We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.Government is by the people, of the people, for the people.
We watched the live stream of Bernie Sanders' address in the capital of our State, so sad that we were unable to be there in person and be counted. Who knows what distance he can go as a candidate, but it's been a revelation having someone campaigning who is willing to say out loud these things that I agree with but everyone else has been too fearful to say - that it should be possible to earn a living wage by working 40 hours per week; that wealth is concentrated in the hands of too few, in this wealthiest nation in the history of Earth; that everyone deserves the same access to health care and to education and that we as a people owe it to all to provide it for everyone who needs it. I am exciting to watch this bubble rise for as long as it can before it bursts, and I hope it pulls the national political conversion in this direction. The most exciting thing about the campaign is that it is crowd-sourced, in a way pioneered by President Obama, but now mature enough to work for this unlikely man. Billions of small contributions can now be sourced, efficiently, from the populace at large, giving us a different option from a few billion dollar contributions from a tiny number of donors. Bernie reminds us that we live in a country that has one vote for one person. This is still the rule, as tough as politics has been over the last few years/decades. The government is us. It was set up this way so that we could ask for the leaders who would represent our interests and work to provide us the best and safest lives (see above).
The Supreme Court of the United States ruled that preventing same-sex couples from marrying denied their Constitutional rights, and so ordered that same-sex marriage be made legal, from sea to shining sea, as I saw in an online post from Melissa Etheridge. Only a few days later, at the General Convention of the Episcopal Church in America, the assembly passed a strong vote to allow Episcopal Priests to perform marriage ceremonies for any same-sex couple who wanted one (the vote included the option to opt out, by an individual Priest or by a Bishop for his or her Diocese, in recognition that some folks might still be having a hard time getting their heads around the fact that someone that used to be wrong is now agreed by nearly everyone to be right). I was proud of this decision, but not surprised, because my church is known for being welcoming to everyone. Everyone. Every last one. It doesn't matter what you have done (got divorced, danced, drunk alcohol, committed a crime, fallen in love and built a life with someone of your same sex), and it doesn't matter what you think (my own Priest quoted a line from a prayer that is part of the Eucharist, saying of God, "only you know our faith", and he pointed out that human beings are notoriously unreliable about their own mental states, so it doesn't matter what you think you believe, all are welcome).
The New Yorker's front section editorial in its July 6 issue, an issue featuring on its cover a tribute of the nine people killed in Charleston, South Carolina, is headlined, "The Confederacy's Final Retreat." It says, "The rearguard movement of Republicans in the aftermath of the slaughter in Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church marked the relinquishing of the Confederacy’s best-fortified positions: the cultural ones." And it's true that something seems to have shifted following that tragedy. A lot of the changes and the impact is around a symbol, the Confederate Battle Flag, which is technically just a piece of cloth, and some people are rightly expressing concern that people will feel like the work is done when in fact removing a cloth symbol is just an easy outward symbol of some deeper transformations that still need to happen to eradicate racism and improve lives for African-Americans. But it does seem that there's agreement that although the flag is just a piece of cloth, it hurts people, and so we shouldn't display it, even though we might have a right to. I am in full agreement with this application of principles of Free Speech. Sure, you have the right to say hateful things, but you shouldn't say them, because they hurt people - do actual damage - and you shouldn't do things that hurt others. (A grad school professor of mine used to use this effective and pithy phrase - "Just because you have the right to believe whatever you want doesn't mean that whatever you believe is right.")("Can" and "ought" are two different things.)
So the challenge that I hope to live up to is to treat everyone equally. To welcome everyone. To love everyone, no matter where they are from or what they look like or what they have done or what they think. That's the ideal of the Democracy, in which I live, and that is the ideal of the church in which I am a member, and that's the ideal of the universe in which I hope to live.
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