I remember it, clearly, four years ago, sitting in the chair in our living room watching the results unfold on the news. My husband already went to bed. I just sat there bewildered. Mentally I was clawing for some sort of correction, adjustment, good news…something. No, instead, a racist, homophobic, transphobic, xenophobic, alt-right Neo-nazi KKK empowering, nationalist billionaire won our election. That’s who people chose, either by directly voting for him, choosing a third party, or not voting at all.

I just sat there. My husband came downstairs and brought me back to reality, asking me to come to bed. We just laid up there and then my husband said: “I’m scared.” Me too, was all I could say.

A lot of us were scared and still are. I think of all my queer LGBTQ+ siblings who are fearful for what the Supreme Court might do to us and our right to not be discriminated against. That fear will still be there no matter who wins the election…we don’t get to relish a progressive victory, should it come, for long.

I’m angry as hell. I know I’m a clergy person and people like to lump their ideas of who I should be on me. But no, I’m not an empty vessel of emotionless platitudes. I’m angry at our country for still questioning whether LGBTQ+ people deserve to be treated fairly. I’m angry at the continued deaths of black Americans on our streets. I’m angry at people who question the climate crisis and doubt the scientific community. The list could go on.

But most of all, I’m angry at moderates and quiet progressives. Think for a minute what the calls for unity are doing to people. Black mothers and fathers mourn for their children — murdered on the streets — but let’s call for unity with people who wave Confederate flags and refer to blacks as violent mobs for mourning publicly. Trans+ people fear for their lives every day, but let’s call for unity with people who would have them committed to mental institutions. Gay people like me wonder just how public we can be with our spouses, but let’s call for unity with people who send me homophobic screeds several times a year. Oh, you didn’t know that? Yeah. As a gay minister in Kentucky, I get lovely threatening letters all the time. From Trump supporters.

There can be no unity until there is accountability. Until there is justice. There needs to be a reckoning with who we are as a country and how this impacts countless Americans — many of whom you love and who are fearful for their lives and livelihood. We need to know you aren’t going to whitewash and minimize our feelings and fears.

The words of Dr. King are popping into my head. Writing from Birmingham Jail in 1963, his sharpest critique was for white moderates. Today, I think it would read “white progressives” — but don’t mistake me for putting words in King’s mouth here.

These words can be directed to any cause for justice. The white progressive that thinks protests are disorderly. The person who won’t call out their conservative race-baiting relatives. The straight person that tells a queer person they’re overreacting. The Trump voter that wants you to understand they didn’t really vote for the homophobia and xenophobia…they voted for economic reasons. The person that “couldn’t figure things out” and didn’t vote.

There is no unity in my heart today. I know that’s not what people want to hear. Some people need to believe that is possible. I’m not sorry for how I feel. My husband and I will still go to bed scared tonight. I have dear friends that will go to bed far more frightened than us. Breonna Taylor is still dead. Trans people are still being murdered. Children are still in cages at the border.

I hope for a Biden win. I really do. As a minister I can’t say that from my ‘pulpit’ — but let me tell you, that was hard to do this year. I feel like a vote for anyone other than Biden is an abdication of one’s integrity as an American. I don’t hate Trump voters…that requires too much energy. I’d prefer to put my energy into causes for justice. But I wholeheartedly believe the political right needs to be held accountable. No one, absolutely no one, is exempt from accountability.

I’m deeply influenced by the American Unitarian movement, so, I need to lean on that tradition today. (And, by extension, the Universalists) Unitarianism teaches me that we are saved by the cultivation of our character and ensuring everyone has an equitable world in which to do that. Universalism teaches me that redemption is always possible…and that the only hell we experience is the one we create. Redemption doesn’t always feel good. It isn’t always nice, tidy, or quiet. Salvation can be a searing pain that burns away the rot from a festering wound.

A wonderful line from Angels in America comes to mind. When asked, “How do people change?” — a character responds:

Well it has something to do with God so it’s not very nice. God splits the skin with a jagged thumbnail from throat to belly and then plunges a huge filthy hand in, he grabs hold of your bloody tubes and they slip to evade his grasp but he squeezes hard, he insists, he pulls and pulls till all your innards are yanked out and the pain! We can’t even talk about that. And then he stuffs them back, dirty, tangled and torn. It’s up to you to do the stitching.

Eventually, we all have some stitching up to do.

I can rail against the right and left today until my fingers fall off. Instead, I’ll be there for my husband. Surround myself with queer people that get it. People that won’t minimize the fear the Trump presidency has exacted upon us and so many other marginalized people. Come tomorrow or whenever we know who our next President is, it’ll be time to jump back in the fight. There is no unity, there hasn’t been for decades. This is the time for accountability and justice. Unity comes later…