Dear Congress (all of you)
In case you don't know it, there are many of us who are disgusted with your actions and in many cases inactions. While you pander in front of TV cameras or push your particular agenda at so called Town Hall meetings, or show up on various cable news shows to spout off your particular party's talking points, your constituents try to get through the day. Those days by the way get harder depending on who you are or what your circumstances. School children take cover in active shooter drills and struggle with the lack of broadband services at home, bullying and quality of education disparities. College students deal with all of that in addition to affordability and student loans. New graduates or others entering the workforce deal with wage issues, housing affordability, jobs they really want or trained for. Young parents have to deal with housing, transportation, health insurance, childcare and parenting itself. Some of various ages are working two or three jobs just to keep up. All are impacted by the high cost of medicine, healthcare and access to equal levels of health services. Seniors worry about Social Security, Medicare, paying for medicine and their legacy.
That's really just the beginning. There's much more but suffice it to say that your constituents are living in a very real world. These are not fake issues. These are not things that just pop into a blogger's head.
Here's something you really need to know. The people you represent are real people. They have real hopes and dreams. They are a mixed bag of folks of all ages and from all backgrounds. Some are poor, some are middle-class and some are wealthy. They're people of color, caucasian, hispanic, Jewish, Muslim, Christian, people of other, or sometimes no religions. They work, they play and they pray together.
Yes, and this is what you really need to understand, the people you represent are expected to get along with each other in a civil society. They go to school, they go to work, they buy groceries, they meet in the emergency room, they try to enjoy life with each other. They are expected to do this. They discuss issues, don't always agree but in the end they figure out how to work things out with each other - from playgrounds to church pews, your constituents know that it's better to get along.
Every once in awhile they are given the chance to send someone to Congress to represent them. You were lucky enough to get that chance. Here's a simple question that really should be asked and may become a demand at some point. Why can't you do the same thing? Why can't you stop the partisan bickering and shenanigans that you seem to spend your day conjuring up? Why can't you learn to be decent to your political colleagues? Why can't you be expected to compromise like the rest of us? The onus is on you. You chose to be termed a leader. Can you meet the challenge?
Finally, if you're taking your cue from a grown man who argues on line with a 16 year old with Aspergers, or who regularly insults people of all sorts, please rethink why you are doing that.
Sincerely,
Lots of US
Friday, December 13, 2019
Sunday, December 1, 2019
An Undivided Heart - Dorothy Day Symposium
A few weeks ago, on Nov. 16th, a symposium on Dorothy Day titled An Undivided Heart was held at Maryknoll in NY. The speakers were all people who are or were involved in the Catholic Worker - Robert Ellsberg, Kathleen and Pat Jordon, Jackie Allen-Doucot, Amanda Dalosio and Kate Hennessy. It was, in my opinion, a great event. For those who know the Catholic Worker and Dorothy, it's a great reminder. For those wanting to find out, its a really a good way to learn from a number of different perspectives. A publisher, people who have worked and continue to work at Houses of Hospitality and a granddaughter and author who has written about Dorothy from a very special family perspective. The program was presented in four parts and has been made available on YouTube. The series begins with Ellsberg, followed by the Jordons and Allen-Doucot and Dalosio. Kate Hennessy finishes the series. So for anyone interested, I'm putting all of the links here. Something worthwhile to take a look at. Enjoy:
There were also some items that people shared online relative to what these people and others had learned from Dorothy. I want to share some things I learned from her when I knew her in the mid 60's:
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