An Open Letter to the World
My Dear People,
Bethlehem. Nazareth. Calvary.
As Joyce said, in the particular is contained the universal.
Columbia. Sewanee. Richmond.
Life is lived, days are passed, not just anywhere, but somewhere. In particular.
So the Incarnation teaches us.
Particular lives, particular places.
"Wavering Place" is one of those particular places for me.
It was at "Wavering", as we often refer to it, that I got sober and that God first got my attention in earnest, through the leafy green, bright beauty of the countryside there, and through the earthy lives of the men who worked the land there.
No one knows where that name "Wavering Place" came from, but it seems to have been called that from around the time a family member, James Pickett Adams, purchased it from some cousins.
Yesterday was, it turns out, the anniversary of James P. Adams' death.
On November 1, 1904. All Saints' Day.
I have known of him (my great-great-great uncle) for years, but recently, coming across his obituary, as well as a tribute written of him, gave me an even keener sense of the man: "James P.", from all accounts, lived an impressive, substantial life: first in his class at South Carolina College; successful in law, and in agriculture; and a fearless soldier, wounded in action. He was also a devoted "angler" and, in best romantic fashion, was drawn to "flowers and forests and fields." And he served for over 25 years as senior warden of the little Episcopal Church, in Congaree, South Carolina, where I was baptized.
But, of everything I've ever heard about him, in all its impressiveness, and of all that is said of him in the obituary and the tribute, nothing has made a stronger impression on me than the following, "From his college days to the period of his death, at the age of 76 years, the life of James Pickett Adams was an open letter to the world."
An open letter to the world.
This Sunday, as we celebrate All Saints', one of the many saints that I will be thinking of will be the man who brought "Wavering Place" into my family, the man "whose life was an open letter to the world."
And, among my prayers, will be a prayer that I too might live with such authenticity, such integrity.
That my life, too, would be an open letter to the world.
May it be so, dear Lord, may it be so.
Your brother in Christ,
Wallace+
