Friends,
I have been writing my Saturday Evening Post now for over three years. I remember well how confusing and despairing the early days of Covid were. We simply could not comprehend what a world-wide, death threatening siege we were facing. Although I often wrote from deep discouragements and fear during those days, I was somehow always able to appreciate the daily gifts of kindness and care that wove themselves among all our isolations. I find myself tonight again besieged with the overwhelming sense that I can’t even begin to make sense of this particular stretch of time, and I again feel a need to share those feelings. I have found myself, like I did during Covid, trying to deal honestly with my feelings and fears while also holding on to hope. Please bear with me as I have written in this mode once again. In this strange fall season of such deep uncertainty and change the signs of hope and assurance compete with the world of lies, destructive storms and war. As I scruff along a leaf-strewn trail I am so aware of how life depends on an often disconcerting cycle of death and renewal that fills and stirs my soul yet often also leaves me with longing for a greater ability to take it all in and be even more fully present to the whole magnificent drama of life as the fallen leaves remind me that life is so fleeting. For me, and perhaps others, fall is a poignant season of both leaving and homecoming, a time of memories and introspection, that question, inform and foster a sense of deeper meaning and purpose in our lives. The current profoundly troubling reality in this historic moment is that so much defies the search for meaning that connects us with our most trusted experience and expectations. It has become nearly impossible to fathom the outcome of the upcoming election despite all the incessant efforts of the pundits and polls to do so. It is also nearly impossible to understand why anyone would create lies that endanger flood victims and support decisions that prolong inhumane warfare. By any basic moral measure of decency and compassion I find these actions as incomprehensible as they are reprehensible. So our bodies, souls and minds struggle with the traditional options we face during times of dire threats and an historic crisis point. As much as I want to believe otherwise, I am deeply concerned right now about the immediate and long term future of our country and our personal freedoms and welfare. In these personal and historical crises situations we have the option to fight, flee, or to freeze and wait for the crisis to pass, similar to the options facing people in the path of the Helene and Milton hurricanes. Unfortunately the options to fight or flee don’t apply to the quandary of the political and war torn world we are facing. Yes, I know we can at least wade into the fray with our votes and encourage others to do so, but our influence is so compromised by the complexity of how a final vote is determined that it hardly satisfies our wish for more specific and effective ways to respond. And many of us have been organizing and demonstrating to stop the war, so we are not bereft of options. But understandably most of us are just choosing to freeze and hope for the best we can imagine. But is that enough to calm our fears and anxiety? If not, what are some alternatives? As I note above it will be a temptation to despairingly succumb to the “yo-yo” effect of the various poling reports In the coming month, and these reports are all we have to inform us, so we have little or no recourse to rely on them despite their questionable reliability. We need to resist this temptation. We need to stay alert and involved as best our time and abilities allow. In response to our anxieties and concerns I want to encourage us to try to cope with our anxieties by finding ways huddle with our various communities for positive support as opposed to privately harboring only the worst of our fears. During the last election, for example, Cathy and I invited friends to join us in our home to watch at least the initial hours of voter tabulation. I would be interested in learning about different strategies to maintain a positive attitude and practices of mutual support during this next month and the months to follow. My own personal emotional, philosophical, and spiritual strategy, as I am trying to confront my fears, is roughly three- fold: First, as noted above, there is actually little I can do to effect significant change other than to strongly encourage people to join me in voting for local and national leadership and related ballot issues. It is an amazing grace, really, that a democratic system of governance provides us with the privilege to vote, and we simply must use it. And we need to find ways to channel our anxieties and fears into some form of support and/or protest as many of you are doing. Second, I have a profound and abiding faith that the individual and communal Spirit in us will empower our struggles to take care of one another with compassion and kindness, whether within our families or communities or national government. Together we can and will ultimately make the necessary changes to provide for our safety and welfare. We can and we will overcome the injustices and oppression that may come upon us, and we will use this historical moment to reinforce our pledges to support one another and the common good, whatever level of support or obstacles there are. We can take courage that one of the gifts of historical crisis is to provide the impetus for major, fundamental change, and perhaps that is what may await us.. And, finally, as much as I dread the threat of the terror of war, climate crises, and oppressive, autocratic leadership, especially on the poor and vulnerable - and more especially on mothers and their children - I also have a profound faith I can trust that ultimately the great power love and truth will triumph over all the destruction and hate. I consider my faith in the ultimate power of love to be my ultimate truth as well. Whether these reflections bring anyone else solace and hope, I cannot know. But similar statements of faith and resilience have given rise to assurances over millennia that love and justice do ultimately triumph. Peace, Tom
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