We Are Blessed

Orig: 10/30/08

A Final Thought Before the Election ...

A lot of friends are confused, scared, and worried about this election and what is happening in our country. In almost every paper you read of someone who has THE answer to our financial/credit/cultural problem, and then you read in some other papers of other people who are re-defining what the financial/credit/cultural problems are! And you realize that the first guys are moving forward with fixes to what the second guys are saying isn’t the problem!

What a mess.

My friends (and it seems a lot of strangers) who want to talk about the situation seem to focus their opinions on what to do in 3 areas: Who’s to blame; What they need to do to get financially secure again; and what they can do to help their neighbors in difficulty. I’ve talked – and prayed – about those three areas myself. But when someone asks me what I am praying for today, I answer that I am praying a prayer of thanksgiving for all God has done for me.

The last 25 years or so have been a wonderful time in our country. There have been ups and downs for me personally, but overall God has been very good to me, even having enabled me to be somewhat prepared to handle the present financial crises. Very few people in the world in the past 25 years have been as blessed as the people of this country. The best prayer we can say is one of thanks. And as for the future? Looking at how blessed we have been, how blessed the world has been – so totally unexpectedly – the only prayer I can think of is: I Trust in You. God has taken care of us in the past; He will take care of us in the future. Trust.

Oh, and what about the election, the subject of this note? I wouldn’t tell you who to vote for, because I know God can make good out of anything – so who am I to say how He would do it. Vote for who you think is best. But I did attach a sermon my parish priest gave a few weeks ago. He spoke on the most important topic in this election, but one rarely mentioned. You can download to your computer or ipod the actual sermon from my parish website . His words-- and choked back tears-- are better heard than read, although the tape cuts off before the spontaneous standing ovation he received.