Love and the Lightning Rod

When I was in Afghanistan the first time, my boss (a full colonel), was an alcoholic and an adulterer.  I’m what he might call a “Bible Thumper,” and it soon became apparent that he  didn’t care for me too much. However I can  say he shared something with me that I thought was exceptionally insightful.  It came right after he disclosed his intent to fire me (or more precisely, relieve me).  What the Colonel said that I believe is very perceptive was, “Oftentimes a leader becomes a lightning rod; the unit members direct all their negative energy and frustration at the leader, fairly or not.”  In spite of the fact that he eventually got a young, female soldier pregnant, was later fired for being AWOL during a drinking binge, and his actions against me were overturned by the Department of The Army, that was a very astute observation.

There is good reason why leaders can become lightning rods – they make decisions and implement policies that affect our existence. For better or worse, leaders, like families have an inordinate influence on our lives.  Healthy marriages create healthy families.  Healthy families create healthy neighborhoods.  Healthy neighborhoods create healthy cities.  Healthy cities create healthy states.  Healthy states create a healthy country.  Why in the world would any leader want to upset the very foundation for a healthy nation?

On January 30, 1905, President Theodore Roosevelt underscored the importance of marriage in a message to Congress, “The institution of marriage is, of course, at the very foundation of our social organization, and all influences that affect that institution are of vital concern to the people of the whole country.”  Make no mistake, marriage matters.

 As mentioned in my last column, Obama advisor David Axlerod said in his book Believer: My Forty Years in Politics that Obama “misled” Americans about marriage.  Why the need for deception?  As a candidate for president, Obama told Rick Warren’s Saddleback Church that marriage could only extend to heterosexual couples.  “I believe that marriage is the union between a man and a woman,” Obama said. He continued, “Now, for me as a Christian — for me, it is also a sacred union. God’s in the mix.”  Me too, Mr. Obama, me too.  However, unlike God, Mr. Obama changed – or as he said, “evolved.”

Why not a man and a dog? A woman and a cat? A man and his car? A man and multiple women?   Back in the 1880’s, the Territory of Utah had a problem with Mormons and polygamy.  The problem was so disturbing that President Grover Cleveland addressed it on December 8, 1885.  In his First Annual Message to Congress he declared, “The strength, the perpetuity, and the destiny of the nation rest upon our homes, established by the law of God, guarded by parental care, regulated by parental authority, and sanctified by parental love. These are not the homes of polygamy.”

Regarding the necessity for a mother, President Cleveland continued, “The mothers of our land, who rule the nation as they mold the characters and guide the actions of their sons, live according to God's holy ordinances, and each, secure and happy in the exclusive love of the father of her children, sheds the warm light of true womanhood, unperverted and unpolluted, upon all within her pure and wholesome family circle.”

Unlike what we see in “Married With Children” or “The Simpsons,” Cleveland knew the value of fathers, and the value of a family that only a mother and father can form.  He told Congress, “The fathers of our families are the best citizens of the Republic. Wife and children are the sources of patriotism, and conjugal and parental affection beget devotion to the country. The man who, undefiled with plural marriage, is surrounded in his single home with his wife and children has a stake in the country which inspires him with respect for its laws and courage for its defense.”

Being a devoted Mom or Dad is not easy, especially in a culture and country where anything goes.   If President Cleveland recognized the importance of traditional marriage back in the 1800’s, how much more so is it now?  In closing, I’ll confess I’m in agreement with what former California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, ironically, not exactly a practitioner of traditional marriage, said about the issue, “I think that gay marriage is something that should be between a man and a woman.” 

The Lord is my Shepherd; the Terminator is my lightning rod.

This article appeared in the 25 FEB 2015 Upson Beacon.