October 12, 2007 - IF YOU BUILD IT, THEY WILL COME - (30th of Tishrei, 5768 )

I was on my treadmill on Monday morning, looking for something to distract me while I worked out, when I turned to the movie channel and recognized what was playing. There was Kevin Costner, again, on his Iowan farm with his wife and young daughter, receiving cryptic messages that were urging him to turn his corn field into a baseball diamond.

I watched for awhile…probably because the Rockies were soon going to be playing for the National League pennant and because baseball had recaptured my attention since about July of this summer. My love for the game had long been dormant…pretty much so way back to the 1975 Cincinnati Red’s World Series victory over Boston.

Then it hit me that title, *Field of Dreams,* was a perfect entrée to our Torah portion, Lech L’cha, this year. You and I can’t know if Abram heard the same urgent voice living as he was, a seventy five year old man in Haran. But it would have been no less bizarre for him and Sarai, having heard God’s call: “Lech L’cha, me’artzicha u’mimoladtcha” (Go forth from your native land, etc.,) to have picked up, left home and scurried down to Canaan than it would have been for Ray Kinsella to have perceived the notion that “if you build it, they will come,” and to have run out and built a ball field from a corn field. In a very real and too similar way, both men were both responding to a call to involve themselves and their families in a ‘field of dreams.’ And I think that I, being on my treadmill on Monday morning at that very hour, was serendipitous in more than slightly mystical ways.

After my treadmill walk, I kept thinking about the comparison of Abram, Ray Kinsella, and the Colorado Rockies The three were driven by something external to “go the distance”…that is, to be and do more than what any normal human being or team of human beings might. They all took up the challenge to move beyond their collective circumstances, to defy the rational, to shut out voices or thoughts of despair, defeat and difficulty. And while adding the Rockies to this mix may be a stretch for some of you, if you compare their achievements to the pages of stats that are stacked against them, you realize what a feat this young ball club has achieved and may yet accomplish.

Indeed, each of our protagonists has involved him or themselves in a true field of dreams. For Abram, God paints a picture. The Eternal encourages the world changing monotheist with these promises: “Go the distance”…that is, “Go forth from your native land and from your father’s house to the land that I will show you.” “If you build it, they will come.” “I will make of you a great nation / I will bless you;/I will make your name great,/ and you shall be a blessing./ I will bless those who bless you/ and curse him that curses you. And all the families of the earth shall bless themselves by you.”

True it is that what I am drawing out here isn’t a perfect analogy. What Abram and Sarai accomplish truly impacts and changes the world. Theirs is the foundational piece for the three Abrahamic religions. In contrast, *Field of Dreams* is but a movie, and its hero, Ray Kinsella, is a farmer whose guilt ridden conscience and need for reconciliation and redemption lead him into a mystical endeavor. Albeit, the story has touched millions who have seen the film and have been touched by its messages and yearnings. No American son who ever had a catch with his dad can get through the movie’s last scene without tears in his eyes. There is that much nostalgic truth contained in that beautifully written script.

And as for the Rockies, who knows what voices they have been hearing or what messages they have been reading on their scoreboard? But the fact is that as James Earl Jones says in the character of the fictitious author, Terrence Mann, Ray’s field will bring people who, like ourselves, are reminded by these Rockies…these young fellows who have been so sensational because they have been such a cohesive and selfless team…athletic heroes who have given back to this community with and through their idealistic characters…that baseball had always represented something decent in America, something unchanged, something pure and innocent that had withstood all the upheavals in our history, all the vast economic and industrial changes this country has undergone. Throughout the wars and the depressions, throughout the protests and scandals, in spite of terrorism and torpor, baseball has been there as a beckon of hope…of what Johnny-hustle could bring home even when the chips were down and there were two out in the ninth. Parenthetically, for those of us who have been watching, the Rockies have done their most damage to other teams when they have been batting with two outs! This never-quit, never-give-up, never say “die” team reflects the characters of /Avraham-avenu/, the seventy-five year old who must have appeared as a foolhardy vagabond to his neighbors, and Ray Kinsella who appeared quite mad to his brother-in-law and to those who hadn’t heard the messages and shared his dream.

Each of us may go through our lives without ever hearing urgent voices, getting score board messages and enigmatic clues as to what to do with our lives. There will always be those of us who perceive life changing messages in everyday phenomena. But the keys to these perceptions---whether to Avram, or Ray or to the Rockies--- are always faith and hope. It always depends on an attitude that each of us has some distinctive purpose to fulfill. Each of our lives has some unique theme to which we must be open if we are to answer to destiny’s call. This may be in helping others. It may be in raising up fine children who will make their own pathways to purposefulness. It may be establish a legacy of decency and honor in the ways we live that inspire others to emulate our examples.

Regardless, we each have been, are or can be witnesses to our own fields-of-dreams throughout our lives. We have thrilled to read about, hear stories of and see others who have lived out their given challenges and their successes. May it be that we might be so fortunate as to perceive our own roads to our destinies and to be able cultivate them and bring them to fruition in our lifetimes.