‘Tis the season – for travel and travel planning: spring break has come and mostly gone and summer’s in our sights.
Where shall we go?
Sicily, 2009
Travel is definitely in. It’s easier and less expensive than ever, and don’t forget the airlines, resorts, theme parks, cruise lines and destinations from national parks to small towns massaging our brains with propaganda, getting our attention, trying to convince us that without them, we are less.
This is nothing new, of course. Human beings are travelers, on a journey. Tourism as a leisure activity may be fairly recent – dating, perhaps from the 18th century – but humans have journeyed since the beginning, as migrants, refugees, pilgrims and nomads. Read the stories of saints and scholars of the middle ages, for example. The extent of their travels can be startling. From Abraham to Gulliver to Rick Steves, we’re in.
But should we be? What are we running from?
Paris, 2012; Hannibal, MO 2014
I’m on the travel train, definitely, but I’m also a skeptic. Why?
Because I think it’s really important to take a skeptical approach to all human endeavors all the time.
What do I mean by that? I don’t mean cynicism, or a dark, negative view of human activity. I mean simply that: skepticism. Human beings are limited, flawed and each of us operates out of a particular, narrow vision. Our actions reflect those limits.
A healthy skepticism refuses to deify, idolize or objectify any one human activity or choice. There are certain goods in life, but those are the fundamental goods. Something like travel can be a good – but it can function as a negative as well.
There’s not a serious spiritual writer ever who has advised: Accept your own motivations and self-understanding as 100% reliably authentic and good – never engage in self-examination or criticism.
In fact, it’s pretty much the opposite.
The reason I’m beginning with this rather broad take is that it speaks to themes that keep popping up in my thinking all the time these days: how many of our political, social and religious difficulties and divisions are rooted in making an idol of a human being, one particular human approach to a problem, a human institution or ideology? All of them? Maybe.
Quick example: ministry – pay or volunteer. Or simply being active or involved in a faith-related institution. Great, right?
Nope, not always. Using your time to be involved in a church can of course be an authentic expression of faith and help others. It can also be:
- Time spent in an externally “virtuous” activity to distract yourself or others from not-so-virtuous aspects of your life.
- An opportunity to attain and exert power over others
- An opportunity to enjoy external affirmation from others
- A means to deceive, use and manipulate others.
- An excuse to avoid duties and responsibilities (very, very common – No, I can’t tend to my messy, difficult and challenging family life because, hey…I’m at church serving God!)
In short, there’s not inherent virtue in ministry as an thing, as an entity. Like any human pursuit, it can be an opportunity for a person to live out their best qualities – or their worst. Usually a bit of both, because that’s the way we humans roll.
So, travel. Is travel always wonderful? Is it something every person should prioritize? Should every family aim to be a vagabond family, ready to hit the road and Experience Life Out There? The travel blogs, the Instagram accounts, the books all would lead you to believe so. But really?
Of course not. In a minute, I’m going to lay out some reasons why travel has become important to me, but know that every step of the way, I’m a skeptic, especially in relation to my own choices and priorities. I know that the travel we do is a luxury and a privilege, and I also know that travel is not the only means to reach our travel goals, ironically.
And believe me, I do go back and forth on all of this all the time, but most of the time I end up in this place:
What the hell. Mike dropped dead when he was fifty. I’m almost fifty-nine freaking years old now. Life is short. Again. What the hell. Let’s get out of here.
So, deep spiritual discernment, obviously.
Before I move on, I want to highlight the thoughts blogger Ann Althouse, known for her “cruel neutrality,” her blogging longevity, the virtual salon she’s facilitated at her blog, her marriage to one of her commenters, and, of course, her travel skepticism. It’s health and a good corrective, and I’ll talk more about it tomorrow. Some good Althouse travel-skeptic quotes:
I question this belief in the kind of “personal contact” you can get from foreign travel. You can trek all over the place and still be quite ignorant, and I suspect the locals mostly look at the tourists as ignoramuses. Why wouldn’t they? And as for the “retreat[ing] behind barricades in their minds,” we’re all in our own mind. There’s no way out. You have never traveled beyond your own skull and you never will. The promotion of travel — an expensive, time-consuming, arduous activity — as the only way to understand the world is propaganda. There are other ways to develop your mind, notably the thing you are doing right now.
ADDED: I wonder if these people who believe they’re understanding the people of the world through travel ever consider spending more time in the poorer neighborhoods of their own city and getting to know the immigrants who live in their town? Why not contribute the money you would have spent on travel to a charity that serves this population and then volunteer for some activities that might involve you in real relationships with some of these immigrants? If that doesn’t seem like a viable alternative to you, then why take pride in the imagined superiority of yourself as a traveler?
All right, clearly the NYT isn’t writing for average Americans who are trying to give kids some culture mixed with fun when they have a couple week for vacation. It’s writing for the subset of its readers who would travel all the way to Thailand with children, stay at a hotel with a concierge, and then feel it’s a good use of time to do crafts (like making little clay elephants) that are easily done at home or in kindergarten class. I agree that’s a better use of time than shopping for souvenirs, but maybe the best use of time is not going to Thailand (with children!) in the first place. Why subject children to all the time-consuming burdens of traveling to such distant places? Why take on the burden of managing them and devoting your efforts to making all the expense and effort seem worth it?
…
There’s no serious analysis of whether it’s a good idea to take your children to Asia. You’re just stuck with inane propaganda: It’s “a great way to open your children’s eyes to a world beyond their front door.” Lots of time on a plane (or a luxury cruise?!) and then making it educational and fun with packaged crafts related to the local flora and fauna? There’s no serious inquiry into whether these long trips are good for children in the first place. If they are as good as they need to be to be worth it, than isn’t it terrible that only rich kids get to do it? How about leveling the playing field? Take your kids to American cities and national and state parks, and donate the money you save to enriching life for poor children.
Better yet, have your children devote themselves to charitable services to the poor in your own town. That’s a greater way to open your children’s eyes to a world beyond their front door.
Guess what:
I agree with her. 100%. Well, maybe 97.3%
And I’ll engage more with these ideas tomorrow. But hey – let’s talk about why we travel first!
Bryce Canyon, 2015; Guatemala 2017
I travel – myself- for the same reason I read and think: I’m curious about the world. I want to understand it. And yes, I am privileged and have the money and time to do so.
But, these days, I mostly travel because of what I think it contributes to the education and formation of my kids. I think about it, and I honestly don’t know if I’ll travel that much after the last one flies the coop. Some people, of course, look forward to that time of life as the Prime Travel Years. Without kids!
I don’t know.
I like traveling with my kids – perhaps because it gives me a justification for an activity I feel a bit guilty about? It’s for the children! Probably. But also because I really, really enjoy sharing information and experiences – well, educating.
I envision traveling without them, and it has zero appeal. I mean – I can see myself living somewhere abroad or in different spots in the US for six months at a time, for example – I definitely envision that kind of semi-nomadic existence as long as the money and health hold out – but what we’re doing now? What Last Son and I are thinking about for his Roamschooling High School years? No, that will be the end of that. That will be enough.
So…for the kids. I’ve written this before, but it bears repeating.
For me, traveling gives me a chance to teach my kids what I think is an invaluable lesson as they navigate the hothouse pressures of American childhood and adolescence:
There is more to life.
And no, it’s not just a matter of diversity and multicultural awareness, blah blah blah, either. It goes deeper.
Do you remember being a pre-teen and teen? What it was like? How narrow your perspective was, how deep your anxieties were, how devasting the judgment and rejection of your peers could be? How it seemed as if your whole self worth and perhaps the meaning of life hinged on the opinions of a crew of 7th graders in one corner of Kansas in one year late in the 20th century?
I consider one of my prime missions and responsibilities as a parent to shatter the glass walls of that hothouse and form my kids in a way that they see themselves beloved by God, beholden only to God, with no one else’s judgment or evaluation important at all – but for God’s.
Not even mine!
There are many ways to do this. Fundamental to all of them is the common sense foundation of faith. Of forming them in a tradition that teaches just that:
You are a beloved, purposeful creation of a loving God. You’re here for a reason – His reasons. That’s what your life is about: learning to listen to Him, be formed by Him and conform to Him so you can live out those reasons, and therefore, live in peace and real happiness on earth and forever.
But guess what? You’re not the only one. Every other person on earth was created by this same God on this same journey. Everyone is so very different – but everyone is just the same.
Being formed in Catholic faith and tradition – you get this, and you get this in a broad and deep way, that places your life in a context so much broader than that gaggle of 12-year olds in the present moment. You’re part of a mysterious, beautiful universe that reflects the mind of the eternal God. You! Are a part of that! You’re a part of a people who’ve been listening to and beloved by this God for centuries. You listen to the same revealed Word, you were washed in the same waters, you share the same food as 4th century kids in north Africa, 12th century French nuns, 14th century aristocrats and beggars, 17th century Japanese villagers, and people of all ages from every corner of the globe today.
My kids still at home go to Catholic schools with kids who have roots from all over the world from the Philippines to Mexico. They live a liturgical calendar that celebrates saints – which means holds them up as role models to emulate – of every age, social class, ability and ethnicity. Every week, they listen to priests and call men “Father” who come from Vietnam, Nigeria, India and Sri Lanka, who speak with Asian accents and Southern drawls.
So yes – rooting a kid in a global perspective – which is essentially an authentic human perspective – isn’t it – is a natural fruit of authentic, intentional Catholic formation. You don’t have to leave town to get it.
But hey – it can be pretty fun when you do.
France, 2012
Charlotte was Both 