So I’m trekking around Washington like I always do…on foot, when I decide to give ol’ Mr. Lincoln a visit. It’s been a long time since I’ve been to the Lincoln Memorial, I think to myself as a meander through the throngs of tourists and midday joggers. It was a sweltering day beautiful as it were and the city was awash in vibrant colors. If any of you have been to the Washington, you’d know what a long, arudous journey it can be between the Capitol and the Memorial. Doesn’t seem that long. The walk is almost laughable. But there you are trudging onwards thinking when the hell am I gonna get there???
But I finally made it. I swept up to the top of the steps — one by one — seeing Honest Abe peek out onto the capital horizan. And there I was, all of a sudden, in the presence of the Great Emancipator himself in all his glory. It’s almost a religious experience…even after all the times I’ve been there. It always reminds me of the ancient Temple of Zeus from the days of yore…whatever yore means. And when you think about it, all the cities of the world…from Rio and its Christ the Redeemer statue at Corcovado to Paris and Notre-Dame Cathedral…the rest of the world is littered with monumental tributes in the name of religion. Yet here in Washington, our tributes are not generally for the sake of religious figures but rather ordinary men and women. OUR capital city contains tributes to fallen soldiers and great political leaders. Rather than Jesus or the Virgin Mary, we see visions of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, John F. Kennedy, Franklin Delano Roosevelt.
So then I think about what it is in the American spirit that impels us to “worship” these figures and give them god-like status in our American pantheon. But then it struck me. It’s not that we are raising them to the level of gods. All of these people stood for something, symbolized a value, and it is not these people that we are elevating, but the values they stood for. It is these American values that we wish to worship and hold sacred. It binds us all as Americans. When Jefferson wrote, “We hold these truths to be self-evident…that all men are created equal…”, when Martin Luther King said, “I have a dream…”, when Roosevelt shouted, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself…”, they were espousing our values.
So whenever I see a monument — which happens often in this city — I think about these values. I think about the American religion. It is something deeper than partisan rancor, deeper than Jesus. It’s the thing that truly unites all of us Americans. The anthem, the flag, the eagle all prostrate themselves in this temple, the temple of the great American experiment. So if a politician were to ask me how to get in touch with the American people, I’d smile and point to the Lincoln Memorial and say, “Talk to the man upstairs.”