Re: Maggie Gallagher
[Rod Dreher  03/15 03:02 PM]

Jason, a military man, writes:

I think most on the Crunchy Con blog have overlooked Maggie Gallagher's most important (for me) point: the American tradition defies being rooted to one place. As someone who's been in the military all his adult life, this is truer for me than most. The great (maybe mythical) American tradition says that our ancestors left England (or other parts of Europe) to escape being trapped into the same place, occupation, and social class as their fathers. To be American means that I am judged on what I do, not on what my father did. If there are better opportunities for me in other places, I should go. The military forces this on all its members, for reasons more related to readiness than virtue. However, we learn that the place is not what matters, the family does; and one can find a community worth belonging to in any corner of America, given a willingness to look and meet new people. My wife, three girls, and I have lived in ten different places in my 17 years in the Army. In every one we've found a vibrant United Methodist congregation in the local civilian community, a support group in my unit, and a group of friends, civilian and military, that we enjoy spending time with and that share our values. What holds these groups together is not where we live, but what we believe. Tying that to a geographical area cheapens the ideal of America for me.