Honoring a Legend.

And living by their example.

Today, Dear Loved Ones, I'd like to remember, honor, and imagine what we might learn from the way she lived, while also challenging us to consider what we might consciously carry forward from this person's gracious example.

We call people legends.

When we aren't criticizing them, we celebrate their books, movies, music, achievements, accolades, personalities, quotes, and cultural impact.

I'd like us to take it further by gently challenging each of us to witness if there was something genuinely good in the way someone lived—something compassionate, generous, courageous, dignifying, or loving.

Then I wonder if we, individually and collectively, might ask in tribute:

What did this person show us that we ourselves can actually imitate, practice, implement, or even embody?

I'm not suggesting we make an idol, or a villain, of other human beings, Dear Loved Ones. Nor am I suggesting that every decision she made, or every belief she held, is one we must share.

Perhaps that is part of the point.

We don't have to agree with someone about everything to recognize good fruit when we see it. And whatever side of whatever fence we happen to stand on, I suspect many of us can recognize something deeply inspiring in Dolly Parton's life:

Generosity.
Compassion.
Humor without cruelty.
Advocacy for the vulnerable and less fortunate.
Investment in children.
Loyalty to community.
Using enormous success to create opportunities for others.

From this incomplete list, we see clear evidence of an intentional life—one bearing fruit. It is fruit that ought to look remarkably familiar to those of us who claim to follow Yeshua.

What fruit did her life produce?

Keep in mind as you read, Dear Loved Ones, that while it might feel overwhelmingly about money, it is far more about what Dolly Parton chose to do with what she possessed.

She used what she had—not merely money, but fame, businesses, relationships, influence, and a caring heart—for the benefit of others.

While we listed some generally known, believed, or associated things above, here are a few more specifically recorded—and verifiable—examples of her good works:

The Smoky Mountain 🏔️🌲 Songbird invested in children.
In 1995, she founded Dolly Parton's Imagination Library. Inspired by her father, who was unable to read or write, it grew to become an international program advocating for childhood literacy that has delivered hundreds of millions of books to children from infancy up to age five.

Dolly Parton didn't simply encourage education—she looked for practical ways to remove obstacles. 📚
Her "Buddy Program" incentivized kids to stay in school by asking seventh and eighth graders to pair up. Each buddy promised to encourage the other to stay in school, and both received $500 upon graduation. The foundation reported that the local dropout rate fell from roughly 35% to 6%.

The Queen of 🎶 Country Music 🎶 continued her legacy of education with her Dollywood Foundation.
She expanded her focus by establishing scholarships for graduating high school students in her home community, with the Dolly Parton Scholarship now worth $15,000 for recipients.

🦋 The Iron Butterfly 🦋 responded when her neighbors were hurting.
Within 48 hours of the devastating 2016 Great Smoky Mountains wildfires, The Dollywood Foundation established the My People Fund. They raised over $12 million and distributed it to more than 900 families who lost their primary residence.

And Dolly didn't disappear when the headlines did. ✨
She stayed and supported long-term recovery; personally giving another $200,000 to local volunteer fire departments in 2019.

Miss Backwoods Barbie's definition of "neighbor" 💖 didn't stop at her hometown. 💖
Her philanthropic efforts supported the Nashville/Middle Tennessee flood recovery in 2010, Humphreys County flood victims in 2021, and relief efforts following Hurricane Helene in 2024, where she and her associated organizations collectively committed $2 million.

The Dreamer-In-Chief invested in healing and medical research. ✨
In 2020, she donated to Vanderbilt University Medical Center supporting what could be considered critical early research related to the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine effort. In 2022, she supported Vanderbilt again for pediatric infectious-disease research alongside her support for pediatric cancer programs and other children's-health initiatives there.

This list of her actions tells us a story about how she chose to use what she had been given.

Believe it or not, Dear Loved Ones, this is only a small sampling of what she had done. Works that I believe are commonly known. I imagine so much more of her everyday generosity isn't known publicly.

And while many of us may not have the resources she did, I think Dolly would be one of the first to say that anything you can do to help another person has the power to make a significant difference.

Creating positive ripples that can last long after the initial gift.

Much of Dolly Parton's generosity was deliberately structured so the good could endure. She created institutions rather than limiting herself to individual acts of charity—leaving a legacy of generosity that continues even now that she is gone from us.

Her money helped, certainly, but so did her influence, her businesses, her voice, her creativity, her time, her remembrance of her roots, and most of all, her love.

Intentional actions are something every one of us can imitate.

Like Dolly, we can respond to the suffering of others—sometimes simply by lending an ear, offering a hug, holding open a door, or advocating for and creating an opportunity for change.

We can live generously, with compassion, and stewardship simply by treating one another with respect, dignity, and care. We can start right in our own "backyard"—from the person at the register, to the stranger knocking on our door whose possibly someone just doing their job to feed their family.

We can invest in the growth, well-being, and joy of children, regardless of who they belong to. We can teach them through our example of how we behave toward them, interact with others, and treat the natural world around us.

We can take responsibility for our thoughts and actions, hopefully inspiring others to do the same, and inviting ourselves to become more aware of how we walk through this world in unison as individuals, groups, families, organizations, communities, and as a species [civilization].

I firmly believe we each have something we can offer others:

Time, knowledge, hospitality, friendliness, perhaps a compliment.

A skill, profession, business, garden, or simple thank you.

An opportunity, a platform, money, clothing, food, and other resources.

A willingness to connect, the ability to listen, or simply the compassion to notice someone whom everyone else has overlooked

And always... love.

How do we use our gifts in ways that resemble what Yeshua taught His followers?

How are we loving our neighbor or caring for the vulnerable, Dear Loved Ones?

Turning back to Dolly as our example, her core message echoes the words of Mother Teresa: love people, and do not appoint yourself as their judge.

While speaking out about love, faith, and justice, Dolly remained humble to her core. So much so that in 2023 she told Drew Barrymore:

“I’m not a good enough person or a good enough Christian to judge and criticize other people.”

She explained that because she wanted love and acceptance herself, the least she could do was try to extend those same things to others.

While I believe this, have said something similar, and try my best to live this way, I fail. I fail because I am human and fallible. That doesn't stop me though, because I believe there is beauty in the effort, Dear Loved Ones; that each choice matters, and with continued practice and Adonai as my center, "all things are possible".

I'm sure Dolly was no exception to blind spots, bad days, mistakes, or simple human ignorance. She was human too, after all.

Perhaps more telling than what Dolly said, however, is what others experienced in her presence:

• Jane Fonda, when asked what Dolly meant to her, put it simply and beautifully: “She meant love.”
• Mike D of the Beastie Boys recalled being touched when she personally thanked every guest for coming to an event, describing her as deeply gracious and “very classy.”
• Eminem shared a letter Dolly sent after his Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction, in which she admitted she didn't know much about rap, yet congratulated him, recognized his excellence, and encouraged him.

She was humble and kind. Her example teaches us that we don't have to understand someone's world completely to recognize what is worthy within them.

There is—yet again—an overabundance of evidence that she genuinely tried to live what she preached. Even in the small things.

Her generosity could be measured in millions of dollars—and in moments that cost nothing.

Dolly crossed boundaries.

Genre. Generation. Politics. Religion. Race. Culture. Fame. Age.

She saw no need to treat people poorly simply because they lived or believed differently. Again and again, she chose something different: to treat people with love, dignity, kindness, and respect—doing what she believed God asks of us.

To treat each person we meet with reverence, grace, and love.

In an August 2016 interview with Vanity Fair, when asked about political leaders, she stated she wanted leaders who "can love, respect, and appreciate everyone for who they are."

She firmly and repeatedly stated that judgment belongs to God—not as a cop-out to avoid uncomfortable topics, nor in a "love the sinner, hate the sin" way that often leaves people feeling more judged than loved.

No, Dolly simply recognized another person's dignity and treated them kindly, even when they weren't in the room.

She trusted that God knows every person's heart, mind, and soul. That we all need His grace and mercy. She lived with a conviction that love is our assignment, advocating for love over condemnation whenever possible.

That's not to say we shouldn't have boundaries, Dear Loved Ones, or that loving people means allowing them to be and do horrible things, but that love, when lived, becomes more than something we believe.

Dolly didn't only give.

She didn't only talk about treating people well.

Those values became visible in a workplace bearing her name.

In 1980, the hilarious and iconic satire 9 to 5—starring Dolly Parton, Jane Fonda, and Lily Tomlin—brought attention to workplace problems and imagined employee programs that, in some ways, were remarkably forward-thinking.

Interestingly, some of the principles we have been talking about didn't remain confined to a movie screen.

Much like the more humane workplace imagined in the film, the company bearing Dolly's name would eventually become known for investing in its people.

Today, Dollywood and its parent company offer employees benefits that include:

• Creating a culture and leadership that is patient, kind, humble, respectful, selfless, forgiving, honest and committed
• Employees receiving a free meal every working shift.
• Subsidized childcare costs through participating providers and access to an employee healthcare center
• 100% tuition coverage starting on day one, including required books and supplies for fully funded programs

Now, I want to be careful here.

Dolly Parton did not single-handedly create every one of these programs—Dollywood operates in partnership with Herschend, and many benefits span the broader company.

But that is part of the point: good ideas don't have to belong to one person, nor does love have to remain a sentiment; each can become structure, culture, policy, and daily life.

Imitated. Practiced. Implemented. Embodied.

What if we stopped merely applauding good ideas and started practicing them?

There is a profound difference between admiring an example and following one.

So perhaps the question isn't whether Dolly Parton was a legend. Her history seems quite capable of settling that one without us.

Perhaps the question left for those of us still here is what we do with the example she left behind.

We can admire the fruit.
We can remember the fruit.
We can celebrate the fruit.
Or, Dear Loved Ones,
—we can plant some seeds of our own, and grow some.

After all, Yeshua didn't tell us the world would recognize His followers by how beautifully we spoke about love.

He said:

“By this all will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another.”
—John 13:35 TLV

So perhaps one of the greatest ways we can honor a life that showed us something good isn't simply to say “Wasn't she wonderful?”, but to ask:

“What did she show us—and what are we going to do with it?”

I pray they know us by our love...

Sources & Further Reading

• Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library — The Dollywood Foundation — History of the Dollywood Foundation, the Buddy Program, its reported reduction in local dropout rates, and the beginnings of the Imagination Library.
• Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library — Foundation Fact Sheet — Foundation history, scholarships, the Buddy Program, Imagination Library, and My People Fund.
• Dolly Parton — Philanthropy — Dolly’s disaster-relief work, including Nashville flooding, the 2016 Great Smoky Mountains wildfires, the My People Fund, long-term recovery efforts, and support for volunteer fire departments.
• Vanderbilt University Medical Center — Dolly Parton’s pediatric infectious-disease research gift — Her 2022 $1 million gift for pediatric infectious-disease research and background on her earlier COVID-19 research support.
• Vanderbilt Health — Remembering Dolly Parton and her medical philanthropy — Additional information about her support of pediatric cancer care, children's health, infectious-disease research, and COVID-19 research.
• Vanity Fair — Dolly Parton on love, equality, faith, and respecting others — The 2016 interview in which Dolly discusses Christianity, judgment, equality, and treating people with respect.
• The Drew Barrymore Show — Dolly Parton on loving and accepting other people — Source for Dolly’s statement that she did not consider herself a good enough person or Christian to judge and criticize others.
• Democracy Now! — Jane Fonda remembers Dolly Parton — Jane Fonda’s remembrance of Dolly and her beautifully simple description: “She meant love.”
• CBS News Detroit — Eminem shares Dolly Parton’s letter — The letter Dolly sent Eminem following their 2022 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductions.
• People — Mike D remembers Dolly Parton’s graciousness — Mike D’s recollection of Dolly personally thanking her guests and the impression her graciousness left on him.
• Dollywood — Employee Benefits — Current information about Dollywood employee benefits, including tuition assistance, career development, retirement programs, and other benefits.
• Dollywood — GROW U. Tuition Program — Details about 100% tuition coverage beginning on an employee’s first day, including required books and supplies.
• Dollywood — 2026 Employee Benefits and Workplace Programs — Documentation of free meals during working shifts, childcare assistance, the Dollywood Family Healthcare Center, tuition benefits, and employee-development opportunities.