Sorrow. Suffering. Anguish. Pain. Despair. These emotions have become all too familiar in today’s America. It is difficult to look at our nation, a nation we all deeply love, and not feel frustrated and lost, saddened and disheartened by the rise of political violence, racism, injustice, and inequality that confronts us today. It is impossible to reflect on the events of January 6^th and on the many decisions being made by the current administration without recognizing that as a people and as a nation, we have fallen short of America’s promise and commitment to greatness.

And yet, while it is understandable that so many of us feel lost in the darkness of this moment, we must resist despair and instead seek the light that hope provides. This hope is rooted in a simple but powerful belief: that although our nation may stumble, what sustains its promise is our enduring commitment to the idea that we can be better tomorrow than we are today. On January 6^th, our nation stumbled—but it did not fall and those who sought to undermine our democracy and destroy our ideals will only succeed if we surrender to the complacency of despair.

But how do we sustain hope when American ideals seem under constant attack—often by our government, sometimes by our fellow neighbors and citizens? President Barack Obama captured this challenge better than I ever could when he said, “Hope is that thing inside us that insists, despite all the evidence to the contrary, that something better awaits us if we have the courage to reach for it and to work for it and to fight for it.”

I believe that something better does await our nation. But we must be honest with ourselves and with one another: even sustained by hope, the road ahead is a steep and difficult one. Still, our nation has been tested before—and time and again, it has proven both its resilience and the resilience of the American people. As we stand here at this Civil War monument, we remember that in 1863, on a battlefield in Gettysburg, President Lincoln reminded a nation confronting rebellion that this country was “conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.”

On January 6, we were shown that insurrection, hatred, bigotry, and racism have not been relegated to history or buried in those hallowed fields in Pennsylvania. We were reminded of Lincoln’s warning—that we are ‘engaged in a great civil war, testing whether this nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure’.  This remains an unanswered question. 

While the current administration and those who stormed the Capitol seek to cling to political power by turning neighbor against neighbor and brother against brother, we must reject that narrative. We must remember the lessons of history: that there is far more that unites us as Americans than divides us. We must reject violence and replace it with compassion, reject hatred and replace it with dialogue—even with those with whom we profoundly and passionately disagree.

Yes, the work before us is daunting, and it remains unfinished; and if we continue as a divided nation, our promise and commitment to greatness will forever remain unfulfilled. So from this day forward, we must come together—liberals and conservatives--Democrats, Republicans, and Independents—and proclaim with one voice that we will no longer allow those who seek to destroy America’s ideals to do so under the false banner of patriotism. We must stand here today and declare to the world that patriotism does not require division, bigotry, and hatred, that era is over.

 And we must once again heed Lincoln’s call—to commit ourselves to ‘the great task remaining before us, to ensure that those who gave the last full measure of devotion did not do so in vain; that this nation shall have a new birth of freedom; and that government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not perish from the earth.’

God bless ALL of us and God bless the United States of America.  Thank you