No Serenity

O God and Heavenly Father, Grant to us the serenity of mind to accept that which cannot be changed; courage to change that which can be changed, and wisdom to know the one from the other, through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen – The Serenity Prayer

Faith

I am not a religious man.  For those who find that concerning – it’s not from “want” of knowledge.  I’ve studied religions my entire life. I was the son of a Catholic mother and a Jewish father, and raised in the Episcopal Church. The joke was it was as close as Mom could get to Catholic without Dad getting mad.  I’ve read from the Koran, the Book of Mormon, the Bhagavad Gita, the Bible and the Talmud. 

For me it’s always been a question of finding faith, not knowledge.  And I haven’t made that great leap of “faith,” at least, not yet.  But it doesn’t mean I can’t draw some knowledge and understanding of human nature from the beliefs I’ve studied, and try to gain wisdom from the prayers and stories I’ve heard.

Change

But this week there is so much to change.  Here in Ohio we find that some of our political leaders sold us out. At least it was for a good price, $60 million.   We are all “on the hook” for the debts of First Energy and their aging nuclear reactors. It’s now a part of our energy costs for the foreseeable future.  And in return, we gave up programs encouraging renewable resources. So instead we empower gas, oil and coal, and push the two remaining nuclear plants far beyond their shelf life. 

And we find that a US Senator, Republican Ron Johnson, Chairman of the Homeland Security Committee, is accepting Russian disinformation as an excuse for investigating the Democratic candidate for President, Joe Biden.  After years of opportunity, Johnson is only now trying to use his Committee to put his thumb on the scale of the Presidential election.  He is naive or cynical: trading on disinformation to impugn Biden’s reputation.  

Courage

This week we discovered that the Department of Homeland Security is sending “flying squads” of “officers” into American cities.  The President determined that those particular cities aren’t governed effectively.  Instead of working towards improvement with the local and state officials, Mr. Trump has decided that HE, who left the United States completely vulnerable to COVID-19, knows better how to run them.  So these anonymous, camouflage clad “troops” are in the streets, using their “muscle” to enforce Presidential will.

As New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman stated, President Trump is using this to deflect America from the COVID disaster. It’s a Wag the Dog scenario, except this is no foreign war. Donald Trump is going to wage a war against Americans in America, all to get votes in November.

Acceptance

And this week we are told that political bullying is just fine. Some Senators spent an entire year blocking any consideration of President Obama’s selection of Merrick Garland for the Supreme Court. Now they have made it clear that if a vacancy occurs while Trump remains in office, they will fill it.  It lays bare what we already knew:  that McConnell was lying when he said we shouldn’t choose a Justice in an election year.  And somehow, it elicits a bully’s sick “giggle” when he and other Senators are confronted with their prevarication.  

This week the President’s former attorney, Michael Cohen, was given the choice of returning to jail or giving up his First Amendment freedom of expression.  There isn’t any legal support for that, just a Justice Department demand. The Attorney General wants to do whatever he can to tilt the scales for Trump in the 2020 election.  The Cohen book certainly won’t be saying much good about Trump. Keeping Cohen in solitary confinement thru Election Day will solve one of the President’s many problems.

Wisdom

And finally this week, the President told us that it was OK to risk thousands of students by re-opening schools under all conditions. “Only .004% of students who get COVID-19 will die,” he said.  There’s 50 million some students in the US, and if only five percent are infected, it means two and a half million get COVID-19.  That tiny little percentage, .004 of a percent, amounts to eight thousand, five hundred kids who may die.

So what we are told is not only are some willing to kill off the elderly, but those kids as well.  Of course the deaths will be spread across the nation, and are likely to be “only” those with existing weaknesses.  We call them pre-existing conditions, but while everyone is waiting for “herd immunity”, I guess the disease will “cull” the herd too.

Serenity

All of these make me angry.  I hate the fact that the nation I love; that I swore loyalty to since I first placed my hand on my heart in kindergarten; whose emblem adorned my pocket as an Eagle Scout; and whose history I have studied and taught my entire life, is letting this happen.  I hate that we need the “Courage” to change in November, and then, God willing, the “Patience” to wait until January, to begin to confront these injustices.

The Serenity Prayer asks the Lord to grant us the serenity to accept all of this.  I prefer a quote from a 1980’s Brat Pack movie,  Red Dawn:

“Hate keeps me warm”.  

And this summer is hot enough already.