Tag: courage

Truth that Frees Us to Resist Evil

by Steve Harsh, posted in Christian Discipleship, Faith and Politics, hope, purpose, Saviors of God

“Whoever is paying our bills and giving us security and status determines what we can and cannot say or even think.” Fr. Richard Rohr

The quote above recently appeared in Fr. Rohr’s daily meditations from his Center for Action and Contemplation. It struck me as particularly poignant and relevant right now when freedom of expression in the U.S. is under attack. The power of those words is in the very fact that there is truth in them even under the best of conditions. Women can understand that truth better than we males because throughout patriarchal history they have not been free to express themselves.

In my lifetime women could only get a credit card if it was in their husband’s name. In my grandmother’s generation women did not have the right to express themselves through voting until the 19th amendment was ratified in 1920.

A clergy colleague of mine was forced out of his church in the mid-twentieth century for expressing his opinion about an issue on an election ballot, and in this age of social media the number of people who have lost their jobs because of an opinion they expressed on their personal social media account is too many to count.

This quote reminded me of another one that has intrigued me for over 40 years. “I hope for nothing. I fear nothing. I am free.” Those are the words written on the gravestone of Nikos Kazantzakis in Heraklion, Greece. Kazantzakis was the author of “Zorba the Greek,” “The Last Temptation of Christ,” several other novels, and “Saviors of God,” a book of “spiritual exercises” that are often as challenging as his epitaph.

Is being free of fear and hope the secret to having no constraints on what we say or think? Some might say being filthy rich so one does not have a boss or anyone else to report to would be the ultimate freedom, but I suspect that those who are not accountable to anyone because of their ultra-wealth are far from free. I base that judgement on the fact that the vast majority of billionaires we see in the media are never satisfied with what they have and continually strive for more wealth and power instead of enjoying what they have.

When Jesus says, “You will know the truth, and the truth will make you free” (John 8:32) what is the truth he is speaking of? Verse 31 sets some context for the more familiar 32nd:

“Then Jesus said to the Jews who had believed in him, “If you continue in my word, you are truly my disciples.” It is to those believers that he promises the truth that will set them free. That narrows things down a bit, but still raises questions, like free to do/be what? Or freedom from what?

The clue to those answers are found right in these verses. Jesus is talking to those who believe in him, and he says they need to continue in his word to truly be his disciples. In other words they are set free to be true followers of Jesus and his way of peace and justice. And later in John’s Gospel in the farewell discourse (chapter 14) where Jesus is preparing his disciples for life in a post-crucifixion/resurrection world he tells them he is going to prepare a place for them. Thomas says, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?” Jesus said to him, “I am the way and the truth and the life.” (John 14:5-6)

Jesus himself is the truth that sets us free, and if we know that truth, not as a doctrinal belief but as a deep, in the gut, all-in personal relationship and commitment to follow Jesus’ way no matter what crap the world throws at us, then we are free from fear and even from hope because in that abundant life in Christ there is nothing to fear and nothing more to hope for.

That is the truth that give us the courage to be, to borrow a phrase from Paul Tillich. It’s the courage described by Bertram Cates in the play “Inherit the Wind” when he is on trial for teaching evolution in a small southern town where almost everyone is against him. At one point Cates says, “It’s the loneliest feeling in the world-to find yourself standing up when everybody else is sitting down.”

But those who know the truth that is Jesus’ message of peace and justice understand that we must fear nothing and stand up against the forces of evil and injustice. I like the way our United Methodist Baptismal ritual says it. One of the questions asked of adults being baptized is this: “Do you accept the freedom and power God gives you to resist evil, injustice, and oppression in whatever forms they present themselves?”

Most of us go through the motions of this ritual by saying the prescribed “I do,” but in times like we are living in now it is incumbent upon all of us who know Jesus as our truth to fear nothing and stand up and say a resounding “Here I am, send me!”

World Communion Prayer 2025

by Steve Harsh, posted in brokenness, Christian Discipleship, Faith Development, hope, peacemaking, prayer

O God of all creation, we set aside one Sunday each year as World Communion Sunday. Given the state of our battered and broken world wouldn’t it make more sense to make every Sabbath or Holy Day a time to pray for a beloved world community?

Our Christian Scriptures say you so loved this messed up world so much that you sent your own beloved son to redeem us. Why would you do that knowing how the evil forces in the world routinely kill any prophet who challenges the empire’s gospel of power and violent control by fear and intimidation?

And yet something about that impractical vision of a peaceable kingdom keeps us coming back to your table. It’s a table where we join a motley crew of humanity – those who hunger for power and the powerless who simply hunger; Israeli and Palestinian, Ukrainian and Russian, an assassin and a widow who forgives him, sworn political enemies dipping bread in the same cup, estranged family members sharing tears of joyful reunion, and those who live for revenge breaking bread with the agents of reconciliation.

We don’t understand the mystery of how ordinary broken bread can fan the tiny ember of hope still smoldering beneath an avalanche of broken dreams. Yet somehow the Holy Ruach of Your spirit blows life into a valley of dry bones and we leave the table lighter and brighter with a spring in our step we thought was gone forever.

The chaos of life has not stopped. The existential threats to freedom and the power of greed and short-sightedness threatening our planet are still as awful as ever. People are still starving in Sudan and Gaza, bombs are still dropping in Kiev, and yet the vision of humanity with all its flaws breaking bread together around one godly table stays with us and empowers us to face the future with courage and love.

Because You so loved the world we dare to also, in the name of the humble servant who calls us again and again to come eat and drink of his very essence. In His name we pray and live. Amen

No Forgiveness Unless We Confess and Face the Truth

by Steve Harsh, posted in Faith and Politics, Faith and Values, spiritual discipline

“ If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.  If we confess our sins, he who is faithful and just will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make God a liar, and his word is not in us.” I John 1:8-10

The Bible is very consistently on the side of honesty and truth. That doesn’t mean everyone in the Bible is honest and truthful, far from it. From Adam and Eve’s deceit about the forbidden fruit, to Abraham lying that Sarah was his sister to save his own skin, to Peter’s denying that he even knew Jesus three times, and so many more incidents humanity’s fallible nature shows up in nearly every chapter of the biblical narrative.

That doesn’t mean the standards and values set forward for us in the Scriptures are not high. The 8th commandment is “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor,” and John 8: 32 tells us that it’s truth, not lies, that sets us free.

God knows we are not going to live up to those high ideals because She made us with free will and knew we would abuse that gift regularly. And knowing that, God built into the system grace and mercy and forgiveness.

But as I John points out, there’s a catch. “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.” But there’s good news because that verse goes on to say “If we confess our sins, he who is faithful will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

That’s pretty straightforward. We screw up, but if confess our shortcomings and failures instead of trying to hide them from, others, ourselves, or from God, which is a fool’s errand for sure, there is redemption.

I bring that up just now because we Americans are experiencing a real shortage of honesty, truth, and confession right now. Yes, I know that’s always been the case, but just now truth is being exiled and threatened at the highest echelons of American society. Our president is so insecure and ignorant of American and World history, let alone the Christian Gospel, that he is terrified by truth.

He is purging exhibits from the Smithsonian because they make slavery look bad! For God’s sake how can anything make chattel slavery, lynching other human beings for the color of their skin, and 400 years of systemic racism look anything but bad? The truth is that The United States was founded on racism and enslavement of African people and on genocide against Native Americans who were here for centuries before white immigrants arrived.

That’s a hard truth to swallow, I know, but trying to bury it with lies, book burnings, and threats to historians only makes the crime worse. As I John tells us, the only road to forgiveness is through the pain of confession, and confession requires a cold hard look at Truth, no matter how awful it is.

Out of sight may be out mind, but it doesn’t change the truth. Rounding up and imprisoning people experiencing homelessness may make some people more comfortable who don’t have to witness that problem, but it doesn’t change the truth that the wealthiest nation in the world refuses to address the grave social issues of poverty, hunger, health care, and adequate shelter that should be basic human rights

We cannot solve problems we refuse to admit we have. That’s the essence of confession. Climate change is the biggest current disaster caused by denial of its existence. Had we confessed as a nation that we were poisoning our planet decades ago we would not be in the mess we are in today.

The truth can set us free, but only if we have the humility and courage to face it. Until then, “If we say we have not sinned, we make God a liar, and God’s truth is not in us.”

Where Oh Where is God?

by Steve Harsh, posted in climate change, Faith and Values, hope

As I have been shaken by the Texas flood tragedy this week my mind has wandered back to all the times I was responsible for a group of young people at camp or on mission trips. I keep wondering if I would have had the courage, composure, and strength to help save those children and youth entrusted to me by their parents if I awoke in a horror movie of rushing flood water filling our cabin?

I hear people asking as I do where is God in tragedies like this? Why did God let this happen? Why does God let cancer, war, and gun violence destroy innocent lives? Of course, I really don’t know any definitive answers to those age-old questions scholars categorize as theodicy, i.e. how do we explain how an all-powerful, loving God allows evil and suffering to exist in the world.

My answer for this week is that God is not a helicopter parent who swoops in to protect and prevent anything bad from happening to us, God’s children. There comes a point in every parent’s life where you have to let your children make their own mistakes and suffer the consequences. No amount of advice or warning or sharing our own past failures will stop a grown child from blazing their own path.

God has gifted us mortals with free will. Oh how many times I have wished I could return that gift which has allowed me to screw up so many times by pursuing my own pleasure, desires, and goals instead of a higher path.

I’m sure there were many times God wished people would not house innocent young girls in cabins on a flood plain. I’m sure God would have wanted and may have urged people in positions of authority to better prepare for floods like those on the Guadalupe River last week. I’m sure God shook her head in dismay when arguments prevailed that sirens and warning systems were too expensive.

I heard on the news tonight that some people who regularly camped in RV’s along the Guadalupe ignored warnings of potential flooding last week saying, “It floods here all the time.” Basing present precautions on past experience can be dangerous. We don’t live in pre-climate change times, and those of us who trust science know that we are living in a new normal where extreme weather events are more frequent and much more severe.

There will be finger pointing and blaming and many law suits filed because of this tragedy. None of those things will bring back any of the victims or ease the trauma of the survivors. The only redeeming quality of this disaster is that our free will enables us to learn from our past experiences. We can ask what would have helped make this tragedy less horrific? What needs to be in place to prevent or limit future flooding occurrences and to improve rescue and recovery operations?

Where is God in all this? Not zooming in like a master puppeteer to prevent the consequences of poor free will choices; not picking and choosing who will survive and who will not. No, God is there comforting those who mourn, weeping with those who sob uncontrollably, and giving strength to the brave first responders and volunteers who are doing the horrible/wonderful work of searching for those who are still missing.

God is there offering hope to the hopeless, absorbing the hate and pain of the angry, and sitting peacefully and patiently with those for whom there simply are no words – at least not yet.

“The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.” Psalm 34:18

Disunited We Stand

by Steve Harsh, posted in Christian Discipleship, Faith and Politics, Government Reform

President Trump’s Big Budget and Policy bill recently passed in the House of Representatives by one single vote, and that was with the considerable power of the Administration advocating for its passage. A procedural matter on that same bill just yesterday passed in the Senate 51-49. These razor thin margins remind us how deeply divided we are as a nation right now. But those votes also reminded me of a piece of early Ohio history that I just learned about five years ago.

This was actually my second reminder of this critical moment in my state’s history. Just last week Bishop Hee-Soo Jung preached at a Juneteenth worship service at our church. Bishop Jung is new to Ohio having been assigned to the Ohio Episcopal Area just nine months ago.

So he has been studying the history of his new home state and reminded us in his sermon that in the 19th century enslaved people in the south thought of the Ohio River as the River Jordan and Ohio as the Promised Land because if they could make it to cross that river they were free.

I told the Bishop after the service of this critical incident in Ohio’s early history that could have changed all of that imagery and reality drastically.

I wrote about that chapter in our history which included a super close vote on approving the Ohio state constitution 222 years ago in an earlier blog post, and with our current political climate being what it is I decided to repost that piece to remind us all that we’ve been here before and that acts of solitary individuals can make a history-altering difference.

The post is from June of 2000 entitled “One Vote Really Matters.”

Until very recently if one of the most important names in Ohio history were to be a Final Jeopardy answer I would have been clueless. And I’m guessing that most of my fellow Ohioans who took the required Ohio History class in middle school would also not be able to identify Ephraim Cutler.

I would still have no idea of the critical role Cutler played in shaping the history of my state if a friend of mine had not recently moved to Marietta, the first white settlement in what became the Buckeye state. Because this colleague of mine now resides in Marietta she made mention on social media of David McCullough’s recent book about Ohio’s beginnings, “The Pioneers: The Heroic Story of the Settlers Who Brought the American Ideal West.”

I am a big fan of McCullough and am very glad to be reading this book. I must say it started slow and took me awhile to get into it, but it was worth the effort for one of the most relevant stories in the book that lit up for me like a Christmas tree because of our most recent unrest about the evil of racism in our nation.

Cutler and his father were prominent leaders in establishing the first settlement in the 1790’s in the newly acquired Northwest Territory and because of their prominence in Marietta Ephraim was elected in the early days of the 1800’s as one of two delegates to represent Marietta and Washington County at the convention responsible for creating a constitution for Ohio statehood.

I was surprised to learn that one of the most heated debates at that convention held in the Territorial Capitol at Chillicothe was over whether slavery would be permitted in Ohio. And even more shocking to my naïveté was how close the vote was on the provision about slavery.

Ephraim Cutler was one of the most vocal opponents of the slavery provision, but on the day of the critical vote on that item Cutler was so gravely ill that he could barely get out of bed. His friends pleaded with him and physically helped him to get to the chamber for the vote, and it was a very important thing they did; because the proposal for Ohio to be admitted to the union as a slave state was defeated by that one single vote.

My mind is still blown by that piece of history. I am shocked at how close my home state came to being a place where human slavery was allowed. I have been self-righteously smug that we Ohioans are better than that, but we came within the narrowest of margins of becoming a slave state.

That history has helped me understand better the depth of the political divisions in our state and our country even today. I knew there have always been deep-seated disagreements about race from day one in these United States — which have never been united on that issue. But realizing how heated that debate was at the very inception of statehood here in Ohio helped me understand at a deeper level why it is so hard to resolve this issue.

Ephraim Cutler also taught me again that one life and even one vote can make all the difference in the world. Imagine what Ohio history would look like if we had become a slave state. Would we have joined the Confederacy? Would we have statues of Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson being removed here in our state capital?

I thank God that brave pioneer dragged himself out of bed to take a stand for justice that day in Chillicothe. His bravery and integrity inspires me to do my part in that on-going struggle for America’s highest ideals today. I hope I do not soon forget who Ephraim Cutler was, and I thank David McCullough for telling his story. It has never been more important to study and learn from our history.

Prayer for a Dying 401-K

by Steve Harsh, posted in Faith and Values, hope, prayer

O God of the universe, my retirement funds are in the dumpster, they’re dropping faster than that first big stomach-churning drop on those big roller coasters. I’m so old I don’t know if those funds will have time to recover even if the market does, and I’m scared.

The other stuff I depend on for my well-being, e.g. Medicare and Social Security is also under attack from rogue billionaires in Washington who have no idea what life is like for us common folks. Without medicare I would not have been able to get the life-saving cancer treatment I just finished, and things are much worse for others who are uninsured or underinsured.

But you know all that already, O Holy One, and you know I’m better off than millions of others who are living in fear of real poverty or arrest and/or deportation to a hell hole in El Salvador just because they are the wrong color or dare to exercise their right to free expression.

My friends are losing their jobs as the economy craters. Public and higher education are under attack. I know you don’t intervene directly in human affairs. You have blessed (or cursed) us with free will; so I just pray for strength, courage, and faith for all of us to support and love one another no matter how deep this economic hole becomes.

No matter what happens to our standard of living our standard of loving can thrive and grow because it is not founded on the whims of human greed, but on the bedrock of your eternal love that nothing in all creation can ever take from us.

Clinging to that assurance our fears for the temporary stuff of this life fade as we affirm our real confidence in what it says on the money we used to have, “In God We Trust.” Amen

Squads of Love

by Steve Harsh, posted in Christian Discipleship, hope, Lenten devotion

The following words of wisdom hit me today right where I needed them. I had another morning when I struggled to get out of bed because I didn’t want to face another day of the awful mess our world is in. And this message by one of my favorite spiritual guides quoting another of my favorites helped me face the day.

Father Richard Rohr shared this insight in his daily meditation from the Center for Action and Contemplation:

Religion scholar Diana Butler Bass ponders the crowd’s outrage after Jesus’ first sermon in Nazareth (Luke 4:18–30)—and the courage required to resist it:  

A preacher gets up, quotes scripture, and reminds the gathered congregation that God loves the outcast—those in fear for their lives—the poor, prisoners, the disabled, and the oppressed. 

In response, an outraged mob tries to kill the preacher…. 

Jesus spoke directly to the congregation saying that God loved widows and those stricken with leprosy—implying that his neighbors had not treated widows and lepers justly. They praised God’s words about justice but were not acting on God’s command to enact mercy toward outcasts. 

That’s when they “all” got angry and turned into a mob. At least, the majority of them didn’t want to hear this. They flew into a rage. 

When they heard this, all in the synagogue were filled with rage. They got up, drove him out of the town, and led him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so that they might hurl him off the cliff. But he passed through the midst of them and went on his way. [Luke 4:28–30] 

… What do you do when the mob turns ugly? When widows and lepers, when LGBTQ people and immigrants, are afraid and treated cruelly—and when a brave prophet calls out the self-righteous? What do you do when there’s a lynch mob or a cross-burning? 

I suspect the unnamed heroes of this story stepped outside of the “all,” not willing to be part of the totality, and made a way for the intended victim to pass safely. Did they spot one another in the angry throng? A furtive glance, seeing another hesitant face across the room? Maybe they moved toward one another, hoping to keep each other safe. Did a few others notice the two and the small band then began to multiply? The “all” was furious; the few didn’t understand how it had come to this. 

It was frightening for them; it must have been hard to go against their family, friends, and neighbors. As they followed the mob to the bluff, they must have worried that if they spoke up they could be thrown off, too. But instead of submitting to the tyranny of the “all,” maybe they formed a little alternative community in solidarity with each other. When Jesus was herded to the cliff, perhaps it was they who saw an opening—made an opening—and helped him escape. He passed through the midst of them and went on his way. 

That is, indeed, a miracle. The bystanders find the courage to do something. 

If Jesus needed that, so do we…. We must form squads of love and make a path through together … no matter how fearsome the mob. 

And that’s the overlooked miracle of Luke 4: Only a community—even one that goes unnoticed in the crowd—the band that refuses to join the rabble—can keep us from going completely over the edge.

Searching for Calm in Crisis

by Steve Harsh, posted in Christian Discipleship, Faith and Politics, Government Reform, hope

I’ve been struggling a lot since January 20 to keep my sanity, and I know I’m not alone. No matter how many times I tell myself that I need to not dwell on the political mayhem I don’t seem to be able to stop myself from checking my phone or turning on the tv or radio to see what the latest chaotic news out of Washington is.

When a friend asked me recently how I was, my reply was something like this: “I’m dismayed, disgusted, depressed, disillusioned, displeased, despondent, and distressed. (Full disclosure – this was at the beginning of a zoom call and knowing I would probably be asked some version of “how are you” I had rehearsed my answer knowing that this friend would immediately understand what I was saying.

While I certainly intend no implication that my situation resembles what Jesus was dealing with in the Gospels, the need for finding peace and relief from my anxiety brought to mind two passages in Mark’s Gospel.

“In the morning, while it was still very dark, he got up and went out to a deserted place, and there he prayed.And Simon and his companions hunted for him. When they found him, they said to him, “Everyone is searching for you.” (Mark 1:35-37)

“The apostles gathered around Jesus and told him all that they had done and taught. He said to them, “Come away to a deserted place all by yourselves and rest a while.” For many were coming and going, and they had no leisure even to eat. And they went away in the boat to a deserted place by themselves. Now many saw them going and recognized them, and they hurried there on foot from all the towns and arrived ahead of them. As he went ashore, he saw a great crowd, and he had compassion for them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd, and he began to teach them many things.” (Mark 6:30-34)

Jesus can’t escape the demands on his time and healing power no matter where he goes. I bet he was glad he didn’t have a cell phone so people could text or call him 24/7 with their requests for help!

But seriously, how do mere mortals like you and me cope with a world gone mad. When there seems to be no end to the pain and suffering the Trump/Musk duo and their minions are willing to inflict on the most vulnerable people in our country and around the world, and we feel powerless to stop them, what can we do?

A friend recently shared a breath prayer from author Sarah Bessey: “Inhale: Show me who to be. Exhale: And what is mine to do.” (From “Field Notes from the Wilderness”). I find the prayer relaxing, but I still am searching for a clear answer to those questions for living my life in 2025.

Paul tells us in Romans that when we don’t know how to pray the Spirit intervenes for us with “sighs too deep for words.” But right now those sighs are too deep for me to understand.

I keep coming back to one of my go to verses in Micah 6:8 where we are told what God requires of us and number one on the list is “to do justice.” But what does that look like in a world where injustice seems to have all the power? Nothing new, of course. That’s the story of human history, but it’s not something I ever expected to have to deal with in my democratic country.

I should have known better. History is full of examples of civilizations and empires that have ceased to exist in any recognizable form. And God knows the United States in spite of many admirable qualities and achievements has an ugly underbelly of racism, genocide, and imperialism that never seems to go away. And here we are in 2025 with a would be dictator using all of those ugly sins of our fathers to try and destroy the foundations of our democracy from the most powerful position in our government.

In the Judeo-Christian Scriptures when God’s people build golden calves or pursue earthly power by putting their faith in monarchs or foreign alliances things never end well. The nation of Israel is split into two opposing countries, carried into exile, and overrun in succession by Assyrians, Babylonians, Greeks and Romans.

But in all of those biblical disasters somehow there is always a faithful remnant that survives the injustice to renew the covenant with God. If we are living in such a time I am haunted by doubts that I am brave enough to be part of such a faithful remnant. What price am I willing to pay to stand up to the forces of evil?

The good news about being in a time like this is that it is a crucible where the rubber of faith meets the road. All questions are laid bare. Do I really believe in resurrection, or in that moving verse in Romans 8 that I have quoted so often that nothing, “not powers or principalities, or life or death, nothing in all creation can separate us from the love of God?”

One of my favorite images of faith is the story of Jesus and his disciples caught in a storm out on the Sea of Galilee and these brave fishermen who make their living on the sea are scared to death. When they look around for Jesus to save them they find him sound asleep in the back of the boat. He is literally sleeping through the storm.

As much as I’d like to be that calm in this or any crisis, I am much more ore like the father in Mark 9 who brought his son to Jesus to be healed. When Jesus tells him all things are possible to those who believe the father cries out, “I believe Lord, help my unbelief!”

Or there is this example from American history. “These are the times that try men’s souls” is a quote from Thomas Paine’s “The American Crisis.” Paine wrote this during the Revolutionary War to encourage the American colonists to persevere and fight for victory. Well, we are in another American crisis 250 years later, and the question is will we persevere and keep the faith in the aspirational dreams of equality for all people written by Thomas Jefferson and signed by all the founding fathers who pledged “their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor.”

The answers to all those questions for me and for our nation are yet to be revealed, but I want to close with a powerful statement from James Weldon Johnson that I read recently in “Sojourners” magazine. His words inspire me.

“I will not let prejudice or any of its attendant humiliations and injustices bear me down to spiritual defeat. My inner life is mine, and I shall defend and maintain its integrity against all the powers of hell.”

May it be so for me and thee.

A New Independence Day

by Steve Harsh, posted in Faith and Politics, Government Reform

How ironic that Donald Trump’s handpicked Maga Supreme Court should choose 3 days before Independence Day to eviscerate the founding documents that have been the foundation of our freedom for 248 years! At least now the stakes are clear for what the 2024 election is all about, and there can be no excuse for anyone ignoring the danger posed by our only President who has ever staged an insurrection to try and cling to power and overthrow a free and fair election.

Lost in the obvious failure last week of President Biden to withstand the barrage of Trump’s lies is the appalling lack of honesty coming from Trump’s mouth. He is such an accomplished liar that only the well-informed listener would see through the bull crap he spouted for the entire 90 minutes. And sadly we do not have a well-informed electorate. A dangerous portion of our population have been so indoctrinated by the right-wing media to believe Trump’s lies uncritically. He has cult-like control over just enough minds to possibly win another election while again losing the popular vote.

There is no time to correct the flaws in the Electoral College which is protected by the very system it perpetuates. There is no time to re-educate the Maga base. The biased court system created by Trump and Mitch McConnell has successfully prevented any legal recourse happening before the November election. The only defense of democracy we have left is exactly what President Biden called for tonight in his forceful and courageous dissent from today’s Maga Court ruling. That defense is ironically what the Trump supporters have also been calling for — let the voters decide.

Well, by God, we will. Today’s court decision is discouraging, and it is very tempting to just give in to despair. But instead what I plan to do is let the rockets’ red glare of our July 4th fireworks inspire me to renew my commitment to the “self-evident truths” that gave birth to this great nation. I will celebrate the vision that all people are created equal, which means no one, NO ONE is above the law. It matters not that six Maga Court justices have forgotten that sacred truth – what matters is that “we the people” have not forgotten.

Those brave men in Philadelphia 248 years ago pledged “their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor” to the dream of equality and independence for all. Now it’s our turn to do the same.

Groundhog Day in Congress

by Steve Harsh, posted in Faith and Politics, Government Reform, Uncategorized

Those of us who live in Jim Jordan’s home district know that his only claim to fame is that he was a champion high school and college wrestler. While I admire the discipline and determination it takes to excel in wrestling, I would l like to point out that wrestling is not a team sport. Democracy, on the other hand, is the ultimate team sport. It requires an ability to collaborate and compromise, skills which Mr. Jordan did not have to learn on the wrestling mat and which are apparently not even in his vocabulary.

For the Congressional GOP to continue to waste time by voting in Groundhog Day fashion for the same unqualified candidate is not only foolish, it is very dangerous. Our adversaries in Tehran, Moscow, and Beijing are drooling in joy over the paralysis of our government. We are the laughing stock of the world and proof to other nations that democracy doesn’t work.

Are there not enough moderate members of Congress on both sides of the aisle to join forces as adults and agree on an acceptable bi-partisan candidate to lead the House in these critical times? We need some profiles in courage who will put personal power and party loyalty aside for the greater good of our nation and world. And we need it now!