In the dim recesses of memory, I recall hearing an anecdote in which it was asserted that William Ellery Channing, the apostle of Unitarianism in New England, declined to announce the topics of his sermons in advance owing to a chance encounter with one of his parishioners. It seems that the two men met along one of the streets of Boston where they engaged in a pleasant conversation, and upon parting, Channing expressed his hope to see the man at church on Sunday. Oh, no, came the reply. The congregant had no interest in the topic Channing planned to address that Sunday, so he would be absent from church. From then on, it’s said that Channing kept his sermon topics to himself until he stood in the pulpit on the day they were delivered.
I’m not quite as resistant to announcing my sermon topics as Channing was, but I resonate with his resistance, though my reason is different. I don’t care if you decide to pass on one of my sermons because the topic doesn’t really speak to you, even though I might be arrogant enough to think that it would have been good for you. But I do care about the ability to be timely and nimble – that is, relevant to the day at hand – and in our current media environment where information spreads at the speed of light, rather than the speed of print, it is difficult to respond to momentous events when we plan Sunday services weeks, if not months, in advance. Since I am neither a prophet nor a soothsayer, I cannot predict a month or two in advance what will be relevant on the day I will deliver a sermon, even when there are broad hints. It’s guesswork.
This morning, I wish I had gone with my initial instinct to speak on the democratic ideal, instead of seeking to conform to the monthly theme of “intentional rest,” as important as that theme is for everyone’s spiritual health and emotional wellbeing – perhaps especially now. But I have no intention of inviting you to rest today. During my 24 years with the Unitarian Universalist Association, I was often in the pulpit of American congregations on the Sundays before and after election days. On those occasions, even as a foreigner, I always addressed the elephant in the room (no pun intended) from a spiritual and ethical perspective, while taking care to not jeopardize a congregation’s charitable status. As I looked ahead to today, it occurred to me that you might not care to hear my pontifications on U.S. politics, especially if the election went well from the perspective of liberals, so I deferred to our covenant groups’ monthly theme. “Intentional rest” it would be. I regret my calculation, especially since I should have known some reflections on public life south of the border would have been good for you, whether you liked it or not.
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| Photo - Yamu Jayanath / Pixabay |
It almost goes without saying that most of us hoped for a different outcome when our American neighbors cast their ballots to elect a new president last Tuesday. I know that many were anxious about the outcome, given how close pollsters expected the race to be, but the momentum seemed to be with Kamala Harris and most people (including most commentators in the mainstream media) expected a Harris victory, questioning only whether it would be a decisive outcome or a squeaker. I was more optimistic, so Wednesday was not a very good day. I don’t think anyone imagined that the so-called “blue wall states” would all tip in favor of the former president. While it looks like the national popular vote will prove to have been within a couple of percentage points, with millions of people staying at home, the results in the Electoral College were decisive as state after state fell to the Republican candidate by narrow margins. The Senate flipped to Republican control and the composition of the House of Representatives has yet to be determined, with 19 seats still to be settled and the Republicans only four seats away from a majority in that house, too.
Once again, those of us hoping to see the United States elect its first woman president have seen our hopes dashed, and it is impossible to escape the conclusion that racism and misogyny were factors in the outcome. I might feel differently if her opponent had been a person of relatively unblemished character, a calm disposition, and a track record of genuine success, but that clearly wasn’t the case. There is no justifiable comparison between these two individuals. One was clearly an individual who was intellectually and morally superior. Our neighbors have once again elected the most bombastic demagogue, the most corrupt grifter, and most vulgar misogynist ever to occupy the White House. It was easier to dismiss the 2016 election as an accident of history, where people could proclaim “this is not who we are,” but this year’s repeat, when everyone knew what the stakes were, reveals that this is exactly what America has become. In an election that was fundamentally about the preservation of democratic institutions, including the rule of law, the restoration of character in high office, a return to civility in public discourse, and a way forward in uniting people across the divisions that separate them, voters once again entered the polling booth as though they were choosing a villain in all-star wrestling or voting on contestants in a reality TV show.
Last Tuesday was arguably the worst day for democracy in our lifetimes – at least those of us under 80 – and the implications of the result extend far beyond the United States. Eight decades ago, the economist Friedrich von Hayek wrote, “if I had to live under a Fascist system, I have no doubt that I would rather live under one run by Englishmen or Americans than under one run by anyone else.” Such hubris! Such cultural chauvinism! I’m afraid that the world is about to find out, but like so much of the nonsense that Hayek wrote during his career, I’m confident that he was profoundly mistaken.
I worry about the people of Ukraine and the Middle East, and now I worry, too, about those in Taiwan and the Philippines, in Poland and the Baltic countries. I worry about women across America, as well as persons of color, the LGBTQ+ community, and even white men who, whether they realize it or not, are in danger of losing their souls, even if every other privilege they imagine they are entitled to is restored to them. And I worry about the chumps who thought they were going to be better off, but who have been swindled once again. The price of eggs isn’t going down.
The commentariat has already rushed in to explain the results, having failed to predict them, scurrying to square what they said ahead of the election with the reality after the fact. Having lived through a campaign of misinformation, disinformation, and media abdication of responsibility, the pundits are seeking to secure their sinecures. Rebecca Solnit has called out those who claim that Donald Trump spoke to voters about their economic insecurities, reminding us that “he was talking to them primarily about himself in his bizarre monologues” which strayed into all manner of fictions while demonizing immigrants, refugees, and trans persons, and completely disregarding the wellbeing of women, in order to generate fear and hatred. People want to believe the election result was about the economy, but it was mostly about common greed, linked hatreds, uncontrolled anger, and unreflective foolishness. The pundits can save their breath.
For everyone else who cares about the triumph of democratic norms and institutions, the work has just begun. Tuesday was not an end, it was a beginning. But perhaps, to get back to the theme that had been announced for this morning, we do need to take a break, a rest, and restore ourselves for the challenges ahead – because we are going to need every ounce of energy we can muster to be allies to our American neighbors who still cling to the ideals of democratic life. “Each person deserves a day away in which no problems are confronted, no solutions searched for,” wrote Maya Angelou. “Each of us needs to withdraw from the cares which will not withdraw from us.” But then we need to get to work. The world is a more dangerous place today than it was when we gathered last Sunday.
In his opening monologue on CNN yesterday morning, Ari Velshi reminded viewers that we do not know how things will turn out in the end while we are still in the middle of them. Well, we’re stuck in the middle together. During the course of the morning, Velshi and his guests made the case for why we need to view last Tuesday as a beginning, not the end.
“There’s never been a once upon a time in American history, and there’s never going to be a happily ever after,” said presidential historian Jon Meecham, while legal scholar Laurence Tribe asserted that the U.S. Constitution has created an architecture through which “power has been systematically dispersed throughout society.” So, instead of assuming that the guardrails are off, it’s better to imagine that the guardrails have yet to be activated. The resistance to the authoritarian instincts of the president-elect and his enablers will include governors and mayors who exercise the independent authority of their own offices; the judges who still interpret and enforce the law without fear or favor; the legislators who say no to laws that would seek to undermine or curtail constitutional protections; the business leaders who, not beholden to government contracts, continue to insist upon honesty and decency in their own enterprises; the union leaders and their members who continue to organize in defiance of institutions demanding their acquiescence; and individual citizens who defy unjust fiats coming from a morally bankrupt administration.
“Even in the darkest of times we have the right to expect some illumination,” observed Hannah Arendt, “and that such illumination may well come less from theories and concepts than from the uncertain, flickering, and often weak light that some men and women, in their lives and their works, will kindle under almost all circumstances and shed over the time span that was given them on earth.” When we return from whatever rest we need, this is the work before us.
In July 1944, Anne Frank wrote in her diary: “It’s difficult in times like these: ideals, dreams and cherished hopes rise within us, only to be crushed by grim reality. It's a wonder I haven't abandoned all my ideals, they seem so absurd and impractical. Yet I cling to them because I still believe, in spite of everything, that people are truly good at heart. It’s utterly impossible for me to build my life on a foundation of chaos, suffering and death. I see the world being slowly transformed into a wilderness, I hear the approaching thunder that, one day, will destroy us too, I feel the suffering of millions. And yet, when I look up at the sky, I somehow feel that everything will change for the better, that this cruelty too shall end, that peace and tranquility will return once more. In the meantime, I must hold on to my ideals. Perhaps the day will come when I'll be able to realize them!” Sadly, we know today that this was never meant to be, but she held fast to these ideals throughout her short life.
Just six weeks earlier, she had confided, “I have often been downcast, but never in despair …” When I read her words, I realized that, as a grandparent, I cannot afford the price of despair. I cannot retire from the cares of the world, even if I would. I cannot rest upon what has been accomplished, and built, and saved. I am called to a new effort to resist and restore, to do whatever I can to heal a fragmented society and a broken world, whatever the perils may be.
If Anne Frank could rise above despair in circumstances that were far more bleak than ours, then surely we are capable of arising to face this latest challenge to democratic life and a world order based, however imperfectly, on international law and cooperation, freedom and justice.
One the eve of the Second World War, Frederick May Eliot, then president of the American Unitarian Association, wrote: “The democratic ideal, even in its present inadequate and half-developed form, has behind it the matchless energy of the divine will. It may indeed suffer reverses, it may find itself betrayed by the half-hearted allegiance of timid souls, it may face the most serious difficulties in adjusting its program to new and unforeseen situations, it may have to fight for its very life against powers and principalities, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places; but it cannot be overthrown or destroyed, so long as faith in [our] own highest ideals remains in the soul … To doubt that is to doubt the very foundations of all civilized religious faith, to surrender one’s birthright, and sink below … into the dark and noisome pit from whence, through thousands of years of infinite and painful endeavor, [hu]mankind has slowly climbed.”
We will not surrender this birthright.
A sermon delivered at the First Unitarian Universalist Church of Winnipeg in the aftermath of the 2024 U.S. Presidential Election.
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