[Today Marti reminds us of our mission.]
For as long as I have known John, which is more years than I care to admit, he has sought to create bridges among people within the church to those out beyond its walls. By renouncing the rigid delineations of people into categories, he encourages Christians to meet individuals in the marketplace with a sense of inclusiveness, and diversity, while delivering a message of acceptance and love.
Everyone’s welcome. This is the Gospel of Welcome and everyone’s welcome. And we mean everyone. Every color, every race, every religion and none, every sexual preference (LGBTQ and you can add XYZ if you want to — they’re welcome, too) every nationality, every disability — everyone, including any category of humanity I’ve left out. Everyone’s welcome.
It’s voting day here in California. Out and about you find voting signs and there are police warnings on my emergency app about possible congestion around polling places.
We’ve been talking a lot about politics lately here at the Catch because it is such a big part of our culture right now. And though on rare occasions, politics can unify, this time around, as you know, divisiveness prevails. There is a strong movement towards separation, and when that happens, it’s usually accompanied with isolation, protectionism and closed-mindedness. None of these are attitudes that serve our vision well here where we celebrate the Gospel of Welcome.
In an election year the future of America will depend on how well people lose. So get ready, some of us will have to apply this to ourselves. But of course, it’s just as important how we win. Maybe even more so. We certainly don’t need “Told you so,” winners. We need non-gloaters. If ever we will need to reach across to the other side, it will be this year.
It’s uncanny how politics so quickly can get us traveling on the low road. The high road seems like we are letting the other guy get away with something, but that’s only if we are making ourselves the judge. Allowing God to be the judge and jury is what allows us to take that little connector from the low road up to the high road. And in an election year, when the temptation is so great to travel that low road and let everybody we don’t agree with know just what we think about them, that is when we need to be moving on up to that high road most of all. It’s not too soon to start doing this.
So to help us with that, here is an excellent piece that actually found some circulation last election in 2016. With a few alterations it will be helpful to us even now.
Long after this election is over … half of us will be able to claim we “won.” The other half will have four years to say, “That’s why I didn’t vote for ____.” Just remember we live in the same America as they do. We have to live, work and eat with each other in OUR America. We don’t get to hop on a private jet and fly away from our community’s problems. We are what makes this country what it is, not the President. He will not stop crime in our neighborhoods, he won’t stop people from stealing your identity, and he will not stop anyone from shooting up our local nightclubs. He will not come teach your child right from wrong, but you can. The President will not come to your home and teach her math, but you can. We as a united people with sound morals, values and ethics can make this country whatever we want. Vote for whomever you want, but remember we are the ones that shape our communities, not the elected ones.
It is critical, especially in light of the ongoing culture wars (and they are ongoing; and appear to be worsening) how we behave as Christians in the world and in the marketplace of ideas, and right now, it’s my observation that we have a tendency to behave very badly. Actually, so is everybody, but “everyone’s doing it” has never been an excuse for bad behavior. People are becoming more and more combative and I have noticed how Christians can hit just as hard as anyone else, and often below the belt.
I’m really puzzled.
Two days ago I published a Catch about what I had learned from something Neil Young wrote in an open letter to President Trump. Now I knew I was stepping into a political minefield that I probably should have left alone, but I learned so much from what he expressed along the lines of what I had been talking about all last week, that I thought we could all benefit.
With the first games of spring training 2020 starting this week, I decided to mark it by going back to one of our most popular Catches which ended the baseball season in October two years ago. This Catch was first posted on October 1, 2018.
Who would have thought that after 162 major league baseball games with 30 teams there would be four teams with identical records who would have to play one more game to determine who is a division winner and who is a wild card team? It’s never happened before, but it happened this year; so today is game 163 for four teams: the Brewers and the Cubs, and the Dodgers and the Rockies. My Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, like the other 19 teams who are on their way home today, only played their allotted 162 games. Which is plenty.
We’ve got so many of these titles — the Gospel According to Peanuts, The Simpsons, Biff, Mary Magdalene, and of course, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. But of all of them, aside from the actual Gospels in the scriptures, the greatest of them for each one of us is our gospel. Think of it as the Gospel According to Me (which for you would of course be the gospel according to you).
I don’t blame the people who voted for you. I support their right to express themselves, although they have been lied to, and in many cases believed the lies, they are true Americans. I have their back. – Neil Young, in an open letter to Donald Trump
Contrary to what it might look like, this is not a Catch about politics. It’s a Catch about attitude, and about what I wrote about all last week, and what I hope you’ve been talking over and seeking to do with your friends and neighbors — about loving our enemies.
So now that we have all of you with boots on the ground refusing to enter into gossip, rumors, and negative talk with friends about perceived enemies — now that there are so many of you, as Bob has suggested in his comments yesterday, being “loving, gracious, humble, and forgiving until the very end – whether we see results or not,” what do you think is going to happen? Now that many of you will be walking away or at least refusing to take part in conversations that are harmful to others even if they are your enemies, what difference might it make?
John Fischer The Catch 