Perspective from the 19^th Hole is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus to use an image from my favorite sport, golf.  Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all my professional positions, including as press secretary in Washington, D.C. for a Democrat Congressman from Oregon (Les AuCoin), as an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, as press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and as a private sector lobbyist.  This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.  I could have called this blog “Middle Ground,” for that is what I long for in both politics and golf.  The middle ground is often where the best public policy decisions lie.  And it is where you want to be on a golf course.

I drew this blog headline from a column composed by one of today’s top writers, David Brooks, whose work often appears in the New York Times.

This time, he summarizes a way for all of us who bemoan Donald Trump’s ascendancy to retain our equilibrium amidst all of Trump’s lies and distractions.

I reprint parts of his column below, but here is one of the most salient paragraphs:

“If paganism is a grand but dehumanizing value system, I’ve found it necessary, in this increasingly pagan age, to root myself in anything that feels rehumanizing, whether it’s art or literature or learning.  I’ve found it incredibly replenishing to be spending time around selfless, humble people who are still doing the work of serving the homeless, mentoring a lost kid who’s joined a gang.  These days I need these moral antidotes to feel healthy, resilient and inspired.”

What Brooks needs – what all of us need – is to do the good work of the Christian gospel, loving your fellow human beings.  Even if they are not like us.  Even if they are immigrants whom Trump hates. 

And, even if Trump does just the opposite of what we do.  To Trump, actions such as those we could take would amount to his definition of  blasphemy because the effort doesn’t advance his personal cause.

But, these days, I am trying to think less about Trump and more how to be a solid Christian who can survive in what Brooks describes as a “pagan world” that he says is emboldened by Trump.

So, here are three ways my wife and I will focus our attention:

• Continue to support Salem Free Clinics, which was started by our church here in Salem, Oregon, which now counts many more churches as supporters, and, more importantly, which provides health and dental help to those who cannot either.
• Continue to support refugee programs for new arrivals in Salem, also a program started by our church here.  It is critical to help these folks who want a better life.
• Continue support Salem Area Young Life, which helps lead young people to Christ.

Focusing in areas such as these provide just as a little reprieve from Trump et. al.

Here is how Brooks started his column:

“I had forgotten how exhausting it is to live in Trump’s world.  He’s not only a political figure.  He creates a psychological and social atmosphere that suffuses the whole culture — the airwaves, our conversations, our moods.

“If there is one word to define Trump’s atmosphere, it is ‘pagan.’  The pagan values of ancient Rome celebrated power, manliness, conquest, ego, fame, competitiveness and prowess, and it is those values that have always been at the core of Trump’s being — from his real estate grandiosity, to his love of pro wrestling, to his king-of-the-jungle version of American greatness.

“The pagan ethos has always appealed to grandiose male narcissists because it gives them permission to grab whatever they want.  This ethos encourages egotists to puff themselves up and boast in a way they find urgently satisfying.  Self-love is the only form of love they know.

“The pagan culture is seductive because it lures you with images of heroism, might, and glory.  Think of Achilles slaughtering his enemies before the walls of Troy.  For a certain sort of perpetual boy, what could be cooler than that?  But there is little compassion in this worldview, no concept that humility might be a virtue.  There is a callous tolerance of cruelty.”

Good points all by Brooks who agrees that it is hard to live in such a culture dominated by Trump – if we let him dominate.

But he adds this:

“…I do think we’re on the cusp of a great cultural transition.  On the one hand, the eternal forces of dehumanization are blowing strong right now: Concentrated power; authoritarianism; materialism; runaway technology; a presidential administration at war with the arts, universities and sciences; a president who guts Christianity while pretending to govern in its name.

“On the other hand, there are millions of humanists — secular and religious — repulsed by what they see.  History is often driven by those people who are quietly repulsed for a while and then find their voice.  

“I suspect different kinds of humanists will gather and invent other cultural movements.  They will ask the eternal humanistic questions:  What does it mean to be human?  What is the best way to live?  What is the nature of the common humanity that binds us together?”

So, I take Brooks words at face value.  I intend to set out to think less about Trump, the would-be authoritarian, and more about helping people find their way to God.