Editor,
As the Nov. 5 election draws ever closer, voters will obviously need to choose between the parties and their candidates.
However, we will also choose between two electoral philosophies.
One approach is to vote for candidates we believe will best serve our nation, irrespective
of our personal needs and wishes.
Unfortunately, Americans obviously disagree as to what is best for America. For example, as I’m an evangelical Christian, I support biblical morality with regard to abortion, euthanasia and LGBTQ issues. Many in our nation clearly disagree with me.
A second approach is to vote for candidates we believe will most benefit us personally, those
who promise to lower our taxes, raise our income, protect our rights, solve our problems and so on, but what benefits me may not benefit others. Raising your taxes to provide more governmental services for me is better for me than for you. Lowering my taxes may hamstring the government’s ability to provide such services to you, but what some consider to be “rights” others consider to be moral wrongs. For example, employing governmental means to advance elective abortion or LGBTQ agendas using my taxes for purposes with which I strongly disagree.
All this to say, the outcome of our election this fall will inevitably disappoint us. Even if the leaders we elect never fall into personal immorality, never lie to us and never make decisions based on personal agendas rather than the common good, they will inevitably lead in ways with which some of us disagree.
This is simply the way democracy in a pluralistic society works.
The key for me is to help our divided and divisive nation know the hope and grace of Christ is for me to experience and then model that hope and grace personally. Br. David Vryhof of the Society of St. John, the evangelist in Boston, asks, “Why would we choose to love our enemies and do good to those who hate us? Because that is the way of God. That is how God responds to those who resist God and choose evil over good. God never stops loving, never stops caring, never stops blessing — even when the creatures whom God has made respond to this love with indifference or opposition … Only God’s love abiding in us can love in this way. Only God’s strength at work in our weakness can make us God-like in our words and actions … Love as God loves, give as God gives, be merciful as God is merciful, surprise people by your generosity and kindness — and everyone will know that you are ‘children of the Most High.’ ”
His wise words apply especially to the way we engage the political issues of our day amid the deepest partisan divisions since the Civil War.
When I “surprise people by my generosity and kindness,” I serve a cause that will endure long after the election is over.
God Bless America.
Norman Phillips
Woodland
