My friend Allie is wise, creative and caring. She is a truly loving soul, open to all she meets. She spends her days sharing her light with others. As a result, she has many friends. Among them is one I’ll call “Maggie.” The two women had been neighbors in Southern California and grew very close—kindred spirits, really—until Allie moved to San Jose.
Slowly they lost touch. Months slipped by, then years, and suddenly Allie realized how long it had been since she had last heard from Maggie, so she texted her, excited to reconnect. The result was not what she expected.
Maggie’s response was all about politics. All she could talk about was how excited she was about her candidate for president. The trouble was, it was not the candidate Allie was supporting.
There may have been a time in this country when this would have hardly mattered, but no longer. Now a person’s choice for president is not simply between two parties, both of which share a basic understanding of what America stands for. It has become instead a choice between two sets of starkly different values.
Allie was stunned. She had thought she knew her friend. She had thought they had shared much the same outlook, much the same values. How then was this possible? More importantly, what was she to do? How should she respond? Could they still be friends with such different views of the world? She thought about it and prayed about it.
Finally, she knew what she needed to say: “We are friends,” she wrote to Maggie, “we will vote differently and remain friends. I believe you want all that is good for our country, for our world, for all people, for our earth. Freedom of choice in this country is our greatest gift. May all be well with our choices. Let us continue to give each other grace.”
Allie shared this with me, and it touched me deeply. Our country is so divided now. And not just our country—families are divided. Friends are divided. And yet here was a woman whose love for her friend would not allow her to give up on her despite their differing opinions.
As Allie said to me, “Knowing my friend’s heart is sincere provides that space for grace, especially as I don’t understand her thinking.”
What a vision of hope this is! What an opportunity for healing! Just think what would happen if more of us began to open ourselves to the possibility that our opponents may be sincere in their belief that they are doing what is best for the country and for the world.
It could be the first step in a whole new way of dealing with our nation’s increasingly dangerous divide. I suspect that it will only be when we begin to trust that those we disagree with are just as sincere as we are that we will truly begin to listen to each other.
And it is only by listening that we will find common ground. It is by trusting that we open ourselves to grace, a grace which we can then share with others.
Father Ernest Boyer is the Rector at St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church in Gilroy and an active member of the Interfaith Clergy Alliance of South County. He can be contacted at [email protected].
