Got Hope.

Last night at 9:45, while watching the election returns come in, Jason and I decided to hop the next train downtown to see what we could see. It was while standing on the platform for the 10:20 train that we heard that Barack Obama had the electoral votes he needed to be declared the president-elect of the United States. It was as we were exiting the train that we heard a woman on her cell phone say, "He hasn't started speaking yet? He'll start in 5 or 10 minutes?" Along with everyone else who had heard her conversation, we started walking a bit more quickly toward Grant Park. It was about 5 minutes later that we heard the first words bouncing off the buildings on Michigan Avenue and I, for one, began to run faster and faster until we found a place where we could hear, among a group of people huddled together on the bridge over the train yard. We stood there, shoulder to shoulder, listening to the start of the speech, shushing the guy who started to talk on his cell phone, as people danced and drummed and cheered in the streets behind us.

When the speech was over and the crowd streamed toward Michigan Avenue, there were a few things I noticed. First, the number of people who brought their small children to be there for this historic event. Second, the diversity of the crowd. In an exceedingly segregated city like Chicago it is not often that you see such a vast representation of the city's diversity all in one place. Third, that as the party started to break up and we all went to our train stations and El platforms and bus stops, it seemed that people had come from all over the city -- people from every neighborhood had come together in "Chicago's front yard" to celebrate this moment. And fourth, even with all the excitment and all the people, there was no trouble. The dozens of police in riot gear had nothing to do. In fact, people were stopping in front of the officers to let their kids pet the police horses. The hundreds of thousands of people in the street that night were civil and friendly, freely giving their cameras to strangers and asking them to take their picture. There was no fear. There. Was. No. Fear.

May this be a sign of what is to come, of a time when we will learn how to live together as a community of people from different places, with different backgrounds, and even different beliefs, and be able to live and work and celebrate together. May this the sign of a time when we will no longer allow ourselves to be ruled by the meta-narrative of fear, but will instead allow the life giving powers of hope to make us new every day. Of course, I don't expect a new government to be able to do all this, after all what I truly long for is the Kingdom of God. But for now, I will hold onto the vision of a night in Grant Park when hope conquered fear.

It was a night to remember.