A Retirement Journal: Remembering Jim Brown & Tim Keller; Celebrating Father David

The weekend of May 18-21 was a very significant one for me. I was blessed to be present in San Antonio, Tx as my nephew David Chacko * (older brother of Peter who was featured in last week’s blog) got ordained as a Catholic Priest. That same weekend 2 Americans, who had shaped my views on life and America, died. They were NFL football star turned actor and civil rights activist Jim Brown and Pastor/Author Tim Keller founder of Redeemer Church in New York City. At David’s ordination I received a book written by Alex McDonald , David’s uncle on my sister in law’s side. The dedication reads To my dad, who taught me that I am responsible for my beliefs. I agree I am responsible for my beliefs. My nephew David, Running Back Brown and Pastor Keller have helped and continue to shape my beliefs or world view.

David was ordained in a beautiful, elaborate Catholic ceremony at St. Mark the Evangelist Church. The service for this Protestant adherent to the Christian faith seemed like a fusion of a wedding ceremony, an ordination, and of all things a coronation :-)! Over 700 people attended including numerous bishops and about one hundred priests, all apparently from the San Antonio Archdiocese. All this for “just” David and one other fellow seminarian. As the caption above says, David Benjamin Chacko is also a 1st Lieutenant in the U.S. Army Reserves. I was taken back to an event eight years ago as then 2nd Lieutenant David Chacko graduated in another beautiful, elaborate ceremony at West Point. At that ceremony there were hundreds of cadets, but David was with a very small, select group that sat on stage along with the dignitaries. This group consisted of academically top ranked cadets. ?David is brilliant, had majored in Electrical Engineering, and the Army had tagged him for great things, great things at least in their estimation. However, somewhere during his WestPoint tenure, David received the “call” to become a priest. He was going to eschew the typical military career ladder and take a leave of absence to become a priest, serve in a parish in his home diocese and then complete his West Point military obligation as a military chaplain. The young man did just that and during this weekend in May, both the Archdiocese of San Antonio and the Archdiocese of the Military, claimed David as one of their own. The call of God is something special. For me it was particularly meaningful to see the world of the Catholic Church come together with the world of the U.S. Army. It was the Ecclesiastical (other world or church world) kissing the structure of the U.S. Military or the American world. ?This type of meeting has been part of my own world view formation.

When I emigrated to the United States as a teenager in the 1960s, the U.S. was going through a significant period of progress in Civil Rights. What was remarkable was that during this period many prominent African Americans were vocal about Civil Rights. These included of course Martin Luther King Jr but also notables like boxer Muhammad Ali who sacrificed professionally by becoming a conscious objector to military service because of the Vietnam War. Vocal folks like these are to be contrasted with the earlier African Americans such baseball players Jackie Robinson and Willie Mays, who both broke the color barrier, but were marked by their reticence to speak out beyond showing their athletic talents. Jim Brown was a star football and lacrosse player at Syracuse University and played in the NFL for the Cleveland Browns. He is widely recognized as one of the greatest players of all time. After his football days, Jim Brown was an actor as well as a Civil Rights activist. MLK Jr. frequently quoted 19th century theologian Theodore Parker when the Civil Rights activist claimed, “The Arc of the Moral Universe is long but it bends toward Justice.” For this Indian immigrant who had been living in a country that had just recently shed the shackles of over 2 centuries of British rule, the arc of justice in America seemed to be bending perceptibly quickly. Jim Brown and other like him were part of this bending. I was conscious of this.

If Jim Brown was part of the American fabric, New York City Pastor Tim Keller, just a few years older than I, helped me make sense of the ecclesiastical and temporal. New York Times columnist David Brooks describes Keller as one of the most important theologians and greatest preachers of our time. For me, Keller helped define the intersection of the ecclesiastical or other world, with America, or this world, where I have spent most of my life. Tim beautifully for me describes the character of God as incredibly loving and merciful yet seeking justice for all, especially the marginalized, without giving short shrift to the commandments or right living of God. While I totally buy into Keller’s view of God’s character, I might quibble with some of his interpretations on commandments- e.g., the role of women! That said, I found Pastor Keller framed the exact elements to develop a world view. Moreover, he did so in the most winsome way not just for me but most.

At the age of 70, as my previous inspirations and heroes are passing away, I am left with Alex McDonald’s father’s admonition- I am responsible for shaping my own beliefs. I am glad I had help from folks like Jim Brown and Tim Keller. Very few folks would put both of those individuals together in the same sentence, notwithstanding they both died within a day of each other. However, John Woods Jr, the National Spokesperson for an organization called Braver Angels, an organization that I very much admire, did just that in a recent blog post. I am grateful because these two recently departed are indeed connected as part of the fabric of what is America. As for Father David, I will increasingly take my inspiration and counsel from those younger than I. This too is part of America, and this too is part of the world beyond meeting the world here.

What do you think of Jim Brown and Tim Keller, if not Father David?!

Jake

*You will notice Father David's LinkedIn profile is WAY out of date!!!