I write this column not particularly spiritually centered but deeply troubled. We are less than 70 days away from the most important midterm election in our lifetime, possibly as significant as elections in the time of Abraham Lincoln or Franklin D. Roosevelt.
I am deeply troubled and angered by policies that dismantle clean-energy initiatives, open pristine lands to further drilling and fracking, pursue seabed mining, weaken voting rights, and seek to erase or distort American history in our parks, museums, and public institutions.
I am troubled by the turning away from longtime allies and by the imposition of 50% tariffs on our Canadian neighbors. I am angered by what I see as a “war of choice” driven by the pursuit of power and wealth. Meanwhile, we are faced with a $40 trillion national debt and growing. At $40 trillion, the debt would be roughly $117,000 per U.S. resident, using a population of about 342 million.
Acts of violence and cruelty are carried out on our streets from this administration without accountability. Earlier in the year we saw in the streets of Minneapolis where a woman and a man, both U.S. citizens, were murdered by ICE agents.
Recently, we saw a young man—a husband and father working two jobs to support his family—killed while on his way to work, shot in the face in his car, dragged out dead and handcuffed on the street. The effect of indiscriminate arrests, most of whom are not criminals but people legally working to become citizens, is to numb us by normalizing once unthinkable actions. And this is happening in our community.
We are at a critical juncture where the far right has been emboldened to use government to destroy government while building a grand arch to celebrate the takeover. Each year is more brutal, and the silence permits the oppression to widen and deepen. Every day, the truth is violated more profoundly from this administration.
Today, the poor are getting poorer while the rich are getting richer in both wealth and political power. The World Inequality Report came out with the finding that 0.001% of the world’s population holds three times the wealth of the poorest half of humanity.
That number is staggering and obscene. Such inequality should trouble the conscience of anyone who believes that every human being bears the image of God. Ordinary and lower middle-class citizens are deprived of health care, childcare, assistance with food and decent housing. Our church served as a distribution site for Second Harvest Food Bank, providing food to families with children. That program ended following cuts in government funding.
The very heavens must cry out in the name of the poor and powerless.
The prayer of the Magnificat, the Song of Mary, is being silenced. Mary proclaimed a God who hears the cries of the lowly, brings down the mighty from their thrones, and lifts up those who have been cast down. Her song is a prophetic declaration that God stands with the poor, the vulnerable, and the powerless.
Where is the Living Christ in us emerging as prophecy? Where is the voice of John the Baptist exposing the evil and wicked deeds of the king and pointing to the light in the darkness? Where is the turning over of tables in the temple by the scandal that we have no money for childcare, and yet we support a form of capitalism that gives more tax cuts for billionaires at the expense of cutting aid and programs for the poorest on the planet.
The biblical story of Exodus reminds us that God does not remain indifferent to human suffering. The enslaved Israelites groaned under the weight of oppression and cried out for help. Their cry rose to God, and God heard their groaning and took notice of their suffering.
“The Israelites groaned under their slavery and cried out.
Their cry for help rose up to God from their slavery.
God heard their groaning… and God took notice of them.” (Exodus 2:23–25)
It is time for us to practice “Holy Impatience.” Patience is indeed a virtue. But there are moments when patience in the face of injustice becomes complicity. There are times when impatience at injustice, corruption, and cruelty to the oppressed must be called out and pushed back. This is that time.
As we approach this consequential election, I encourage you to ground yourselves in the work of prophetic witness. Whatever our political affiliations, we have a moral responsibility to be informed, engaged, and attentive to the choices before us.
Talk with one another. Listen to one another. Share your growing understanding and concerns. Encourage family members, friends, and neighbors to register and participate in the election. Bring people together for honest conversation—not simply to persuade one another, but to illuminate the moral and civic choices before us. Most importantly, resist the temptation to believe that your vote does not matter.
This is a time for courage.
This is a time for conscience.
This is a time for Holy Impatience.
A time for good trouble.
May we refuse indifference and passivity. May we listen for the cries of those who suffer. And may the Living Christ within us give us the courage to speak truth to power, seek justice, and become a light in the darkness.
