We are today eleven days into Advent. The panic about Christmas being near has begun. A mixture of excitement as we wrap presents, make plans, and get too much food in, with a sense of dread we might not be ready or it might not live up to expectations. In waiting some people like to rush to have what we want to happen happen quickly, not worrying about details, whereas others want to look over everything before they believe they are ready.
For little children, the day before Santa coming is a terrible wait. They want tomorrow, today. But isn’t if tomorrow is huge, the day before one of a mixture of stuff in our heads? Dread, anticipation, longing? The hopes and fears of all the years might come to be as tomorrow the world might change.
We have what I believe is the most crucial General Election in years in our country tomorrow. Tomorrow, well, Friday really, things in our country will not be the same as they are today. At election time I always think of how hard people before us fought to get the vote. Suffragettes a century ago, are an example of how society has not been equal. In some parts of the world today suffrage for everyone is still not a reality. I think voting like in Australia should be compulsory. Even if you scribble on the voting paper or write rude words on it, you should do this one bit of democratic right that wasn’t always a right. I also think you can’t moan about politics in the next five years if you haven’t taken part in the process tomorrow. My vote has gone into a post box in Tydd St Giles. My constituency is a very safe seat for the current incumbent, the Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union. I’m sure he’s a very nice man, and I hear he’s been about, but we’ve had no hustings and very little information about any of our candidates, in these rural parts, which I’ve found sad. I’ve voted and I’ve taken part and I wait to see what happens, not just with Mr Barclay but nationally.
We all want a society that is fair, just, inclusive and where we can flourish. I’m writing this in Sainsbury’s cafe in Kings Lynn, waiting for my car to be ready as it is in the garage opposite. John Lennon’s Happy Christmas War Is Over is blasting out over my scrambled eggs! All the Christmas songs we hear over and over are about a desire for a twee world where everyone loves each other and there are no problems suddenly. Think about the classic from Meet Me In St Louis, Have yourself a Merry Little Christmas: the message is definite. From now on our troubles will be out of sight.
The election campaigns, (and I am using a mixture as I can’t tell you how to vote) are about this better future tomorrow and the fear we might go another way. It’s been a nasty year or so in Parliament. And the election campaign has been really shameful too. The worst has been the conservative candidate in Hastings and Rye making shameful comments about disabled people. She should be removed from even standing. Discrimination has no place in a just society. The media this week depending on their editorial stance, try to put the fear of God into us if we dare consider another way we think might bring a better tomorrow, or they dig up dirt from the past so we dare not trust the person they want to smear. It’s all very worrying and sad. I understand why people might not vote tomorrow but as I’ve said I urge scribbling on the paper!
A General Election in Advent is a rare thing. The last time it happened was in 1923. Some people were very scared a Labour government might be elected for the first time and threatened to leave the country should that happen. Ramsay McDonald was indeed elected. His administration didn’t last long but it was a seismic shift in politics in this country. A similar thing happened with the election of the Attlee government in 1945, the arrival of Thatcherism in 1979 and the jubilation we felt when Tony Blair walked into Downing Street in 1997. I don’t think I have been so let down by a Prime Minister than I was by him. At a time of expectation we can be swayed by strong rhetoric. I said all along America would elect Donald Trump, because he played the “we can make our country better” card. I can also see how Hitler advanced as Germany was in a mess and he told them his ideology was the answer.
We want a better tomorrow. We are people of expectation. Thinking about Advent, God’s ancient people believed that a vibrant future would come of blessings and prosperity. But they forgot the ethics in the scripture they recited and heard in their worship. For a stronger tomorrow, they needed to return to God. They needed at the heart of their lives God’s shalom.
If we expect only what we want or a narrow view blessing only us, then we blind ourselves to the possibility that tomorrow might be radically new. All those standing for public office tomorrow I believe sincerely want to make a difference. They are, in the main, good people. The proof of their commitment to a just society will come if they really can deliver the words of a manifesto. If Mr Barclay is re-elected, I have an issue about major unfair injustice in our part of his constituency I need to have out with him! I’ve come across scandalous neglect in mental health provision and it’s causing indescribable suffering.
SNP, Green, Labour, Liberal Democrat, Conservative, Brexit party, or none of the above, I the end we make our choice thinking deeply about the issues and if we have a faith, what we believe God is saying to us today on this last day of campaigning concerning tomorrow. Whether we trust those on the ballot paper or not, we have a responsibility to make a difference ourselves. The result of this election may be one some of us don’t want. I remember the day after George W Bush was re-elected in America, the Guardian’s front page was just a page of black ink with a tiny caption of two words: “oh shit”! But maybe in the end we have to live what we expect. Maybe as Jim Wallis writes on the last page of his fabulous book “God’s Politics” we need to be the ones we are waiting for.
After making a huge mistake the other day, I’ve been challenged about my behaviour. For the situation to be better, only I can put it right through different words and a better attitude, breathing more and getting less wound up. The Advent hope is that a better world can come. God in the coming Christ does his bit, but we have to play our part. The teenager Mary saw it. More powerful than any manifesto, in the Magnificat, which certain traditions recite every evening ,the world is about to shake, and everyone is included, and those that have been unjust are dealt with. There is an excitement that all of us can be part of a divine party to build something new! Tomorrow will be better.
Someone sent this prayer above to me yesterday. It can be seen as controversial. But it isn’t party political! It is saying it is a given if we follow a religious path, that inclusivity, the other, not just want we want is the only way to have that tomorrow we want and need.
So dear readers, read and think today. Unless you’ve already posted your vote following all the instructions how to put gote voting paper into envelope B etc, go and be in your little booth in A cold church hall somewhere, take the little pencil on a string and make a difference. And whoever is elected, we pray for them, and in expectation, even if party politics after tomorrow lets us down, we can build that better future ourselves where we are. Are we the ones we are waiting for?
Rend Your Heart
12 “Even now,” declares the Lord,
“return to me with all your heart,
with fasting and weeping and mourning.”
13 Rend your heart
and not your garments.
Return to the Lord your God,
for he is gracious and compassionate,
slow to anger and abounding in love,
and he relents from sending calamity.
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