"The Fourth" 2020. I'm listening...
I’m wondering what there is to
celebrate here on The Fourth of July.
There’s of course the establishing of an independent country (becoming formally
politically independent from the colonial power). Then there’s celebrating time off from work
for many people. One might celebrate certain treasured features
of this country, the USA. It’s a place where science, engineering,
innovation and risk-taking have helped to usher in the peace and prosperity
many people in the USA and other
countries enjoy. Maybe one celebrates a
belief that the USA helps to prevent
deaths and suffering from conflict all over the globe in its role as world
policeman. Some may have other ideas of how the USA makes the lives of those who live here or in other countries
better, or safer, or easier. Of course,
many will simply want to celebrate the existence of USA because “we” live here and so do most of our friends and parents
and children and siblings and extended family.
What’s not to celebrate there?
There is the troubling problem
of what’s not to celebrate. We are
living through a difficult time where we are stressed economically, socially,
physically, politically, in every way.
That’s because the USA, along
with every other country, has
responded to the Covid-19 virus infecting millions of people on the planet,
including lots of us. And the
response of the USA has been what it
is, other countries have made their responses.
What would a perfect response have looked like? No such thing. Not on planet earth, anyway. So here we are, in the muck of our collective
experience of imperfection, of disruption, economic catastrophe, suffering, and
untimely deaths by the thousands. And a
heightened awareness of pre-existing conditions like structural racism and other features of a far from perfect USA that no one would celebrate. Features that need to be challenged and
changed.
Stories are told. Videos are shared. There is sadness, grief, rage. More stories.
There will always be stories, and as humans, we will respond to
these. Stories will always engage our
hearts with more impact than science or statistics.
This is my prayer for Liberation
Day. That we can muster the courage
to listen to the stories and watch the videos. Police killing people, rioters
engaging in all types of violence. Such
suffering; we feel the rage, the fear, the despair, that intense near
hopelessness. But then we must wait. We have our heart space… Breathe deeply, stay there, in the heart space. Listen: the better angels of our nature might be heard. We can listen. We can rise up (listening to each other as
well), and use the transformational tools of this modern world to make USA. A
truly great America has not been
made. All together now.
As I read your thoughts, I find myself ruefully imagining a country I could genuinely feel more proud of. There will always be social challenges, but we seem to have almost purposefully, and sometimes indeed deliberately, disabled our ability to meet them.
ReplyDeleteI wonder if culturally, we have taken the ideas of liberty and independence too far. To many people, those freedoms seem to be permission for rapacious capitalism, hoarding resources, getting ahead at the expense of others, disparaging the less fortunate and even embracing self-righteous ignorance. The worship of selfishness surely corrodes our actual strengths to the point where there is little left to celebrate.
I do wonder what celebrating the 4th, flying the flag, or engaging in other patriotic rituals have come to actually mean. Randy
Agree, Randy. USA has a self image of individualism that manifests too often as an orientation toward "not being told what to do" as if the issue of whether the community will be best served by everyone doing what is being asked or not is unimportant. Evolving away from such reflexive individualism will help with our long term survival, not to mention our collective health now.
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