What can love do today?

The title of this writing sums up what I learned when I sought to understand President Trump’s sudden involvement in the Kennedy Center.  His actions appeared to be a grudge response. So it was.

The grudge developed during his first term as president.  Three entertainment stars associated with the Kennedy Center refused to attend the annual White House party with the President.  Not only did they refuse to go, they made their intentions and feelings public through the media.  This, in turn, resulted in the cancellation of the event, which had been an annual celebration and community building experience for many years.  Ah.  Now I see, it is payback time.

I understand being distraught by the times and the political climate. Completely.  I often feel that I am having a very bad dream – that the violent actions being taken by the President just cannot be real. But, of course, they are.

Try this emotion and thought experiment.  Suppose you are a clerk in one of the yearly meetings of the Religious Society of Friends.  President Trump invites all the clerks of yearly meetings to attend a reception at the White House.  What do you do? Please settle at this moment and consider this in worship.

Now consider this: George Fox met with the Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell twice.  He wrote to King Charles with advice, which with at least one point he may have had influence (the release ordered by King Charles of 700 Quakers from jail). 

Fox was not interested in attacking people.  He did not attack or destroy to gain notice in the press.  He did not draw a line he would refuse to cross or dare someone to cross; rather he opened the circle as if to say: What are you afraid of? 

Fox was not about polarization. He was about realizing unification based on the recognition that a bit of God exists in everyone.  That bit makes unification possible. No matter how serious the disagreements might be, we are made with the possibility of unification on matters. 

If Quaker clerks declined to go, if they insulted Trump, what good could possibly come of that?  Fox spoke early and often.  He knew that there was always a chance that Spirit speaking through him might change even the toughest of critics.  He touched Oliver Cromwell, and perhaps King Charles as well.  He touched untold numbers of people.  Not only did he make himself present and available to people in power, he was accustomed to speaking truth to them in ways that they might hear.

Clearly there are stands Quakers take.  We stand for truth, for peace, for mercy and justice, and for the hope of guidance from the Spirit in the life of every human being. Many have taken stands in situations of white-hot attack.  Walking away has not been an option.  Courage and self-control are called for.  They were then and they are today.

In reality, it is beyond unlikely that the clerks of yearly meetings will be invited to meet the President.  But in reality, I think it is valuable for us to think about our reactions, our language and our positions.  Are we available to speak with hopes of being heard by anyone and everyone?  Do we speak and carry ourselves in ways that keep doors to possible reconciliation open? Do we honor the possibility that we may be called to speak truth to power, and do we keep ourselves postured to be available to do that (rather than reacting in harmony with many others)?  Do we encourage in our conversation the possible, unification on – if nothing else – what we share in the transcendent divine?

If we react in conversations, whether to join the energy of others in an affirming way, or to feel the warmth of being part of the upset, criticizing group, are we giving room to Spirit? There is that bit of God.  The way is to seek an opening, and the hope is for an opening.

Be imitators, be exemplars, we have been exhorted. Let us see what love can do [William Penn].  Miracles are always possible.  Peace is always possible. Mercy and reconciliation are always possible.