"2018"

“2018”

            January is named after the Roman god Janus, a personage who had two faces:  one looking back and one looking forward.  It is a good name for the first month of the year – looking back at the year that has just passed and looking forward to the new one.  2017 was quite a year.  It was the first year of my retirement, and I must say that I enjoyed it.  I missed the people of Oakhurst Presbyterian (I’m not allowed to return there for a good while yet), but I did not miss the meetings or the stress.  And in this terrible cold snap, I have not missed worrying about pipes freezing or heat failing in the old building.  Many thanks to Dave Hess, who lessened my fears considerably over the last few years about heating issues at Oakhurst.  They are still in the search process for a new senior pastor, so please keep them in your thoughts and prayers.

            On a national level, many of us exhaled that we kept out of a major war for 2017, but the presidency of Donald Trump has been a unmitigated disaster and disgrace.  When he got elected in November, 2016, I consoled myself a bit that he seemed like Ross Barnett or George Wallace or Orval Faubus, all Southern governors who were racist and oppressive, but we made it through them.  I also told myself that the Trump era would likely be like the Reagan era, but I must admit that Reagan looks so much better in comparison to Trump.  It took me awhile to realize that Trump was a continuing voice of the Reagan Revolution, in which angry white people sought to turn back the clock to regain the “rightful” place of white males ruling the world.  And, then to add Trump’s deep insecurities and narcissism, and we have a very dangerous person as President in a very dangerous time.

            The Republicans in control of Congress remind me of the Democrats in power in the South in the 1890’s and in Congress in the first half of the 20^th century.  They seem interested only in gaining power and in the repression of those who are poor and those who are not classified as “white,” all leading up to the continued and even enhanced domination of the rich.  The heinous tax cuts passed at the end of 2017 will be a lasting legacy of this imprint, and it sounds like 2018 will be a year when they will seek to cut benefits for poor and middle class and turn Medicare, Medicaid and even Social Security from their “community” orientation to an expression of more individualism.  Programs like Social Security were never meant to enhance the “individual.”  They were meant to build up the common good, all the while assisting individuals. 

            So, on these levels, 2018 looks like a grim year.  There are signs of hope, however – the Democratic victories in Virginia, New Jersey, Georgia, and Alabama offer us some hope of a substantial change in the November elections.  Voter turnout will be a key, and here we have a lot of work to do.  A friend of mine posted on her FaceBook page that her state of Tennessee ranks last in the nation in voter turnout, and I know that it is low all over the country.  That will definitely have to change, and it is relatively easy to do – mainly folk like us getting friends and strangers to vote.  Key folk are young people who seem to see no point in voting, and I hope that the election of Donald Trump has disabused them of this notion.   Young people are also part of this sign of hope – many of them seem to be in disbelief that we are where we are, and many of them are leading protests around the country.  The hopeful breakthrough of women’s voices is also a sign of hope.  What we have seen is only the tip of the iceberg, but at least people are beginning to speak up and are not totally dismissed.  These are among the signs of hope, and we should all be working to keep our society from reverting back to the 1890’s where repression and racism and sexism rooted themselves in our collective hearts for the next 70 years.  Let us not repeat that scenario.

            It remains a dangerous time.  As the revelations about obstruction of justice increase for Donald Trump, he will likely seek to take over the Department of Justice, and he will definitely take us into a major war.  His lack of self-esteem will not allow him to take the revelations that will be coming this year.  I don’t know if a Republican congress will be up for impeachment, but the revelations may be “criminal” enough that they will have no choice.  And, if the Democrats can win both houses of Congress, they can impeach him,  though a 2/3 vote in the Senate seems unlikely.   As we look backwards and forwards here in January, 2018 will be  momentous year in American history.  Let us work so that the arc can move back towards justice in this new year.