America!

It seems like in the past few years there have been a lot of, well, let’s say disgruntled people, in our country. There has been the staunch divisions seen and revisited a hundred times. The feelings of unity that the country might have shared at one time seems shattered, and now as the National Holiday approaches I hear whisperings that we don’t have much to celebrate this year.

In places all over the country we hear either the hard-liners, who believe whatever the government says patriotism, and the depressing embarrassment of those who might claim to be Canadian when traveling abroad.

More than a hundred years ago there was written a song that has the power still to bring a tear to those patriots who will really sit and listen to it. “American the Beautiful” was written by Katherine Bates and in 1895 first published by The Congregationalist. Following 9-11 Dan Rather quoted the last verse of the song and nearly burst into tears on air.

It’s a great song, and maybe instead of being overtly proud of the mistakes our country has made, or terribly embarrassed by our grand successes we can all unify and look at the verses for what they are. A message of hope.

Bates was living in the gilded age, but there were tragedy enough even in her time. True she was a Wellesley girl, but she writes in a time in which there have been horrible train wrecks, the Homestead Strike claimed American lives and left families thrown out into the street, Lizzie Borden had been brought to trial just the previous year, and not long before that was the Wounded Knee massacre.

Surely a woman living in such troubled times as these couldn’t have been able to see the beauty in the country around her. And yet she does, with such piercing clarity that a century later we read her words and are taken in by the verse.

In the first verse she relates the physical power that the country has. She wrote this taking a cross country train trip and was inspired by what she saw. And yet, she reminds us that the most beautiful part of the country is the brotherhood we share. The crown of all we have that is good.

The second speaks of pilgrims, but not those who landed on the rock I think. Instead, these are the passionate pilgrims who make a way through the wilderness. The pioneers of action and social view who make plain the path we need to take. And the confirmation is in the self control they must exercise, because the path is not for person gain or liberty, but the Liberty of all the nation’s people.

Verse three reminds us of the heroes that prove their belief and faith in what the country was founded all. All races and all creeds have died for the causes of the nation, and as the songs goes, if they love this country and love mercy more than their own life, then they are truly our most noble children.

And then the fourth. And this is the hardest I think, especially now, having suffered on our native soil, we have come out of our heady belief in our immortality, to see the reality of our fragility. We are no longer un-dimmed by human tears, and yet, this verse’s integrity is in tact.

The last verse begins, speaking about the patriot dream. That is the intangible thing, that goes beyond, that, as she says, sees beyond the years. She talks of Hope.

And that is what makes us beautiful. What makes America Beautiful, is that amazing ability we have to hope. She had it even in 1895, when there were trains exploding and people dying, and massacres, and crazy murders – she still sat on that train and was inspired by her nation, and by the people that dwell in it. She looked at all the squalor and filth and said, “ah, but look what we could do.” And she wrote verse that still strikes to the core of us.

We teach our children in school that the American flag is a symbol. That the colors stand for Courage, for Purity, and for Justice; that might not be quite right. The flag stands for the Hope of those things. The Flag doesn’t promise that beneath its shadow you will, without a doubt, find those things.

Instead the Flag says, “Here are our hopes.” When we are at our best this is what we endeavor to do. This is what we wish for our whole nation. These things above all else. These are the ideals we will fight for, these are the dreams we will instill in our children, and our children’s children.

This holiday I hope that no matter what our political affiliation, no matter who’s man or woman is in the political offices, no matter what our varying stands on all of the turbulent issues at hand right now, we can all take a day to relive the Hope that Bates captures. No matter what you think of the country, put out a flag in pride for what it stands for. Raise it will all your heart behind it with the understanding that we can all stand together on Hope that someday, “beyond the years,” we will look at cities that truly do gleam without corruption or pollution or selfishness and know that the time for our tears is over, and the time for Brotherhood has arrived. Hope with me, and work for that hope, “from sea to shinning sea.”