Great Opinion Piece in USA Today

Jesse Jackson inspired me to become a committed voter; Trump made me a principled voter.

The process of choosing who and what earns my vote requires more work because I no longer rely upon a political party as my main source of guidance.

Emma Petty Addams

Opinion contributor

Some may find it surprising that the Rev. Jesse Jackson greatly impacted the political life of this white, suburban  Latter-day Saint woman.

In 1995, he came to Stanford University and delivered a stirring address to 2,000 students. As Jackson spoke, I felt the solemn weight of citizenship and a pressing need to never take it for granted.

I’m a little embarrassed that his message about bigotry, war and segregation was lost on me that day. But I am profoundly grateful that at age 19, it was burned into my civic consciousness that it is my privilege and duty to vote at any cost and to encourage others to do the same.

For the next 20 years, I voted (often with a baby or young child in my arms) as a Republican in every election, using that party’s platform and candidates as a guide for completing my ballot.

My children are older now and my county in Omaha, Neb., automatically sent vote-by-mail ballot applications to all residents for the 2020 election. For me, the act of voting has never been easier or more convenient.

But the process of choosing who and what earns my vote now requires more work because I no longer rely upon a political party as my main source of guidance.

This is because my run as a mostly Republican voter came to a screeching halt in 2016. Muslims are not terrorists, and Mexicans are not rapists. There was nothing so sacred about conservative policy or Supreme Court judges that justified allowing hateful rhetoric to shape public policy.

Take time to listen, learn

After the election, I listened more closely to my liberal friends and to politicians I had previously ignored. I read book after book to try to understand systemic racism. I asked a lot of questions, seeking out voices of immigrants, refugees and those whose American experience was starkly different than mine.

I began to realize my previous votes had been cast mostly out of self-interest, with little consideration for how they might affect those around me. I felt the earth shifting a bit beneath my feet.

During this time, I also joined Mormon Women for Ethical Government, a unique nonprofit full of women from all along the ideological spectrum. We discuss and analyze politics, taking advantage of lively discourse and diverse viewpoints, and then seek to proactively make peace in the public sphere by advocating for the issues we care about.

Many, like me, had been lifelong Republicans but were entering 2017 politically homeless, frustrated and fired up.

As we studied and learned together, I discovered that though I have always had free and easy access to the polls, there are many in my country who do not. My focus turned from my own vote and toward the rights of others.

I began volunteering part time for MWEG and eventually joined its leadership team. This gives me a front row seat to the sort of innovative thinking that happens when the tension emerging from conflicting viewpoints is harnessed for good.

In MWEG, we call this peacemaking! Now I can articulate what I believe I had known all along — that no political ideology has the corner on truth and that we need to hold our elected officials accountable at every turn.

Evaluate each candidate

I feel a responsibility to be a principled voter who evaluates candidates and policies against a set of ethical principles rather than being taken in by personality or tribalism.

This ideological journey toward principled voting has brought me back full circle to the day Jackson inspired me to be a committed voter. I feel that same passion when I think about the power of an individual, casting her vote in a profound act of duty and love for her country. But now I am voting in a far more expansive way.

I still tend to lean conservative but no longer believe that ideology to be morally superior. Less unencumbered by party loyalties, I see in 2020 that voting should be more than just about me and my rights.

As a citizen and a Christian, I am excited to use my vote to help assure and defend that right for all Americans.

Principled voting requires more work on my part. But I believe my country is worth the effort.

Emma Petty Addams is a mother, musician and the executive director of Mormon Women for Ethical Government. She lives in Omaha, Neb. with her husband and three sons.

Andrew Maxfield on FB today

One of my composer friends, Andrew Maxfield wrote this today:

Okay, I’m about to violate two of my facebook rules: I’m going to talk about my religion (just a little) and I’m absolutely LIVID while writing. If you didn’t know I can be livid, well, yeah. 

Yesterday, United States Senator Mike Lee (from Utah, a Mormon) headlined a Trump rally in Arizona. It is a strange election indeed when a Republican presidential candidate can’t count the majority of the Mormon vote as a gimme—but this is such an election, and strangely enough the Mormon vote might actually matter. (Trump could never, not in a million years, count on my vote as I’ve explained previously, but I’m a minority both in Utah and sadly among Americans of my faith.)

In introducing Trump, Mike Lee compared him to “Captain Moroni.” For my many friends who aren’t Mormon, Captain Moroni is depicted as a good dude in the Book of Mormon, sort of a righteous tough guy—the kind of army general you’d like to follow in a battle.

Keep in mind, treasured friends far and near, that I don’t care if you read the Book of Mormon as fact, fantasy, fanfic, or not at all. The point is that Mike Lee just crossed a line for me.

First, because Lee just prostituted scripture. Let me be clear about my language: prostitution is selling something that isn’t supposed to be sold. In speaking Mormon-ese to a rally with Mormons (and other Christians) in attendance, not only did Mike Lee position his endorsement as a very special kind of sales pitch, but he co-opted scripture to do it, for the off-limits purpose of calling darkness light. Captain Moroni isn’t for sale. Neither is the Bible for photo ops. But Lee is a quick study, and Trump knows plenty about prostitution.

Second, because Lee comically, pathologically misread the very chapter to which he referred. Again, friends, I don’t care what you think of the Book of Mormon, but dig this. Alma Chapter 46 (excerpt pasted below) relates the rise of a would-be autocrat, Amalickiah, against whom the aforementioned Captain Moroni reluctantly raises an army in defense of domestic tranquility. Amalickiah wants to be king. He surrounds himself with sycophantic, enabling “lower judges” who also, it turns out, want power. He is a master of propaganda (that’s the old word for “fake news”) and sowing dissension. He doesn’t claim to be a stable genius, but it doesn’t take a stable genius to follow the Populist’s Power-Grabbing Playbook. It’s a classic, and Trump follows it. And how. If this chapter of scripture teaches us anything, it teaches about the moral and political dangers of demagoguery!

Sure, I’ll play the Book-of-Mormon-metaphor game: call the adulterous, lying, opportunistic vulture of a would-be dictator what he is. Behold, oh Arizonans, your future King!

All the same, I’m not going to say that Biden is Captain Moroni instead. How absolutely stupid. That plays into the delusional dichotomy of extreme partisanship. If anything, Captain Moroni might be an invitation to each of us to resist the Amalickiahs who present themselves, one after the other, throughout history and into the future. Studying sacred texts should enable us to know them when we smell them. Further, the Book of Mormon is, itself, a cautionary tale about partisanship! It ends badly when warring factions lead a civilization through civil war into total destruction.

I acknowledge that some Mormons will draw opposite conclusions: no, don’t you see that Biden is the bad guy and Donald is here to raise the Title of Liberty? Such is life, religion, and metaphors. Mark Twain intuited this intractable irony when he wrote The War Prayer. Why do I stick with a religion if such people are in it, you might ask? Partially because such people are in it (and we get along quite well in so many aspects of our lives), partially because I fear what the community would become with less diversity of views within it, and partially because I choose to read the Book of Mormon as scripture (yes, along with the Bible) and have found purpose and meaning in church fellowship.

Oh, how I wish that yesterday’s rally were an SNL skit! (Could Jimmy Fallon be Mike Lee, please?) Then it would be uncomfortably funny—like the Book of Mormon musical or Mitt Romney trying to crack a joke—and we could all just go home. 

No, this was a blasphemy of NASCAR-megachurch proportions, and it is as uncomfortable as it is embarrassing and just plain wrong.

Shame on you, Senator Lee. May your flattering prostitution buy for you what it will, and may God spare us all from Captain Trump.
===
ALMA 46
…
3 Now the leader of those who were wroth against their brethren was a large and a strong man; and his name was Amalickiah.
4 And Amalickiah was desirous to be a king; and those people who were wroth were also desirous that he should be their king; and they were the greater part of them the lower judges of the land, and they were seeking for power.
5 And they had been led by the flatteries of Amalickiah, that if they would support him and establish him to be their king that he would make them rulers over the people.
6 Thus they were led away by Amalickiah to dissensions, notwithstanding the preaching of Helaman and his brethren, yea, notwithstanding their exceedingly great care over the church, for they were high priests over the church.
7 And there were many in the church who believed in the flattering words of Amalickiah, therefore they dissented even from the church; and thus were the affairs of the people of Nephi exceedingly precarious and dangerous, notwithstanding their great victory which they had had over the Lamanites, and their great rejoicings which they had had because of their deliverance by the hand of the Lord.
8 Thus we see how quick the children of men do forget the Lord their God, yea, how quick to do iniquity, and to be led away by the evil one.
9 Yea, and we also see the great wickedness one very wicked man can cause to take place among the children of men.
10 Yea, we see that Amalickiah, because he was a man of cunning device and a man of many flattering words, that he led away the hearts of many people to do wickedly; yea, and to seek to destroy the church of God, and to destroy the foundation of liberty which God had granted unto them, or which blessing God had sent upon the face of the land for the righteous’ sake.
11 And now it came to pass that when Moroni, who was the chief commander of the armies of the Nephites, had heard of these dissensions, he was angry with Amalickiah.
12 And it came to pass that he rent his coat; and he took a piece thereof, and wrote upon it—In memory of our God, our religion, and freedom, and our peace, our wives, and our children—and he fastened it upon the end of a pole.
13 And he fastened on his head-plate, and his breastplate, and his shields, and girded on his armor about his loins; and he took the pole, which had on the end thereof his rent coat, (and he called it the title of liberty) and he bowed himself to the earth, and he prayed mightily unto his God for the blessings of liberty to rest upon his brethren, so long as there should a band of Christians remain to possess the land—
14 For thus were all the true believers of Christ, who belonged to the church of God, called by those who did not belong to the church.
15 And those who did belong to the church were faithful; yea, all those who were true believers in Christ took upon them, gladly, the name of Christ, or Christians as they were called, because of their belief in Christ who should come.
16 And therefore, at this time, Moroni prayed that the cause of the Christians, and the freedom of the land might be favored.
Sure, read the whole story in context and see what I mean: https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/.../bofm/alma/46...
Image credit from a Twitter user I don't know or follow: https://twitter.com/travisshumate/status/1321629549830918144

Tara Westover at UVU

 Although I was a half hour late due to sign up difficulties, I finally got into the stream to listen to Tara Westover's chat with President Astrid S. Tuminez of UVU. Very interesting. I will have to watch the entire thing, including what I missed, when the recording is available.

A few quotes: "Education should be associated more with inquiry than with certainty."

About the internet: Tara talked about where people get their news--often from social media sites or other information-providing sites. She said, and I am probably quoting imperfectly: Their whole business model is based on making us hate each other. Love sells, and awe sells, but nothing sells like hate. At some level, you all need to realize that there are people making money off of your hate. And you need to decide--do I want to be a part of that?

She talked about the "breaking of charity" which is associated with the Salem Witch Trials--when a point is reached where people can't believe that "the other side" has anything positive about them. Demonizing, as it were.

Books Read September 2020

 Apparently moving makes for a month of not much reading. Also, I may be guilty of watching too much of a couple of Canadian TV shows that I like a lot: Republic of Doyle, set in Newfoundland; and Kim's Convenience, set in Toronto. So, what little free time I had for reading was not used very efficiently. Maybe when a person is really tired, even reading takes too much energy!

So--I only finished four books, and two of those were from listening. And they were the New Testament and the Pearl of Great Price, which I listened to while doing my planking and other exercises.

So I only read two actual books, and both were YA. So, overall, not my most ambitious month of reading ever!

I read Under the Banyan Tree by Toni de Palma. It is about a girl who has been blessed with not the best of parents. She runs away to Florida where she lucks into meeting wonderful people who give her a job and a place to live and a pseudo-family. Ernest Hemingway figures into the story. It was an easy and warm-hearted read.

And I read Jasmine Skies by Sita Brahmachari. Mira goes to India to meet her mother's relatives and learns a great deal about herself as well as her family. I had read the earlier book about Mira's family a year or two ago (ahaha! make that 6 years ago--I checked in Google Drive, and the earlier book was in fact read by me in 2014!) and it was a good read. This one was, too.

And that's all folks. An abyssmal record of reading for me, honestly.