Life Parsings

Resounding Independence Day

It is the weekend of the 250^th birthday of the USA. Like many other Americans, I suppose, my celebration of “America” is not so much muted as transmuted. The soundings of America to me are changed, as are my soundings in return.

Muted: What I Do Not Celebrate

I’m not celebrating that democracy or this republic — a term that ignorance insists is an opposing correction to the former — are thriving. Choose whatever term, democracy or republic. Neither is thriving. The body and very idea of American democracy are on life support. The colors that compose the “all” of the proclamation of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are whitewashed in the bad faith of legalia and executive orders.

I’m not celebrating that the torchlight of liberty, democracy, and justice is shining bright for all people. It isn’t. Foreign policy now is premised on slandering allies, removing life support, embracing strongmen, and immolating emolument clauses. Domestic policy has turned…well…to violent domestication of independent voices and slamming shut the no-longer-golden door once opened to huddled masses, wretched refuse, homeless, and tempest tost.

I’m not celebrating that free expression and the commitment to truth-telling, however arduous is that task, are honored absolutely. They aren’t. Journalism is sawed and dissolved in the acids of oligarchic interests, truth and justice advocates are redefined as terrorists, unchecked corporate dollars are counted as free expression that de facto silences all expression of the nigh-penniless.

I’m not celebrating freedom of religion. After all, that purported freedom is being redefined by a select committee of antihistorical “only in America” ideologues fusing white nationalism with an idiosyncratic Christian puritanism bereft of traditioned morals. Neither Jesus nor St. Paul nor even Cotton Mather (whom I do not laud in all ways!) would recognize the MAGA Christianity of straight white libertinism fused with collagen-infused violent empire-ing and oligarchic grifting, while yet faith’s freedom is denied by the requirement to support their party of gross global militarization with my taxes.

I am not celebrating that the rule of law, particularly so much Constitutional law, is corrupted by rulers over the law across all federal governance branches. I do not celebrate that there is so much more to name that I don’t celebrate, the bulk of which belongs to the exhausting and exhausted present tense of our country’s disunion.

And I do not celebrate that I am not alone in my lament.

Transmuted: What I Do Celebrate

I willfully and heartily celebrate the past tense in which America rallied for and achieved goodness, as I celebrate too when we faced our failures truthfully. Similarly, I celebrate that we the people still possess the prospect of positively coordinating “American” rhetoric with American reality, of fulfilling the aspirations that unite us with each other and our founders.

I celebrate that in this land and time of distinct imperfection that most of us are inspired not so much by the perfect as the better, according to the shared criteria of what are good, true, beautiful, and just, as when the neighbor’s unexpected mowing of another’s lawn is of the same generous quality as a country’s foreign aid and a poor widow’s tithe.

I celebrate that Americans freely and spontaneously form community where hardship is suffered and joy sung; where women and men blow whistles and cheer children’s games, congregations forgive medical debt; where erstwhile arguers solve life together, shake hands, become friends, friends can sit with friends in hospice and at new births, and families and societies grow beyond the limitations of genes and cultures; where truth is sought for truth’s sake and shared behavior follows suit; where earth and sea and sky and all their creatures grow calm and smiling at health’s re-founding.

I celebrate that the ligaments of this particular democracy, constitutionally defined, still hold our parts together, thanks to the wisdom, knowledge, integrity, and courage of citizens, institutions and agencies that place democratic principles and civic responsibility above personal privilege. And so I celebrate particularly all teachers public schools, institutions, agencies, attorneys at law, court system, police forces and military service members who know, imbibe, represent, teach, and protect our freedoms according to the values announced by our Declaration of Independence and the protocols prescribed by the Constitution and Bill of Rights.

I celebrate that my Christian faith feeds my fervor for my nation’s democratic life and health, while simultaneously clearly distinguishing between my faith and my patriotism, feeding my fervor too for everyone’s religious freedom beyond toleration toward loving respect. My neighbors, whoever and as they are, are God’s image bearers and fellow citizens beyond boundaries, whom I am doubly glad to serve as a Christian and United States citizen. I celebrate that I am called and can be both without confusion.

I celebrate that so much more can be said to be celebrated at this time of Thanksgiving-in-Summer, when the grilled burgers and brats with the beer add to and temporize the heat of the day’s; when shorts and sandals with family and friends accessorized by sky sparkles on this day’s end exemplify the community of freedom and gratitude America is meant to be for all people. In sum, I celebrate — I hope without the resonances of kitsch and glib tropes — that I can say “God bless America” and mean it with the deepest respect for and for the good of all the world’s nations and peoples.

And I do celebrate that I am not alone in my celebration. However transmuted it is, Happy Independence Day! May it be so, finally unmuted, again for all “America,” for the good of all.