The search for unity

In the United States, is it too much to ask?

BNWA DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE efore Thursday’s observance of the National Day of Prayer, an annual occasion marked since Congress sanctioned it back in 1952, Cross Church Pastor Ronnie Floyd said he hoped the day would inspire a needed spirit of “unity” across the nation.

“We need to issue a strong forward call that America needs to come togeth- er — that we’re better together than we are apart, that a house divided cannot stand,” Floyd said. “And we need to understand that [the same is] true for a church, that’s true for a family, it’s true for business, it’s true for the state, it’s true for the nation.

“We just need to really come together, and the only one who’s going to bring us together is God himself.”

We do not doubt God’s power in that regard, but it’s safe to say the One in charge of the universe has so far chosen against delivering unity to this still-young nation. The Psalmist tells the reader “how good and pleasant it is when brothers dwell in unity,” and certainly believers are called upon to live and act in harmony. Through faith, all things are possible; in democracy, well, we’re not so sure.

We can appreciate a kumbaya moment as much as any Coke commercial (“I’d like to teach the world to sing, in perfect harmony …”), but a lack of unity isn’t necessarily the biggest threat to our nation’s future. In a country rooted in free speech, freedom to believe (or not) as one chooses and to assemble peaceably to seek redress of grievances, it doesn’t seem perfect unity was what the Founding Fathers anticipated.

They envisioned a “more perfect union,” but they weren’t so bold as to predict a perfect one.

Unity too often means something like this: “We can stop all this arguing, if you’ll just come around to my right way of thinking.” That’s too much to expect. But we do respect where we think Floyd is coming from. In the never-ending (thank goodness) debate about how we govern ourselves, it often seems we’ve lost a certain capacity to even imagine people with different ideas can find some common ground.

We would pray (and do) for an increased capacity among us Americans in our ability to differ without casting those who think differently as evil.

Honestly, the few times our nation has very temporarily appeared to be solidly united, it has usually involved high body counts. And even then, the appearance of unity fades fairly quickly.

“Pray for America - Unity” was the slogan stamped on all the wristbands, ball caps, T-shirts and other merchandise available for a few bucks at the National Day of Prayer website. Fine, but we’d encourage prayer for all our attitudes, too, that kindness, empathy and compassion might be at the heart of our debates and decision-making. That’s something every one of us can set to work achieving in our own hearts and minds without reliance on divine intervention. Unity is well beyond our individual efforts.

It’s not in the Bible, but experience suggests the Ben Franklin-esque advice that “God helps those who help themselves” is a reliable, common sense path. By all means, pray for unity among us flawed humans, but in the meantime, also seek a greater capacity for treating others as we ourselves want to be treated.

In so doing, it may just be that we’re responding to an guiding hand well beyond our own understanding.