Don’t Blame Leftists

“God grant me the courage to change the things I can, the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, and the wisdom to know the difference.”

I saw the above words posted in my school cafeteria when I was around 12 years old, and it was such a revelation at the time. Decades later, it occurs to me that God often doesn’t grant us the wisdom to know the difference. We have the ability to do the right thing, assuming we know what the right thing to do is, but we often have no way of knowing if doing the right thing will work-if it will deliver actual results that we can see in our lifetimes. That isn’t even to mention the times when we aren’t sure what the right thing to do is.

The Bible tells us that we are called to always do the right thing, regardless of whether it works or not. The Bible does not always tell us exactly what the right thing to do in any given situation is. The Bible provides a general outline, and we are left to sort out many of the details ourselves. The Bible leaves many questions unanswered, but Jesus said that the Truth would set us free, and Jesus calls on us to speak the Truth, no matter the consequences, whether it works or not.

There is a great deal of speculation on what goes on in the minds of most Americans. Many believe that the country is shifting left. I disagree: my speculation isn’t worth more than anyone else’s, but for whatever it’s worth, based on what I see in Massachusetts, I do not believe that more and more Americans are becoming radical leftists. Our problem is not that leftism is gaining in popularity, our problem is that decent people are either giving up, or gave up long ago.

Since the internet came along, I have been astounded by the strong opinions that many who have never stepped foot in Massachusetts have about my home state. The assumption, and it’s a fair one, is that because Massachusetts sends crazy leftists to Washington, most people in Massachusetts are probably crazy leftists. There are 6 million people in this state: I don’t know most of them, but when I look around, I don’t see very many crazy leftists. I do see a large number of sane, decent people who have given up, and who aren’t even willing to try. Leftism is obviously a problem, but it isn’t the main problem. Our main problem is hopelessness. Out main problem is millions of people who believe that what they do and how they vote, or whether or not they vote, and whether or not they speak out, doesn’t matter. We hear a great deal about political correctness and cancel culture, but it isn’t even that. The people I am talking about don’t even seem to be particularly scared: they aren’t afraid, they have just lost all hope.

I was speaking recently with an online friend who knows very little about Massachusetts. I told her that my parents were very active in the pro-life movement, and some of my earliest memories were of picketing in front of abortion clinics. She was shocked, and she said that it must have been scary to grow up that way, considering how strong support for abortion is in Massachusetts. When she said that, I was reminded once again of what a strange place Massachusetts is, and how difficult it is to explain it to people who don’t know it. Being raised pro-life in Massachusetts was not scary in any way, because most people in Massachusetts are well aware that abortion is wrong. No one ever threatened us, very few people even got angry. Last year, I walked through downtown Springfield with a pro-life sign on Jan 22: I received many honks and waves and thumbs up, no one gave me any problems. In 50 years of pro-life activism in this state, no one has ever given me any serious problems. It isn’t scary at all. It’s depressing, because most of the people I encounter don’t even attempt to defend abortion. They don’t try to tell us that we are wrong. They know that we are right. They just think that we are fools who are fighting a lost cause. Being pro-life in Massachusetts has never for one minute caused me to be afraid. I don’t even feel hated most of the time. I just feel like there are millions of voices whispering in my ear: “Don’t you realize it’s hopeless? Give up, it’s hopeless, etc..” The thing that is most depressing is that most of the people who say that know that abortion is wrong. They aren’t radical leftists. They have just lost all hope, and apparently they want everybody else to lose all hope too. They are the third faction in American politics, and they usually go unacknowledged: America is not split 50/50 between left and right. It’s probably more like, a third are on the left, a third are on the right, and a third think that they don’t matter, and that there is no point in doing anything anyway.

I have gone on long enough. I just want to end this thought with two quotes:

“If we take the widest and wisest view of a Cause, there is no such thing as a Lost Cause because there is no such thing as a Gained Cause. We fight for lost causes because we know that our defeat and dismay may be the preface to our successors’ victory, though that victory itself will be temporary; we fight rather to keep something alive than in the expectation that anything will triumph.” T.S. Elliot

“The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” Edmund Burke