It’s less than a week till the midterm elections and I’m thinking about the future.  I’m guessing I’m not alone.  This is the brilliance and the burden of the human mind: To contemplate a time that has not yet happened with its range of foreseeable possibilities and whatever degree of hope and fear they inspire.  Policy is our way of collectively shaping the preferred possibilities.  Elections are our way of collectively choosing who makes the policy.

In a happy co-incidence, US elections follow on the heels of All Saints and All Souls Days, November 1 and 2.  These days direct our attention to the past – to lives who have embodied love and justice, stories where Life’s creative advance shines through.  Saints – official, unofficial, and nearly-unknown – demonstrate what is possible.  They spark hope.  Though dead, they are alive and present in a great communion in which we participate.

This Sunday we’ll observe All Saints/Souls days by lighting memorial candles for those dear to us.  We’ll also hear a story of an Anabaptist forbearer whose life can illuminate the present.

On Tuesday we’ll vote for our preferred future, knowing that elections are just one way we do this. 

To live well, we will need a strong grounding in the past, alertness within the present, and hopeful wisdom toward the future.

Joel