Hope is lived

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“Hope is living the reality and yet investing in a different one.”

          Mitri Raheb

 

I’m tired

Madeline Kahn

“I'm tired, Tired of playing the game

Ain't it a crying shame, I'm so tired, God dammit I'm exhausted!” tired.

 

Tired of waking up every morning, wondering what a narcissistic President has done this time to draw attention to himself or deflect attention away from his sins and his failures.

 

I am tired of hate

Tired of lies

Tired of greed

Tired of racism

Tired of corruption

Tired of ICE abusing people

Tired of regulations being ended, ensuring the end of the planet

 

I am tired of Trump, Hegseth, Rubio, and Huckabee

Tired of Netanyahu

And genocide (because that is what it is)

 

I am tired of people saying Trump has done more good than bad

Really?

By what standards!?

 

Ah, there we have it.

 

I have been wondering lately what the problem is.

Why do the GOP faithful just keep plodding along, supporting

Trump, Tuberville, in Oregon, Drazan and Bentz

Abbot and Paxton

 

And what I now believe is that the reason is this.

The starting point

 

What is the starting point for the policies and behaviors

Of MAGA GOP?  The President, the Congress, the SCOTUS (that right-wing majority is bought and sold), the supermajorities in Red States

 

What is it that shapes their thinking and drives their behaviors?

 

Their starting point is money and power

Everything is about money and power.

Will it make us money? Will it help us make more money

Will it help us keep our money? Will it make it so we don’t have to share our wealth?

(After all, we earned it!  Or daddy or granddaddy did)

 

Will it give us power, the ability to shape the world the way we want it?

Will it give us the ability to make America White?

Will it give us the power to get retribution on those we don’t like?

Or the power to imprison them in concentration camps, or expel them?

Or kill them?

 

Will it give us the power to make all the rules?

To impose our will on a diverse world, on diverse and unique people?

 

The starting point should be

Love and service

 

How do we love all the people

How do we serve people

How do we make sure everyone has enough to eat

A roof over their head?

Healthcare.

Water

Safety

 

How do we find ways to welcome people into our country

Who are coming from danger and terrible, deadly poverty?

How do we welcome them?

 

It is not that the Democrats are stellar

They too have a relationship with money and power that taints

 

But they also have a clue about love and service.

And of the two parties, they are more likely to actually design and enact policies.

That help the people, not just the GDP

 

You start in the wrong place.

You have the wrong goals.

You have the wrong goals

You have the wrong strategies

You have the wrong strategies, and you have the power to implement them

 

And people, real people

Old people,  young people

People who have physical health issues

People whose bodies and minds don’t work quite right

People who are strangers

People who are poor

People whose skin is not white

 

Get abandoned.  Ignored.  Left behind

Worse, they get demonized

Minimized

Marginalized

 

You have the wrong goals, and you think ICE is a good idea

You cheer when mining companies tear apart what used to be a national monument

You turn a blind eye to the needs of real people

You rejoice in domination, and control, and YES

Cruelty

 

Jesus could have started from the wrong place

The tempter certainly wanted him to.

But he rejected the starting point of power and wealth

And embraced the starting point of love and servanthood

 

That is what drove his ministry.

And if we want to be followers,

We too must embrace the way of love and servanthood

 

The Jesus path is not easy.

But we see, with people like Putin, Kim, Netanyahu, and Trump

What it looks like when we choose the way of power and wealth

 

It is not great

Not even close

 

So think about what your starting point is

Why do you support whom you support

Why do you admire whom you admire

Why do you vote for whom you vote?

 

In my book, right now, if we want to be faithful to the Gospel

The people like Trump, Drazan, Bentz, and all the rest

Abbott and Paxton

Are not viable options

 

But that is just me

With my understanding of the starting place

That God would have us choose.

The Big Story

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Richard Rohr talks about the Cosmic Egg, four domes of being.

It is kind of an ethical and spiritual matryoshka doll

With smaller, more limited layers of meaning nested within

Larger, more profound layers

 

The smallest “dome” is “My Story”

Each of us has our own story

This is me

 

Me, as differentiated from all other beings

And their story

 

Not all cultures allow people to have

“My story” the way we have

This story in America (and the West in general)

 

This is the individual and individualism

It can morph into

“It is all about me”

 

A place where “My Story” is all that counts

Choices about right and wrong

Good and evil are based on one primary criterion,

How does it affect me?

 

I want lower gas prices!

Therefore, I will support a person who promises those lower prices

Even if they are a person who lies, is corrupt, greedy, predatory, and cruel

If I don’t think that person’s negative qualities will impact me, personally,

All is good!

 

Our story is the layer at which we say,

“This is us”

USA, USA, USA

 

This is groupthink

This is group loyalty, group identity

My country right or wrong

My version of Christianity versus yours

My race, my ideology, against yours

 

There is nothing wrong with either

Of these layers of meaning

It is good to have a sense of self

And a love of country

 

IF

Those layers of meaning are connected to something

Greater

Something, or someone infinite

 

Because there are “Other Stories” out there

Other people who also have a story

That is precious

 

And other groups that have

Faith systems, countries, ideologies

Different from ours

 

If we cannot accept that there are other stories

And insist that only our story is the “right” story or the “good” story

If we see others as inferior, wrong, threatening

 

We end up with ICE

And Pete Hegseth, and Donald Trump

 

What could be good about us as individuals,

And as a culture

Becomes twisted and tainted

And no longer healthy

 

What we need to realize is that we

As individuals

We as a collection of individuals

We as a gathering of different “tribes”

All participate in

 

THE STORY

The story (according to Rohr)

Consists of “the patterns that are always true” (p. 21, Things Hidden)

 

Forgiveness heals

Hate destroys

God loves all

Those who have are called to take care of those who have not

(Welcome the stranger, feed the hungry)

 

Spiritually, we must take all four “domes” seriously

We need a sense of self

We need community

We need an awareness of and respect for others

And we need to understand how we participate in the holy

 

MAGA’s big error is that it doesn’t move beyond “our story”

 

Many religions try to move to “The Story”

But neglect the importance of the individual

And the power of culture

 

And toxic individualism creates

So many ills

 

I think Jesus was on to something when he said

Love God (the story)

Love your Neighbor (our story and other stories)

And love yourself (My story)

 

We are part of the big story

Living in a diverse world with a plethora

Of beautiful stories

Joined together in community

And aware

That we, as individuals

Matter

 

It doesn’t get better than that

 

 

Others don't have to lose for us to win

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Someone else’s belonging does not require my exile.

Scot Loyd

What is the opposite of abundance? It's not scarcity. It's greed. Greed is the belief that there is not enough for everyone, so you'd better grab yours now. What is the opposite of love? It's not hate. It's fear. Fear is the belief that someone or something can hurt you.

Robert G. Allen

________________________________________________

Most politicians make promises.

In 1920, Warren G. Harding promised a “Return to Normalcy”

In 1928, Herbert Hoover promised “A Chicken in Every Pot and a Car in Every Garage”

In 1956, Dwight Eisenhower offered “Peace and Prosperity”

In 1988, George Bush offered a “Kinder, Gentler Nation” 

Barack Obama offered “Hope,” and Trump said he would “Make America Great Again”

Promises, promises

And now we have a President promising that if we let him stay in power

He will give every American adult $5000

The check is in the mail!

If you think about it, what most politicians do is appeal to our sense of scarcity.

They promise us what we think we don’t have

Wealth.  Power.  Safety. Hope.

A chicken in the pot.

To put it another way, they often appeal to fear (or create it)

Trump spoke to those people spooked by the emergence of a “new America” that had dared to elect a black person to the Presidency.  To a nation of people suddenly realizing that white, Christian, heterosexual, and culturally conservative was not the definitive identity of the “true American.”

Trump promised to take us “back”

Make us “backward” is more like it

He has succeeded in some horrible ways

We are such malleable people.

So easily influenced, swayed, so easily controlled.

We are afraid of “not enough”

Not enough money, food, water, housing

Not enough health care

And every leader ever (with a notable exception)

Preys on that mentality

And promises to give us what we are afraid of losing, or what we think we don’t have.

Obama promised more equality and equity to a nation controlled by white conservatives for years.

Trump promised white evangelical Christians that they would regain control of American culture.

Biden promised less Trump.

Trump promised cheaper gas and more affordable groceries (and underneath it all, white supremacy)

We truly believe, I think, that if others gain, we will lose

We have been taught that there is not enough to go around

This, by the 10% who have (and are hoarding), who control 68% of America’s wealth

By the 1% who control more than 30% of America’s resources

Someone once said (often attributed to Mahatma Gandhi), "The [Earth/world] provides enough to satisfy every man's needs, but not every man's greed." 

What do we do with the fact that our fear, our sense of scarcity,

gives people like Donald Trump so much power?

Maybe we listen to the one guy who didn’t buy into the scarcity model

And who defined an abundant life in a far different way

Blessed are the poor

Blessed are those who mourn

The first shall be last and the last first

Sell all you have and give to the poor (are you listening, Elon?)

Jesus did not sell wealth.

Jesus sold abundance

He promised that if we could learn to trust in God

(remember the lilies of the field)

We would be set free from the scarcity mindset

And we would be able to be

Welcoming

Accepting

Generous

Forgiving

And we would be satisfied.

Remember Isaiah?

Why do you spend your money for that which is not bread and your earnings for that which does not satisfy? Listen carefully to me, and eat what is good, and delight yourselves in rich food. (55:2)

Why do we keep listening to Donald Trump

And not to Jesus?

Seems like a valid question

And I believe Walter Brueggemann was right.

The power of the future lies not in the hands of those who believe in scarcity but of those who trust God's abundance.

Lord, help us trust