The Vote

Here is a confession: I don't usually vote, and I am very embarrassed about it. I mean to. I want to, and I believe in doing it.
The one and only political act in my life has been to march in the peace rally in Portland this year. Even then, I felt a bit ignorant, like a second rate marcher, who was going to be found out, and kicked out, because I wasn't wearing a shirt that says "Bush is the Antichrist". I don't find myself championing for any one political candidate, or party, and I feel horribly uninformed, so I bow out in a very cowardly way.
Today in my Gender Communications class we were discussing the history of Women's Suffrage, and how so many women and men fought a long and hard battle, so that I would have the right to vote. I was humbled, and grateful.
It means the world to me to have that opportunity. It really does. Almost as much as it means to me that my mother has stuck out a tough few years as a female youth and family minister, within a church tradition where the female part of that is a problem for many.
She does it because of God's call on her life. She has a message about Jesus that she wants to share through her work, and so she is willing to take the heat, and carry on.
She also does it for her daughters, and granddaughters. So that we might not discount God's call on our lives, or our spiritual experiences as less than valid within our church families.
I am so thankful for people who see a bigger picture than just what is acceptable in the culture around them. I shudder to think about where we would we be if no one was willing to question the social norms of their day and age. Let me throw out a word like....slavery, for example.
(On a side note...sex slavery and human trafficking have not been eliminated from the world. At all. Not even close).
So.....I am going to make a conscious effort about becoming an informed voter. Not just for the presidential elections, but in local things that affect the schools and people who live in my community.