Beyond Peasant Envy
June 03, 2007
Rev. Dr. Donna Schaper

Ancient Testimony: Psalm 12

The Psalm today is classic lament: God was with them then and not us now. We might call this kind of nostalgia "peasant envy." Nostalgia is the way we never were. It has a traditional feel but is actually traditionalism. Tradition is the living faith of dead people, and traditionalism is the dead faith of living people.

Traditionalism is a kind of peasant envy. It is living in a photo album. It is living in a landscape painting where it never rains, the temperature is always 65, and both sun and shade are available in the nanosecond that we need them; the food is perfect, there are no chemicals in it, and we eat on china. Peasant envy is more insidious than just the search for the right conditions, environment, and lighting: it is a preference for the past instead of the future. It is also a bias against the young.

I have learned to ignore these psalms and the way they put down young people. I have learned what sociologists call "reverse mentoring," the way young people have something to teach and the way the Psalm 12 crowd can't hear what they have to say.

The Psalm 12 crowd takes peasant envy to new heights in forecasting doom, which becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. Marilyn Clements, a brilliant organizer for health care, said that they are learning to talk about how good health care for all could be, instead of talking about how bad it is and was. Note the tilt towards the future. I call this good posture. Bend forwards, not backwards. Let a good future pull you towards it - and let younger people lead the way.

Our Community Ministers kept telling me, "Learn to text." They meant using my cell phone for text messaging. I did learn to text, but I had to beg one of my kids to teach me how to do it. They were sitting in the back seat; I was sitting in the front seat. I begged for guidance; they said, enough with you. I don't know about you, but my offspring are sick of teaching me technology. So I learned it myself, after about an hour of fiddling with the cell phone, and poor. Instead, they have given to me. I was trained to think that parenting would be me giving something to my children. Guess what? I was wrong. They have given much more to me than I could ever give to them. When we hear texts like this one, which say all the good was during our time, not the new time, be careful. If you want to be envious of something, be envious of the great future today's young people will enjoy.