It’s appropriate for us to breathe out a sigh of relief.
But then immediately re-oxygenate ourselves for an uphill effort to restore our democracy after all the damage it has suffered. The next would-be demagogue will be much more cunning than the current one. And the Republicans have made the erosion of democratic institutions part of their unwritten platform. Surely they will devise many more voter-suppression schemes in the states they control, through gerrymandering, reduced access to vote-by-mail, etc - all in the name of preventing the “voter fraud” they have cynically confabulated. It is frightful to see a political party, once worthy of respect if not allegiance, fall into such depravity.
January 20th will be a big day, but only the first in a long haul.
What can progressive Christians contribute to the cause of resurrecting democratic values in America? I hope this question stirs in us this season.
Because it has to do with Christmas.
To save democracy, surely we must get the facts straight. We must help our fellow citizens sort out which sources of information are reliable and which are not. The ubiquity of misinformation has proven disastrous, as abundantly revealed in this election cycle and its aftermath. (Perhaps our progressive churches should start 12-step groups for people recovering from addiction to Fox and OneAmerica and NewsMax.) There ought to be lively debates in a healthy democracy about how to stop and reverse the factual reality of human-caused catastrophic climate change. There is plenty of room for disagreement about how to solve the problem. But to deny that the problem exists is to replace facts with bad myths. And that’s what the Republicans have done.
So to save democracy, surely we must get our myths as straight as the facts. Because a good myth can move our hearts to create and sustain a beloved community.
Christmas is a myth. And a mighty fine one. I would argue that it is foundational for democracy.
It is the potent story of a king, the Prince of Peace, born not in a palace but outdoors in a rude manger. Not a normal dictator who rules by force, but a completely different kind of leader whose only power is the attractive pull of divine Love.
There is no tyranny in the power of Jesus. It’s up to you – it’s up to me – it’s up to "we the people" – whether or not to walk his path of unconditional compassion. Thus the myth of Christmas lowers heaven to earth and raises the human to the divine. The Messiah was born to humble peasants in a stable, reflecting the fact that you and I are endowed with the shared capacity to assume the temporal throne.
And that means choosing our leaders by majority vote. There’s no other way to reflect our will as a people. No other way to collectively legitimize our individual authority.
The King of kings lies in a manger of straw outside of Bethlehem. In a crib in a tract home in the suburbs of Des Moines. On a sofa in a mobile home in Florida. In a cardboard box in a tent on Skid Row.
Not in a down-padded crèche in a suite in Mar-a-Lago.
The myth of the Republicans is that the leader is a big shot who dominates others, and that you as an individual ought to aspire to be and do the same. It is not about democracy. It is an Amway pyramid scheme.
The myth of Christmas is that the leader of the people is one of the people who organizes the people to build a divine kin-dom of kindness. The myth of Christmas is that together, we the people can create and sustain the common good.
The Republican version of Christianity is the “prosperity gospel” of a super-powerful, supernatural God who bestows favor on those who go with his program, who then bestow favor on those who go with their program.
The Christmas version of Christianity is the gospel of the humbled God of the manger and the cross. A God of unconditional love by all, for all, regardless of pomp, pretense, or the lack thereof. A God incarnate in each human soul – each created equal, endowed with unalienable rights.
If Christmas is the humble myth we live by, then we’ll be humble enough to submit to the facts of our world, however challenging and inconvenient they may be. We’ll vote for leaders who take pandemic science seriously, and we’ll wear our masks and keep our distance until the vaccines are widely distributed.
And most critically, we’ll rise up to perfect and defend our democratic institutions. We’ll amend the Constitution to eliminate the loophole-ridden Electoral College so we can have direct national-level voting by the majority for the presidency. We’ll end gerrymandering, in which entrenched politicians choose their voters: we’ve had quite enough of minority rule in this country. We’ll make voting easy and accessible to all. We’ll pay for principled journalism by subscribing to reputable media outlets. We’ll gently but firmly guide our friends and relatives away from consumption of propaganda and conspiracy theories. We’ll choose our myths carefully and seek the facts continually. We’ll make sure our children get educated in the principles and systems of democracy.
The massive turnout at the election, and its 7,000,000-vote margin, should give us hope for the future of our democracy. Let it be the star that guides us as we move forward - driven by sacred myth, finding our way by facing facts.