PILGRIM NOTES

I've come to wonder whether we have sometimes built the walls around our belief systems so high that agreement has become a condition of belonging. And if that's true, listening to God becomes more costly than we might imagine. Because what happens if I really ask God to correct me—and he does? What happens if the people I love don't change with me? What happens if I no longer fit comfortably among the people who helped give me my identity?

My vote. The candidates I support. The policies I advocate. The causes to which I give my time and money. Even the way I regard people whose politics I find objectionable. All of it must be subject to the same question I ask about the rest of my life: Is this what God wants of me? And perhaps there is another question beneath that one: What is my influence actually serving? Is it serving the purposes of God as I understand them—love of neighbor, truth, justice, mercy, human d

Looking back, I realize my civic conscience—love for God, love for neighbor, and gratitude for the privilege of living in a free society—was being developed at home, at school, and at church. Long before I had the right to vote, I had the freedom to ask questions, debate ideas, and discover that citizenship requires participation, not merely observation. I'm deeply thankful for the people who taught me that.

When fear searches for an explanation, simple stories become attractive. Some point to immigration, religious pluralism, ethnic groups, or political opponents. Whether these explanations contain elements of truth or not, they often reduce a complicated cultural transformation to a single villain. Fear rarely tolerates complexity. It searches for someone to blame. And once fear has identified an enemy, taking back political control begins to look like the obvious solution.