Americana High Holy Day

Friends,

It’s Super Bowl eve as I write (or morning when you will read this.) Millions of Americans are flush with excitement as we prepare for what can be considered America's national "high holy day" to recognize and join in celebrating some of the most popular icons of contemporary Americana: professional football, consumerism and advertising, over indulgence of snacks and caloric food, and pulsating musical and dance extravaganzas of strobe-lighted, hyper-energetic dancers in sync with a current cultural god* or goddess. With all the nationally concerted attention during the three or four hours on Super Bowl Sunday Americans will probably be as close as possible to becoming the United States of America - short of a national calamity. (The icons of nationalism and militarism will have been covered at the Super Bowl opening ceremony). Not all of us are equally enthralled by all the hoopla, of course, but it is a powerful cultural force, and, like it or not, it is impossible not to be caught up in the vortex of its seductive draw.

The Super Bowl, like professional football in general, represents for me an awkward combination of fascination for the competitiveness and violence of the game’s cultural importance, and an equal amount of reticence and remorse for enjoying what otherwise violates my basic values of nonviolence and moderation. It captures my visceral attention and excitement even as I am inclined to feel guilty for doing so. So why do I still watch it? (And, yes, I will be there in spite of myself, with bowls of snacks and a (non) alcoholic beverage in hand like many of you.) The simple answer is that we all just apparently need some vice in our lives. So my thoughts tonight are both in anticipation of it all and as a confession of my moral laxity.

I watch football, and now the Super Bowl, because it is truly high powered entertainment: the ads, the game tension, the half time ritual are a great show. They rouse me from the safer but often boring sense of equanimity that I would like to believe defines my common sense and morality. In other words I am hypocritical when I am so vocal in my self righteous criticism while also enjoying being part of the happening itself. I just want to feel part of the grand extravaganza. And I further justify and rationalize my Super Bowl observance because football has long been part of my family’s weekly entertainment since childhood. And this year holds a special tension: my son and sister are devoted Patriot fans, and I will be rooting for the opposing Seahawks. (Do the Patriots really need another Super trophy, I ask?)

So my remarks this evening are part confessional and part an opportunity for me to acknowledge the tension between my aspiring morality and my tensions with the real world. As a conscientious person I am challenged by daily decisions of accommodation and compromise between my scruples and how I actually live: what I eat, how I travel, how much violence in the media I can tolerate, how can I resist injustice and oppression assertively and yet nonviolently. I often wish I lived in an ideal, cooperative, and conscientious community that would better hedge me off from me with alternatives to the temptations of comfort and convenience behind most of my moral lapses. I am grateful my Quaker community and its historical culture have established the testimonies of peace, simplicity, integrity, community, equality and stewardship in our daily and communal lives. These are righteous and moral examples for me to follow, and in general I am very aware of them in my daily life as they represent a truly responsible and righteous path we must all learn to honor if we are to live on a sustainable planet. But they are still best practiced as loving admonitions.

I also acknowledge I say better than I do, and I think that is true of most of us. If we truly love the natural world, love each other, love ourselves and walk humbly before all of God’s gift of life, we can and will live with respect for our integrity and the behaviors that will guide us away from our fears and temptations into a fullness of life we all seek. But, yes, we will also occasionally enjoy the excitement to step outside (temporarily!) from our best intentions.

Peace, Tom

*In what some consider a breach of respect for the "true America," this year’s idol, Bad Bunny, will represent an alternative world to white America with his Puerto Rican music in Spanish. I love the way surprise and grace touch our worlds. I welcome the inclusion of our Spanish speaking neighbors and friends into positions of leadership and honor.

And, O yes, “Go Hawks!