DEFEAT FASCISM

 There used to be a time when disasters brought Americans together. In my lifetime, some have done so. I remember well the assassination of John Kennedy and how, for a time, we all mourned as a country, not as parties or sects. One of the most enduring memories is not of a talk show host mouthing insults but of young John Jr. saluting his father's coffin.

 Then there was the bombing of the federal building it Oklahoma City. As the dust settled over the carnage, President Bill Clinton offered soothing words that convinced us that we would prevail though the gates of Hell had opened to offer us a peak.

For years, disasters damaged us but created harmony. When one part of the country suffered, we all felt pain.

Then there was 9-11. For days we joined hands and resolved that we were one. Then, as the smoke cleared, someone saw an opportunity for partisanship. It took us to a strange place. It eventually led us to a war that unsettled a large part of the Middle East and we still search for ways to overcome the effects.

The awful experience of the Covid pandemic showed us that the forces of evil will utilize a natural catastrophe to divide good people. Americans died needlessly because of the divisiveness but a political party gained traction which now threatens to destroy the America that once mourned together. It's a damned shame. What would the Galilean say?

DEFEAT FASCISM

When you think about it, the extreme right-wing fundamentalist evangelicals may be headed into a box canyon, a positive sign in the long term. It's like this:

The rise of the MAGA cult has benefited in large part from the support of the fundamentalists. How did this happen?

From the book THE KINGDOM, THE POWER, AND THE GLORY by Tim Alberta, we learn that they blossomed due to first their religion, then from fear, and finally from hatred. It didn’t arrive through study and introspection. The willing derived it by being spoon-fed rations of fear. Evil influencers preyed on minds troubled by primal fears that their lives were not progressing as they had hoped. Their belief cohort might not sustain hegemony. Dread of becoming a minority gnawed at their equilibrium.   A huge crowd of anxious prospects awaited the new alter call.

Giving them the doubt that many feel moved by their religious fervor, how did they move from the Sermon on the Mount to support the attacking of the most cherished citadel in secular America, the United States Capitol building in Washington D.C? How did they come to support a presidential candidate marked chiefly as being totally devoid of decency or morality?

Seems the next step was fear, fear that some dark force was forcing Christians to abandon their most cherished beliefs. Some were not long held. Abortion, for example, did not become a politically charged issue in the United States until the 1970s and 1980s, primarily due to the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision. Someone saw it as wedge issue to be exploited, despite it's not being mentioned in the New Testament and only by enhancement of vague passages in the old, such as Psalm 139:13-16, which describes God's presence in the womb, suggesting to some the sacredness of life from conception.

From there it became a foundational “fear stone” in the movement of fundamentalism from religion to politics.

Gun control formed another support. Although if allowed, some Americans would vote to rescind the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, there has never been a serious suggestion by any politician or person of power. It has become, nonetheless, an issued laced with almost rabid vitriol.

Then came sexual orientation and those who are not avowed heterosexuals.

Next, the “least of those among us,” demeaned as non-producers.

Then came immigrants forced to leave their homes due to warfare among cartels battling for supremacy in meeting the insatiable demand for drugs by Americans.

Then they moved to honest, decent Americans, not excluding Jimmy Carter, Anthony Fauci, Nancy Pelosi, and Barack Obama and family, not to mention Joe Biden.

Then anyone who spoke on behalf of supporting the planet.

Then all Democrats and anyone labelled a "liberal." They don't ascribe the word to a supporter of policies that are socially progressive and promote social welfare. They refer to those who dare provide love and grace to "the least of those among us."

The fear and hate didn’t arise from a study of scripture, it came from pulpits, first for monetary reward and then for political power, usually for both. Far too many ministers found, that for personal reasons, the rewards of fear and hate far outweighed the rewards of love and grace.

Each year demands a new set of monsters bent—according to right-wing evangelist ministers, Fox News, and political operatives—on taking away evangelicals' freedom to practice their religion. Each step moves the group of monster/victims closer to average Americans. This includes our friends and neighbors, particularly mainline Christians who still spread the love of Jesus and don't mix it with politics. All of us are in danger. After all, the hate mongers must have new fuel with which to replenish their demand for fear.

In short, they will run out of sujets de haine, subjects of hatred.

Where can they turn, then, but to themselves? Rember the Nightof the Long Knives?

DEFEAT FASCISM

 Sometimes I catch myself wondering just what America is all about. It changes over the years. It was once a bountiful land for stone-age tribes who sometimes lived in harmony, sometimes fought, sometimes traded but respected the land and left no great scars upon it.

Sometimes it was about a place where one could practice religion without government guidance or interference or the threat of being burned at the stake for one's beliefs.

Sometimes it was place where land was so plentiful that a family could not harvest its share without the help of slave labor.

Sometimes where men who had never owned a slave were willing to die in a war that meant the end of slavery.

Sometimes it was a place where opportunity was unbounded for some, restricted for others, and prohibited for others.

Sometimes it was a place from which brave men would storm beaches in the face of death to defeat fascism.

Sometimes it was a place where good people struggled to make the opportunities of this great place available for all.

For long periods, it was a land of opportunity and progress for many, a light that attracted people from all over the world who sought its promises.

Sometimes it took great steps forward to extend its promises for all.

Every once in a while, it seems to take a step backwards.

DEFEAT FASCISM

 There is a scene in the film version of Red Badge of Courage—the one starring Audie Murphy—in which the actor Andy Devine plays a character called “The Cheery Soldier.” It is an odd scene. During a frantic battle, the protagonist (Murphy) runs away. He joins a sad caravan of defeated and dying men. That night, lost and bewildered, he encounters the Devine character who exudes joy and hope, leading the young man back to his unit. Next day, he performs bravely and becomes a hero.

The allegorical example of heroism born of positivity and duty is so inimical to the standard thirst for revenge and power that it makes one tremble.

This echoes the New Testament account of Paul and Simon “locked in jail” as accounted in Acts 16-25-26:

“About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the other prisoners were listening to them. Suddenly there was such a violent earthquake that the foundations of the prison were shaken. At once all the prison doors flew open, and everyone’s chains came loose.”

Perhaps we could all learn from these examples, those of us who believe that the forces of darkness have descended upon America. They have won. There is no doubt. The depravity of their actions has served to prove that there is no limit to what their followers will tolerate. Now they are "rubbing it in." What can we, the losers, do?

Maybe quit trying logic and anger and become the “cheerful losers.” Perhaps a display of what we consider righteousness, displaying how that makes us cheery instead of argumentative might work to make the prison doors fly open.

Who knows? It might, in some redeemable soul, cause a moment of “winner’s remorse.” If we are cheery with loss, might they develop some sense of over-optimism about the value of what they have won?

After all, they are so fond of the scriptures. Isn’t it written “ For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?”

It is indeed, in Mark 8:36

THE CENTER

 Heard a new phrase today that fits me perfectly: "The sensible center." Do you sometimes feel like you are in a crater in the middle of "no man's land" and both sides are firing heavy artillery at one another and it passes over you in a dreadful exchange?

That's me. I don't think there is a place in the center for me. Not to trivialize the poor, but I feel that I, and many of my friends, represent the politically homeless. Life wants one to choose from the extremes these days. I don't feel comfortable with either. Here are some examples, not intended to change your mind but to illustrate how I feel as the bombs pass overhead.

I believe strongly that I have no standing on the abortion issue, and I support the privilege of a woman's deciding, along with her physician, what is best for her body.  On the other hand, the use of abortion to determine the sexual makeup of a family's children bothers me.

I believe that there is a portion of my homo sapiens colleagues, some 0.6 percent of the adult population, born with a condition called gender dysphoria. I believe they deserve acceptance, grace, and treatment. On the other hand, I accept the consensus of scientists who state that there are two sexes, male and female. Telling young children that gender is an arbitrary choice from which they may choose disturbs me.

I believe that capitalism, along with the exercise of life, must be regulated. On the other hand, I think America is often over-regulated. When one's job is to address the problems that confront dense living, one must often use regulations to meet those problems. When one's job is to write regulations, one does so, regardless. Using regulation for aspirational purposes and not for the betterment of society disturbs me.

I believe, as Oliver Wendell Holmes stated, that taxes are the price we pay for civilization. On the other hand, waste and pork-barrel spending suck the lifeblood from America. Rewarding loyalty with government largesse disturbs me.

In short, I think that societal choices are complex and not to be addressed with sound bites or on social media. For example, I think the dropping of nuclear bombs on Japan was a horrific act. But then, I was not a 22-year-old man who had landed on the beaches of Normandy in June of 1944 and had helped defeat the Nazis only to be assigned to a legendary infantry division that would have been in the first boats ashore if the United States military had landed at Kyushu.

Don't get me wrong, my safe place tends toward the left. But I don't choose blind dogma. I think, and therefore I ponder and evaluate. At the end of the day, I love America more than I love a political party.

DEFEAT FASCISM

 On May 26, the president of the United States of America commented on Memorial Day, the day we Americans honor those who died in the service of our country.

It is a day of remembrance. It is a day that we honor "Those few, those happy few, the band of brothers [and sisters]" who gave their lives for our country.

It is a day when we all take a moment to reflect on the blood of faraway places like Normandy and nearby places like Gettysburg. It is day we recall those portions of distant fields that will, in the style of poet Rupert Brooke, forever be America.

It is a day that calls for us to become Americans, not members of a political party or religious sect.

It is one of the most sacred days of the year for American patriots.

It is a day for somber reflection and remembrance.

It is a day that demands our noblest instincts.

Proving once more that there is no bottom to his insidiousness, here is what the president of the United States of America spewed upon us:

MEMORIAL DAY

Watching all the ads for ways to celebrate Memorial Day makes me sad. Some Americans can't seem to take anything at face value anymore. Any day can fall victim to fun and frivolity. 

I'll spend some time Monday in quiet reflection at a spot on our farm where a tree line sits atop a distant rise. I'll think about the man who used to sit there with me. This time of year, the sunlight begins to appear through patches of leaves. We were sitting there once and he said, quite softly, "That always reminds me of seeing those parachutes hanging from trees, sometimes with one of those boys still attached to it."

He is the same man who said of artillery attacks, "You just pray let me live one more second … just one more second."

As I'm writing this, there is distant thunder and I'm reminded of my own experience "in harm's way." I didn't thunder where I was. The rain would just come and stay for days. If you heard rumbling, it was the sound of war, and you could only wonder who was the perpetrator and who was the victim.

On this Memorial Day, let us honor the victims who left home and family to go into situations where they might have to pray, "Just let me live one more second." Many didn't.