I don’t know if anyone has mentioned this to you, but today is what’s known as “election day” and if you haven’t voted already, it seems you can go and cast a ballot for who you would like to be the next president. Well, not exactly who you would like, that person probably isn’t running. Anyway, I hope I haven’t shocked you or anything. Maybe you live under a literal or metaphorical rock and don’t know that today is supposed to be the apocalypse.
On the other hand, maybe you do know that today is supposed to be awful, and are seriously freaking out, and don’t even know what to do with yourself. Well, fret no longer! The Religion News Service has got in touch with a spiritual sort of person, who has lots of spiritual thoughts about things, and she has prepared herself to stand in the gap with some “Spiritual Self-Care” for election day.
What she’ll need Tuesday (Nov. 3) as she awaits the result is what she has described as “spiritual Xanax” — something to keep her from watching news coverage all day, to help her stay focused and remember what’s important.
Who is this that is doing this lovely thing? Nadia Bolz-Weber. It’s going to be a live event:
Her offering, “Keeping It Together on Election Day,” gathers all the different people and perspectives she said she wants to hear from on Tuesday. What has been helpful for her is taking a bigger perspective, realizing humans have experienced all kinds of suffering. “If you’re going to be accessing poetry and prayer and meditation and mantras, you’re sort of drawing upon the wealth of those who’ve come before us and accessing their wisdom and whatever kept them on track and kept them together,” she said. The public theologian and ordained Lutheran pastor in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America has organized a group of faith leaders from across religious traditions to share a prayer, a joke, anything “centering and calming and helpful” — she’s not sure what exactly everybody has planned — for a few minutes at the top of each hour on Tuesday. She’ll stream their interactions from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Eastern time on Instagram Live, where she goes by @sarcasticlutheran.
I like that—“public theologian.” That’s what we need in times like this. Celebrity sorts of spiritual-ish people who soothe and calm us, who administer spiritual Xanax. Like Jen Hatmaker, who spent many minutes yesterday reminding her tribe that if they sign up for the Jen Hatmaker Book Club—the community you need right now—you get not only the book and the stickers but also the T-shirt. Life is so tough, and maybe you can’t cope.
I guess I’m fascinated by the idea that we can’t cope, that this election is so unprecedented and terrible, and that life is so unfathomable, that the thing you need now is to hunker down with your self-care and your snuggly and just try not to cry. And really, one might wonder. I happened to see this picture yesterday and was truly moved, almost to tears myself, by the hopeless misery in the eyes of these young women. They are in despair. Their bodies are despoiled. Their minds are ruined. And they are so young—and, what do you call it…rich.
It strikes me as strange and curious that it is mostly rich and privileged people who are deeply and terribly unmoored in this unprecedented time. It is the ones who had education and possibility at their disposal who are the most unglued. It is surprising to me, honestly, because other places are having elections today, ones that are dubious at best, and, though there is deep unhappiness and even violence on offer, as I’ve watched the news, I see anger and emotions like that, but not really despair, which seems to be the thing that a lot of Americans are feeling.
Despair, I would say, which—when you have everything you need, and the opportunity to participate in the civic life of a country, and all kinds of financial and social safety nets, and a free education if you will take it—is decadent.
And by decadent I mean unnecessary. There are ways to pull yourself together without rushing into the arms of Rachel Hollis. The Christian call over and against the “spiritual” and “self-care” one is to face facts about yourself—that you need help—and turn purposefully and hopefully to the one who can give that help. That would be God if you’re still confused. God is our hope, our very present help in times of trouble. No matter what happens to you, when you put yourself in his hands, he will help you and keep you. Though your body be destroyed, though your money be snatched away, though your truck be stolen, though your dreams and plans be dashed, though your candidate lose, though you run out of your meds, he will not abandon you to Sheol. You can trust him.
So, vote, if you feel like it. But if you don’t want to vote, that’s fine. But don’t self-medicate. Don’t feel sorry for yourself. Don’t despair. There’s probably some Halloween candy lying around not so you can eat your feelings, but so that you can rejoice that God is not surprised by how foolish and decadent we are and provided a way for us to have true and abundant life no matter what is happening in the voting booth or with the rona. Have a nice day!
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