Tomorrow, life will go on.
Teachers will return to their oversized classrooms filled with immigrant students whose lives have been suddenly upended, and millions of Evangelicals will wait expectantly for the Republican President and Republican-controlled House and Senate to deliver on their pro-life promises.
And life will go on.
I am told it’s in the name of small government. I’m told it’s in the name of the unborn. I’m told it’s in the name of jobs. Religious freedom. Less taxes.
But I believe in a God that does not see the world through a political lens. I believe in a God that would protect not only the unborn but also the lives of my Latino students, many of whom face permanent separation from their mothers, fathers, sisters, and brothers if the President-elect actually does what he has threatened.
I believe in a God that has given us all free will, including those who are Muslim.
I believe in a God that despises sexism and misogyny as much as he does any act of sexual sin.
I believe in a God that is holy. I believe in a God that would hold up all of morality as precious. I believe in a God that would not pick, choose, and rationalize, as our Evangelical church would have us do.
When I was a little girl, I would sit in sermons, and the pastor would say things like, “If only every Evangelical in America voted, can you imagine what changes our country would see?”
I don’t know if every Evangelical voted today, but given the polls, I think we have our answer. And if this type of weak, compromising, power-grabbing culture is what the Evangelical church represents, then I am not an Evangelical. Perhaps I never was.
But life will go on. I will mourn for my teacher friends who are still in Oklahoma, working 2 to 3 jobs just to survive. I will mourn for my students, whose futures are suddenly uncertain. I will mourn for my country, which after four hundred years has still not solved our greatest blemish. I will mourn for my church, which has forgotten that we serve a God greater than any political party.
And life will go on. I believe in a God whose kingdom is not of this world, so what can I expect from this world but grief? I will do good where evil reins and have mercy where enmity lives.
And life will go on.
