Fr Robert Hendrickson

Today is All Saints Sunday. It is also Ingathering Sunday. And it is the Sunday before Election Day.

As I think about the thread that ties all of these together I come away believing in the power of love versus fear. Perfect love casts out fear. The saints are not those who never feared loss or hardship — of course they feared it. Yet love cast out fear. Their love of God, of Jesus, and of their fellow men and women made them risk and strive and face loss, peril, and the sword for the sake of love. Even Jesus seemed to show some fear in the Garden as he prayed for the Father to let this cup pass from him — yet it could not and he went to the Cross ready to forgive. Yet, for the Christian, love is stronger than death and the empty tomb would prove the power of God’s love.

Giving and stewardship are all about love versus fear. When Karrie and I give we do so with the fear that we won’t have enough to pay for college, or out-of-pocket health costs, or to fix pack rat damage, or to cover the cost of a rattlesnake bite to a cat, or to treat our dog’s valley fever, and on and on it goes. Once you start down the fear path then it spreads — it’s viral. But so is love. When we start down the love path we find it casts out fear and it spreads from us to others. We try not to pass an opportunity to be generous because generosity unlocks generosity in us and in those around us. So we focus on what we love rather than what we fear when we give.

Voting needs to be the same. When our votes are cast according to what we fear we find that almost every choice that follows fear is one history (and we) regret. Whether it’s fear of Communists, fear of the Japanese, fear of LGBT folks, fear of African Americans, fear of the Chinese, fear of the Irish — when fear drives our hearts cruelty guides our hands. So I pray that we can bring ourselves to vote out of love not out of fear. We see other points in our history where love cast out fear and Americans made bold choices because they came to love a vision of their neighbors, their country, and themselves that called the, to risk some loss for the greater good.

May love guide our faith, our giving, and our votes this week. May love cast out fear.

Robert