A Call for Repentance and Reconciliation

Now, today, on January 12, 2020, democracy in the United States of America appears to be teetering on the edge of an abyss.  One week ago, the President of the United States incited a riot of supporters who stormed the Capitol, and it appears that only luck and quick thinking by an understaffed police force kept us from seeing the execution of the Vice President, the Speaker of the House and many others on primetime TV.  Democrats understandably want to impeach the President a second time, a justifiable action but one that effectively declares war on his 75 million voters, too many of whom believe, on no evidence, that the election was stolen – their way of expressing outrage about a culture they feel has abandoned them and appears out of control.  We are in the midst of a pandemic, which half the population doesn’t appear to believe in.  It will kill at least half a million people, many of whom will die because we were fighting with one another so much and so hard that we didn’t defend ourselves, our families and our communities from the spread of a preventable disease.

What’s worse, everyone owns a part of where we are now.  Republicans enabled a demagogue so they could make progress on their policy goals or position themselves for higher office.  Democrats and Republicans sucked up to Wall Street and politicalized the legislative progress to advance their careers and their agendas, too often selling out the lives and communities of too many people in the heartland.  No one has really attended to the lives and health of poor and working people and people of color, whose communities have been neglected for decades, if not for hundreds of years.  And no one has confronted the outsized influence of people with money, people with something to sell, on our politics, so that our legislators work for them instead of for the common good.

But leaning over the edge, and looking into the abyss, we just do not have time for “who hit who first,” other than to reflect on the childish nature of our public process over the last fifty years.  

But it’s worse than that.  Our culture is out of control. Cell phones which allow no privacy. Sexting and hook-ups.  Video games that confuse reality with violent sexualized fantasies.  Narcissism. Consumerism. Isolation.  Arrogance. Greed. Fractured families, in which people who should only love one another don’t speak because of politics, because of the division and discord dreamed up by people with something to sell, in the interest of profit which has become the only value of our culture.  We no longer think about the right thing to do.  We are completely focused on the upside, on the business model, how any and every thought and idea can be monetized, on what’s in it for me, not on what is best for one another and for our democracy.

We should all be ashamed, but it is not clear there is even time for shame now.  Hundreds, thousands, or hundreds of thousands of our fellow citizens are armed and are considering an armed rebellion.  There are likely mutinies brewing in the armed forces and among police and National Guard.  In the United States of America.  On our watch.

And yet, scratch us, and we are decent people.  Kind people.  Respectful people.  Caring people.  People who believe deeply in the very democracy that is slipping through our fingers.

What is to be done?

It is time to hit the pause button.  To take a step backward.  To listen instead of speak.  To walk instead of run.  To think about repentance for what we’ve thought and done as each of us, trying to find the best path, have missed the mark.  To make space for other people, with other ideas.  To seek reconciliation before it is too late.

Some of us want to focus on Donald J. Trump, the President.  Others want to focus on Joe Biden, the President-elect.  We think it is time to remember Dr. Martin Luther King Jr and a host of other brave men and women of all colors and kinds, from all traditions, who said and say the same thing, over and over again. Feed the hungry.  Clothe the naked.  House the homeless.  Let justice well up as the waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream.   Dr. King himself said the “a riot is the language of the unheard,” that “injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere,” and that “we must learn to live together as brothers and sisters or perish together as fools.”  We would do well to listen close and listen now.

Dr. King’s birthday is Friday January 15.  We are putting out a call.  Let’s honor his memory and use his day to heal this nation.  Let’s fast and fall silent, listening for the still small voice of that which remains great within us.  Let’s gather and walk, in every city and town, silently. Let’s reflect on our own transgressions before our passions push this nation, and our democracy, over the edge.

We’ll be fasting and walking on January 15.  Please join us.

Michael Fine

Marcus Mitchell