Obama Walks While Fox Squawks

Not since 1977 has a newly inaugurated President walked Pennsylvania Avenue; Jimmy Carter was the last President to do so until yesterday. President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama got out of their armored Cadillac limo to walk Pennsylvania Avenue in a 15 degree wind chill. The Obamas graciously waved and smiled at the thongs of citizens that gathered to get a glimpse of the world's most powerful couple. While millions of people here and around the world were wishing President Obama well, a bottomless pitcher of haterade was being served up over at Fox News. I caught a somber looking Brit Hume praising the presidency of the outgoing 43rd and Glenn Beck nitpicking the 44th's pragmatic but eloquent inauguration speech. I see it's going to take some people a long time to get over the fact that Barack Obama is our president. Now is as good a time as any because it's going to be a long four years. Hume, Beck and the rest of the haters over at Fox News and beyond, are content to wallow in their divisive, narrow minded politics. They are convinced they know better than the 9 million people who elected Barack Obama by overwhelming popular vote. As Americans, we all have a stake in Obama's success as well as failure, whether they want to acknowledge this or not. At one of the most challenging economic times in American history, President Obama is going to need our support and prayers. Change has obviously come but some people still aren't ready for it.

Overheard at the gym

First, a disclaimer...I would very much prefer not to overhear other people's conversations at the gym. I try to go at least twice a week, three times if I'm lucky, and what I want to do is get in the pool and move. I'm not much of a swimmer, but I used to take water aerobics classes, and now I just go to the pool when I have the opportunity and do "freestyle water aerobics for one". I don't ask for much--I just want my own little spot near a wall where I can just do my thing and tune everybody else out. If conditions are right, that's where I can do some of my best creative thinking. But if people within earshot are having a conversation, then conditions are most definitely not right, and I can't seem tune them out no matter how hard I try. I was actually in the shower, not the pool, so I couldn't see who was talking, but I had passed some older women on the way to the shower. Several of them--I'm guessing at least three--were having a conversation that I kept catching bits and pieces of... "I stayed up way too late last night watching the returns." "So, what do you think?" "I don't knooow!" "Well, our governor has endorsed Clinton." "Boo!" "I'm not ready for a woman president." "Me neither." At this point, I *really* wanted to be able to tune out, because I was afraid I might hear something that would annoy me enough that I'd feel compelled to butt into their discussion. But the water wasn't loud enough to drown them out, so as I finished up my shower, I heard the conversation turn to the subject of women priests, and how one of the women had a friend who is one, but, "something about that is just not right." Also, apparently the women's movement is to blame for "the mess we're in today". Whatever that is. But I wouldn't be sharing this story with you now, if it didn't have a positive twist. Here it comes. One of the women said (paraphrased) "I used to think like that. Then my husband left me when I was 40, and I was totally unprepared to support myself. I vowed that I would never again let myself end up in that situation. ... Sometimes your situation changes, and then you change." I didn't hear what the other women said in response, but inside I was saying "Right on, sister!" Because every day, in small ways we have opportunities to speak up and give the other side of the story. And an alternative perspective, when shared by "someone like you" has a better chance of taking root and possibly, as time goes on, softening (or even changing) some of the judgments people make.

On dialog, debate, and change

I was thinking recently of something I remember Bishop Gene Robinson discussing at a talk he gave on working for the "common good". He was explaining the distinction between debate and dialog, saying that in our society at this point in time, we seem much more likely to engage in debate than in true dialog... When I listen to you, all I'm listening for are your weak points--so that I can come back at your weak points and win this discussion we're having. I'm not listening for your strongest points. I'm not trying to understand where you are, what your experience has been, what makes you think the way you do. I'm just looking for the place that I can pick you apart. So I'm listening for the worst in what you have to say. Wheras in dialog, it seems to me that I'm listening for the best that you have to say, and looking for some kind of common ground that would permit us to move forward together. Along with Gene's remarks, my mind keeps returning to the following piece from a sermon my rector gave a couple weeks ago. I find myself wanting less to call someone a racist or a homophobe or a religious zealout or a suburban escapist than to invite them into a conversation with those who are different from them. If there is hope in our world of endless wars, of school shootings and mall shootings, of crushing debt and poverty, of bigotry and prejudice, then I ma not sure even the most killing of statements from me to those on the other side will effect change. And change is what I want to see and experience. I've been trying, unsuccessfully, to write a post encompassing these two quotes, as well as adding my own reflections, but for one reason or another that hasn't happened yet. But I decided to go ahead and post this anyway, as food for thought.