Can We Still Be Friends?

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The day after the election, my church (Catholic, in South Texas where we are predominantly Hispanic) sent out a Facebook notice to schedule the following: 

a time for conversation and strategies for respectful conversations in difficult and stressful times - to provide a safe space to explore attitudes and strategies that might be helpful in maintaining relationships with people we love, with our friends, family and community. 

In another Facebook post, an article was linked in which the young author, a recent Boston College graduate and O'Hare Fellow at America (a provider of editorial content "for thinking Catholics and those who want to know what Catholics are thinking"), despaired of his inability to talk to his parents about the election.   

Now, to my knowledge, my church has never held such an event. It holds Bible studies, rosary making meetings, prayer meetings, and hosts numerous community volunteer projects. But a strategy meeting to explore ways to maintain relationships after a national election? It feels unprecedented. 

A comment in response to the Genovese article jumped out at me and might explain some things:

Elections are not usually this contentious. There is usually a sense that no matter who wins, the country will basically be okay. The sense that all will be okay is missing because of the incredibly low standards of civility set by the president-elect during the campaign, his utter lack of experience, and his history of corruption. That his campaign was characterized by a complete disregard for facts is also not reassuring. I have seen quite a few elections now and this is the first one that has left me afraid for this country. This election is not typical. If it's the first one you have voted in, rest assured that the outcome does not usually leave people feeling so outraged and in despair. - L Weber

The meeting is Monday at 7:00 p.m. and I'm going. 

I'm going because, like L Weber and Nick Genovese, I'm outraged and confused and sad and I have so many questions. The main reason I'm going, though, is to witness. To witness what and how people of faith discuss the world we now live in post-election. 

I mean, really. It's not like people haven't voted before and had elections come out in ways they weren't happy about. The church never felt moved to host such a meeting before, though. Why is it doing so now? 

Sure, there've been loads of viewpoints passed on via social media. Heck, even beloved Spurs Coach Pop had something to say about it. But, no one in San Antonio is rioting. So...what makes this moment in time so different? Why is there a need to host a "safe space" to talk about things since Tuesday?

I think a big reason is that people are genuinely confused about how a man like the donald could have been elected Commander in Chief of the United States of America. 

Over and above that, though, I think people are genuinely confused as to how people of faith could have been the ones that pushed a man like the donald - a man who absolutely doesn't know the difference between 2nd Corinthians and "Two Corinthians" and who publicly asserted he was pro-choice and then changed his stance and who admits to assaulting women - over the top and into the highest office in the land. 

Because that's what happened. Indeed, White evangelicals, Catholics, and Mormons carried Trump into the White House. They overlooked all he said and did and said, yes, but....

After learning this, I asked in all sincerity, if the donald is the answer for believers,* what is the message sent to non-believers about what it means to follow Christ? 

My confusion clearly echoed Pop's. After Tuesday, he questioned:

We live in a country that ignored all of those values that we would hold our kids accountable for. They'd be grounded for years if they acted and said the things that have been said in that campaign by Donald Trump. I look at the Evangelicals and I wonder, those values don't mean anything to them?

Since Tuesday, that's all I've been wondering. Look around you. Since Tuesday it's clear, Pop and I** are not the only ones wondering. 

Faith, like politics, is personal. I know I don't have the answers, because my personal faith and my personal politics are having a hard time reconciling this turn of events in our country. 

But these are questions that have to be answered. By people of faith. By religious institutions. If the saying is true - they will know you are Christians by your love, by your love - people right now are really wondering - where is the love? 

* Which I know begs another question: just how bad were the other candidates that the donald was the best worst choice? Clearly, it means Hillary is satan. /s Maybe that's a post for another day but don't hold your breath.

** In my fantasy, Pop and I are bffs. Don't judge me, it's my fantasy.

The American Dream

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What is it today?

In case you’ve been hiding under a rock, the US is smack dab in the middle of election drama. After November 6, maybe we’ll get a reprieve from the misery our media seems to delight in slinging at us from every possible angle. But, I doubt it.

We also just marked the passing of an 11 year milestone of the tragedy most Americans identify as “9-11” or, simply, “September 11 – Never Forget”.

Last year at this time, I was consumed with my memories of 9/11. I sought out words and pictures and documentaries about the day, and I stayed up late into the night on many consecutive nights watching people on my screen share their stories about their own personal experiences surviving the event.

This year, I gave my attention to two pieces on the subject (here (@_otis_) and here (@grange95)), and no more.

My thinking this year on the tragedy is, again, great sadness. The destruction of the towers, the injury to the Pentagon, the plane-turned-bomb failing in its original mission and crash landing in a field in Pennsylvania, the loss of lives. These are things that those of us who lived through it will never forget and those who come after will never fully understand. And what was destroyed physically pales in comparison to what was done that day to America’s mentality.

Our media, particularly during this election season, illustrates each day how America’s mentality was injured, possibly irreparably, that day. What was not destroyed by outsiders eleven years ago, now seems to be hanging by a thread.

We have become a nation of division, hell bent on achieving specific, individual, interests, rather than seeking shared and united goals or dreams. And there is no unifying leader or inspiring call that Americans can look to and rally around as one. For if you like Obama, you are an anti-life socialist. If you like Romney, you are a capitalist religious extremist pig. And where is the middle ground in those choices?

In 1931, James Truslow Adams wrote a book called The Epic of America, in which he defined the American Dream as “that dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement….It is not a dream of motor cars and high wages merely, but a dream of social order in which each man and woman shall be able to attain to the fullest stature of which they are innately capable, and be recognized by others for what they are, regardless of the fortuitous circumstances of birth or position.”

Inherent in this definition is the notion that the innate capabilities of each man and woman are different. Not everyone will attain the same “stature”. What is “success” to one will be less than success to another. But, the dream is the opportunity to achieve “the fullest stature of which [one is] innately capable.”

To me, this idea is merely a truth. We are all created equal under the law, in that we each have the right to work as hard as we wish to work and achieve as much as we wish to achieve; however, we are not all born with the same smarts, the same strengths, to parents who push and guide (or hurt and harm), or into impoverished families or those with money, land, power, or privilege. This is simply a truth.

There once was a time when what you were born into mattered less than what you personally did with what you were born into.

There once was a time when striving to be a millionaire was something to aspire to rather than a pejorative used in political ad campaigns.

There once was a time when we were inspired by a candidate asking us not what our country could do for us but what we could do for our country.

Was I living in a fog before 9-11 and just not fully able to see the inequities all around me? It’s possible.

Today we seem as ants scurrying around and in and out of a bed destroyed by a torrential downpour, our colony fusion off-track and our queen, Lady Liberty, long drowned.

I wish I could express myself better, but it’s the best my innate capabilities will allow….For me, 9-11 destroyed more than buildings and landmarks and the lives of nearly 3000 innocents and their families. That day marked the breaking of America’s heart and psyche and blinded our eyes to a common dream that once stood as a beacon of hope to the world.

If we, as Americans, can’t see it (or don’t believe in it) any more, how can anyone else?