Notes from my Knapsack 6-25-2026

Notes from my Knapsack 6-25-2026
Jeff Gill

Two centuries and a half this June, in Philadelphia
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Before the Declaration of Independence could be written and amended and approved, there had to be a motion.

Richard Henry Lee of Virginia would make it, friend of Patrick Henry and Sam Adams, on June 7, 1776. Before the Continental Congress he moved "that these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States, that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved.”

Yes, this man’s cousin “Light-horse Harry” Lee would be the father of Robert E. Lee. Irony is a primary element in our history; get used to it.

On June 11, the Continental Congress appointed a "Committee of Five"  consisting of John Adams, Roger Sherman, Benjamin Franklin, Robert Livingston, and Thomas Jefferson, neatly balanced between north and south with Virginia the pivot point in between. Technically, these five men drafted the Declaration of Independence, but as we know Jefferson drafted it, while Adams and Franklin made some changes to it. Our nascent Congress did not reconvene until July 1, 1776.

They approved Lee’s resolution as presented on July 2 (12 votes aye, New York abstaining, long story), which is the source of John Adams’s famous letter of that date to Abigail, his wife, saying “I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated, by succeeding Generations, as the great anniversary Festival. It ought to be commemorated, as the Day of Deliverance by solemn Acts of Devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with Pomp and Parade, with Shews, Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires and Illuminations from one End of this Continent to the other from this Time forward forever more.”

Yet Congress, as is their wont, fiddled and diddled and modified odd phrases and moved around punctuation for three days. It was not until the Fourth of July that they officially adopted the Declaration of Independence we know now, and sent it to the printer’s office. The National Archives tell us the final form was “engrossed on parchment” only on July 19, 1776, and signed actually in the first days of August. Ask Nicolas Cage when the map was drawn on the back in lemon juice…

The true point, the serious observation, is this: they spent weeks getting it right. It was not one man, flawed or inspired as you might hope or believe; this was not a quick impulse out of mass emotion at work quickly rushed into print. Years of struggle were distilled into weeks of deliberation and crafting, in words and phrases with centuries of precedent behind them, in part going back to the Magna Carta itself in 1215. References to nature, and nature’s god, to a creator, and to how rights are self-evident, all had the weight of history behind them. It was not just the eruption of passions, but the end result of well-developed considerations, that ended up on that page now enshrined at the National Archives.

We, the people, had representation and deliberation working on our behalf in Philadelphia that long ago summer. We may still be thinking about how those ideas actually work in practice, but what we celebrate this year is the enduring legacy of the intention and action behind those words in 1776, continuing today “with liberty and justice for all.”


Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he’s moved by what they did at Independence Hall in Philadelphia, in 1776 and in 1787. Tell him your America 250 thought at knapsack77@gmail.com or follow @Knapsack on X.

Notes from my Knapsack 6-11-2026

Notes from my Knapsack 6-11-2026
Jeff Gill

America Goes Outdoors
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As part of our ongoing programming around America 250-Ohio, and for Granville in particular, I’m going to be greeting people on Wednesday and Saturday, June 17 & 20, at 9:00 am in Opera House Park.

The theme for the month of June all over the state is “America Goes Outdoors,” and I will talk briefly about our local history around parks and outdoor recreation, then lead an expedition to climb to the summit of Sugar Loaf just to our west.

A park in Granville since 1896, with a monument part of the village centennial celebrations in 1905 on the very top, Sugar Loaf is part of a movement to parks and open space preservation which rippled across Ohio  after 1891, and the state’s purchase of Fort Ancient near Lebanon.

Before that we had village commons, meant as much for sheep and geese as for picnics or relaxation, and the rural cemetery movement was a move to having open areas for strolling and reflection on the edge of industrial cities, starting in New England before the Civil War, coming to Granville & Newark shortly afterwards with Maple Grove & Cedar Hill respectively. But a park as a “park” was a new idea in the 1890s. The whole concept of “national parks” didn’t get a structure to it until 1916; in that same year Indiana launched a state park system, which Ohio didn’t do until 1949.

In fact, on August 20th at 7:00 pm I will be offering a talk about the “preservation history” of the Newark Earthworks at the Octagon’s visitor center off 33rd St. in Newark, where I’ll share a bit more about how we in Licking County, and in part Granville, has been ahead of the curve on parks and outdoor recreation. But that night won’t include climbing a hill…

If you want to just come for the brief program at 9:00 am on June 17 & 20 to Opera House Park, you are more than welcome to do only that. I do hope we have a goodly crew to ascend to the summit of Sugar Loaf, though, and offer three cheers to parks and preservation and the out-of-doors, as local residents have enjoyed for many years. Before the 1890s, outdoors was where you went to work, to chop wood, hunt for game, even to make your way to an outhouse.

Since the 1890s, with electricity and automobiles and, yes, flush toilets, our relationship with being outside has changed. Outdoor recreation is a huge part of our state economy, and an aspect of our lives we know we need more of. Exercise, fresh air, and contact with nature isn’t something we get while pumping water at the well or from churning butter in the farmyard: we have to do so intentionally.

But we all need a little more time outdoors; I think we all acknowledge that. This June for America 250-Ohio we’re making a small down-payment on what we owe ourselves, as well as paying a debt of gratitude to our ancestors to saw fit to set aside some places like Sugar Loaf for later generations to enjoy.


Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he’s hiked the Sangre de Cristos in New Mexico and across the canyons of Zion in Utah, but Sugar Loaf is special. Tell him where you like to hike at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on X.

Faith Works 6-5-2026
Jeff Gill

Artificial humanity in actual life and everyday faith
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Pope Leo XIV issued the first encyclical letter of his papacy, entitled “Magnifica Humanitas.” It’s easy to find online; the text is some 40,000 words, and in 12 point type at double space about 150 pages. You could call it a short book, but one with some heavy thinking from the first line:

“Humanity, created by God in all its grandeur, is today facing a pivotal choice: either to construct a new Tower of Babel or to build the city in which God and humanity dwell together.”

If you’re wondering what an encyclical letter is and how it fits into the teaching role of the Catholic Church, the pope covers that ground for you, too. He’s talking about the social doctrine of the faith as he is interpreting it for our present age, and within that condition you see something of what an encyclical is. Such a document is not meant to express enduring truth as much as to apply what the church teaches to the times we find ourselves in.

Right now, that’s AI, artificial intelligence. Computer driven intelligence of a sort which can perform administrative tasks and do analysis in a flash, which threatens to collapse and consolidate entry level work of all sorts, especially in the knowledge space. Pope Leo reminds his readers that esteemed predecessors, like another Leo his choice of papal name was clearly meant to evoke, wrote entire encyclicals about social issues, like “Rerum Novarum” in 1891.

In a sense, “Magnifica Humanitas” is a series of footnotes to “Rerum Novarum,” which is itself the basis for most Catholic social teaching to the present day. Pope Leo XIII in the Nineteenth Century wanted to address the relationship of labor and capital investment, and the duties and responsibilities between governments and their people.

That previous Leo took no little criticism from secular leaders asking who the pope thought he was to comment and command in the world of business and employment, and the current Leo has had much the same response. But this non-Catholic thinks both of them are just doing their job, whether elected officials or the chief executive officers of the world agree or no.

It is interesting: if the Archbishop of Canterbury, or the Ecumenical Patriarch of Orthodoxy, or any other Christian communion’s leader were to issue an authoritative teaching document on matters of technology and justice, I doubt it would roil the waters much. The Bishop of Rome, as the Vicar of Christ, still has enough weight in the wider world to make crowned heads and Resolute desks uneasy, and I think that’s a good thing.

Pope Leo XIV is asking not just his adherents, but people of faith and those of good will in general, to think about how our use of technology influences how we see other human individuals in all their humanity, a quality we share together, which we do not with chatbots or online assistants. Could our patterns of interaction with AI tools start to erode our sense of humanity when dealing with people?

His focus on the core aspects of humanity is appealing to me, no less than when he pushes my nerd button by quoting towards the end, about responsibility on our part, from J.R.R. Tolkien. It’s a passage where Gandalf is speaking about the hopes of humanity in a time of doubt and great challenge:

“It is not our part to master all the tides of the world, but to do what is in us for the succour of those years wherein we are set, uprooting the evil in the fields that we know, so that those who live after may have clean earth to till.”

I might wish the pope had added just one more line to that quote, which went on: “What weather they shall have is not ours to rule.”

Pope Leo is asking us at least to think about the weather forecast before we make too many plans. I have a few more thoughts about this encyclical before I’m ready to move on with July’s celebrations.



Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and preacher in central Ohio; he’s happy to read an encyclical from time to time. Tell him how you feel about AI at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on X.