Wendell Berry is well-known American farmer, environmentalist, author and poet. Some of his writings about environmental degradation, corporate greed and government corruption can be quite strident. But when he writes about nature, family and community his words can be tender and appreciating. These are the things that he holds on to in a crazy world. For Wendell Berry it is those things that reflect most clearly the love of God for us humans.

One of his poems is about the love that continues through the family. I do know that this is not a universal experience, with broken links in most families. Despite our faults and brokenness however, in most families there is love and care enough to raise the next generation, to pass on something of value.

Across the distance he saw
his granddaughter arriving
at a meeting he was leaving.

They called to each other
in greeting and farewell.
“I love you, Granddaddy.”

“I love you too, honey,”
he called back, and it was
his father’s voice he heard

uttered as his own, as from
the distance behind him.
And so he remembered

again the ancient lineage
of his love, given to him
and again given, living

backward, time beyond
time, to the Love that called
to itself the heaven and the earth.