HOMEPAGE MY PROFILE ESSAY ARCHIVE MESSAGE BOARDS CALENDAR On Climbing Mountains at Age 81 For the past twelve years, my wife Christine and I have vacationed in the mountains of Western North Carolina, an area that once was a vital part of my childhood. We rent a house for a week, sometimes two, in the community around the High Hampton Inn and Golf Club. Neither of us plays golf so the primary activity of our time there is hiking. We climb a mountain almost every day. Within a very short distance, there are mountain trails to such peaks as Rock Mountain, Chimney Top, Whiteside Mountain (on which is located a large rock outcrop known as the Devil’s Courthouse) and Yellow Mountain. Rock Mountain and Chimney Top are our favorites. They rise to heights near 4600 feet. Rock Mountain can be approached from two sides. One is a gradual, but longer ascent to reach the spectacular views it offers at the top. The other side is a more vigorous climb across rock outcroppings where climbers are aided in four places by wire ropes that assist the navigation upward or downward, depending on which way one is going. Chimney Top is the more vigorous climb and there is only one way to reach the top with the last hundred yards being the scaling of a solid rock surface. We have climbed these mountains two or three times on each visit to this lovely place in the past and we wonder each year whether we are physically capable of making it to the top one more time. We passed the test last year when I was only 80. This year we hoped to pass the test at 81! The first day, we decided on a practice run. We would go up Rock Mountain from its base on the gradual incline side and return the same way. This would begin to get our mountain legs into readiness for the harder climbs to come. So armed with water, boots, hiking sticks and compact disc players on which we were both listening to (if you can believe it) the biography of Karl Rove entitled, Courage and Consequence: My Life as a Conservative in the Fight, we set out to make our first journey to the top of Rock Mountain. An hour and a half later, we sat on the crest at the top and surveyed the beauty of this area for miles in each direction. We met other hikers at the top, as we usually do, and exchanged pleasantries while enjoying our accomplishment for only about fifteen minutes. Then we gathered ourselves together and made the descent the same way we had come without any incidents. We had accomplished the first step. Pleased with ourselves, we planned to extend our hike on the next day. On our second day we walked from the High Hampton Inn to the foot of Rock Mountain, a trek that added about twenty minutes to our hiking time before we actually reached the mountain itself. We then began our ascent from the same gradually rising side. On this day, however, our plan was to return to the Inn by descending the much steeper, if slightly shorter, side. This obviously meant a more strenuous hike, but it was the next step in our projected climbing program. The trip up was beautiful and the ascent was smooth. We made it easily and within two hours. Again at the top we met other hikers, especially an attractive young couple and their three boys from Southwest Florida, near Clearwater. Catching Christine’s English accent the wife noted that her grandmother had come from England and, as it turned out, from a place near Christine’s childhood home, so they shared English stories. The family left and we watched admiringly as their youth allowed them to move at a much faster pace than we could safely manage. The first part of the descent was fairly easy until we approached the first of the four rock areas where those wire ropes were installed to help climbers navigate the rock slabs. When we were about five minutes from this initial testing area the sky turned quickly and ominously dark and out of that sky lightning flashed, thunder roared and a veritable deluge of water began to fall. This pelting rain made the rocks slippery and turned our climbing paths into veritable rivulets of water. We navigated carefully the first two difficult sloping rock areas; sometimes using our seats for locomotion as the wet surfaces were dangerously slick, all the while being practically drowned with heavy, heavy rain. During all this, the voice of Karl Rove kept extolling the virtues of the Bush Administration and Rove’s role in making sure that no mistakes were ever made during the eight years of the Bush presidency! The descent became increasingly difficult and dangerous. When we reached the third and most difficult challenge we were about to decide that it would be best just to sit in the woods, absorb the rain and wait for it to cease before going on. We would have had to wait a long time because this particular storm was destined to rage for almost two hours. To our surprise we then spotted another couple making their way up the mountain and we prepared to stand aside to let them pass, even as we wondered at their sanity in going to the top in this storm. The couple turned out to be the one we had met earlier at the top of Rock Mountain. They were coming back, not to make a second ascent, but because they thought we might need some help. We did. There was no let-up in the torrential rain and I had to remove my glasses because the rain had made seeing through them impossible. The Karl Rove disc I was reading had come to an end and I did not replace it. My concentration had to be on navigating the path down. At this third rock formation, where one of the wire ropes was installed, we discovered that the wire was broken. Aided by our angels of mercy and with the help of our walking sticks, trees to whose branches we could cling and roots on which to plant our feet we slid down these rocks as if we were on a sliding board. Three down, we then moved on to conquer the fourth obstacle. We made it, while the relentless rain continued. When we finally got to the “T” in the trail where one path goes up Rock Mountain and the other goes up to Chimney Top, we bade our rescuers farewell, confidant that we could negotiate the remaining hour or so back to the Inn. This homeward path has hills and valleys, but no treacherous steep rock formations to master. We were now only walking in ankle deep water that was rushing down from the mountains with a relentless fury. On this part of the journey, we once again met other hikers going up, but this time equipped with appropriate yellow slickers. It was so unusual in this weather that we enquired of them as to their purpose or even whether they had lost their minds! They turned out to be workers from the local emergency rescue squad responding to a report that a man at the crest of Chimney Top had suffered a heart attack. Helicopters could not come to his rescue in this rain so these emergency workers were going up by foot, leaving their ambulance and most of their equipment at the foot of the mountain. I had to admire their commitment to the rescue process even though I could not imagine a worse place or a worse climate in which to suffer a heart attack. We continued our walk, looking like two drowned rats until finally we were back at the Inn. We then walked to our car, which we now discovered was parked in water half-way up the side of the tires. It nonetheless worked and soon we were back at our cottage. Neither of us could remember ever having been so thoroughly drenched. We literally peeled our wet clothes off, toweled ourselves dry, redressed in fresh clothing , put on new shoes and drove back to the Inn for lunch, which fortunately for us they served until 2:30 p.m., and where we saw our “angels of mercy” again. Now we discovered their names, Ann and Clark Lea, and met other members of their large family gathering. We also discovered they were part of our “tribe,” that is, they were Episcopalians! It is a small world. We were then greeted with the startling and sad news that the man with the heart attack had died. Even more surprising and disturbing we discovered that he was only 35 years old and with no previous health concerns. He was on vacation with his wife and two young children. His wife had spent that morning in the spa and his children had been in the children’s program having a wonderful time. Life is strange and uneven. We had made it safely home because of a younger couple who came back up the mountain to assist us. The heart attack victim had not survived even though the rescue squad had braved the elements to climb Chimney Top in an heroic effort to save him. Both of these actions were random acts of kindness performed by people who had been complete strangers up until that very moment. Each of them made us aware of just how deeply interdependent all human life really is. It was a new context in which to hear the biblical question that the book of Genesis suggests that Cain framed when God asked him about the whereabouts of his brother Abel: “Am I my brother’s keeper?” Christine and I both realized anew that the essence of humanity is that we are responsible to and for one another. Our experience in that storm on Rock Mountain had made this lesson indelible. Perhaps it was the reading of Karl Rove’s book that made me begin to yearn for a less selfish, more compassionate approach to this nation’s common problems on the part of the Congress of the United States. We are one people, one nation and in that one nation we will rise or fall together. We are the keepers of the dream that makes brothers and sisters of us all. The next day, our boots being too wet to put on again, we climbed Whiteside Mountain instead of those a little closer. It is an easier path and sneakers were sufficient for the purpose. Chimney Top remained for the end of the week. What a way to live at age 81! (Please note that Christine is only 73). ~John Shelby Spong P.S. Chimney Top was conquered two days later and a photograph of us at the top as proof of this accomplishment will adorn our 2012 Christmas card! Read the essay online here. Question & Answer Dr. Gabriel Andrade of the University del Zulia in Venezuela writes: Question: Can you tell me the precise moment when, according to you, the Church began to twist the original message and interpreted literally the tales of miracles, resurrections, etc? Answer: Dear Dr. Andrade, No, and neither can anyone else! We see the changes beginning in the New Testament. There is a vast difference between Paul and the gospels; a vast difference between the first gospel, Mark, and the last gospel, John. I‘m not sure Paul would have been able to say the Nicene Creed with integrity. Christianity did not separate itself from Judaism until between 50-60 years after the crucifixion. Miracles do not attach themselves to Jesus until the 8th decade. Paul knew of no miracles. The miraculous birth of Jesus did not enter the tradition until the 9th decade. The story of the ascension of Jesus was a 10th decade addition to the story. It would take hours and even books to put your question into a context where we could begin to address it competently. I hope we might have the opportunity to meet and discuss this more thoroughly at some point. Thank you for writing. ~John Shelby Spong Announcements Any questions or concerns, please contact us at support@johnshelbyspong.com or 503-236-3545. 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