To Vote, to Pray

I just posted the following on facebook, and thought it should go here as well. It may be the shorted blog post you will ever find on this blog.

When I voted this morning, the "high" tables with the privacy shields were all full, so I knelt at a low coffee table to fill out my ballot. When I was finished and walked up to put my ballot in the machine, the man standing there commented, "I wasn't sure whether you were voting or praying."

 

This struck me as oddly appropriate. In a world where some are politically silenced, in a country where people have had to struggle for the right to vote because they were the wrong sex or their skin was the wrong color, casting a ballot has an almost sacred significance. To have a vote is to have a voice, however small and seemingly insignificant, that can help shape history. As in prayer, we lift up our voices. What we ask for and hope for may not happen, but saying what we have to say matters still.