Post Election Thoughts

Many of us find ourselves with strong emotions, whether happy or sad, based on the outcome of the election Tuesday.  Throughout this election season, it has been hard for all of us on either side to reconcile our minds with people who think so differently about important issues.  Somehow I keep coming back to this passage from Madeleine L'Engle.  I hope it gives us some ideas about the way forward.

"I once had an acquaintance who was a far more regular church goer than I, rose early to go to Holy Communion each morning before he went to work, and yet hated all [Asians].  Whenever an [Asian] priest celebrated communion, he refused to receive the bread and wine.

"I knelt behind him in a small chapel on a morning when a Japanese priest, one of my friends, was the celebrant, and I knew that this man would not touch the Body and Blood because it was held by yellow hands.  And I was outraged.

"I am not in love and charity with this man, I thought, and therefore, according to the rubrics, I should not go up to the altar.  And yet I knew that my only hope of love and charity was to go forward and receive the elements.

"He did not know that he, himself, was acting wholly without love and charity.  Something within him obviously justified this abominable reaction, so that the next Eucharist, if it was presided over by somebody he recognized as priest, as he was unable to recognize the Japanese priest, he would hold out his hands and receive in love and humility.

"He does not know what he is doing.  He does not know.

"Surely within me there is an equal blindness, something that I do not recognize in myself, that I justify without even realizing it.

" All right, brother.  Let us be forgiven together, then.  I will hold out my hands for both of us today, and do you for me tomorrow morning when I will be asleep while you trudge through the dirty streets to church.  It is all right for me to be outraged by what you are doing here in the presence of God, as long as it does not set me apart from you."

Whether you voted Republican or Democratic, whether you are enjoying the thrill of victory or experiencing the agony of defeat, it is all right for you to be outraged by the blindness of the opposing side, as long as it does not set you apart from them.  May we learn from each other and go forward in love and charity.