Saturday, January 16, 2021

Parker J. Palmer: The Arc of MAGA and MLK, Jr. Day

Beautifully, powerfully, wisely said. Thank you Parker Palmer for your strong voice of wisdom and truth! The essence of his words here embody the horrors and the heartbreaks of our times — and the heartfelt hope that we will learn its lessons and respond with courage and fierce love.

May we all choose to actively work together to cultivate the Beloved Community that our nation and our world has so long yearned for. Molly
 

The Arc of MAGA and MLK, Jr. Day
Sometimes, history hands us images that trace the arc of complex events in ways that sear the souls of those who have eyes to see. Think of the photos we’ve seen of hundreds of thousands of mesmerized Germans idolizing Hitler, alongside horrific photos of the victims of Nazi death camps.
For me, the images shown here reveal the arc of MAGA. One shows troops attaching rolls of razor wire to the wall that separates Nogales, Arizona, from Nogales, Mexico. In early 2020, I saw that razor wire with my own eyes, and saw all the scraps of clothing snagged on it. It was not hard to imagine what had happened to the bodies of the hungry, homeless, hunted men, women, and children who tried to gain entry to this “land of opportunity.” I cannot unsee any of this...
The second image shows rolls of razor wire that U.S. troops have attached this week to the metal barriers erected in D.C. Their purpose is to protect our democratic institutions—and the people elected to serve in them—from violent attacks by American citizens during a Presidential Inauguration. I worked in D.C. for five years, and this image sickens me. No one should be able to unsee it.
So here we are, after four years of #45’s reign of error and terror. The “credit” for this avoidable catastrophe goes to him, his enablers in the administration, and his mesmerized adherents across this land. When we try to wall out the world and truth itself with razor wire, we end up cutting ourselves. As the blood flows, the perps hide in the White House, or behind silence, or behind self-serving “resignations,” or behind outrage that anyone would question their demented beliefs (see the Proud Boys, QAnon, and many others).
On Jan. 18, we mark Martin Luther King Jr. Day. There would have been no surprises here for MLK: Black Americans have been bleeding from the razor wire of white supremacy ever since America enslaved Africans to build our economy, having established a genocidal campaign to steal this land from its Native peoples.
This time around, can we honor not only MLK’s pastoral voice but his prophetic voice? Can we celebrate and emulate his justified anger, his fierce advocacy for the disinherited of every race, his devout desire to save white people from the living death created by their own hardness of heart?
Can we live into a courageous form of love that calls out all lies, cruelty, and cowardice for the sake of the common good? Can we stand up for the fact that President-elect Joe Biden and Vice President-Elect Kamala Harris received 7,000,000 more votes than their opponents in an exhaustively vetted election that no one has the right to call “rigged”?
We who stand by truth and justice far outnumber mesmerized MAGA adherents who want to razor-wire this nation to keep out all that threatens their toxic ideology and/or privilege. Can those of us who are part of this increasingly un-silent majority work together, so that four years from now we can contrast today's image of razor wire in D.C. with an image that speaks of MLK’s Beloved Community?
That question is up for grabs. The answer is up to us.
 
 

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