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| Sognefjord. |
You know what I'm talking about. It's the contagious power of hope ... The chance to vanquish the demons of fear, division, and hate that have consumed us....
Michelle Obama. Screenshot from source. America, hope is making a comeback.
—Michelle Obama at the Democratic National Convention, August 20, 2024.
During the U.S. presidential election campaign of four years ago, I wrote a blog post, "The mere sound of his name will signal hope." The real audience for that blog post was me. I was trying to convince myself that, whatever the outcome of that race (Biden vs Trump), hope had to be anchored in something deeper than election outcomes.
Maybe you remember those days. As I wrote then, "This uncertainty is incredibly stressful. I know people who are asking whether now is the time to begin planning emigration to some country that is on a less self-destructive path. Maybe I'm somewhere beyond naïve, but even as I work to keep us away from the edge, I also know I will keep hoping whatever the outcome."
In the event, Biden received 51.3% of the popular vote, compared to Trump's 46.85%. and prevailed in the Electoral College by a count of 306 to 232. Of course, election day itself was not the end of the stress; the vote totals weren't available until the fourth day after the election, and Trump wouldn't acknowledge the results for yet another eight days after that. Even then, he refused to concede, asserting that "the Election was Rigged" and went on to wage a campaign of election sabotage through January 6, 2021, and beyond.
It might seem that, at the time, hope was vindicated by the results of the 2020 U.S. election, but the COVID 19 crisis, its human costs and economic consequences, were still with us. Ahead were the debacle in Afghanistan, the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the Israeli tragedies and the ruthless responses in Gaza and the West Bank. Our human capacity for chaos and cruelty still require worthy advocates of hope to remain very sober.
Here's one question about today's U.S. politics that also keeps me very sober: how can it be that the 2024 presidential election predictions still seem so close, when one of the two principal candidates continues to operate by standards so obviously unworthy of any serious contender for the nation's most responsible job: boast and blame and belittle.
At a press conference last week, Trump revealed the true cynicism of his approach: "All we have to do is define our opponent as being a communist, or a socialist or somebody that’s going to destroy our country." Not that he limits himself to these charges; ugly comments on race, appearance, and intelligence are routine, and who can forget his obsessions with nicknames and crowd sizes? He is apparently confident that the right combination of lies and slurs will give him a winning hand, while we just wonder just how tens of millions of our fellow citizens could possibly agree, to the point that the results of polls still show a close contest!
(Do any of the core supporters of this man ever ask themselves, "What about his doomsday predictions last time, concerning the dangers of a Biden victory? Did any of those warnings actually come true?")
When I stop to ask myself where my own hope comes from, I have a superficial answer and a deeper one:
First of all, right now, after four days of a happy (if endlessly repetitive and carefully filtered) Democratic National Convention, I have grounds for hope that our 2024 elections will select the sole presidential candidate who actually appears competent to serve as the head of our country's executive branch.
However, I remember Len Vander Zee's quotation from J.R.R. Tolkien: "I am a Christian….so I do not expect history to be anything but a long defeat, though it contains…… some glimpse of final victory." (Context in this post.) As hard as we work for a specific outcome in any situation, nothing is guaranteed. Ultimately my hope rests in that promise of final victory.
To tell the truth, my hope doesn't depend on defining that victory with certainty. My best glimpses are in the Bible, but my understanding is rooted in trust, not in intellectual precision. I believe that, at the end, you and I will experience God's hospitality according to the promise Jesus made to his friends as he prepared to say goodbye to them—on his way to be executed as a political threat:
Don’t let this rattle you. You trust God, don’t you? Trust me. There is plenty of room for you in my Father’s home. If that weren’t so, would I have told you that I’m on my way to get a room ready for you? And if I’m on my way to get your room ready, I’ll come back and get you so you can live where I live.
—John 14:1-3. (The Message.)
Another glimpse of victory comes a bit earlier in the same Gospel—and again I'm glimpsing through trust rather than claiming to understand exactly what it will look like. It will be good.
You need to know that I have other sheep in addition to those in this pen. I need to gather and bring them, too. They’ll also recognize my voice. Then it will be one flock, one Shepherd.
John 10:16. (The Message.)
Politicians of goodwill and integrity will always seek to serve their inclusive "one flock," and the forces of privilege may, for the foreseeable future, seek to keep us fearful and divided. We, and the generations to come, will still be required to choose hope and integrity each time the challenge presents itself, rarely knowing for sure what the outcome will be in any given struggle. I'm incredibly grateful for the ultimate vision of a room in God's home, and pray for insight in every season to reflect that vision in the ways we treat each other ... and the ways we choose our leaders.
Looking back eight years; sixteen years.
Mark Russ on Quaker approaches to hope.
Keeping hope sober ... a case study of repression: the death of Russian pianist Pavel Kushnir (long, but maybe not long enough!).
A shadow on the Democratic National Convention: Palestinian voices are shut out.
The epistle issued by the Friends World Committee for Consultation's World Plenary, held August 5-12 near Johannesburg, South Africa, and online.
Dungeons, Dragons ... and Quakers. The experience of Mike Huber of West Hills Friends Church. (Russian translation.)
Lil' Ed and the Blues Imperials play a song written by Lil' Ed's uncle and one of my earliest favorites among Chicago blues musicians, J.B. Hutto. (Here's Hutto's version, audio only.)
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