On April 29th, 2026, the Supreme Court essentially gutted the Voting Rights Act of 1965. The impact was immediate, and jarring. Several states took the Louisiana v. Callas decision as justification to gerrymander their districts to give significant electoral advantage to Republicans – and to reduce, if not negate, the influence of Black voters. A flurry of legislative activity has taken place, with the express intention of reconfiguring districts before the midterm elections in November.
The 6-3 Supreme Court majority based its decision on their conviction that the current district configuration is an unconstitutional racial gerrymander. That racial difference should not be figured in. To my mind, the conservative majority of the Supreme Court is increasingly locked in to seeing the world as they think it should be.Through this lens, we should all be color-blind; that a person’s race doesn’t matter.
But it does. And it has. Racial prejudice and racism have been embedded in the American project from the beginning. That sad and sordid history cannot be wished or willed away. It still rears its ugly legacy in so many dispiriting and tragic ways. We can hold on to a vision of the world as it should be – and to do all the work required to bring that about, but that vision needs to held in tension with the world as it is. In my opinion, which is shared by so many others, is that the Supreme Court is not doing that. From their lofty judicial perch the majority members of the Supreme Court look out over America and are adjudicating their decisions with increasing disregard for what is happening on the ground.
Privilege can do that. Especially when it combines with power.
One of the glaring deficits of privilege is that it engenders a myopia in those who lead yet don’t claim their privileged status.That privilege, particularly when it is accompanied by power, can enable people to see only what they choose to see. And ignore, dismiss, or demean everything else. Vision can easily then be limited to seeing the world as they think it should be, which creates a narrowing and tunnelling perspective, and which is happening in more and more sectors of American life.
The growing billionaire class, whose wealth provides them with layers of insulation from the world as it is, regularly use their money to advance their agenda – which invariably involves securing their stakes and growing their portfolios — with little if any regard for the consequence their actions take. As one of the kingpins of the financial elite, Bill Gates, has said of Elon Musk, who currently reigns at the top of the world’s wealth pyramid, “the picture of the world’s richest man killing the world’s poorest children is not a pretty one.”
President Trump continues to see and shape the world as he thinks it should be: obedient and loyal to him. From demanding that the color of the Lincoln Memorial reflecting pool be changed to blue, to prosecuting the war in Iran on his most recent whim, to giving orders to Republican candidates that in true Mafioso fashion they are not allowed to refuse, Trump seeks to dominate every corner of our lives which, in his increasingly disturbed psyche, is as the world should be.
And a growing portion of the Christian world, which is unofficially identified as the New Apostolic Reformation, seeks dominion over the “seven mountains” of government, education, media, entertainment, religion, business, and family, which, from their reductionist biblical perspective, will create a world as it should be. Paying no attention to the diverse religious world as it is, which has millions of people who interpret the Bible differently, or who don’t subscribe allegiance to the Bible at all. They see themselves as the stewards of the truth, and everyone who does not align themselves with their particularly theology is false, if not outright demonic.
These are disturbing, if not disorienting, examples of the toxic combination of privilege and power. And, as many of us know, that list of examples is growing.
As a person of faith, I hold on to a vision of the world as it should be, which is to be filled with and framed by hope, peace, justice, mercy, freedom, and compassion. Those values can be hard to come by, especially in a ruthless and polarized world. What I have learned over the years is that for any headway to be achieved on implementing those timeless values requires an acknowledgement and appreciation of the world as it is. Not just conceptually, but personally. Personally connecting with the world as it is – with all of its achievements, resources, beauty and skill – along with its pain, corruption, confusion, and violence. The world as it is needs to be held in tension with the world as it should be. Living in that tension both sharpens the vision of the world as it should be and at the same time mitigates the influence of privilege and diminishes the punishment of power.
Martin Luther King’s greatest contribution – to me and to so many others, was his claim that love is the bridge between the world as it is and the world as it should be. Instead of power seeking domination, love, as King saw it, provides connection – between people, and between the world as it is and the world as it should be. One of his more famous quotations is his integration of power and love: “Power without love is reckless and abusive. Love without power is sentimental and anemic. Power at its best is implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love.”
Power and love need to be paired together. They can help us live faithfully and effectively in the tension between the world as it is and the world as it should be.
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On Thursday, May 7th, the National Day of Prayer, I hosted a gathering of four faith-based, bridge-building groups in reflecting on one of America’s “sacred” documents, the Gettysburg Address. Reflections were given from the leaders of Braver Angels, faith250, Interfaith America and One America. Prayers were offered from six different religious traditions, and silence was kept. You can watch the video of the event here: National Day of Prayer Event Recording
