Thank You

Thank you to those who sent me notes in response to my request for help on Friday. Opinion was about as divided as I was myself: split, but biased on the side of not holding the presence of so many anti-life politicians against a charity whose work is feeding the poor. That is where I was headed, before my post, and where I wound up.

I opened the invitation on Friday, started getting interested, then saw the names and swore. My first reaction was to say, "Forget about them. It's about people who are hungry. Go." But then I got worried that I was too easily giving in, taking the path of little resistance, to make myself feel better about doing something for those in need, but ignoring others in the process. Once I get myself worked up into one of these "how righteous will I be?" conversations, the only thing left to do is to seek opinions from others who are less apt to be a three-, four-, or five-handed Tevye than I.

I am not usually one for "ritual purity." I find that when I want to be that way, it is usually a distaste for certain people, people I would rather not be around, masquerading as righteousness. In this case, I have a long-running dislike for the two Senators, coupled with a strong distaste for the Congressman since I lived in his district, that is partially but not entirely owing to their absolute, categorical refusal to acknowledge the nature of their stances on abortion. (For one thing, if you have a last name starting with "O'" as I do, you tend to have very, very strong opinions about the Hyannis Irish, many of them uncharitable in the extreme).

I have not yet decided whether to go to the event at all, but the decision is now entirely about the merits of attending (versus making a donation and not attending) and financial grounds (did I mention I've quit my job?), and not about eating dinner with tax collectors and prostitutes. So thank you for helping me work through it.