[Sent 7 January 2021 to my wife and our three daughters]
Good morning on this very dark and grievous day. I trust you are well and safe, both in reference to the devastating coronavirus pandemic and now also in reference to the unparalleled political/societal meltdown yesterday in Washington, DC. Mitt Romney’s pointed speech in the Senate Chamber after Congress reconvened last night had an appropriately sober tone. By contrast, the shock and dissociation expressed by Mitch McConnell et al Republican officials seemed disingenuous, self-serving, misleading, and indefensibly late since they have been in unwavering lockstep with Trump from Day One four years ago. And Lindsey Graham’s lacing his “enough . . . count me out” comments with humorous asides distracted from the gravity of the moment and trivialized his complicity.
Trump called his supporters to the city. He stood before them yesterday morning, repeating yet again his false claims about the election. He reassured them “We will never concede”. He incited them to head to the Capitol to “take back the country”.
Heavily armed they stormed the Capitol. Trump watched the assault on TV for hours. He addressed those who vandalized the Capitol as “very special”, telling them “We love you”. He delayed calling in the National Guard.
We will never forget the surreal images for which Trump and his enablers are responsible. He should be arrested. They should resign.
As Mom and I watched yesterday’s unfolding tragedy through the afternoon and evening, I recalled a photograph I made (inserted below) during one of my annual visits with Eberhard and Renate Bethge in their home near Bonn.
As we stood together in his book-lined home office, Eberhard pulled down a worn Bible to show me where his ‘friend in the singular’ (and Renate’s uncle) Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906-45) had written ‘9.11.38’ in the margin after the destructive/violent Kristallnacht (Night of Broken Glass) and underlined these words – “They burned all the houses of God in the land” (Psa. 74:8).
‘6 January 2021’ is now in our mental margin, on our list of disillusioning national dates.
By late 1942 and after a decade of covert as well as overt opposition to Hitler and the Nazis, resistors such as the Bonhoeffer family had reason to hope. Germany’s military losses on the Eastern/Russian Front had set in motion elaborate plans for stopping Hitler by arrest or assassination. Bonhoeffer wrote a reflective essay for his immediate family and fellow conspirators titled After Ten Years. His father read the essay to the assembled family on Christmas Day 1942. Bonhoeffer closed the essay with this haunting question – ‘Are we still of any use?’ I find his painfully candid response to this question timely for us as we look/move past the Trump presidency. Here is my translation of his response –
We have become silent witnesses of evil actions. We have been drenched by many storms. We have learned the art of disguise (displacement, counterfeiting) and ambiguous speech. We have through experience become suspicious of people and remain often culpable (guilty, at fault) regarding truthfulness and free speech. We have been mellowed (made brittle, pliable) or perhaps even become cynical through intolerable (unbearable) conflicts. To be useful, what we need to be is unpretentious (without artificiality), modest, straightforward individuals – not geniuses, cynics, despisers of humanity, cunning (clever) tacticians. Will our strength to resist (stand against) being unnaturally shaped be strong enough and our genuineness (uprightness, sincerity, honesty) with ourselves remain relentless (unsparing) enough that we can find our way back again to simplicity and straightforwardness?To be of some use in the days ahead, we must scrub ourselves clean. Only then might we be in a legitimate (dis)position to encourage others to scrub themselves clean.
Doug/Dad
