, is one that seems to lose its distinction after a while. People tend to focus on the traditions of celebration rather than the reason for them. The Fourth of July is obvious—the national birthday. But Memorial Day to many can mean the start of summer, a long weekend, a picnic, a parade, a day at the beach, a cookout.

A field adorned with numerous American flags, celebrating Memorial Day, with a sunset in the background and 'MEMORIAL DAY' text overlayed.

Those are all nice, but there of course is a more. Memorial Day started in the Civil War, and became official in 1971, as a day to remember the men and women who died while serving in the U.S. military. According to history.com, it was originally called Decoration Day to reflect the practice of placing flowers and other decorations on gravesites. 

With another Memorial Day weekend upon us, I was reflecting on this holiday. And I was thinking there are a number of specific things we could remember on Memorial Day, especially as this year coincides with the 250th anniversary of the founding of our nation. So here is my list of 10 things to remember on Memorial Day.

1. The sacrifices of soldiers.

This is the original point of Memorial Day, and it needs to be stressed. My wife and I had the opportunity to visit the American Cemetery in Normandy, France while I was teaching in the country. That and other sites really drove home the reality that these soldiers, often only in their teens, got out of boats onto a beach and climbed a hill while being shot at. They prevailed as a force, but many died. To this day the resident of Normandy are grateful. We should be as well, for soldiers who maintained freedom in this and other wars.

2. The uniqueness of our independence. 

I have recently enjoyed watching some films and documentaries about George Washington, the signing of Declaration Of Independence, and other national history from the revolutionary era. Other nations have established themselves, but the American experience was unique for what it established. Not just a national independence, but one in which individuals were free of the tyranny of a monarch. Bold souls listed their grievances against a king and invoked God to establish what we have today. On Memorial Day we remember soldiers who died defending it. We should also remember what it is that has been worth the sacrifice of lives. I’d suggest reading a transcript of the Declaration of Independence this Memorial Day.

3. That we are a federal republic.

One of the classes I teach is about law, and I have to remind students of the unique form of government we have. Not a simple democracy, the United States is a federal republic, a federation of independent states. This is the result of founders who wanted a strong government but were also wary of a government with too much power. The colonies that became states had different personalities, histories, and interests. To get them to join the new union required preservation of some of their autonomy. This created out country and its system of state and federal laws. It is worth remembering that and what it means today. Here is more information about a federal republic from the Bill of Rights Institute. 

4. The five freedoms of the first amendment. 

If you ask most people about the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, they will say it guarantees free speech. That is not wrong, but it is incomplete. I one time asked a class what are the five freedoms in the First Amendment. Two could answer. I told them to thank their high school government teachers. For the record, the freedoms in order listed are religion, speech, press, assembly and petition the government. Note that “press” does not mean journalism exclusively but anyone with the means to distribute information. Also, “separation of church and state” is NOT in the First Amendment or anywhere in the constitution. Read it for yourself. It is especially important to remember this Memorial Day as even democratic governments around the world are censoring free speech. 

5. The meaning, rights, and responsibilities of citizenship.

Citizenship, and becoming one, has not been an issue in most of our national history. People who immigrated to the United States would often go through the process to become citizens, and appropriately celebrate when they had done so. To be a citizen grants privileges, to be sure. But citizenship also implies a responsibility and a loyalty to the national values and culture. In recent years, we have seen a number of people advocating for open borders, violating law and diminishing citizenship. The growing problem of “anchor babies,” an abuse of the intent of the 14th Amendment, also demonstrates a desire to enjoy the privileges of citizenship without the responsibility. There is an industry of “birth tourism” to enable this. In some cases, this practice has not been about enjoying citizenship benefits but an insidious plot  to subvert the United States. To be a citizen should be to assimilate and embrace our founding values. 

There is another set of things to remember on Memorial Day that go beyond our nation. These are more about personal reflection.

6. Your childhood.

As a man of a certain age, whose parents are in advanced years, I sometimes have been thinking way back to my childhood. It is good to do this from time to time. For one thing, it brings up memories of a simpler time that shows we can be informed and entertained without cell phones and the internet. Conversations are best in real time in person. I also think about my uncertainty about the future and can reflect that things worked out ok for me. I am glad that in my childhood I developed a joy of reading and being outside, two things that are passions of mine to this day.

7. What you love about your spouse.

It is unfortunate that the rate if divorce in this country is at or higher than 50 percent. I don’t blame people, but I do hurt for them. Often I hear people explain a divorce by saying thy drifted apart. I can see how that happens. But after three decades of marriage, I find myself thinking about what first attracted me to my wife (and wonder what the heck it was that attracted her to me!). We all change and live through a variety of circumstances. We are not perfect and have disagreements. But the things that first attracted me to her are still there and worth remembering, especially if I may be momentarily annoyed by something else.

8. Those you love who have passed away. 

As I wrote about my spouse above, I am very mindful of the many friends who have had to endure their spouse passing away. On Memorial Day, we remember fallen soldiers. Many of the spouses of my friends were fighters too—fighting disease if not war. Memorial Day is a good day—as if this doesn’t happen every day—to remember in a special way those who have died and are missed. I would suggest not thinking about their absence and their death, but remember with gratitude and comfort when they were here and how they loved their lives as a blessing in the lives of others.

9. Your career path.

My college students are just starting out on this path, but even they can reflect on Memorial Day about how they chose their field, or a specific role within it. As we age, we have a much longer view. Periodically I think it is health to consider how one’s passion, ability, and calling intersect and led to a career or aspiration. Memorial Day for many is a day off from work. But it is also a good day to re-calibrate and think about why you work. Hopefully it is for more than a paycheck and health benefits. 

10. Where you were when God laid the foundations of the world.

This one is a play on multiple passages of the Bible in which God responds to someone complaining about a life circumstance, even a severely difficult one, bye asking “where were you when I laid the foundations of the world?” It is a rhetorical and theological question, not one seeking an answer. The point is, God is bigger than anyone or anything, He created all, and He has a plan. I have reminded myself of this often when going through deep valleys in my own life. Memorial Day is another day (as is every day) to remember the majesty of God. 

Less technology can mean more sophistication

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Steve Jobs, the founder and long-time leader of Apple, is credited with saying that “simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.” He was talking about the intuitive design of the phones, tablets and computers the company makes.

An open book resting on a wooden surface, showing pages fanned out, against an orange background.

But I have been embracing the concept of simplification in my own life recently, ironically due to a bad experience with Apple.

Sophistication is a misunderstood word. It is positively associated with complexity, elegance and being cultured or important. The word comes from the Greek “sophists,” a group of people who were itinerant teachers for pay, experts in rhetoric and philosophy, known for their ability to persuade. It’s how we get the notion of a “sophisticated” argument. In the fourth and fifth centuries, a sophist was a term of contempt for someone who engaged in fallacious arguments intended to mislead.

Whatever the meaning of the term, in modern usage related to technology, sophistication has come to mean having multiple devices and apps and programs. But, as I noted, I was moved by a tech company to make some significant reductions in technology in order to be more simple, or the ultimate sophistication.

The issue I had with Apple was the sudden closure of my Apple account. I don’t know what I did wrong and customer service would not tell me. I suspect I forgot to monitor my cloud storage and went over the limit. As I result, I had to start a new Apple account and rebuild much of my digital life.

Fortunately, I was able to recover some vital documents and other parts of my digital life. But in the process I made some significant, dare I say sophisticated (ie simple) changes:

  • I eliminated many apps that I was no longer using;
  • I purged my contacts, including hundreds of people who I no longer had a professional or personal relationship with. A surprising number of contacts are now deceased.
  • I no longer back anything up to the cloud, since that was the source of my problem and exposed the fact that someone else controlled a lot of my stuff. I have several high capacity thumb drives and a large external hard drive and back up to those so I am not dependent on an impersonal company to retain access to my personal documents if anything happens to my equipment.
  • I separated my work and personal lives by no longer syncing anything but calendar. Its a sophisticated, technological work-life balance.
  • I have started to favor reading hard copy books from the library over electronic anything. I still have e-books and news online. But for a pleasant diversion I am enjoying free access, no power requirement, and no interruptions by ads, emails etc. 

I thought I was doing something unique, emerging as “Tim Penning, unplugged.” But as I have spoken to people about this, I find a broader cultural movement with eliminating or reducing technology in our lives. Around the world, including various US states, there is a move to ban or limit cell phones for kids in schools and to monitor social media access. Many adults are voluntarily using technology less. I read an article that old basic flip phones are popular among young professionals. And of course there are all sorts of cautionary objections to the adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) in our culture. 

This view of technology may remind some of the Luddites, a group of British craftsmen in the 18th century who objected to automated machinery for fear of losing their lives. The term Luddite is unfairly used to indicate people just against all technology. But they were merely responding to a practical concern about their livelihood.

I am responding to a practical concern for my life.

Since going not no-tech but less tech, I have found I have greater energy and less stress. I savor times when I am walking in nature or reading a book on paper. I often set my phone in another room, shut down the computer, and do what comes naturally as opposed to waiting to respond to the next device “bing” like one of Pavlov’s dogs. 

I feel sophisticated.  

There are two spirits in the world

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There are two spirits in the world

The world is in chaos. More than normal. That is obvious.

But it is not complicated. 

The chaos will continue. But there can be clarity in the chaos if you look at the world with the right perspective, through a spiritual lens.

There are two spirits in the world. Only two. It’s not complicated. 

Some would say this is an over-simplification. They would argue that such a “binary”—seeing things as one or the other—is not a complete conception of reality. 

However, these same people would likely agree with the many pundits and others who describe our current culture as polarized. There are strong opinions that seem irreconcilable. 

But this is not not about ideology, it’s about theology. It is not about political parties, it’s about spiritual forces.

There are two spirits in the world.

There is the spirit of evil, and the spirit of good. There is the spirit of darkness, and the spirit of light. There is the spirit of this temporal world, and the spirit of eternity.

These contrasts are obvious in our culture, from politics to media to entertainment to social conversations.

On the one hand there is overt pride and self interest. On the other there is humility and service.

The response to the death of George Floyd was violence and destruction and threats. The response to death of Charlie Kirk is peace, worship, singing, and forgiveness. 

The one spirit encourages screaming, chanting and ranting. The other spirit moves to calm, rational, and civil dialog.

One spirit places identity in personal achievement, sexual preference, possessions and the things one can create. The other spirit gives people an identity in the One who created all things. 

One spirit encourages an allegiance to human traditions that vary with time. The other spirit favors divine authority that is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow.

One spirit claims that everyone should speak their own truth. The other spirit is the absolute truth.

One spirit enables and defends lawlessness. The other spirit respects law, order and justice.  

One spirit worked to allow and now celebrates ending the life of humans in the womb, The other spirit stands for the fact that life is sacred.

One spirit seeks to disrupt peaceful worship to make themselves heard by other people. The other spirit moves in the hearts of people to peacefully worship and to be heard by that spirit.

It all looks chaotic and hard to explain. You could conclude and fret that society is breaking down. Or you could see evidence of the larger truth.

There are two spirits in the world. 

This is not new. From the time when humans first fell to temptation by the devil, God announced there would be enmity between these two spirits. Since then this concept of two spiritual forces is frequently mentioned in the Bible, most famously in the Apostle Paul’s letter to an early church in Ephesus:

“For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.” (Ephesians 6:12).

So once you can see clearly, and understand the chaos, what do you do?

You choose.

This also has biblical precedent. The prophet Joshua advised:

“choose this day whom you will serve…as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD” (Joshua 24:15).

Jesus also called people to choose: “Whoever is not with me is against me” (Matthew 12:30). 

And, after you choose, have hope and stay confident.

As the disciple John wrote of the two spirits: “He who is in you is greater than he who is in the world” (1 John 4:4).

The world is in chaos. But you can view it simply. And you don’t have to fear. You just have to choose. 

There are two spirits in the world.

Re-embracing my Dutch heritage

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There is much talk these days of immigration and assimilation. I’ve determined to assimilate my  roots.

A sudden desire to reclaim my Dutch identity happened while I was speaking Spanish last month on a Miami elevator. My wife and I were getting on a hotel elevator to go to the lobby. When the doors opened, a hotel employee was working on the elevator and spoke Spanish and made hand gestures to inquire if we were going up or down. 

Facade of the Flamingo Express and Post Office located in the Dutch Caribbean, featuring arched windows and a red-tiled roof.

“Abajo,” I said, tentatively recalling some of the two-years of Spanish I studied in college. But then another word came to my mind silently.

“Why?”

Why, I wondered, would a person who is not only in the United States but working here be unable or unwilling to speak English? Since they work on elevators, would it not be possible to at least learn up, down, open and close?

This probably sounds harsh to some. It sounds practical to me. And the question is born not out of judgment of immigrants but the fact that I come from an immigrant family.

Seventy years ago, in 1956, my mother and her parents and siblings came to the United States from the Netherlands. They had to have a sponsor and prove that they could gain employment. They also learned English. 

I remember my mom telling me she got work in an office and used the typing and filing as a way to improve and practice her English. My oldest uncle was able to purchase a television for the family and they used that to work on their vocabulary and intonation. My youngest uncle came home from school having been mocked for his accent and stood in front of a mirror repeating the words that caused him embarrassment until he could pronounce them as close as possible to an American Midwestern intonation. 

All of this to say my mother’s family assimilated. My mom was 16 at the time the family arrived in New Jersey and made their way to Michigan. Four years later she met my dad, an American whose dad had immigrated from the Netherlands as a boy. By the time I came around, all my family knew was English and I considered myself simply an American. My mom made some attempts to teach us Dutch, but we just giggled. This is typical of second-generation immigrants, like my friends with Hispanic surnames who speak less Spanish than I do.

When I was in high school, I wanted to learn Dutch. But the high school did not offer that. So I had two years of German. This is a bit ironic. My mothers family was still in Utrecht, a suburb of Amsterdam, when the Germans occupied it. Last year when one of my aunts died, my cousin told a story at the funeral of her spitting on a Nazi soldier’s boots when he tried to give her candy.

I also recently finished reading a great book called “Things We Couldn’t Say” by Diet Eman. Eman went to the same church my wife and I attended in Grand Rapids when we were first married. She had worked in the Dutch resistance during the Nazi occupation. She speaks proudly in the book of refusing to speak German, even though she could, that whole time. She lost her fiancé in the conception camps, and left the Netherlands after the war due to the painful memories, eventually landing in the United States. She passed a few years ago, but would likely have frowned, or this many years on, laughed at me for learning German.

But I give a lot of this as backdrop. What really sparked my desire to re-embrace was a recent trip to the southern Caribbean. We took a Christmas cruise to the “ABC” islands—Aruba, Bonaire, and Curacao. I learned that all of these islands maintain a close connection to the Netherlands and are part of the Netherlands Antilles. I thought this was merely a historical artifact. I saw a man with a t-shirt that said “Dutch Caribbean” and I thought it was amusing. Then I saw that descriptor on a post office and city hall and other official contexts. 

I also heard conversations in shops and on the sidewalks that reminded me of family gatherings when I was young, back when my grandparents and mom and aunts and uncles would speak Dutch when together. It turns out that Dutch is one of the main languages of these islands. Another is Papamiento, a blend of Dutch, Portuguese, Spanish and African languages. 

I thought many times on this trip that it would have been nice had I learned Dutch as a child, and then I speak it with the folks on these islands. In addition to learning German and Spanish formally, I on my own studied some French to prepare for teaching at a partner school there four times. When I worked for an NGO I always tried to pick up some basic phrases in everything from Hausa, a common trade language in Nigeria, to Tagalog, one of numerous dialects in the Philippines. I’ve always been fascinated by languages. But why did I not learn the language of my heritage?

Well, I’m doing that now. Despite the large number of Dutch people where I live in west Michigan, few speak Dutch anymore. But I may go to the Netherlands one day,, and I’d like to return to the Dutch Caribbean, where I could speak Dutch. But even so, I want to learn it as a hobby, because language acquisition is a good exercise for the brain health of persons my age. But I also want to do it as a re-connection to my own heritage, albeit decades late.

I have started the lessons, and am enjoying it. I also recently visited a Dutch store near me to acquire some Dutch treats. (Little known fact: we get the English word “cookie” from the Dutch “koekje,” which technically means little cakes and comes from what the Dutch put together from meager provisions when they lived as a colony in New Amsterdam, so named from 1624 until 1664 when the pompous English renamed it New York). 

My mom is amused that I am doing this. She is advanced in years, and laughed when I practiced a few of the basic phrases I learned so far. I recently moved her and my dad to assisted living when they both suffered sudden health declines. As part of that, my mom had fallen and passed out and was a bit loopy for several days, during which one time she randomly spoke Dutch. She was no doubt back in her long-term memory because she had not done so in years. This also got me thinking. I am all for assimilation of immigrants into the language and culture of their new country. But it saddens me that my mom suppressed a lot of her Dutchness, including the language, to blend in. She says she identifies simply and proudly as an American, I’m happy about that. But part of her, and my, identity is Dutch as well.

Perhaps I should fill out the demographic information on various forms that I am Dutch-American and join the hyphenated community of my countrymen. 

For now, I try to regularly take time in my home office, glancing occasionally at a decoupage of the city of Utrecht I took from my parents place when they moved, to go through my Dutch lessons. I feel like an immigrant in a way. A man of a certain age with a PhD going through the paces of what seems like “See Dick Run” books from grammar school. But it is a source of joy and a sense of duty to learn the language of my roots.

I will still speak English to most, and Spanish or German or French when necessary in multi-cultural conversations. But when those interactions end, don’t be surprised if I say good bye in Dutch:

Tot ziens.