Yay, this has been a time coming.

Power = ...

...contacting your elected officials.

On Thursday, January 29th, I went to the State Capitol of Nebraska in Lincoln to rally against LB 48, the Illegal Immigration Enforcement Act, as proposed by State Senator Janssen of Fremont.

The bill would make it illegal to "harbor" undocumented immigrants (so, for example, the ESL class at one of my churches would be breaking the law if they were working with undocumented immigrants), would make police have to check the immigration status of the people they pull over or arrest, and the last section of the bill reads, I kid you not, that if the Illegal Immigration Enforcement Act is found to be unconstitutional (which it is, immigration is a federal issue), "the Legislature hereby declares that it would have passed the IIEA...irrespective of the fact...that (the IIEA) would be declared unconstitutional."

I am really working on this reconciliation thing a lot right now. But I am struggling so hard to understand why the Republican Party felt that it was so necessary to re-read the Constitution on the first day of Congress in DC, and in Nebraska and other states, the same party is disregarding it. I don't even like partisan politics. I wonder how I would be as a politician.

ANYWAY. One of my pastors heard that it takes just five phone calls for state senators to decide that they need to pay attention to an issue. And I don't really know how much email petitions do, but they probably do something more than nothing.

I started drafting this entry almost a month ago, and in that time, the world has seen what happens when people use their voices. Sometimes, it is really, really scary to speak. But we just gotta keep pushing ourselves to do it as much as we can.

Here's some help...thanks, P.L. -

...my age demographic (approximately 18-30).
I believe there is some "waiting on the world to change" that I gotta do. (See Mayer, John.) A wonderful quote that an Oberlin '09 - LVC '09-'10 friend shared with me about two years ago now helps me put that in perspective as well:

"We can not do everything, and there is a sense of liberation in realizing that.

But as the youngest person on staff at my workplaces, I can do stuff on the computer, and more importantly, my opinion is sought out and taken seriously, because people want to know what people my age are going to do. There has been some discussion in my house about the importance of finding a faith community of people our own age. And I definitely value that. But I have been so wonderfully affected by getting to know many people this year who are 60 and better...and I have been told that they have benefited from my presence as well.

Young people of the United States of America and the world, we are the future now, yo. We are coming into our own, and we can do some real good. Let's do it! Let's BE it.

...your identity.

Two of my dear friends are thinking transgenderly - one MTF, one FTM. I could not be prouder and happier for them for recognizing and acknowledging their thoughts and feelings and being out in the open about them. I love both of you very much and you know who you are!



A part II to this may be coming, or maybe something completely different. Thanks for reading the stuff I'd been wanting to blog about for a month.