Hermits and Politics

Yesterday I congratulated the Canadian people on their elections because it felt like the right thing to do. Then I read Broad ‘apprehension’ from Canadian Jews in response to Carney’s election and Will Islamists Play Kingmaker in Canadian Election? Now I am second-guessing yesterday's post. Why shouldn't I keep this blog entirely out of politics?

Sister Laurel also has me asking this question of myself. Her article On Hermits and Involvement in Politics is required reading in this field. How much involvement in politics is appropriate for the Christian hermit?

(On a side note, Sister Laurel appears to be in the minority among US Catholics on the significance of the 2024 presidential election: Catholic voters favor Trump over Harris nationally and in swing states, exit polls show | Catholic News Agency.)

I am leaning in the opposite direction from Sister Laurel on the question of a hermit's involvement in politics. At least to start. We will see where I wind up. As it stands right now, I am going to allow myself up to four hours of time in a day for political research and up to two blog posts a day on political issues. It's hard to imagine the Holy Spirit keeping me up for long at this maximum level of political engagement, but I suppose it could happen. Saint Augustine was inspired to write The City of God, after all.

Let me say a few more words about the state of my political theology at this juncture. 

When I am at my best, I am praying daily for the marginal, for the retired, for the student body, for the workforce, for the civil service, and for my elected political leaders at the local, state, federal, and international levels. 

I am an independent: I am not registered with any political party. I believe God works on both sides of the political spectrum. I have voted for Democrats, Greens, and Republicans. As I understand the right side of the spectrum in Israel and the western hemisphere, it is conservative, Judeo-Christian, Zionist for One Jewish State, capitalist, industrious, fair, and accountable. As I understand the left side of the spectrum in Israel and the western hemisphere, it is progressive, spiritually liberal, Zionist for Two States Side-by-Side, feminist, socialist, and fiercely committed to climate and social justice. 

The ideal balance point in the west is probably something like social democratic steady state capitalism in a reforming United Nations on the way to world federation.

I am currently reading the following books: On Settler Colonialism by Adam Kirsch; The Builder's Stone by Melanie Phillips; The Political Thought of Xi Jinping by Olivia Cheung and Steve Tsang; Social Democratic Capitalism by Lane Kenworthy; The Great Debate by Yuval Levin; Steady-State Economics by Herman Daly; The Common Sense of Politics by Mortimer Adler; and St. Thomas and the World State by Robert Hutchins. In part because of my disability (including medication side effects), I have great difficulty holding to anything like an organized reading program, but I will do my best to finish reading On Settler Colonialism and The Builder's Stone by the end of May.