Telling the Truth

connecting the dots of my life

Tag: Power and Control

August 19, 2020

Dear Mr. Trump, | 2017 revisited

This morning I woke up wondering how much longer we can survive as one nation. Making it to November’s election feels sketchy. Here’s what I wrote in September 2017. 

Dear Mr. Trump,

I woke up today wanting you to know that I’m praying for you, and how I’m praying for you. Hence this open letter.

As I see it, we have two kinds of leaders in the USA: those elected to office, and those who elect them. Clearly, given your electoral college votes, you won the vote, and were duly sworn in last January as President of the United States.

We, as unelected citizens, are also leaders. Did we not go to the polls and exercise our guaranteed right to lead by casting our votes? No matter who wins the election, we citizens lose if we vote carelessly or not at all, assuming we’re given a fair opportunity. We also lose if we fall back into apathy or cynicism and wait things out. Or try to take things into our own hands.

As a follower of Jesus, I am exhorted to pray for you as the President of the USA. I can’t say ‘my’ President, because you serve all of us.

As our President, you have visible power and office. That means you have access to your executive pen, the bully and praise pulpit, the power to hire and fire designated people, and a stage that magnifies your voice far beyond what it would be if you were not President of the USA.

As President, you might be tempted to think you’re in control, or that you can change or ignore situations to your liking. Or at least do what you can to make things more comfortable for you and yours. You might also want people to like you. Especially the people to whom you made promises. You might even hope for some to hate and fear you.

And so I pray for you the way I pray for myself as a citizen leader. I pray you and I will let go of our desires for power and control, esteem and affection, safety and survival, and especially the desire to change situations not in our control. The most important thing you can do is lead well, as the follower of Jesus you say you are. Which would be the most important thing I can do, as well.

Right now, even though it’s stormy, you’re a mighty visible oak. Still, tree rot often begins on the inside. Then one day, often without warning, the mighty visible oak crashes to the ground, often taking with it trees close to the mighty oak.

Gone. Not with a whimper, but with a resounding earthquake that travels to the other side of the world and back, creating tsunamis and chaos in its wake.

I like to think of us citizens and residents of the USA as tiny acorns that survive. Not all of us will make it. But the future does lie with us, doesn’t it? Which is why I can’t pray for you alone.

Please know that we’re trying to make as much sense of life as we can, hoping and praying you will grow into your office one day at a time, one step at a time. No matter the cost to your personal comfort or reputation. Which is what it means to follow Jesus.

Respectfully,

Elouise Renich Fraser

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 21 September 2017, reposted 19 August 2020
Photo taken by DAFraser, 11 September 2017, Longwood Gardens Meadow

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September 21, 2017

Dear Mr. Trump,

I woke up today wanting you to know that I’m praying for you, and how I’m praying for you. Hence this open letter.

As I see it, we have two kinds of leaders in the USA: those elected to office, and those who elect them. Clearly, given your electoral college votes, you won the vote, and were duly sworn in last January as President of the United States.

We, as unelected citizens, are also leaders. Did we not go to the polls and exercise our guaranteed right to lead by casting our votes? No matter who wins the election, we citizens lose if we vote carelessly or not at all, assuming we’re given a fair opportunity. We also lose if we fall back into apathy or cynicism and wait things out. Or try to take things into our own hands.

As a follower of Jesus, I am exhorted to pray you as the President of the USA. I can’t say ‘my’ President, because you serve all of us.

As our President, you have visible power and office. That means you have access to your executive pen, the bully and praise pulpit, the power to hire and fire designated people, and a stage that magnifies your voice far beyond what it would be if you were not President of the USA.

As President, you might be tempted to think you’re in control, or that you can change or ignore situations to your liking. Or at least do what you can to make things more comfortable for you and yours. You might also want people to like you. Especially the people to whom you made promises. You might even hope for some to hate and fear you.

And so I pray for you the way I pray for myself as a citizen leader. I pray you and I will let go of our desires for power and control, esteem and affection, safety and survival, and especially the desire to change situations not in our control. The most important thing you can do is lead well, as the follower of Jesus you say you are. Which would be the most important thing I can do, as well.

Right now, even though it’s stormy, you’re a mighty visible oak. Still, tree rot often begins on the inside. Then one day, often without warning, the mighty visible oak crashes to the ground, often taking with it trees close to the mighty oak.

Gone. Not with a whimper, but with a resounding earthquake that travels to the other side of the world and back, creating tsunamis and chaos in its wake.

I like to think of us citizens and residents of the USA as tiny acorns that survive. Not all of us will make it. But the future does lie with us, doesn’t it? Which is why I can’t pray for you alone.

Please know that we’re trying to make as much sense of life as we can, hoping and praying you will grow into your office one day at a time, one step at a time. No matter the cost to your personal comfort or reputation. Which is what it means to follow Jesus.

Respectfully,

Elouise Renich Fraser

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 21 September 2017
Photo taken by DAFraser, 11 September 2017, Longwood Gardens Meadow
Response to Daily Prompt: Mighty

16 Comments
March 12, 2017

What I’m giving up

I didn’t grow up in a church tradition that required me to give things up for Lent. Yet today I’m asking what I’m giving up for Lent.

Why now? I think it’s related to my health, my age, my ability to live as an independent woman, my need to have things go my way at this time in my life.

I feel quite well most of the time. Perhaps weary and a bit stressed out now and then, but not awful. Yet sometimes I fall over the edge–into anger or fear. It’s usually triggered when something doesn’t go the way I anticipated it would. It’s like throwing a lighted match into a dry haystack. Or going over a cliff. Too late to step back and do something different.

So what to do? I don’t have a magic formula. However, I’ve been reading a wonderful book about prayer. It’s Cynthia Bourgeault’s book called Centering Prayer and Inner Awakening. It seems connected to what’s happening.

Her book is helping me reconsider these episodes. They flare up when I hit moments of extreme frustration. Sometimes they’re about my health and wellbeing. Other times they’re triggered by memories of things that happened to me as a professional woman.

The goal I’m after is this: to learn ways of interrupting what’s about to happen before I go over the cliff. I know I won’t learn this overnight. Still, I want to recognize, welcome and listen to those small signs before I go over the cliff or say things I’ll regret. Sometimes that’s not possible. Other times, it is.

As part of this discipline, Cynthia offers a litany written by a friend. It’s a prayer to be offered as often as needed, without having to make it up myself. It’s for the moment I realize my frustration and anger are escalating, ready to overflow. It won’t work if I’ve already exploded.

I grew up believing everything unwelcome in me needed to be  ‘fixed’ if not denounced and forsaken. Slam the door in its face! Send it packing! Or at least keep it hidden in a closet. It’s not the ‘real me.’

This, however, is about the real me. The person I am in God’s presence. Just as I am. Especially when I’m unhappy about the way things are going. What’s happening in me has something to tell me. Instead of slamming the door in its face or denying its presence, perhaps I could welcome it. Listen, and learn from it. After all, it’s part of me whether I like it or not.

So here’s the litany, an active giving up of something. Not just for Lent.

I let go my desire for security and survival.
I let go my desire for esteem and affection.
I let go my desire for power and control.
I let go my desire to change the situation.

Quoted by Cynthia Bourgeault in Centering Prayer and Inner Awakening, p. 147 (Cowley Publications 2004)

I long to stay fully present to God and, so far as possible, to the truth about myself. No matter what rises to the surface or comes at me without warning. Whether it’s anger, fear, pain or death itself.

© Elouise Renich Fraser, 11 March 2017
Image found at kairosjourney.org

12 Comments