What Matters Most
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The Unitarian Universalist minister David O. Rankin liked to relate a story from his career. In 1968 he preached a sermon just before the presidential election in which he was not thrilled between the choice of Richard Nixon or Hubert Humphrey. Instead of making the case, however subtly, for either candidate, he chose instead to recommend that everyone vote for the most intelligent, experienced and compassionate candidate. Moments later, in the receiving line after the service, he was confronted by a man loudly and angrily shouting at him, “How dare you use the pulpit to support Hubert Humphrey!”
I endorse no candidates here, nor even stake a position on individual items on any ballot. No, let’s talk politics, but not parties. For decades now, we have repeatedly been told about values voters, and the moral majority, and the religious right, and family values and “pro-life” voters and so on.
It’s time to change the script.
Because friends, I’m a values voter. And the values I hold dear are taking care of my fellow human beings, ending oppression, and making sure that people have healthy food and a safe place to live. My values support people of all gender expressions and sexual orientations, people of all races and ethnicities, of all national origins. My values are truly pro-life, not just pro-birth.
I consider myself both moral and part of a majority. I try to live a good life, to not harm others as much as possible, to do the right things and to be a good person. And I believe that the majority, perhaps all of us, are doing those same things, even if we might sometimes differ on how to accomplish them.
And I hope it goes without saying, I’m religious, though not right. I’m tired of the conversation about religion in this country assuming that religious people span the gamut from fundamentalist Christians to conservative Christians. There are liberal and radical people of faith, and there are Jews, Muslims, Sikhs, Buddhists and dozens of other religious groups who are here and politically engaged! If we could get this word out to the major news networks sometime soon, that would be great.
I think I have great family values. Those values include supporting same-sex couples in living their lives the way they choose, with the same access to rights and privileges I have as a heterosexual, cisgender man in an opposite-sex marriage. And I have family values that say children should grow up in a home where they are loved and cared for and supported, and that matters more than other concerns.
And I’m pro-life, but not in the narrow, nonsensical way I often hear used by those who claim that title. I support life—I want to support the flourishing of all human life. I recognize that women have a better understanding of their own bodies and decisions than I do. I oppose the death penalty—again, because I support life. I’m anti-poverty and pro-prison reform, because I’m for life. I’m pro-medicine and pro-science, and even pro-socialized medicine, because I’m for life.
I’m even, and here’s something you probably didn’t expect a minister to say, pro-gun. At any rate I’m not totally anti-gun, and that feels radical in an age where there’s precious little middle ground. Though I don’t own any, I’m not opposed to guns. I’ve lived in places where guns are important, and not as a symbol or for some inflated sense of self-defense. I lived in rural Mississippi and spent time with people who hunted, for whom guns were part of a way of life, with people who each donated hundreds of pounds of meat a year to a local children’s home as part of a program called Hunters for the Hungry. So I’m pro-gun, and I’m pro-responsible gun ownership, and I’m pro-sensible gun control—something this country lacks right now.
Maybe you think at least some of these same things about yourself. Perhaps you cringe at the destructive, divisive policies and platforms you hear from people who are too eager to lift up their moral framework as the right, and proper, and only one for this country. You might see the US as a country too large and too diverse and too amazing to be contained by any one system of thinking or seeing.
We follow the prophetic calls of those who have come before us, like Frederick Douglass and Barbara Jordan and Rosa Parks, and those like the Rev. William Barber working today. Barber has called upon people of faith to lift up and defend the most sacred moral principles of our faiths. We support pro-people and anti-war policies, equality in education, healthcare for all, fairness for all people in the criminal justice system, and rights for all people, especially people of marginalized identities.
The work that Unitarian Universalists around the country and the world are doing in the political process, the work we do in our local communities, all of this is part of the same work of creating the beloved community. And whoever we elect, this work will continue.
Friends, vote for the most intelligent, experienced, and compassionate candidates. And then go love the hell out of the world, each of us in our unique ways. The world cries out for our efforts, and no election alone will end that.
His passions include sports, the outdoors, and spending time with his kids. He lives in Pinole, Calif., with his wife, the Rev. Kristin Grassel Schmidt, and their four children.
- What Matters Most - March 1, 2020
- Bringing a Child into this Broken World - March 1, 2012
