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Change is in the air
The autumn leaves have begun their annual dance. The nights are getting colder and morning begins with the whoosh of warm air from the furnace vents. Ah yes, change is in the air. In more ways than one. Because in two weeks -- oh, let them be short -- we'll know who is to assume the mantle of leadership for the next four years. At long last the political ads, political commentators and the ubiquitous 15-second sound-bites from the candidates will come to an end. That will be a welcome, albeit short, change.
Come January, when new cabinet members are presented and a whole new round of confirmation hearings begin, the political dance will begin, again. Get used to it, after all, in four short years, we get to go through the entire process, all over again.
It has been a particularly grueling campaign it seems, or maybe it's just my age. I don't think President Bush had removed his hand from the Bible on Inauguration Day four years ago before hats began sailing into the ring. I can't even keep track of all of the wannabes, though why anyone would want such a thankless job is beyond me.
Paraphrasing Abraham Lincoln "You can 'please' some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can not 'please' all of the people all of the time." In this day and age, I don't think it is possible to please anyone at any time.
The challenges are enormous. We're at war. We're flat broke (though no one wants to admit that) and sadly, our bankruptcy extends far beyond our financial debts.
In between political ads, breaking news and the occasional TV program, we are assaulted by evidence of our moral bankruptcy, in the form of commercials.
You've seen them. Sassy, disrespectful, disobedient children. Thinly disguised thievery. Unabashed falsehoods. Unapologetic romantic liaisons that come this close to crossing the ever-diminishing line of decency. All to pitch one product or another to a populace that accumulates so much stuff, a room is frequently designated to hold unused, out-of-style, or dare I say it, items broken beyond repair, all to sell at an early summer garage sale. Now, I fully understand that when garage saling the mantra has to be "buyer beware" but this year particularly, we had to just stop going. We were tired of throwing away other people's trash while paying for the privilege.
I love this country. I love what it stands for, I love the dream that is the United States and I admire the vision of the Founding Fathers in establishing a self-rule form of government. How brave they were. And how confident.
I fear their confidence was misplaced, though it has taken generations for that truth to become known.
I've said it before. Regardless of who is elected next month, or how valiantly they try to redirect our headlong rush to destruction, we are their only hope. Because the only way this form of government can survive is if the people themselves are self-disciplined. We exchanged the absolutes that stood for millennia for a newfound relative morality, which, more than any other factor, has become our undoing and has led to our abysmal state of moral bankruptcy. If we would see change, if we would find hope, it is up to each one of us, individually and independently, to return to the core values our forefathers possessed, to seek out again that which we know to be right, that which time and history has taught us is good and proper and righteous. Seek out these character traits, practice them every day, because as a friend recently commented, "Practice makes permanent." And in your seeking, do not fail to honor the source of all truth, the only One who can change the heart of man and make him new.
"But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law." Galatians 5:22, 23 (NIV)
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