Shabbat Sermon, November 9, 2024 - On the Election

On Wednesday morning, I woke up admittedly a little later than normal because it was my day off.  However, I noticed a remarkable event – the sun came up just like on every other day!  I went out shopping, and observed that the foliage was looking remarkably beautiful this year.  I stopped into the stores and the price of eggs – were the same as last week! And Christmas displays were up, 2 months early, just like they were supposed to be!  It was a perfectly normal Wednesday! 

And that was the problem. 

For America had just elected a man with dementia, who repeatedly confused basic details and facts, believed that 200% tariffs would benefit the American consumer and lied about everything else, including his denial of sexually assaulting women.  Yet America found this person worthy to be president once again, despite his tremendous failures the first time. 

But otherwise, things were pretty normal. 

And this is the danger.  Because the fascist party that has now taken over Congress is not going to force us to put pictures of the dear leader up in our homes, it is not going to deputize black shirt militias or shut down the free press on the first day they take over.  But over time they will impose their plans to destroy the welfare economy, seeking to modify it with the intention of ending Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid.  They will attempt in some way to show they are forcing migrants out of the country, no matter how much pain and sorrow it causes families and communities.  Women’s health care will continue to suffer with no competent substitution for the ACA. 

And most of us won’t be aware of what is happening because it won’t affect us.  But then one day it will hit home and we will be like, What is this?  How did people let this happen?

Before the election, I was a daily reader of Hopium Chronicles by Simon Rosenberg.  Reading his comments and assessment as well as all the folks who were part of his group – about 100,000 readers – it was very uplifting.  People were working hard for the Harris campaign.  I spent several days making phone calls, but other people spent hours and hours canvassing.  The ground game was really impressive and Harris seemed to be gaining momentum in the final days of the campaign.  But in the election 30 million voters who voted in 2020 decided not to show up.  Even Trump did significantly worse than in 2020.  I won’t speculate here why.  But immediately my thoughts were drawn to the prophet Isaiah.

Every day I study Torah and one of my current studies is the book of Isaiah. In chapter 58 and 59 of Isaiah, which we are familiar with because it forms the core of our haftarah for Yom Kippur, the people of Israel are frustrated.  They have been released from Babylonian captivity, they have been given permission by the Persian conquerors to return to their homeland.  Yet as they return, things are not going well.  People are cheating one another and exploiting each other.  Poverty is everywhere.  And the returnees are angry.  They have done what they were encouraged to do, return home, begin to rebuild Israel, seeking God and living by the Covenant.  But the conditions have not improved.  They cry out to the prophet, “Why, when we fasted, did You not see? When we starved our bodies, did You pay no heed?”… “We hope for light, and lo! there is darkness; For a gleam, and we must walk in gloom.” “We moan like doves.  We hope for redress, and there is none”.

But the prophet responds “Where have you been all this time?  You thought starving your body was what God wanted?  No, it was so much harder than what you thought was enough”. 

Most of us believe that democracy happens every four years.  Like the good Samaritan who spends all day on Thanksgiving feeding people at a homeless shelter, when people are starving every day of the year, most of us get heavily involved with elections the months before a Presidential election.  But democracy, to work, is a daily endeavor. It is hard work.  No, it is very hard work because it requires people to accept that 300 million individuals with a myriad of needs have to work together with respect to their differences to create a society that meets the basic needs of 300 million different types of people. There is a story that I am sure we have all heard, that upon exiting the Constitutional Convention, Benjamin Franklin was approached by a group of citizens asking what sort of government the delegates had created. His answer was: "A republic, if you can keep it." 

While the anti-democratic and illiberal forces pursue their goals relentlessly winning state houses, developing plans to put right wing judges on federal benches when possible, and organizing their supporters to flood open city, county and state meetings (remember the violent outbursts at local congressional meetings before the ACA was voted on or to undermine mask wearing during COVID?), we liberals watched the news and said, wait until the next election.  Because polls show repeatedly that liberal policies and concerns are overwhelmingly popular.  But how many of us are involved between elections in organizations that are promoting these policies and pushing local government to make changes?

And as Vice President Harris said in her concession speech, sometimes change takes longer than we would like.  Nikki Lipschultz compared the work of organizing for change, at one of our We Make Indiana meetings, with seeding rhizomes in the ground, they are out of sight until they burst forth and one can’t imagine where all the plants came from. 

In our Torah portion this week, Avram is called by God to go to a Land he knows nothing about with a very tempting promise: I will make of you a great nation, And I will bless you; I will make your name great, And you shall be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you And curse him that curses you; And all the families of the earth Shall bless themselves by you.” And off Avram goes to fulfill this holy mission.  Within about 15 minutes of reaching this Promised Land there is a famine and he has to take his wife and leave for Egypt to survive, during which time he is almost killed and his wife kidnapped.  He returns to Israel and for over 10 years, the key promise, that he will father a nation, produces bupkis.  Finally with Hagar, the handmaiden he produces a son, but it turns out it’s the wrong kind of son.  Not the one God has promised him.  Eventually a miracle birth occurs, Isaac, the right son is born but God tells him he has to slaughter him.  In the end Isaac is saved, Isaac marries and when Avraham dies at 175 years old, he is the proud grandfather of two kids.  Where is the nation?  Not only this but God tells Avraham in our Torah portion this morning that his descendants will suffer for 400 years in another land before everything works out.  Meanwhile Avraham’s brother fathers 12 children, the symbolic number for nationhood, his son Ishmael, the wrong son, fathers 12 children to reach nation status, even Esau, the wrong grandson, will reach nation status before Avraham’s suitable descendants.  Nevertheless Avraham did what was right and good, and patiently followed the plan that God had promised, which came to fruition.  How hard it must have been for Avraham to stay true to a plan that was constantly saddled with obstacles and failure?

And that is what we, whether one voted for Harris or Trump, who dearly care about democracy in this country, a country whose democratic and meritocratic promises have been so important to us Jewish Americans, must be willing to do and to endure. 

So, what shall we do?

First, keep smiling – the great rabbi Shammai taught, Greet everyone with a pleasant countenance. This teaches that if a person gives his friend all the finest gifts in the world, but does so with a pained face, Scripture considers it as if he had given him nothing. But one who receives his friend with a smile, even if he gives him nothing, Scripture considers it as if he had given him all the finest gifts in the world.  Smiling to those we greet gives the world around us and ourselves a confidence that we can weather any challenge. 

As Abraham Joshua Heschel said, I am an optimist, despite myself.  I feel the same way.  Before the election I feared that this could be the end of America as we know it.  But now I feel only if we give up on it.

Next, join a group that gives meaning to life.  Make daily prayer and joining minyan a regular practice.  Not because we can sway elections through prayer – believe me, I tried really hard and it did not work – but because to be part of a group of people who are all committed to be together not for entertainment, not to make a buck, not for enjoyment but to grow spiritually, helps one grow spiritually. 

And join a group or volunteer your time to a project or an organization that is working to uphold democracy and liberal welfare policies all the time, not just 6 months before a presidential election. We Make Indiana is about making change locally.  We can’t save Ukraine, we won’t be able to enact a national safe gun policy, but we can demand that the local police protect our immigrant neighbors, that money is budgeted for mental health, that zoning laws protect the environment, and that the library not ban books because of religious fundamentalist fears.  Join our Sinai team and commit yourself to being a larger part of local democracy in action.

Join Democracy Docket or Project Democracy.  Or choose a concern of yours and give of your time – maybe your issue is gun safety, or environment or worker’s rights.  All of these areas are targeted by the recently elected fascist party. 

And lastly, there will be many articles offering advice on self-care.  While this is important, we don’t want to be too hysterical because it is very hard to do good work when we are hysterical, let’s see if we can limit the self-care option and focus more on other-care, that is helping other folks, be it an elderly neighbor, a school kid who can use a big brother, a food bank or food kitchen.  Because the way to personally respond to the amount of collective hate that his government will promote is to express an increase in love.

As Robert Fulghum, author of All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten, wrote in a different book, It was on Fire When I Lay Down On It, “The line between good and evil, hope and despair does not divide the world between ‘us’ and ‘them’.  It runs down the middle of every one of us.  I do not want to talk about what you understand about his world.  I want to know what you will do about it.  I do not want to know what you hope.  I want to know what you will work for… As the wagon driver said when they came to a long hard hill, “Them that’s going on with us, get out and push.  Them that ain’t, get out of the way.”