Lila ~ May 28

 

Memorial Day

I don’t have any ancestors that fought in contemporary wars.  My grandfather had flat feet, and was not drafted.  Who knows?  If he had gone to war, would I or any of my cousins be here today? In the capacity that we are?  

My other grandfather, my father’s father, was in the reserves for the Korean War, but was not sent overseas.  The war ended before he was needed. He was actually in the medical reserves, as he was a doctor, but was never called to duty.   

I am in the DAR, and have qualifications for the UDC.  I have two patriot ancestors that fought in the Revolution, and I have Civil War ancestors who fought for the south.  I don’t glorify them, but I don’t denigrate them either.  Like my cousin Rob said, they are just there, in history.  We just accept that they fought for their cause as they saw fit.  When I was a child, I learned about my colonial ancestors, white Anglo-Saxon protestants. I knew of America's Christian past, but it was never taught to me in a spirit of bigotry.  It was simply just taught to me. 

It wasn’t until later on, that I encountered ultra conservative, right-wing groups that wanted to glorify and deify America’s golden past.  They want to recreate it and re-live it and impose it on everyone else today. 

Last week, I went on a field trip with the 8^th grade to Washington D.C.  We saw the war memorial—WWII, Korea, Vietnam. 

I also saw the memorial for Abraham Lincoln and MLK.  

The next day we went to Arlington National cemetery, and wound our way up to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier, before I had to go back down with a student that fell ill.  

It makes me think of all that our country has stood for.   The American Experiment.  People who were breaking away from the idea of Europe.  People who were breaking away from the autocratic despots and monarchs and against the institutions of the Catholic and Anglican Church. They had a different idea of what the government should look like.  The Reformation and Enlightenment thinkers pulled people out of Feudalism and Catholicism and developed different ideas of what government and church should look like. 

The Protestant Reformation gave people not only the right but the responsibility to read and study the Bible for themselves.  Unlike in the Catholic Church, where power was concentrated in the hands of a few.  Priests and popes ruled over the masses at Mass.   Many Protestant churches had more democratic forms of church governance, and some scholars believe that this influenced the development of democracy. 

I like author Richard Rodriguez’ observations about Protestant Countries versus Catholic ones: 

“Life is hard.  Flesh is weak.  Consolation is in order.  Lapses are allowed for. Catholics have better architecture and sunnier plazas and an easier virtue and are warmer to the touch.  At its best, Catholicism is all-forgiving….

Protestants run cleaner police departments and courts of law than Catholics.  Protestant trains smell better than Catholic trains and they run on time,” (Days of Obligation, Richard Rodriguez, pg. 183).

I love the work of Richard Rodrigeuz, his eloquent and poignant observations of American culture and of his Mexican Catholic upbringing.  What he describes here is correct.  Protestant countries progressed in ways that Catholic countries did not.  They were the first to become democratic and capitalist and the were the first to industrialize.  They had better justice systems and public works systems that work.   

But Protestants are stuffy.  Unlike Catholics, who have a religion that allows people to sin and fall short.  They don’t have to get it right after one trip to the altar, as in evangelicalism.  They have plazas with big murals, they sip coffee and take a mid-day siesta, and take life as it comes. 

In the gospels, Jesus talks about servant leadership.  “The rulers of the gentiles lord it over them, but it should not be so among you.  For he who is greatest among you must be the least, and he who is greatest of all must be the servant of all.” 

Jesus lays down a concept of servant leadership.  The belief that leaders are called to serve with the well-being of the people in mind, not simply for their own self-aggrandizement, as was seen amongst the “Rulers of the Gentiles” of his day.  (It also harkens back to the Torah and Samuel, when God warned the people what would happen if they elected a king.  There were to be limits and restraints upon his power.)  This concept actually leaked into the Christian concept of kingship and government, even prior to the Reformation.  That rulers were to rule justly, and were accountable to God. 

The relationship between religion and political theory has fascinated me and I want to dig deeper. 

I remember going to church in the mid-2000s and the 2010’s.  It was the height of the culture wars.  An attempt to pull us back to America’s golden years.  I still remember people just arguing and fighting over what it meant for the church to be the church, and what perfect “Biblical” government should look like.  People have been arguing about this for 2000 years.  

I’ve since learned to live with acceptance that maybe there’s no perfect Biblical government and there’s no perfect church.  Working so hard to live apart from “the system” didn’t work for me.  Jesus calls people to love one another, regardless of what system they are working in.  There are good systems and better systems, and there are just plain bad systems, but we can still follow that command no matter what. 

 Anyway, thanks to all who fought, to protect our freedoms and to defend our borders, so that we can enjoy peace and prosperity here, that many other countries don't have.