Kinfolk, Neighbors, and Living in America

Posted on September 12, 2026 by Brian H. Gill
Google Street View: Traill County (North Dakota) Highway 11 near Goose River, looking south. (August 2012)
Scenic, no. Good farmland, yes. Red River Valley, near the Goose River, looking south.

Change happens, which isn’t a new idea. At all.

“Everything changes and nothing stands still”
(“πάντα χωρεῖ καὶ οὐδὲν μένει”, quoted by Plato in “Cratylus” (ca. 360 B.C.))
(Heraclitus, Wikiquote)

This week I’ll be talking about — mentioning, actually — some of my relatives, what Thomas Jefferson said about settling central North America, and why I like being an American. On the whole.

Indian Cemetery Field Trip

Tony Webster's image: Itasca State Park, Minnesota, a little south of Preacher's Grove. (June 2017) via Google Maps, used w/o permission.
Tony Webster’s image: Itasca State Park, Minnesota. (June 2017)

A high school field trip brought my class to Minnesota’s Itasca State Park. One spot we walked through was what I’ll call an Indian cemetery. What the currently official term is, I don’t know. Moving along.

As our teacher talked about the customs associated with this particular burial ground, one of the students made the wawa-wawa sound associated with Indians in westerns.

This was the 1960s, so the act wasn’t as remarkable as it might be today. Our teacher, responding to the vocalization and other disrespectful behaviors, reminded us that this was someone’s grave and shouldn’t be mocked.

I didn’t say anything at the time, or later, but remember feeling startled and repelled by what a few of my fellow-students did. No virtue there. Mocking someone whose chief offense was being dead and not closely related just didn’t make sense.

Make that not very closely related. I’ll get back to that.

Republic, Republican

Flag of the United States of America.

Before getting to what Thomas Jefferson said about folks living in what had abruptly become part of the United States, I’d better clarify what he meant by “republican”.

Basically, it’s the idea that people have a right to choose their political officials. A related idea is that a government’s power comes from the folks being governed, not that everything folks at my level have comes from the state.

A “republic” and a “democracy” aren’t the same thing. In a democracy, citizens rule themselves directly. The United States Supreme Court paraphrased something Daniel Webster said about that, back in 1891.

“…Mr. Webster’s argument in that case took a wider sweep, and contained a masterly statement of the American system of government, as recognizing that the people are the source of all political power, but that as the exercise of governmental powers immediately by the people themselves is impracticable, they must be exercised by representatives of the people; that the basis of representation is suffrage; that the right of suffrage must be protected and its exercise prescribed by previous law, and the results ascertained by some certain rule; that through its regulated exercise each man’s power tells in the constitution….”
(In Re Duncan; No. 1174; United States Supreme Court; argued December 17, 1S90; Decided March 30, 1891) [emphasis mine]

Now, onward to stuff Thomas Jefferson said.

Thomas Jefferson, Change, and Using Our Brains

The ‘good old days’: 1800 presidential election
“The Providential Detection” (ca. 1800). Jefferson kept from burning “Constitution & Independence U.S.A.” on the altar of “Gaelic Despotism”, with help from Satan, the writings of Thomas Paine, and French philosophers.
Left: '[Dividing the] national [map]', political cartoon by John Cabell (1860). Right: 'Political caricature. No. 3, The abolition catastrophe. Or the November smash-up', political cartoon (1864) see https://www.loc.gov/resource/ppmsca.33122/ https://www.loc.gov/resource/cph.3a12905/
Politics of yesteryear:
“Dividing the National Map” (left, 1860),
“The abolition catastrophe….” (right, 1864).

My country’s 1800 presidential election was about as serene as any other. I think that’s why Jefferson strongly suggested less hand-wringing and more looking at what was actually happening.

I also think that’s good advice, no matter what period we’re in. Or which crisis du jour we’re told to face with blind panic.

This excerpt from Jefferson’s first Inaugural Speech, by the way, is chunkier than I’d like. I’m handling it this way for two reasons. First, I like to give at least a little context; second, I spent part of this week thoroughly enjoying a visit from our grandchild and don’t have time for summary.

“…If there be any among us who would wish to dissolve this Union or to change its republican form, let them stand undisturbed as monuments of the safety with which error of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left free to combat it. I know, indeed, that Some honest men fear that a republican government cannot be strong; that this government is not strong enough. But would the honest patriot, in the full tide of successful experiment, abandon a government which has so far kept us free and firm, on the theoretic and visionary fear that this government, the world’s best hope, may by possibility want energy to preserve itself? I trust not I believe this, on the contrary, the strongest government on earth. I believe It is the only one where every man, at the call of the laws, would fly to the Standard of the law, and would meet invasions of the public order as his own personal concern. Sometimes it is said that man cannot be trusted with the government of himself. Can he, then, be trusted with the government of Others? Or have we found angels in the forms of kings to govern him? Let history answer this question.

“Let us, then, with courage and confidence pursue our own federal and republican principles, our attachment to our union and representative government. Kindly separated by nature and a wide ocean from the exterminating havoc of one quarter of the globe; too high-minded to endure the degradations of the others; possessing a chosen country, with room enough for our descendants to the hundredth and thousandth generation; entertaining a due sense of our equal right to the use of our own faculties, to the acquisitions of our industry, to honor and confidence from our fellow citizens, resulting not from birth but from our actions and their sense of them; enlightened by a benign religion, professed, indeed, and practiced in various forms, yet all of them including honesty, truth, temperance, gratitude, and the love of man; acknowledging and adoring an overruling Providence, which by all its dispensations proves that it delights in the happiness of man here and his greater happiness hereafter; with all these blessings, what more is necessary to make us a happy and prosperous people? Still one thing more, fellow citizens — a wise and frugal government, which shall restrain men from injuring one another, which shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government, and this is necessary to close the circle of our felicities….”
(Thomas Jefferson First Inaugural Address (March 4, 1801); via PresidentialRhetoric.com; — Dr. Martin Medhurst Distinguished Professor of Rhetoric and Communication, Baylor University, Waco, Texas / Paul Stob, Assistant Professor, Dept. of Communication Studies, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee) [emphasis mine]

One of these days I may get back to that “hundredth and thousandth generation” snippet, the Louisiana Purchase and Lewis and Clark expedition, and 19th century American history. Or at least a manageable subset of those topics.

But this week I’ll skip ahead to Jefferson’s second inaugural address, and how he saw my homeland’s “aboriginal inhabitants”.

After, that is, a short — for me — look at how I found these transcripts.

“Hundredth and Thousandth Generation”

Earlier this week, I remembered hearing that Thomas Jefferson thought settling North America’s interior would take at least a few centuries.

After a fair amount of digging, I began wondering if this was another of those ‘famous things that never really happened’.

Then I got a break.

Google’s started putting an “AI Overview” at the top of search results. It’s a handy new feature, partly because the Overview often includes search terms I can use.

This time the AI Overview told me that the Thomas Jefferson quote I’d been looking for was in his second Inaugural Address. That, and a little checking, led me to a transcript.

But a quick glance through his second Inaugural Address didn’t show me what I was looking for. Neither did a careful paragraph-by-paragraph reading.

Turns out that Jefferson’s prediction was in his first Inaugural Address. He said that the recent Louisiana Purchase had “room enough for our descendants to the hundredth and thousandth generation”.

Actually, the first Jefferson transcripts I found (Thomas Jefferson First Inaugural Address (March 4, 1801), Thomas Jefferson First Inaugural Address (March 4, 1805); via Avalon Project — Documents in Law, History and Diplomacy; Yale Law School) had him saying “thousandth and thousandth generation” .

I’m pretty sure what Jefferson actually said was “hundredth and thousandth” . But either way, the point is that he thought the process of folks setting up farms, towns, and cities in North America would be very lengthy.

I’m not sure why Google points me to Yale’s Avalon Project for both Jefferson’s first and second Inaugural Addresses. Whatever the reason, it shows why thinking is a good idea, and verifying results makes sense. No matter what technology a researcher uses.

Attitudes and “The Call of Cthulhu”

I’m not sure what the currently-official term for groups Jefferson called “aboriginal inhabitants” is.

Instead of Bowdlerizing or expressing revulsion, I’ll share another oversized excerpt and natter on about some of it.

“…The aboriginal inhabitants of these countries I have regarded with the commiseration their history inspires. Endowed with the faculties and the rights of men, breathing an ardent love of liberty and independence, and occupying a country which left them no desire but to be undisturbed, the stream of overflowing population from other regions directed itself on these shores; without power to divert, or habits to contend against, they have been overwhelmed by the current, or driven before it; now reduced within limits too narrow for the hunter’s state, humanity enjoins us to teach them agriculture and the domestic arts; to encourage them to that industry which alone can enable them to maintain their place in existence, and to prepare them in time for that state of society, which to bodily comforts adds the improvement of the mind and morals. We have therefore liberally furnished them with the implements of husbandry and household use; we have placed among them instructors in the arts of first necessity; and they are covered with the aegis of the law against aggressors from among ourselves.

“But the endeavors to enlighten them on the fate which awaits their present course of life, to induce them to exercise their reason, follow its dictates, and change their pursuits with the change of circumstances, have powerful obstacles to encounter; they are combated by the habits of their bodies, prejudice of their minds, ignorance, pride, and the influence of interested and crafty individuals among them, who feel themselves something in the present order of things, and fear to become nothing in any other. These persons inculcate a sanctimonious reverence for the customs of their ancestors; that whatsoever they did, must be done through all time; that reason is a false guide, and to advance under its counsel, in their physical, moral, or political condition, is perilous innovation; that their duty is to remain as their Creator made them, ignorance being safety, and knowledge full of danger; in short, my friends, among them is seen the action and counteraction of good sense and bigotry; they, too, have their anti-philosophers, who find an interest in keeping things in their present state, who dread reformation, and exert all their faculties to maintain the ascendency of habit over the duty of improving our reason, and obeying its mandates.…”
(Thomas Jefferson Second Inaugural Address (March 4, 1805); via PresidentialRhetoric.com; — Dr. Martin Medhurst Distinguished Professor of Rhetoric and Communication, Baylor University, Waco, Texas / Paul Stob, Assistant Professor, Dept. of Communication Studies, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee) [emphasis mine]

I think this is an important point: Jefferson said that folks who’d been living in central North America were “endowed with the faculties and the rights of men”. That he needed to point this out is less than ideal, and I’ll leave it at that.

What he said about their “anti-philosophers” convincing others that “their duty is to remain as their Creator made them, ignorance being safety, and knowledge full of danger” reminded me of something H. P. Lovecraft wrote.

“…The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. … The sciences, each straining in its own direction, have hitherto harmed us little; but some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the light into the peace and safety of a new dark age….”
(“The Call of Cthulhu,” H. P. Lovecraft (1929); via WikiQuote)

Words, Meanings, and Respect

Oi.

These days, I’d probably say something like “faculties and rights common to all humanity” instead of “faculties and the rights of men”.

In Jefferson’s day, and during my youth, “men” and “man” was synonymous with “humanity” in this context.

Many folks did not assume that using the male pronoun meant that women weren’t quite ‘human’.

Others — were another matter. I remember when ‘she’s smart as a man’ was supposed to be a compliment, I don’t miss ‘the good old days’, and I’m drifting off-topic.

I think it’s worth pointing out that Jefferson saw folks whose ancestors had been here long before the first English colonists as people. He also thought that they hadn’t gotten in on the ground floor with use of technologies used by English-Americans. I think he was right.

I also don’t feel shock and revulsion at Jefferson’s statement that making new technologies available to these non-English folks was a good idea. I’ll grant that ‘inducing them to exercise their reason’ wasn’t always done well.

“Crafty Individuals”

“…These persons inculcate a sanctimonious reverence for the customs of their ancestors; that whatsoever they did, must be done through all time; that reason is a false guide….”
(Thomas Jefferson Second Inaugural Address (March 4, 1805); via PresidentialRhetoric.com)

The last point I’ll make — the part with “crafty individuals” and “they, too, have their anti-philosophers” — is that I think a problem Jefferson saw affecting “the aboriginal inhabitants” is also part of today’s America.

I get the impression that folks at one edge of political spectra feel that what we need is a return to the ‘good old days’ of, say, the early 1950s. Meanwhile, folks along another edge — it’s as if they never got the memo that it’s no longer 1967.

Me? This isn’t the America I grew up in.

Some changes have very emphatically not been for the better, some are improvements, some are simply — changes.

Spotting “crafty individuals” who aren’t aiming their appeals at folks whose causes and principles I can sympathize with isn’t all that hard. Double negative: awkward, but I’ll let it stand.

When they’re tugging at my heartstrings, that’s another matter.

For me, at least, it helps that I think Heraclitus was right. Change happens. I also believe that reason makes sense and thinking is a good idea. Which should be obvious, but apparently isn’t.

Family and Neighbors

Google Maps: Hovde, in Beridalen, Nordre Land, Norway.
Hovde, in Beridalen, Nordre Land, Norway: about 110 miles north of Oslo.

Folks on my mother’s side of the family ended up in the Red River Valley, some of the planet’s best farmland that’s as flat as their homeland was mountainous.

We were among the first Euro-Americans living there, so meeting folks from the established families was pretty much inevitable.

A Blanket

One encounter wasn’t friendly. The homemaker noticed someone walking off with a blanket that she’d left to dry on a clothesline.

I’ve no idea why he thought this was a good idea, and she probably didn’t either. She did, however, know that this was her blanket and she wanted it back.

So she scurried after the blanket and its temporary bearer, expressing her views on the propriety of his action with many words and one broom. He kept walking.

This went on for some time until the man made an exasperated sound, threw down the blanket and resumed his hike toward the horizon.

Marrying Into an Older Family

Another encounter was rather more permanent.

Somewhere along the line, I learned that one of my aunts — great-aunt, actually, if memory serves — wasn’t happy about her appearance.

I hadn’t noticed anything odd, apart from her not being as long-faced as most. But I didn’t see anything odd about my very Norwegian relatives speaking English, so I’m arguably not all that observant.

When one of my cousins married, the ceremony followed norms of my great aunt’s ancestors. I appreciate the sentiments behind that decision. What I think of it is a bit more complicated, and far more than I have time or inclination to discuss this week.

None of this shows that we’re paragons of virtue or exemplars of tolerance.

From where I’m standing, someone on my mother’s side married someone from the area’s older families: and that’s about it.

On the other hand, being related by marriage to a particular subset of this continent’s “aboriginal inhabitants” does affect how I see my country finally sorting out the mess left by broken treaties in the 19th century.

I Like It Here

Udo Keppler's 'False Alarm on the Fourth' cartoon for Puck. Uncle Sam tells Lady Peace: 'It's all right. There's no fighting. The noise you hear is just my family celebrating!' (1902)
“Uncle Sam — It’s all right! … The noise you hear is just my family celebrating!” (1902)

On the whole, I like being an American.

Despite having started as thirteen English colonies, this country let my ancestors become citizens: even though many were Irish.

I like living in a country where following my faith is legal, and I can say what I think without first getting approval.

There’s more, but that’ll do for today.

I’ve talked about some of this before:

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Words and Actions Matter

Posted on September 5, 2026 by Brian H. Gill
Charles Forbell's 'Club Life in America: the Stockbrokers' Cartoon from Judge Magazine. (November 1929)
1920s: good times, until they weren’t.

My father grew up west of Chicago: first on a farm, then in Rockford, Illinois.

His family moving to Rockford wasn’t so much a matter of seeking a better way of life, as bad weather and worse economics forcing them off their farm.

Then they experienced what we call the Great Depression. And that’s another topic. Topics, actually.1 (You might enjoy reading what I said in footnote 1. Then again, maybe not. 🙂 )

‘You Can Do So Much More’

In the years leading up to World War II, my father was just another Irish kid in Rockford’s schools. That’s when an English teacher asked him about his plans.

He hadn’t given the matter much thought, but he did have a plan. He figured he’d graduate from high school. Then he’d get a job in the watch factory.2 After that, he’d work until he died or retired, whichever came first.

It strikes me as a good plan, given his circumstances.

The English teacher wasn’t so sure.

‘Oh, Bernard’, she said, ‘you can do so much more’.

I see her point. My father’s smart, articulate, observant, and intensely interested in everything. So am I, and I’m drifting off-topic again.

Many decades later, he told me that his English teacher’s words got him thinking about a future that didn’t include working in the watch factory.

Either way, he’d probably have included ROTC in his high school experience.3 As I said, he’s smart and observant. It’d been obvious that a major war was brewing, so getting prepped as an officer made sense.

But including college in his plans — that’s an idea he said wouldn’t have occurred to him, if an English teacher hadn’t seen more than just another Irish kid in him.

He didn’t entirely turn his back on watches, by the way. The top of a dresser in his basement study was nearly covered by pocket watches.

Actions and Outcomes

My father would probably have had a good life, if he’d followed through with his watch factory plan. But then he wouldn’t have met my mother. And I wouldn’t be here, writing about what his English teacher said. So I’m glad that conversation happened.

The point of all this, if there is one, is that what we say and do matters.

Sometimes it’s pretty obvious.

If I heave a rock toward someone’s window, for example, broken glass and an irate homeowner are a near-certain result. Telling the homeowner it was an accident probably won’t help.

Sometimes we can’t know what will happen. Not clearly.

My father’s English teacher almost certainly didn’t see that he’d have a short career as a teacher, and a much longer one as a librarian. And I don’t think anyone saw me coming. Other than God, of course, and that’s yet another topic or three.

Since what we do and say matters, I figure that saying and doing what makes sense is a good idea. That’s obvious, but it’s still a good idea.

I’ve talked about my father, responsibility, and vaguely-related stuff, before:

1 The 1929 crash had roots — as usual, it’s complicated. The investor/economic angle has been exhaustively hashed, rehashed, reheated, and served with various viewpoints as seasoning.

I’m reasonably sure that bad weather and resulting food production issues were also a factor.

That’s an idea I got from my father, back when he spent as much time as he ethically could at the reference desk, reading whatever he pulled from the shelves when he wasn’t answering questions (“Early Diagnosis, Tardy Treatment, and a Gimpy Hip” (January 25, 2025) Shock at the Reference Desk). This would have been during the 1950s, 1960s and early 1970s.

While writing this post, I looked for authoritative online resources discussing North America’s weather/climate in the 1920s. This is what I found:

With time and effort, I might find more local and regional meteorological records for the period which are both online and not behind a paywall. But weather and climate during the 1920s doesn’t seem to be a particularly hot topic, and I’m running out of time this week. Besides, I’m in my mid-70s, and don’t have the energy of a 40-year-old kid.

2 Nearly a century later, here’s what I found about timepieces and Rockford, Illinois:

3 ROTC:

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Night Watch, Paying Attention, and My Father

Posted on August 29, 2026 by Brian H. Gill
Technical drawing of a U.S. Navy World War II-tank landing ship (LST). (1959) From U.S. Navy All Hands magazine September 1959, pp. 32-33; United States Navy. Via Wikipedia.
U.S. Navy WWII LST (Landing Ship Tank), from All Hands magazine..

My father, Bernard Ives Gill, was a Lieutenant J.G. on an LST during World War II. One of his duties was standing watch on the bridge. Being a rather junior officer, he often got the night watches.

On one of these, both he and the sailor at the helm were experiencing the wakeful serenity of duty. Below, the ocean streamed by. Above, stars slowly rolled around the pole as hours passed and the convoy sailed towards its destination.

Then they noticed that the stern of the ship ahead of them looked a lot bigger than it should have.

A Little Background: Signal Cables and the Captain’s Cabin

“LST” stands for Landing Ship Tank. Each LST was very roughly as long as a football field and weighed well over a thousand tons.

The things were not particularly maneuverable.

Signal cables or chains ran from the bridge to the engine room passed right by the captain’s cabin. Being mechanical connections, they made quite a racket when someone on the bridge signaled the engine room, and someone in the engine room rang the repeater to acknowledge the order.

During night watches, it was customary for slight adjustments in power needed to keep the ship in position to be carried by a runner from the bridge to the engine room as written messages. That way, the captain could have a good night’s sleep.

Back to that quiet night watch.

Oops

Both my father and the sailor at the helm hadn’t noticed that the stern of the ship ahead of them had been getting bigger. Not until they were too close for comfort.

And not until in was too late to send a runner.

The ship’s engines had to be re-set: fast!

I gather that the repeater cables rattling/clanking/banging in the captain’s cabin brought him sharply awake. Naturally, he was curious as to why the sudden maneuver was necessary.

I don’t know what happened after that. My father would only say that he was embarrassed, and that the captain wasn’t pleased.

So What?

An obvious point to this story is that situational awareness is a good idea. So is correcting mistakes, even when it’s embarrassing.

I could rattle on about war, peace, high ideals and all that. But I’ve discussed that sort of thing before:

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Ducks

Posted on August 22, 2026 by Brian H. Gill
Brian H. Gill's photo: sunset, seen from the north room window, 8:07-8:08 p.m.. (August 20, 2026)
Sunset here in Sauk Centre: no ducks, just a nice photo. (August 20, 2026)

Ducks haven’t been a major part of my life, but our paths have crossed now and again.

Once, for example, I was driving north of Moorhead, Minnesota on — I’m not sure what its name was then. These days it’s called 57th Avenue N, CSAH 22, or 40th Avenue N; depending on which stretch of pavement you’re on.

Anyway, on its way toward the Red River,the road went through a cluster of homes. It was like those housing developments that popped up after WWII. Except that the houses weren’t all alike, and there were trees.

I gather this is because folks had built their homes piecemeal. Most of them apparently liked trees, and had varying notions of what their house should look like.

It wasn’t a monument to urban design, but I liked the result. Particularly compared to what happens when a developer clear-cuts land, plops housing units on what’s left, and I’m drifting off-topic.

Just Me and Some Ducks

This particular duck encounter happened when I was still living in Moorhead. I’d been driving to Fargo and decided to take the long way, on — whatever the road was called.

I was still driving between fields, maybe a thousand feet from the houses and trees, when I saw something in the middle of the road. It was a duck, waddling deliberately down the road’s centerline.

So there I was, sharing a road with a duck. With decisions to make.

It’s not the sort of situation discussed in the Minnesota Driver’s Manual. Not specifically, at any rate. So I was on my own, without official guidance, facing a duck.

There wasn’t anyone else in sight, just me and the duck.

I stopped the car and watched the duck. And my rear-view mirror, of course: so I wouldn’t be blocking the road for someone else.

As soon as I stopped, the duck turned its head — to look at me, I’m guessing.

It paused, then turned again, so it faced the grass growing by the road. I couldn’t hear it quack, but saw its bill open and close. Then the duck did a quick about-face and scooted for the left side of the road, with a brood of ducklings racing after it.

Within seconds, mama duck and her ducklings were out of sight in the tall grass.

I waited a few moments, making sure there wasn’t a straggler still in the grass to my right, and then drove on.

Animals

I’m none too fond of mosquitoes, ticks, and leeches. But by and large I like animals, and think they should be treated humanely. That’s something I didn’t need to change when I became a Catholic. I’ve talked about animals, priorities, and somewhat-related matters before:

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Voting, Voter Resources, Faith, and Me

Posted on August 15, 2026 by Brian H. Gill
😉 “I Voted”: another election, another sticker. 😉

It was a bit past one when I voted in Minnesota’s primaries this Tuesday. Two of the three election judges were checking off other voters when I got there.

Verifying that I was a registered voter went smoothly. I gave my name, the election judge saw that I was me, and that was that. Sauk Centre is a small town, and I’ve lived here — probably longer than you’ve been alive.

Voting is something I’ll do again, come November. To the extent that it gets me out of the house and occasionally lets me chat with folks, I enjoy the process.

It’s also part of acting as if what I believe matters. I’ve been talking about that for quite a while, off and on, including this, from about a decade back:

“…Being a good citizen, contributing to the good of society and taking part in public life, is part of being Catholic: or should be. (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1915, 2239)

In my country, that includes voting intelligently: thinking about issues and candidates, voting for whoever and whatever is best; or likely to do the least damage, in some cases.

Panel from Wiley Miller's 'Non Sequitur', referencing television content before an election. (September 6, 2015))

This isn’t a ‘political’ blog, so I won’t be claiming that one candidate walks on water, or that another is a spawn of Satan; or claim that God votes a party ticket.

I occasionally share what I think about immigrants, private property, and other ‘political’ issues. Depending on what part of which post you look at, I could be pegged as conservative or liberal….”
(“Love, Neighbors, and Voting” (October 1, 2016))

Deciding who and what to vote for: that’s where voting stops being a pleasant break in routine and starts being a less-than-pleasant civic duty. Or would, if I did the heavy lifting involved in that task.

This time around, as usual, I brought along a cheat sheet my wife had drawn up. We’re both very ‘Catholic’, and she’s both less emotional and more informed about candidates and issues: particularly the local and regional ones. I trust her judgement.

I’m taking it easy — easier than usual — this week, so I’ll just sketch out how being a Catholic affects being a citizen, share an updated link list of resources, link to what I’ve said about this sort of thing: and call it a day.

Faith and Citizenship

Rembrandt's ink sketch: 'Jesus and the adulteress'. (ca. 1639-41)

Being a Catholic and a citizen is very simple, and incredibly difficult.

I have to think that every human being is a person, with a share of humanity’s “transcendent dignity”. That’s everybody — NO EXCEPTIONS. Age, health, who our ancestors are, what we’ve done: none of that makes someone a non-person. We’re all, each of us, a person: someone made “in the image of God”. (Genesis 1:26–27, 2:7; Catechism of the Catholic Church, 355-357, 361, 369-370, 1700, 1730, 1929, 2258-2283)

Like I said, simple. And, at least for me, very difficult.

Basically, my obligation is to love God, love my neighbors, and see everyone as my neighbor. Always. (Matthew 5:43–44, 22:36–40; Mark 12:28–31; Luke 6:31, 10:25–27, 29–37; Catechism, 2196)

Getting back to voting, that’s part of how my native culture works.

Voting, responsibly, is part of our public life. Or should be. Since I’m a Catholic, that makes it an obligation. Along with recognizing humanity’s solidarity and respecting authority. Within reason. (Catechism, 1778, 1915, 1897-1917, 1939-1942, 2199, 2238-2243)

Voting Responsibly: Resources

Image: cover of USCCB's 'Forming Consciences for Faithful Citizenship'. (Copyright 2007, 2011, 2015, 2019, 2023)

Good news, the USCCB (United States Conference of Bishops) provides a pretty good set of resources, explaining why voting for the candidate with the nicest haircut may not be a good idea.

Frustrating news, the USCCB’s website isn’t entirely stable. They may have reasons for changing the URLs of resources and not updating their own pages to reflect the changes, but — well, that’s my problem.

These links were valid on the afternoon of August 13, 2026:

Faith Matters, Or Should

Louis M. Glackens' cartoon in Puck: 'The Yellow Press'. William Randolph Hearst as a jester tossing newspapers with headlines such as 'Appeals to Passion, Venom, Sensationalism, Attacks on Honest Officials, Strife, Distorted News, Personal Grievance, Misrepresentation' to a crowd of eager readers, among them an anarchist assassinating a politician speaking from a platform draped with American flags; on the left, men labeled 'Man who buys the comic supplement for the kids, Businessman, Gullible Reformer, Advertiser, and Decent Citizen' carry bags of money that they dump into Hearst's printing press'. Puck (NY) (October 12, 1910)
Problematic news isn’t new. (1910)
See “Truth, Beauty, and the Evening News” (June 15, 2024)

There. I’ve found valid links to arguably-useful voter resources, and outlined how my beliefs affect how I try to act.

Now it’s time for me to say I’ve talked about this sort of thing before, and share links you can follow — or not, although I think you’d find some of it interesting:

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