When You Can't Set Things in Order

I have a relationship that ended badly last year. I was in a dark place while I was pregnant, and I withdrew from everyone I knew, partially because of depression and partially in a last-ditch effort to protect those relationships from ruin. (I wasn't a very nice person when I was pregnant, which was a strange, new thing for me. I really didn't know how to handle it.)

This particular relationship suffered more than the others did for a reason I don't completely understand. Before I knew it, this person was offended beyond repair and out of my life without a glance back.

I tried to apologize, but they were in no mood to hear it.

And so I let that person go. What else was there to do? I thought about them every once in a while during the next few months. Always wishing I had an opportunity to ask what happened. To clarify whatever they misunderstood. But their message was clear when they left: I don't want to hear from you. Leave me alone.

And that is perhaps the worst feeling in the world. Wanting to making something right, but not being able to.

The months passed.

I decided to break my silence with this person, knowing full well that it was not welcomed. I got no response. This was almost worse than a bad response.

The next day I was sitting at church pondering this struggle I was having. The desire I could not make happen: to set things straight. I sat on the back row of Relief Society, half-way listening to the lesson, praying, pondering, then, resignedly, scrolling through Facebook. I happened to come across an article that was posted by a Mormon page I follow. It was a General Conference message from 1977 by Elder Boyd. K Packer, titled "Balm of Gilead." He talks about excess baggage that we sometimes carry in our lives. Of it, he said:

"Some of it you have to get rid of without really solving the problem. Some things that ought to be put in order are not put in order because you can’t control them."
And then I realized I needed to put down this excess baggage I'd been carrying around. I couldn't fix it with the person I'd (however unwittingly) offended because they had their own agency and I could not control them, even though I had good intentions. All I could do was work it out with God. I spent the rest of the meeting in silent supplication to give my burden to the Lord. In the end, He's the only one I'm responsible to. And you know what? It worked. I felt healing and peace for the first time in a long time.

I know the Savior is anxious to take our burdens. We are the ones who are often unwilling to give them up. When we do give them up, he takes those chains of our weaknesses and worries and forges them into our crowns of glory.

He can heal us.

He can take away our worries, not just our sins.

He is waiting to purify and exalt us, if we just let him.

Enthusiastic Patriotism

I have been shamed. Our whole society has been shamed.

Shamed into believing that America is not a great country.

She has too many flaws, too many imperfections, too many blemishes in Her past. She is unworthy to be applauded or celebrated. She has done more bad in the world than good.

I don't know when it was, but sometime during the last couple of years I started to believe these lies. Well, I like to think that I didn't really believe them. But I was at the very least shamed into silence. I didn't dare oppose the lies.

Cultural genocide.
Imperialism.
Slavery.
Racism.
War-mongering.
Medling.

These words have come to dominate into the conversation about the history of our nation. And how do you oppose that? They have the facts, they have the proof. They say, America has a dark past that must be revealed. They insist, we have to tell the world how truly bad we've been. They argue, not only must we reveal this dark past, but we must make it the dominating view on our history.

I saw the effects of this "new history" during my college classes. American Studies was my major. No longer did I hear about the great and wonderful America that I'd grown up learning about and loving. Now I was being told that it'd all been a lie. America wasn't that good. They made a point to highlight every flaw at every opportunity.

This gets a little depressing after a while.

And pretty soon, I was a once-proud American who is too afraid to celebrate Independence Day with too much enthusiasm because I'd been told it's all fiction.

Founding Fathers? Slave holders.
Declaration of Independence? Just talk.
Constitution? Racist.
Colonists? Native killers.

I read an article called, "What I'm Celebrating Instead of America's Birthday this Fourth of July," and it made me sad. Really sad.

Now it's not even worth celebrating. We have to create a new, unintelligible, mish-mash holiday to replace it, because it's just that bad to say, "I love America!"

And then later that day I read a friend's post on Facebook, and it shook some sense into me:

"Do we love our country less when we wish it was better? OF COURSE NOT!"

And that made me realize, dang it, I love this holiday! I love this country! I FREAKING LOVE AMERICA!

Think about it this way. I seriously love my husband. Is he perfect? Has he never made a mistake? Has he never been wrong? Does he always live up to expectations? OF COURSE NOT. But you better believe that I love him. And I don't have to qualify my love with any "buts" every time I tell him or someone else that I love him.

It's the same concept. Don't be afraid to love America-- and don't apologize about it either!

So that's how I came to realize: celebrating something doesn't make you blind to its imperfections. And when you love something you don't have to add reservations to that love because of shortcomings.

It feels good to be enthusiastically patriotic again.

Celebrate on!