"Put Not Your Trust In Rulers..."
Thanks very much, Psalm 146. But in the meantime...
Dear Friends,
I’ve been learning how to drive recently. I am in my mid-30s and this is something I have put off for as long as humanly possible. It is a combination of impractical and unfair for my wife to remain the only driver in our house. But that doesn’t mean I need to enjoy the process.
Now, to be fair to myself, the driving is going pretty well. I drove us to my job a little over a week ago, taking advantage of the slower Sunday morning traffic on the 45 minute route between our house and the parish where I work. But when I logged on to speak to my therapist the next day, I was assessing the state of my anxiety and my general temperament.
“I’m trying to only be anxious about what is immediately in front of me,” I told her. “And I’m leaning on the way I usually do things – that I don’t get overly excited or hopeful about something I don’t know the outcome of.”
Perhaps you can see where I am going with this.
Particularly with the ability to vote early or by mail, I was setting aside my election anxiety as much as possible in the last few weeks. I didn’t need to think about making my way to the polls on Election Day because I had already voted. I live in a deep blue state. There was nothing more to be done.
And, in the back of my mind, I can see my hopeful self eight years ago, when my wife and I drove my grandmother and her sister to our local polling place in New York. When we were confident until we woke up the next morning.
Sometimes I think back and I am so grateful that my first presidential election was what it was: an absentee ballot sent home to New York from my college dorm, ushering in Obama’s first term. One of my sisters is voting for the first time in this election. The other voted for the first time in the previous one. Both in Florida. It’s a very different mood.
As I write this, there’s no longer another anxiety I can set before myself to focus on. I imagine most of you are in the same boat. (And knowing what I do about the entanglements of international politics, I send my apologies to my handful of international readers who have to be unduly concerned about the United State’s presidential election.) But what more can we do besides vote faithfully and pray?
It’s one of those times when I want to trust in God. This week’s Track 2 Psalm selection, for example, is at first glance exactly what we need -
Psalm 146
1 Hallelujah!
Praise the Lord, O my soul! *
I will praise the Lord as long as I live;
I will sing praises to my God while I have my being.
2 Put not your trust in rulers, nor in any child of earth, *
for there is no help in them.
3 When they breathe their last, they return to earth, *
and in that day their thoughts perish.
4 Happy are they who have the God of Jacob for their help! *
whose hope is in the Lord their God;
5 Who made heaven and earth, the seas, and all that is in them; *
who keeps his promise for ever;
6 Who gives justice to those who are oppressed, *
and food to those who hunger.
7 The Lord sets the prisoners free;
the Lord opens the eyes of the blind; *
the Lord lifts up those who are bowed down;
8 The Lord loves the righteous;
the Lord cares for the stranger; *
he sustains the orphan and widow,
but frustrates the way of the wicked.
9 The Lord shall reign for ever, *
your God, O Zion, throughout all generations.
Hallelujah!
(Or enjoy it as a jaunty little folks tune - )
And yet! This is the big picture, the eternal one. It’s not terribly helpful on its own, here and now. The Lord does care for the stranger and the widow and does command us to do the same. And yes, earthly rulers are little more than dust like the rest of us. But to not worry about those rulers is to fail to care for the stranger and the widow. It’s to ignore the way powers of structure are constituted and function in the here and now.
Bless friends of the newsletter, And Also With You pod for doing an episode on Christian political hope this week because this is definitely not my area of expertise.
I know many of our churches are open for prayer this week or holding space for us to be in community, and I’m sure many of us are also inclined to stay in our homes and a pace the floors. Perhaps you need some Election Day prayer stations you can use at home to anchor your time, even if they just give you five minutes away from staring at exit polls each hour.
Maybe you need to run to you closest bookstore to track down a copy of the Rev. Elizabeth Ashman Riley’s Rage Prayers because I think we already have enough reasons to be angry about this process, whatever the outcome. Maybe you have older kids who are feeling the anxiety, who have heard the hateful rhetoric, who want to add their own rage to the fire.
I am watching my friends on social media reach out into the world in their own ways. Making soup and inviting the neighbors to share. Ordering yarn for a new project.
Antidotes for Anxiety
Like I said above, I am not an expert on Christian political hope. I am not an expert on any kind of hope, honestly. But I AM an expert on being anxious. And on living inside of the anxiety. (My credentials: a formal anxiety diagnosis that is old enough to legally drink.) So come on in.
I am not going to offer you anything profound for your program planning this week because we all need to keep our heads above water to plan anything. Instead, a few things for keeping your footing, no matter what happens:
Turn on some music. I was recently recalling that as a teenager, when I was panicking, I would sing Seek Ye First very quietly to myself. I don’t know how it started, but it’s true and it was an anchor. After the 2016 election, I made two playlists for a friend: Hope and Strength. I confess I really like making playlists, so these mini lists were a gift for her and for me. I don’t care if you opt to blast hair metal or Chappell Roan all day/week.
Speaking of hope, here’s an October 2020 throwback to very early Wiggles & Wonder, featuring St. Augustine’s wise words: “Hope has two beautiful daughters; their names are Anger and Courage. Anger at the way things are, and Courage to see that they do not remain as they are.” That was definitely in the days of desperate clawing for hope, so it seems fitting to revisit.
Can I commend Stress/Anxiety Baking to you? Again, this is the sort of thing that got a lot of early pandemic press as all the bags of flour disappeared off of shelves, but I’d been on to this one for several years. Anxiety baking works for a number of reasons, but as someone who has undertaken Dialectical Behavioral Therapy, one of the skills that helped me manage distress more effectively than almost any other was one termed “mastery.” It’s simply doing something that makes you feel in control because you can do it fully and competently to completion. I used to keep boxes of baking mix in my pantry for when I needed an outlet. Maybe you’re predicting enough distress that your family needs to plan a bake sale this week. My church doesn’t have an industrial kitchen like many, but if yours does, maybe it’s time to bake for the next few weeks of coffee hour.
Panda Cam. (Or koala/hippo/penguin…) Need I say more?
Of course, in all of this, we can visit with our anxiety. We can do our best to set a trap for hope. And we can keep each other company.
I’ll be back to my normal content next week (hopefully). Until then, what are your practices for wading through the anxiety?
Peace,
Bird