Before the inauguration, I was very disheartened about the election of Mr. Obama and his administration. I'm still uncomfortable with him as our leader, but I want to show him my respect for giving it a go by running for the office to inspire Americans to be the best we can be at home and in our interaction with our global family. I think he inspires people (not only because of his brilliant gift of rhetoric...to be used for good or ill we shall see...) but because our country is yearning; they really do need the virtue of hope in something, anything. The seeming meaninglessness of 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina broke many of our spirits, and though we have picked ourselves up, it's only been a half-hearted effort. I believe many who support Obama do so because the media has blown his capabilities out of proportion and made him an overnight sensation, but I believe others are just searching for meaning again. St. Thomas Aquinas says we always seek the good, it's just a matter of where we find it and if it's truly fulfilling. It is up to us to remind others that our meaning and our hope lies in something well beyond this immediate world. It is up to us to remind them, as the priest said at Mass today, that "the glory of God is the human most fully alive."
January 20, 2009
A Response to 'A Little Bit of Hope'
Edith, of course you are right about the March coming up. I'm going for a third time, and am looking forward to it (and hopefully snagging a spot behind the Dominicans who sing the Salve (the prayer for the dead) outside of the Supreme Court). I get very uncomfortable when people are yelling and screaming, going around putting pictures of aborted fetuses in the faces of those who are protesting the March. I prefer to walk quietly, hoping and hoping and hoping that the witness of so many people (especially the little ones!) who are dedicated to preserving and protecting life during their own lives, will be inspiring...not only to those in our government, but to other fellow Americans. No matter what our new President and our Congress have before them to vote on, we women really can peacefully demonstrate in our daily choices how to love in very simple ways.
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Thanks, Julian. I know that you are right. I've been trying to get my spirit in the same place. I found this quote from S. Teresa of Avila --
“Christ has no body now on earth but yours, no hands but yours, no feet but yours. Yours are the eyes through which Christ’s compassion is to look out to the earth. Yours are the feet by which He is to go about doing good, and yours are the hands by which He is to bless us now.” I think it's really apt to that last portion of your post.
I've been studying a political philosopher named Eric Voegelin and he wrote in a book called the New Science of Politics that "The spiritual destiny of man in the Christian sense cannot be represented on earth by the power organization of a political society." It just seems like all this hype, emotion, the sobbing you see people doing, the 2 million is so reminiscent of this kind of thinking -- that a political organization can give us spiritual meaning. And I guess as human beings, you cannot really separate our bodies and spirits. And electing the first African-American president in this nation is amazing. Even more amazing -- that people of all races are so brought together by him. But I fear him. I fear the 'changes' he wants to make. His intellectual pedigree, combined with this fervor seems to make his moves almost beyond reprehension.
Even more so, this makes me question my vocation. What is my role in this world of today? How can I promote Christ in a nation that seems to have placed its faith in a politician, in a political savior? I am just hoping that God has plans to surprise me.
PS: I know that comment was little discombobulated, but so are my thoughts right now!!
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