The other day I heard the phrase "earth is our common home." I've been mulling over the idea of home for some time. What is the meaning of home? What does the word mean today?
People move around so much. Some buy houses - or until recently they bought houses - not to create a home but to buy a temporary house, always planning to move to a bigger, better house. I grew up in a town that was bulldozed from the wilderness. An instant town. Most everyone in my high school's graduating class knew from kindergarten through senior year that our stay in this new town was temporary.
When I was young and read stories about people and places where houses belonged to generation after generation of the same family - it was a foreign concept to me.
At the beginning of Western Literature Homer tells us of Odysseus, yearning for home. But just yesterday on the radio I heard the phrase "earth is our common home." What does the very word mean? Why is home important? Why do people yearn to leave home and go back home?
