What can God do for me today?

Through the recent campaign, I tried to keep my comments about Sarah Palin limited. It was simply too easy for me to fall into the sin of judging her, not just as a potential elected official, but as a human being.

The strong ties to 3rd wave Pentecostalism, which a life long Catholic like me finds weird and unnerving. The strong ties to the "Flag hating" Alaska Independence Party, which makes my working class, Irish Catholic, son-of-a-WWII vet sensibilities bristle. Being an overly protective father of a disabled son, even Palin's strange behavior and choices concerning her youngest son Trig make me uncomfortable.

With all that and the governor's politics, it would be waaaay too easy for me to see her as a characiture and not a fellow child of God. But something in her recent interview on Fox News caught my attention:

"Faith is a very big part of my life. And putting my life in my creator's hands - this is what I always do. I'm like, OK, God, if there is an open door for me somewhere, this is what I always pray, I'm like, don't let me miss the open door. Show me where the open door is. Even if it's cracked up a little bit, maybe I'll plow right on through that and maybe prematurely plow through it, but don't let me miss an open door. And if there is an open door in '12 or four years later, and if it is something that is going to be good for my family, for my state, for my nation, an opportunity for me, then I'll plow through that door."

I cannot look into Palin's heart and mind, but if we take this quote at face value, it seems to suggest that Evangelical Protestants have a somewhat different view of their relationship with God than the one I hear described each week at Mass. We certainly do hold that God is the one true source of good and power. But it seems distinctly un-Catholic to presume to know, with certainty, that God's will and one's own ambitions perfectly coincide.

In this particular case it is even more striking to me because there appears to be no thought given to the consequences of one's own actions. Instead of 'God keeps giving me great opportunities and I just seize those bulls by the horns...', perhaps 'God keeps giving me great opportunities so I will just keep trying to overcome my failures as a servant...' would be closer to my understanding of our instructions from Christ.

It just struck me that God is credited for the opportunity, but "plow right on through" is seemingly wholly separate. It is incredibly difficult to view much of Sarah Palin's campaign rhetoric as being in line with the 8th Commandment. And even now that the election is over, she seems to have some difficulty with the truth.

This is not to suggest that I am morally better than Sarah Palin. As A. J. Jacobs noted in his book, "The Year of Living Biblically", "I lie a lot" myself. I am just noting that, in our conversations with God, we seem to focus on different things. I spend a lot of time asking for forgiveness for my many failures and generally ask for help in finding the strength not to repeat them. Add some gratitude for the many blessings in my life and the wonder of creation (that one has been happening a lot more since I started watching "The Universe" on the History Channel), and there just doesn't seem to be a chance for career opportunities to even come up.

Of course, that could just mean that I should spend more time talking to God...