Faith and Family | Susan Hines-Brigger

Susan Hines-Brigger

Susan has worked at St. Anthony Messenger for 27 years and is an executive editor. She and her husband, Mark, are the proud parents of four kids— Maddie, Alex, Riley, and Kacey. Aside from her family, her loves are Disney, traveling, and sports.

Susan welcomes your comments and suggestions!

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CatholicFamily@ FranciscanMedia.org

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Bridging the Generation Gap

“OK, boomer.” That’s what my daughter said to me the other week when she was helping me set up my new phone.

When she said it, I was confused. I had simply been telling her how lucky she was to have all this technology because, when I was her age, we only had one phone on the wall in the kitchen for my two sisters and me to use. And I am certainly not a member of the baby boomer generation. I am a very proud, card-carrying member of Generation X, the forgotten generation.

I could tell she meant the expression in a playful way, but I also know my kids well enough to read between the lines. And in that space was a sense of exhaustion of hearing about “the old days” and how much easier this generation has it. Beneath that phrase lies a tension between the generations that is not going away.

If you were to ask members of older generations what they thought about kids today, you might hear words like “entitled,” “weak,” or “irresponsible.” On the flip side, younger generations tend to see their elders as intolerant, selfish, and out of touch.

Still, I was interested to know what she thought the expression meant. She told me it was a term people of her generation (Generation Z, or “Zoomers”) and other generations (millennials and Generation Alpha) use to refer to older people’s apparent lack of understanding of things that seem second nature to her generation.

According to Dictionary.com, the phrase OK, boomer is “a viral Internet slang phrase used, often in a humorous or ironic manner, to call out or dismiss out-of-touch or close-minded opinions associated with the baby boomer generation and older people more generally.”

Her generation has a point. Older generations do tend to dismiss the challenges, insights, or ideas of the younger generations, citing their lack of experience. So they are not all wrong in their perspective. But they’re also not completely right either.

THE OTHER SIDE

There is the other side to this generational back-and-forth. For instance, without members of Generation X, there would be no beloved smartphones. It was the baby boomers who brought us the Internet and fought for many societal changes such as women’s rights and civil rights.

Sometimes younger people see things as “back in the day,” but they fail to see that those things have a direct effect on their lives now. And all that experience we’ve earned and tell you about? It does have worth. And it could prevent you from making some of the same mistakes we made.

Take that, Zoomers.

MEET IN THE MIDDLE

That is the problem, though. Suddenly, these discussions become territorial, with both sides lobbing generalizations at each other and defending their generation. Those kinds of conversations paint entire generations with one broad stroke. Sure, there are people in both age groups who might fall into these stereotypes. But that is not everyone, and to think that way isn’t fair. All of us need to remember that.

I talked to my daughter about this divide and the lack of understanding between our generations. Surprisingly, she listened. Then I listened—without talking—to her. And I truly heard her and her concerns and perspective.

So how do we keep this conversation going? Well, moving forward, perhaps we older generations could present our insights and opinions in a less imposing and more open way. And the younger generations could help us and talk with us in a more understanding and open way. Hint: Phrases like “OK, boomer” are not going to help.

The bottom line is that boomers and Zoomers each have something important to offer our world. Let’s take advantage of it.

FAITH and FAMILY A DIFFERENT GENERATIONAL PERSPECTIVE

I’ve lived in two centuries, four decades, and two millennia, and I’m only 22 years old. Having been born in the year 1999 has made my life full of interesting assumptions. Those of us born in or around that year find ourselves recently graduated from college, finishing up our education, or navigating the first few years of postgrad life. There are those of us who call ourselves millennials and those who call ourselves Generation Z. But, for me, it seems I’m somewhere in between.

The generations above and below me have some sort of problem with each other, and I don’t seem to resonate with either. Being born in 1999 means we can’t call ourselves ’90s babies because we were only a year old, but being a 2000s baby means something completely different, according to the stereotypes. We were born in a year that allowed us to live through 9/11 but not remember it, to grow up while the Internet became a household commodity, but also remember having a limit of only 30 texts a month and a flip phone. We grew up in a time in which older generations say, “We had it easier,” but no one accounts for the toll that technology has taken on our mental health.

Being a 20-something in 2021 means a lot of things. But if there’s something we do well, it’s being passionate and connected: a passion for change and a desire to be connected.

COUNTERING STEREOTYPES

In a negative way, though, this can be viewed as our generation being lazy and overly sensitive, especially the portion of our age group that is closely Erika Glover related to Gen Z. We are told time and time again that “back in my day, we didn’t have all this fancy technology to do things for us.” And while I have to agree, the idea of an encyclopedia doesn’t sound thrilling, and the easy spread of false information isn’t all that grand either. We are told we are devoid of faith, but we desire change and growth in our world, having deep faith in what we expect of our peers. We find ourselves at a crossroads, one side of us relating to the millennials’ McDonald’s PlayPlaces, cartoons, and video store runs before sleepovers. But on the other hand, like most Zoomers, we are extremely individualistic and have our minds set on making a difference to change the world. It seems my generation is the gap between two—one might say the best of both worlds. Being born in a world before smartphones and living to see how a pandemic impacts school and job interviews, you could say we’ve been preparing for “the real world” this whole time, and we didn’t even know it. —Erika Glover

Friar Pete & Repeat

These scenes may seem alike to you, but there are changes in the two. So look and see if you can name eight ways in which they’re not the same. (Answers below)

Stephen Copeland

Stephen Copeland is a storyteller and an Indiana native who now lives in Charlotte, North Carolina. He recently published his first memoir, Where the Colors Blend, about his journey from doubt and despair to a place of faith and hope. He’s been published widely in this magazine and at FranciscanMedia.org. You can follow his work at CopelandWrites.com.

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When Words Fall Short

How do I begin writing about prayer when I have not felt like praying?

It’s not that I’m angry at God. It’s not that I’m indifferent to prayer. But sometimes there’s a heaviness to suffering that only silence can hold. There are times when words fall short. Instead of rising from my lips, as my prayers once did, now they sink like stones, collecting on the ocean floor of my family’s pain. The tide betrays a rocky shore, remnants of my efforts, all those sunken words. In the morning, I’ll cast them into the ocean again. Grief, in this sense, is pure mysticism.

There is a weight to my words because my mom passed away unexpectedly last February. She was 60 years old—healthy with no existing medical conditions. But her pure and loving heart stood no match against a cardiac arrhythmia that took her in her sleep. Just a few months before, we were dancing on my wedding day, all three of her and Dad’s children to be married within the same year. We felt that her best days awaited her, before a seeming glitch in the grand design stole her away.

As I write this, having found out two days ago that my wife and I will be having a child, I am simultaneously filled with wonder over the miracle of life and with a deep ache that just one more year with my mom would have fulfilled her dream of becoming a grandmother. Some dreams will never be. There is no why, no explanation, no resolve. These are our own crucifixions.

So, what does prayer look like when words fall short, in the anguish of our own Garden of Gethsemane? What happens when our words sink into a dense expanse and are coughed up with the tide?

DESERT HEALING

Last summer, my wife and I finally went on our long-awaited honeymoon that the pandemic delayed. One day, the blazing sun in Sedona, Arizona, rose above the red rocks and invited us to a day of hiking. We soon discovered that surrounding wildfires had forced authorities to close the parks and trails. We drove around dismayed, then saw a sign for a placed called the Chapel of the Holy Cross. Why not check it out? Our day’s plans had been derailed anyway.

When we walked into the chapel overlooking the red rock buttes and scorching sandstone, not even the scrambling tourists

and blatant disregard for “no photos” signs in the chapel could drown my awe. As beautiful as the chapel and its location were, what captured my gaze was the 30-foot bronze crucifix raised high. It was almost as if Jesus’ broken body flowed downward into the golden trunk of a tree that climbed upward. Its branches stretched above Christ’s head, adorned with 12 leaves, paralleling St. Bonaventure’s image of the Tree of Life. Here was paradise and trauma intertwined, victory and horror colliding, Eden and Golgotha flowing outward into this very moment in time. Somehow, it was enough.

We sat in a pew, somewhat distracted by the couple taking a selfie at the crucifix as if it were a national monument.

“Should we light a candle for your mom?” my wife eventually asked.

“Yeah,” I said, rising to my feet.

I lit the wick of a votive candle. My wife held my arm and asked, “Do you want to say a prayer?”

“No,” I responded. I did not have the words.

Somewhat self-conscious that I could not even offer up a prayer for my own mother, we exited the chapel. I stopped when I saw a humble green statue that no one seemed to notice. It was St. Francis, always seeming to show up in my weakest moments, perhaps because he realized poverty made us strong in Christ.

Francis, one of the few saints depicted without a book or scroll in his hands, did his own kind of Lectio Divina before the crucifix. So did his spiritual sister, St. Clare, most notably before the San Damiano Cross. I could not utter a word in that chapel, yet I was taking part in a great Franciscan tradition without realizing it. Sometimes icons, symbols, nature, and art can take us where words cannot. We read them by allowing them to read us. This, I think, is its own kind of prayer.

The author captured a sun dog in the sky above the Chapel of the Holy Cross in Sedona, Arizona.

On the way down the mountain, having felt something in my soul that had been mostly numb since February, I took a photo of the chapel. My camera captured something I hadn’t noticed in the glare of the sun: a sun dog bending over the chapel, almost like an eye gazing outward toward the heavens. I look at the photo often. It reminds me of the bronze crucifix and its outward gaze upon my life, as the cross somehow contains all the prayers I cannot yet pray.

SILENT TRUST

Suffering Christ, even when I cannot feel you, I trust you are near. When I do not have the words, or when the words I pray fall short of what I mean, I trust you pray them for me. I may not have the words, but I offer you my gaze.

Amen.

PRAYERFUL TIPS BEING PRESENT WITH THE CROSS

• Spend time meditating before a crucifix, as Sts. Francis and Clare so often did. Maybe that means getting to Mass 15 minutes early and gazing upon the crucifix above the altar, taking a prayerful stance before the one on your bedroom wall, or even pulling up a photo of the San Damiano Cross or the Chapel of the Holy Cross on your digital device.

• Gaze upon the cross without the pressure to pray or conceptualize what you see. Trust the encounter and remain open to whatever rises up during this experience, even if it is nothingness or emptiness.

When the power of love overcomes the love of power, the world will know peace.

—Jimi Hendrix