c. 2004 Religion News Service

(Tom Ehrich is a writer and computer consultant, managing large-scale database implementations. An Episcopal priest, he lives in Durham, N.C. Visit his Web site at http://www.onajourney.org.)

(UNDATED) We have spent the past many months listening to politicians. It is time they listened to us. Here is what I hope they hear come November 2:

First, voting is serious business. Men and women died to give us this right. We don’t intend to have our franchise cheapened or stolen just because you want power. Your efforts to manipulate voter registration and election-day balloting are shameful. What little respect other nations have for us will be lost if you shred democracy in order to rule.

Second, don’t take election results as a mandate to do whatever you want. A nation that is divided down the middle doesn’t give such mandates. Be the president of all the people, not just the 48 percent who voted you in.

Third, don’t think you fooled us. We aren’t fools. Sure, some Americans don’t know up from down, but most of us are educated and capable. We balance checkbooks, make out grocery lists, hold down responsible jobs, sign contracts, negotiate for cars and houses, read newspapers and possess common sense. We can handle the truth. We recognize lies, evasions and empty slogans. We know far more about the issues facing America than your sound-bite campaigning would suggest. It wasn’t hiding the truth that got you elected.

Fourth, don’t misread our votes as delight in your candidacy or as unquestioning affirmation of your policies. Some think you are wonderful; most, I think, are skeptical. You know how to campaign, but that isn’t the same as governing. We know the job is overwhelming in its size and complexity. What we have been listening for is character. You should be asking whether or not we have seen decency, wisdom, magnanimity and honesty in you. I think you would be surprised by how little we trust you.

Fifth, don’t meddle in our faith, and don’t try to exploit our religious divisions for your political gain. That is playing with fire. Our democracy cannot stand it. Our votes don’t give you permission to convert one side’s narrow religious morality into the law of the land.

We in the faith communities will deal separately with religious leaders who sense an opportunity for short-term advantage on a few wedge issues but are blind to the questions and needs that their people are laying before God.

Sixth, there was a dark side to Sept. 11, and there was a light side. The light side was our discovery of oneness as Americans, a reclaiming of flag and patriotism by all citizens, an awareness of ourselves as fortunate people occupying a good land.

Politicians turned the dark side to their advantage. But you cannot have the light side. You cannot segment this nation into friends and enemies, morally pure and morally impure, worthy and unworthy, red states and blue states, Christians and all others, whites and all others, rich and all others, native-born and all others.

That isn’t the America we know at the ballpark, where we all stand for the anthem; or at work, where we all expect to be treated fairly; or in courts of law, where we all expect justice; or in our religious institutions, where we all expect free expression; or in our homes, where we all expect privacy and liberty.

Yes, we are divided, and our opinions are strong. But we will work it out. Voting is one way. More important will be countless encounters at dinner tables, backyard fences, workplace break rooms, and Wednesday church suppers. You cannot prevent those encounters by ratcheting up the fear and by declaring some good and some bad. We know better. It isn’t your place to declare your partisans as morally superior. In that song of freedom, we are one.

That, dear reader, is what my vote will be about. Yours, too, I suspect. Whichever candidates and party we support, I hope we all demand that the full meaning of our votes be heard.

MO/PH END EHRICH