We are less than two months from Election Day. November 5 is a significant day in our country as we exercise our right and responsibility as citizens to vote. Aside from the presidential election, which has dominated the headlines, we will also vote for state and local leaders – decisions that directly impact our communities. Voting is an important first step in our faithful civic engagement and one important way we can involve ourselves in our community and country.
Civic engagement through political and nonpolitical processes is how we live into our baptism and share Christ’s love as we work to make a difference in our communities and strive for justice and peace across the globe. During this election season, there are many ways for you to participate: volunteer at your local polling station, become an election judge, assist with getting out the vote, and help organize candidate forums. And we thank all of you who are already engaged as volunteers or workers.
With all the tension and division in our country, we are called to be both a prophetic presence and a reconciling and healing presence in the world. Let’s remember the importance of respectful conversations and debates that seek to understand each other’s positions without the often-distorting media hype or political campaign spin.
Our involvement in the political process should be marked by loving kindness, especially towards those with whom we disagree most vigorously. When Jesus commanded us to love our enemies, he made it clear that hate should have no place in the life of a Christian.
As Lutherans, instead of focusing our prayers for our candidate or party winning, let us pray for discernment about how, no matter who wins, we might be agents of God’s work of love, healing, justice, and reconciliation in our country and our communities.
Our political involvement, however, must begin and end with prayer – individual and collective. This reinforces the role of faith in shaping civic engagement and promotes a more spiritually grounded political process.
We pray for the future because the future is in God’s hands, and God’s wisdom transcends the limits of our minds, imaginations, fears, and expectations. No matter what, God awaits us in the future – because God is faithful, and because God’s love is not contingent on our works, nor on any political candidate, political party, or political arrangement.
Let us pray:
Holy God, out of your great love for the world, your Word became flesh to live among us and to reconcile us to you and to one another. Rekindle among us the gift of your Spirit so that we seek to live in unity with all people, breaking down the walls that divide , ending the hostility among us, proclaiming peace to those who are near and to those who are far away; through Christ Jesus, in whom we all have access in the one Spirit to you, both now and forever. Amen.
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