I tried to write a reflection on the life of Joe Paterno yesterday. After spending a good bit of time on it, I gave up. There is so much that I admire about the man, and yet it all seems eclipsed by what happened at the end. Still, it seems unfair not to acknowledge all the good that came before the end. How do you put all of that into something that makes sense?
Thank you, Barnabas Piper, for putting into words the feelings that so many of us are having about JoPa’s legacy: “Conflicted. Complex. Complicated.” Piper writes:
There is no single side to the memory of Joe Paterno any more than there is to any other person. He was good and he was bad. He did great and wonderful things for hundreds and thousands of people, and he failed miserably in a moment of great need. But beyond this is the reality of eternity. Defining the reality of Joe Paterno cannot be limited to the space between birth and death but must be recognized as eternal.
Read the rest here.
