Fr. Chuck's Column, October 25, 2020

 Election Day approaches; if you are able to vote, I urge you to do so. It is a great and hard-won privilege. I forward to you an article by Lubna Zeidan, the Program Director for iACT for Refugees. iACT is an interfaith organization in Austin, and St Austin parish is a longtime member.

God bless,

I work and talk daily to newly resettled refugees from all parts of the world who are in turn mystified, amused or surprised at some of what we do.

Recently we discussed the topic of voting since many of our old clients are now citizens. We discovered a number of cultural barriers kept people who have lived under oppressive regimes in other countries from understanding the basic concept of democracy. It is harder than we thought to convince them to vote.

We see refugees who have lived at the mercy of their leaders. They never had a choice of who their oppressor was. One regime may be overthrown for another and seldom does it make a good difference in people’s lives. The results are never good for those who have no power. They may not vote because they believe their vote doesn’t count.

Those who at a moment in time may have been hopeful and worked at voting out a dictator, may have paid the price in imprisonment, torture, death of loved ones and the necessity to flee for their lives. They now think twice about voicing any opinion. They may not vote because they are not sure of the repercussions.

Others were openly encouraged to participate in elections in their countries but somehow the same person kept winning at 95% of the vote. They knew the whole act was a sham. They may not vote because they don’t trust the systems or those who created them.

Our refugee clients have horrible voting experiences that they need to overcome before they trust to participate in American elections. But what is our excuse?

We know one person-each of us- does make a difference. We found our power in petitions, protests, or just writing letters. We are free to participate in every election. We are able to learn about our candidates, to question them and to hold them accountable. And if we don’t like what they do, we can vote them out. Our government can reflect who we are if enough of us participate. Think every day about how lucky we are to live in a democracy. Please vote!