It’s Election Day and man, are these wild days, or what? Seems like the Crazies are out to get us all!
Polarized politics from the head shed to the local leaders
Scary Nationalists and just as scary Democratic Socialists
AI shocking the bejeebers out of most folks
Widening gaps between social classes
…and don’t me started on gas prices, shrinkflation, taxes…
It’s easy to lean into the voices that cry out, “America’s best days are behind us!”
With our local paper, like many around the country, fading, my information comes largely online or via local news outlets. I often have to remind myself that each one carries a bias with the intent to herd me in a particular direction. Some are obvious, like the hard right Fox News or the just as hard left MSNow, but many just lean to influence in one direction or another. It’s a tough lift to know what is the truth, or at least enough of it to really understand a problem.
Part of my daily news diet is an email from a commentator I like, Michael Smerconish. He is a Philly lawyer who has a radio show I often catch in the car. Squarely in the middle, his mission tries to bridge gaps and show how most of us aren’t on the fringes populated by right or left nut-jobs, screaming for attention.
Here is a recent slice of Smerconish.
The Hill’s headline from a new Quinnipiac poll: “22 percent do not consider themselves proud Americans.” I read the same poll and saw something different. How about this headline instead - over three-quarters of Americans consider themselves proud Americans. Same data. Opposite takeaway.
And it gets more interesting when you put three questions side by side. Sixty-one percent say America isn’t living up to the Declaration’s promise of equality and liberty. Fair enough—that’s a tough verdict as we approach the 250th anniversary of its signing. But then ask those same Americans if the best days are ahead—and fifty percent say yes. And ask if they’re proud Americans - and 78 percent raise their hand.
That’s not a contradiction. That’s the American DNA. We’ve always been a country that measured itself against an ideal it hadn’t yet reached. The Declaration itself was aspirational—written by men who didn’t fully live up to it. The gap between promise and performance isn’t a source of shame. It’s the source of the argument—the constant, generational push to close the distance.
Taken together, it says to me that we collectively realize we are in the midst of a difficult period but that people are nevertheless proud to be American, believe we’re going to get through it, and half think the nation’s best days are in the future, not the past. Glass half empty? I’ll take three-quarters full.
Neither this guy nor I are ignoring the issues clouding our way forward, as a nation and in most any town. But what gets missed is that while the crazies are getting the bulk of the attention, they only span from the goal line to about the ten yard line on either end with the vast majority of us spread across the rest of the field. Left or right leaning moderates.
I can live with that because that’s the way a pluralistic society works. Room for all.
Living well with folks of different opinions is as old as time. It’s just now, we have one-click access to white-hot opinion shapers who make it so easy to get fired up over what is right and wrong in matters that, in the long run, may not matter all that much. We make life a series of zero-sum games and we go all out for the win. But life as a Christ follower is to be more inclusive than that.
Paul, in Romans 12, first talks about re-orientating one’s thinking more in line with Jesus, then he displays the variety of ways faith looks for the church to function well, and he finishes up with a flurry of challenges, almost commands, if we are to live out our faith. Read verses 9-21 again. These are note-worthy on your bathroom mirror so as to ponder your daily choices against that yardstick.
And vv.14-18 can be highlighted for this discussion.
Bless those who persecute you. Don’t curse them; pray that God will bless them. Be happy with those who are happy, and weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with each other. Don’t be too proud to enjoy the company of ordinary people. And don’t think you know it all!
Never pay back evil with more evil. Do things in such a way that everyone can see you are honorable. Do all that you can to live in peace with everyone.
That last line trips me up. There are some folks I just don’t want to be at peace with. I’d rather curse them and pray that God would smack their melon and pay them back with just as much as they dished out. Uhh…wait, dang, verses 14 and following say to do just the opposite. BUT. I. Don’t. Want. To.
And there’s the rub. This isn’t calling you to have no passionate opinions, but if you and I intend to live out a Jesus-life in Jesus-like ways, this passage calls us to bless, pray for, live in harmony, not think I have a corner on the truth (even in my mind), and resist paybacks toward those who see life differently.
This is where faith life gets taken out and driven through town and walks down dark alleys and looks for ways to live a distinct life. Our choice everyday is living just like our ever-coarsening culture, or striking out in ways you already really know is right.
Deepak Chopra, an author who can sometimes be pretty far out there, has a good line to quote.
Every time you are temped to react in the same old way, ask if you want to be a prisoner of the past or a pioneer of the future.
The Crazies, politically and religiously and socially, do everything but put yard signs up trying to convince us that their brand is the only true option. Deviate and the Crazies will demonize, brand folks heretics, and employ cancel tactics. Zero-sum now is the norm in every arena and even trying to have a discussion will likely bring a charge of gaslighting, thus shutting down any dialogue, let alone a healthy argument.
Here is Richard Rohr on our times.
Whereas Descartes said, “I think, therefore, I am,” the American mind now says, “I win, therefore, I am.” That is not an exaggeration. “I win, therefore, I am” is at work in our economics, politics, global policy, social media, religion, and even our personal relationships!
Yet, this passage calls us to know what we believe, stand firm while working to live in peace with everyone.
Now, that’s a good encouragement for this Election Day Tuesday, really any day. Let’s work for ways to put into practice what Romans 12:14-18 teaches believers. It will call you to shut your mouth when you want to retaliate to the Crazies, to not rise to the click-bait scattered on your path, and work to find a way to be at peace with everyone.
And post-election days will be a fine time to put this into practice. Let’s give it a try. Today.
Music? Sure…
2wo bad jokes for the day…
The other day one of the neighborhood kids bet me his dog could jump higher than my house.
I said, "You're on!"
I lost the bet, of course, because my house can't jump at all.
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One day the first grade teacher was reading the story of Chicken Little to her class.
She came to the part of the story where Chicken Little tried to warn the farmer. She read, "...and so Chicken Little went up to the farmer and said, 'The sky is falling, the sky is falling!'"
The teacher paused then asked the class, "And what do you think that farmer said?"
One little girl raised her hand and said, "I think he said, 'Holy cow! A talking chicken!'"