Cross-Generational Community
Shifting Winds, Growth, and Summer Fun
Chautauqua is a social and educational movement that began in the United States in the late 19th century and expanded across the country until the 1920s. Its mission was to enrich life through the practice of four pillars – art, education, recreation, and religion. Founded when there was little cultural enrichment in rural America, its goal was to provide these places with offerings aimed at intellectual and moral self-improvement and civic involvement.
Chautauqua communities brought in educational speakers, musicians, and preachers. Over the years, well-known speakers at Chautauqua included Ralph Waldo Emerson, Ulysses S. Grant, Susan B. Anthony, Theodore and Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Jane Addams, and Amelia Earhart. Performers included Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald, and Lucille Ball.
While the Chautauqua communities’ growth declined over the past century, some remain vibrant today, and their educational summer programs are popular. The one in upstate New York, where the movement started, is probably the one that is best known. This summer’s programs revolve around themes such as the state of believing; the global south; freedom of expression, resilience, and democracy. Religious services and spiritual practices include Quaker, Christian Science, Episcopal, Unitarian, Catholic, Torah study, and meditation. Musical performers include Bonnie Raitt, Natalie Merchant, Cècile McLorin Salvant, and Trombone Shorty with Mavis Staples. A comprehensive list of offerings is too extensive to list.
I first heard about the Chautauqua movement earlier this year when John Mann, the Director of Education and Lifelong Learning at Lakeside Chautauqua, reached out to ask if I was available to present for a summer weeklong lecture series entitled “Culture of Belonging.” Celebrating its 150th anniversary this year, Lakeside Chautauqua, in Ohio’s Marblehead Peninsula, sits on the shore of Lake Eerie. Families from around the country gather for recreation while enjoying programs for personal enrichment.
During a brief two-night stay at the Historic Lakeside Inn, I walked the grounds and asked people about their history with Lakeside. Two things stood out for me about this vibrant community. First, the abundance of programming for adults and children of all ages is impressive. What struck me the most, though, was people’s deep connection to this place, even as their relationships to the community’s mission, the four pillars, varied from person to person.
People shared their childhood memories that then continued into adult experiences. Lakesiders returned summer after summer to create new memories with their children and grandchildren. A few people live there year-round, most moving there after living elsewhere. More people I spoke to were not permanent residents; they had second homes or rented places each year. I met people from all over the country – Pennsylvania, Vermont, California, to name just a few states – who returned to Chautauqua because of their happy childhood memories and because they could continue to create new memories with their growing families.
A few people spoke to me about the challenges facing the community, mirroring the same issues that so many communities across the country today encounter. For example, how do faith offerings change as more community members move away from organized religion while other members want to keep traditional practices? Another challenge is keeping the summer program affordable to all. The cost of homes in the one square mile of this community has risen dramatically, as have the fees required to participate in the summer programs. Some people inherited homes from parents or grandparents, and paying for the usage costs of the summer programs is more prohibitive for some than others.
Before and after my talks, people spoke to me about the difficult conversations the community needs to have around differences of beliefs, especially spiritual ones. While I don't know this to be true, I imagine most people who attended my talk were self-selected for more progressive spiritual values. During a question-and-answer period, one man, sitting off to himself in the back of the room, asked me to talk about the pain experienced within our communities. He gave the example of his pain when his church closed because of dropping membership numbers. This question was important because for our communities to grow and remain healthy, there is often loss, and we must process grief. One person’s growth is another person’s loss, and at different times we will both welcome change and experience it as loss.
The venue and time restraints made it impossible to explore the circumstances of this man’s loss. I thanked him for making this critical point and acknowledged his pain. Then I offered the possibility that we can use our pain around loss to bridge our differences, because the experience of suffering from loss, or the feeling of rejection, is something we have all experienced. I gave the example of the long history of faith communities rejecting people because they loved differently or had identities that didn’t fit into neat categories.
Personal experiences of loss and pain can open our hearts if we let them. By igniting our compassion for ourselves and others, we can better work toward reconciling the tragic inconsistencies within our faith traditions. By opening to the loss that comes from change in our communities, and letting it make us more compassionate, we can better realize the potential of vibrant community, which is appreciating our differences and our shared humanity and loving more deeply.