One of the tragedies of our time is the limited number of genuine conversations that we are able to engage in during the course of any given day. Our abilities to communicate seem to have fallen to a new low in recent days with most forms of literature and educational programming adapting to an ever declining number of words and images to “make their claims” and “promote their causes.”

Language has the unique capacity to bridge many divides, whether cultural, social, or ethical as we consider the capacity of our language to communicate meaning and understanding to others. Our problem lies in our growing inability to communicate at all. The nature of our conversations has become an ever smaller number of words, frequently misused or misunderstood in light of unknown meanings. The passage of prose taken from a book fifty years ago may need radical restatement today in order to even have a hope of being understood today by the average reader.

Educators note a “dumbing-down” of the common language we use. Our conversations are less “littered” with description and adjectives that provide meaning and nuances of tone and intention. Our ability to understand is often muddled with such inadequacies of speech. Ideas and beliefs deserve words that speak well and wisely. Movements and causes and principles and calls for response deserve to be undergirded with the insights and comprehension of those who fall into step behind them.
Our time for conversations is being sapped by multi-tasking distraction-laden interruption and the sacred occasion of worship or even a family shared meal is fast becoming a rarity rather than the norm.

To converse is to exchange thoughts and ideas. It is to engage one another in the complementary task of sharing ourselves and in turn better understanding one another.
Ours is a world of narrowing demands and wide intolerance. It is a world of weak diplomacy and outrageous war-mongering. It is a time of loneliness brought about by a failure of a generation to retain the capacity for social communication with family, friends, and neighbors. It is a season of suffering brought about by misunderstanding, poor use of language, and mistaken ideals gleaned from sound bites of interpreters of those who lived and spoke before us.

Words are very much with us in our daily lives, but we have lost the ability to value them for their capacity to enrich our relationships to the persons with whom we share this world. If we are media oriented, visual learners, we must not abandon the vocabulary and the settings that will allow us to become something more than parroters of pre-programmed persuasion. We need the words and the voices of those who will enlarge our understanding rather than diminish it. We need the power and wisdom of those who will engage in the battle for peace through words before bombs and guns become the only sounds heard. We need the minds of those who have great gifts to share to be opened with the capacity of language to embrace new thoughts and dreams and visions for the future. Let us pray for ears that hear, that have heard, and that are still listening.