Today is Easter. I’ll get to that. But first an apology.
Last Sunday’s post (The Strangest Dream) disturbed some readers. It was intended as satire, which is “the use of humor, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people’s stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics.”
Some readers didn’t see it that way.
Some saw the humor but thought it was in poor taste. Democracy is under serious threat. And that’s not funny.
Some thought I was advocating violence to save the United States from MAGA. In my dream, Biden, taking advantage of his opponent’s claim that the president has “full and absolute immunity from any crimes while in office,” shot his opponent dead and then, in quick order, assassinated certain notorious icons from the obnoxious right. In my dream, they, not immigrants, were the ones “poisoning American blood.”
(Ha! Good one!)
Some thought I had made coolheaded Biden out to be a closeted tyrant, untrustworthy, sinister. In my dream, he ruled America like a king, but benevolently. “You can call me Uncle Joe.”
(Ha! Good one. Do I detect a subtle reference to Joseph “Uncle Joe” Stalin?)
Actually, I thought the piece was ludicrous—and funny—with an edge. Nevertheless, I don’t want to make things worse for anyone barely hanging on in these stressful times. And if I did, I am sorry.
These are troubling times.
In fact, one reader, a self-avowed Christian, confessed that she’d leave the country if the antichrist is reelected. And that led me to think of Dietrich Bonhoeffer.
Bonhoeffer was a German pastor. During the rise of Hitler, he was a student in the United States. He could have remained here. But he returned to be with his people in their troubling time—to stand with them against the horror.
Bonhoeffer wrote The Cost of Discipleship (1939). Jesus, he said, calls us to take up our cross daily and follow him, to make good trouble in troubling times, to stand courageously against injustice while (somehow) loving our enemies.
Participate, don’t spectate!
Bonhoeffer died daily with Jesus and rose daily with Jesus to confront injustice with love and courage. He joined the resistance. For that he was hanged at age 39 on April 9, 1945.
Today is Easter. Let love arise. Take hope. Take joy. Be fully alive. Jesus rises daily in the hearts of countless souls making good trouble.
