Hope Sticks
On 9/11/01 I, like many others, went directly to my storage closet, took out my American flag and hung it in my front yard. I did this as an act of solidarity with my brothers and sisters who were so horrified by the scenes of buildings toppled and human beings suddenly struck down. I did this to say to the survivors and those who had lost loved ones "I share your pain." I did this in utter ignorance of what was to come.
I took that flag down just a few days later and have not hung it since.
First and foremost, because I understand my citizenship in a greater Kingdom, one that does not respect borders and bureaucracies, principalities and powers. A Kingdom with no flag, but a banner...the banner of peace.
And I took that flag down because I did not want to be identified with an administration that so shamelessly marked itself by its agenda. An agenda of acquisition, domination, isolation, and corporation. I wanted no part with men and women who chose to build their kingdom via the exploitation of a flag stained by the blood of 9/11's victims.
And I, like many others, suffered the presence of this administration and its puppet king enjoying one illuminating hope: he will not be re-elected.
My husband and I were moved to tears of patriotism for the first time in a long time by the words of John Kerry as he brilliantly declared that "faith without works is dead." And again, we wept as we cheered with 17,000 others in Las Cruces, New Mexico at a Kerry rally. We wept a third time as we stood in a crowd made up of Native Americans, Hispanics, African Americans, whites, mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, neighbors, friends and strangers in Taos, New Mexico singing "Give Peace A Chance."
Hope springs eternal....or at least until November 3.
I, like many others, met the post-election dawn with feelings of grief, disbelief, and dread. I did not turn on the TV or the computer or the radio. I had no desire to see the face or hear the voice of the man who would be king yet again.
Sometime that afternoon I went to the sink to wash my face and saw the round Kerry/Edwards sticker that I had taken from my shirt after the Las Cruces rally and pasted to the mirror optimistically believing it to be a talisman of hope, hope that had now been dashed against the rocks by 51% of my fellow Americans.
In anger I ripped the sticker from the mirror, wadded it up, tossed it to the floor, and left the room.
Only later did I notice that not all the sticker had peeled away. Part of it remained and still does today.
And that little piece of the sticker shouts at me that my hope was not and is not a gutless sensation easily cast aside, cheaply sold, or malevolently stolen. Hope is a light and it calls us to move from a place of mortification to a place of expectancy. In so doing, we move.
Having moved, we can not go back. We can not find the exact place we once stood. We are forever changed.
And having thus changed, a little piece of that hope sticks. It remains. And it is the yeast that will work in the hopeful of our country to give rise to a revolution that is much needed and long overdue.
I am sickened by the message of healing that comes from the agent of the disease. I am wary of the olive branch extended in the name of American unity. I am horrified at the perversion of God's Name in the mouth of one who proclaims war just.
But more than anything, I am hopeful for the stirring I feel in the guts of our country. A stirring that will not lay down, sit down, or be voted down.
In all of the rhetoric-shouting and speech-making and futuristic-idealizing I caught a glimpse of a better world, a world for which I am not only hopeful but to which I am committed.
So today I will go to my closet, take out my flag, and I will hang it from its pole upside down, as a sign of national distress.I will keep it there to denote my personal belief that we can do better. In the greatest country, the richest country, the most educated country on planet earth.... we can and must do better!
I took that flag down just a few days later and have not hung it since.
First and foremost, because I understand my citizenship in a greater Kingdom, one that does not respect borders and bureaucracies, principalities and powers. A Kingdom with no flag, but a banner...the banner of peace.
And I took that flag down because I did not want to be identified with an administration that so shamelessly marked itself by its agenda. An agenda of acquisition, domination, isolation, and corporation. I wanted no part with men and women who chose to build their kingdom via the exploitation of a flag stained by the blood of 9/11's victims.
And I, like many others, suffered the presence of this administration and its puppet king enjoying one illuminating hope: he will not be re-elected.
My husband and I were moved to tears of patriotism for the first time in a long time by the words of John Kerry as he brilliantly declared that "faith without works is dead." And again, we wept as we cheered with 17,000 others in Las Cruces, New Mexico at a Kerry rally. We wept a third time as we stood in a crowd made up of Native Americans, Hispanics, African Americans, whites, mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, neighbors, friends and strangers in Taos, New Mexico singing "Give Peace A Chance."
Hope springs eternal....or at least until November 3.
I, like many others, met the post-election dawn with feelings of grief, disbelief, and dread. I did not turn on the TV or the computer or the radio. I had no desire to see the face or hear the voice of the man who would be king yet again.
Sometime that afternoon I went to the sink to wash my face and saw the round Kerry/Edwards sticker that I had taken from my shirt after the Las Cruces rally and pasted to the mirror optimistically believing it to be a talisman of hope, hope that had now been dashed against the rocks by 51% of my fellow Americans.
In anger I ripped the sticker from the mirror, wadded it up, tossed it to the floor, and left the room.
Only later did I notice that not all the sticker had peeled away. Part of it remained and still does today.
And that little piece of the sticker shouts at me that my hope was not and is not a gutless sensation easily cast aside, cheaply sold, or malevolently stolen. Hope is a light and it calls us to move from a place of mortification to a place of expectancy. In so doing, we move.
Having moved, we can not go back. We can not find the exact place we once stood. We are forever changed.
And having thus changed, a little piece of that hope sticks. It remains. And it is the yeast that will work in the hopeful of our country to give rise to a revolution that is much needed and long overdue.
I am sickened by the message of healing that comes from the agent of the disease. I am wary of the olive branch extended in the name of American unity. I am horrified at the perversion of God's Name in the mouth of one who proclaims war just.
But more than anything, I am hopeful for the stirring I feel in the guts of our country. A stirring that will not lay down, sit down, or be voted down.
In all of the rhetoric-shouting and speech-making and futuristic-idealizing I caught a glimpse of a better world, a world for which I am not only hopeful but to which I am committed.
So today I will go to my closet, take out my flag, and I will hang it from its pole upside down, as a sign of national distress.I will keep it there to denote my personal belief that we can do better. In the greatest country, the richest country, the most educated country on planet earth.... we can and must do better!
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