The House March into the Senate

Watched the "march" of House Representatives to the Senate ... a solemn procession with a most serious purpose.

I'm moved ... in part dispirited by the present issues clouding our nation's life and threatening its future.

I'm hopeful that the Senators who declared their partiality will repent and then take seriously the oath of impartiality.

Every day that passes, our nation suffers damage, and so does the world, for much of the world, by design or accident, depends upon us, for good and for ill.

From the get-go, I saw this all coming - a criminal narcissist cannot change his or her behavior, and for reasons historians will study for decades, if not centuries, a lot of Americans believed the man's lies and admired his presumption.

While the man lost the popular vote by a considerable margin, the age-old problem of the South once again reared its ugly head with the Electoral College, a device created to give the less populous Southern Slave States a greater weight than actually deserved - including the infamous "Three-Fifths Compromise" of 1787.

And, then, into the calculus, Russian Interference.

From the environment to immigration, from voting rights to jobs, from international treaties to education, America has been in turmoil and decline.

From the top down, aided and abetted by Southern politics, the odious idea of nullification, foolish and mislead evangelicals, and the insidious racism still bedeviling our land, the Union is clearly under attack and daily threatened by a cabal of beliefs and behaviors inconsistent with our Constitution and our Democracy.

I'm heartened that we still have a lot of people who care for the nation's wellbeing - women and men of good character and reasoned faith, who exhibit good cheer and a fondness for knowledge and learning, who desire to do the best they can for the greatest number of people, irrespective of race, religion, language and culture.

I'm heartened by the evangelicals of good conscience who are emerging out of the shadows cast by the extremists, to challenge the distortions that have crippled much of the American evangelical church.

And I give thanks for women and men of the mainline churches who are sustaining their convictions on voting rights, inclusion rights, and fundamental kindness and mercy for all.

Where and how it all ends, no one knows, but I hope that we can do what Christ did in the Holy City - when entering the precincts of power and commerce, he overturned the tables and shut it all down, declaring the awful truth: that which pretends to be holy is nothing less than a bunch of robbers stealing the wealth of the people and feathering the nests of the 1 %.

That 1% saw to it that Christ was killed, but truth cannot be destroyed so easily, and there was a resurrection, much to everyone's surprise.

I hope and pray that we'll be surprised by goodness and mercy, wise government and faithful servants, who indeed seek the greatest good for the greatest number of people.