Religion and Politics: What They Told Us Not to Talk About
Being a curious kid, I innocently asked the group, “did you vote for Reagan or Mondale?”
I once thought you cast your votes with yard signs. The first time I went with my dad to the polling location, I asked “why didn’t you just put a sign in the front yard like other people?”
I really believed there were election workers who drove around the city counting all the yard signs to determine the winner of the race.
Shortly after this lesson, I learned another.
My grandpa and a group of old white men were huddled together drinking coffee and eating donuts in the church social hall before the service started. I overheard them talking about the recent presidential election, the economy, crime, jobs being sent to Mexico, and the preacher’s sermons.
Being a curious kid, I innocently asked the group, “did you vote for Reagan or Mondale?”
I was six years old when Ronald Reagan won the 1984 presidential election beating Walter Mondale for his second term in office. At that age, I knew the candidates, but didn’t understand partisanship or reaganomics.
Before anyone could answer my question, my grandpa gave me the look. The look that said, I’d made a big mistake. I walked away knowing I’d hear more about this later. And I did. Back home after church, my grandpa told me “we don’t talk about religion and politics. And we sure don’t ask people who they voted for.”
I silently wondered, hadn’t my grandpa and his friends been talking about politics?
Today I wonder, why don’t we talk about religion or politics ?
Why are religion and politics—and some would include money and sex—topics not to be talked about?
Why do they make us uncomfortable? Why are they deemed impolite? Why is talking about them considered bad social etiquette?
Of this I am certain, we cannot heal wounds we will not talk about. We cannot change unjust laws we will not discuss. We cannot create a safer world for our children if we refuse to address the real dangers they face.
Despite my grandpa’s warning, in this country we do talk about religion and politics. We talk about it a lot, with those in power determining what is political and what expression of religion is legitimate. These same people and parties label our discourse as free speech or woke-ness, protected or criminal.
Last year, I attended an event where the opening speaker reminded us not to talk politics. They boldly announced that we were welcome and our politics were not. They then challenged us all to change the world with our writing. It was a disorienting and disappointing experience.
However we dress it up, politics influence every aspect of our lives. We must talk about this if we want to change this. And we must ask, who benefits from our keeping silent? Those with political power benefit from silence, not those who are oppressed by it.
I don’t know the exact path to social transformation. I don’t know how we stop or even slow this violent corrupt road we are speeding down as a nation. But, I do know this; we have to reimagine what we talk about and how we talk about it.
For me poetry is a form of resistance and revolution. Poetry has always been a way of sharing thoughts, curiosities, pains, and doubts I otherwise couldn’t express. Some of the most difficult discussions I’ve had started with a poem. I’ve told my hardest truths through poetry and through those pages my new life was birthed and unexpected lines of communication began.
The poems we write and read or burn and ban—like signs we put in our yards—say a lot about the world we ache and vote for.
On Wednesday, August 27th I met a dear friend for coffee. In the back corner of a neighborhood café we talked about creativity and imagination. She read me poems and gifted me a new journal. She inspired a walk to the river, where I hoped to write about softness and peace, and being gentle with ourselves and others. As I packed my bag to head to the water, my phone told me of another school shooting.
I did still make it to the river. Here’s the poem I wrote while there.
Read or listen below.
Annunciation
©Rebecca Wilson
August 27, 2025for fire drills we went outside to the far side of the playground lined up along the chain link fence back at our metal desks within minutes for tornado drills we went to the locker rooms brought along our social studies textbook teacher said put your head in your lap and the book on your head if the ceiling fell in this would protect us for the start of the day we rose to pledge the flag right hand over our hearts except for Todd who was born with a heart on the other side of his chest some days we sang America The Beautiful or My Country, ‘Tis of Thee others The Star-Spangled Banner or God Bless America as the score played over the intercom they taught us slavery was bad Thanksgiving was good Civil Rights were eternal the content of our character mattered more than the color of our skin the last war was the last Hiroshima and Nagasaki could never happen again tornadoes mostly only usually happen in Oklahoma not Michigan I asked who Oliver North was why his trial was on TV they said something about Iran and Nicaragua and sent us to music class to learn more songs This Land is Your Land and one about a love-sick cat named Señor Don Gato to art class painting pictures gluing random objects together to gym class playing dodgeball and kickball and steal the bacon to math class science and reading field trips to farms and museums to the auditorium for special assemblies and spelling bees I knew words like natatorium and unemployment not lockdown or active shooter simulation we all knew if you brought a gun in your book bag you were expelled forever when Aaron brought a butter knife he wasn’t kicked out just got paddled by the principal in the hall while we all listened to him scream in fourth grade while day dreaming I saw flames big huge magnificent bright orange flames rising from the apartments across the road standing at the window we watched them burn choked by the fear of knowing it wasn’t a drill
Water-fully Yours,
Rebecca & 10CAMELS
Invitation to Reflect
What lessons have you been taught about talking religion and politics?
What conversations do you shy away from?
What conversations are you called to have?
How might you get creative about having them?
Here’s what’s coming to the Well this September.
Wednesday, September 17th: Touch Grass
Wednesday, September 24th: Touch Water
Friday, September 26th: Friday Field Trip to a special water location for paid subscribers.
I am in that classroom next to the cafeteria singing Señor Don Gato while the chicks hatch from theit eggs before we line up for yearly vaccinations. Intentions were what they were and the walk to and from school was my world. Thanks for cnjoring these memories
There is a lot right now burning right in front of us. How do we respond? How DO we talk about school shootings? We speak with angry voices and feel sad for what we cannot do. It’s hard to speak out in a calm and peaceful manner, but we must try. I MUST try. Thanks for the questions your writings evoke.