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.