Travel and mobility can be good for the soul as long as we respect other peoples, lands, and traditions. But in this age of speed and of “virtual” community, and in this nation built with the vision of constantly receding horizons, it is also good to be settled and to know one’s place—to be married to the land and to place.

A sense of place demands listening to the heartbeat of God’s creation in a particular place. One can sit in a single place and behold the dynamism of the air, the stars and planets, the flora and the fauna which is ever changing yet completely unique of a certain place. Natural surroundings tell a story with a past, present, and hope-filled future.

“There goes the neighborhood” is a little joke on the gravestone of Rodney Dangerfield. But the attitude that spawned that phrase—the attitude that is closed to any incarnation of “the other,” is no joke, but a tragedy of self-destruction. Our place—our neighborhood—is alive in the fullest sense when we cherish the wisdom of ancestors who walked here before us, and the wisdom of the ancestors of neighbors yet to come who will bless us if we are open to them.