Reflect

Imagine a world in which no one ever thought beyond their own generation — a world where no one worked toward something they knew might not come to fruition in their own lives. Think of Susan B. Anthony, who died 14 years before the 19th amendment was ratified. Or Harvey Milk, who was assassinated long before national laws were passed to protect the LGBTQ+ community. Without their hope for a future they knew they might not see, essential seeds of change would have gone unplanted. Striving for the liberation of the Czech people, the dissident and poet Vaclav Havel wrote, “Hope is not prognostication. It is an orientation of the spirit, an orientation of the heart; it transcends the world that is immediately experienced, and is anchored somewhere beyond its horizons.” To be a person of hope requires that we act on behalf of the world we believe is possible and good, not the one we will necessarily live to see.