The past few weeks and months have been hard. I live in Minneapolis and many of you may recall the political assassination of Melissa Hortman, the speaker of the Minnesota House of Representatives, and her husband this past June. Then, on August 27, two young students were shot and killed at Annunciation Catholic School in Minneapolis. The school is less than a mile from my house and the wife of a good friend was attending the Mass at which the shooting occurred. (Fortunately, she was unhurt. Eighteen others in the church were not so blessed.) And, yesterday, Charlie Kirk, a young conservative political leader, was gunned down in cold blood and there was yet another school shooting in Colorado.

It is clear that the political and social fabric of America is under great stress. I don’t see the situation turning around anytime soon, but I have faith it will change. Such optimism may strike some of you as naive–and, perhaps, it is–but pessimism is insane.

Buckminster Fuller once wrote, “We are called to be architects of the future, not its victims.” I agree and I’d like to share a personal story that illuminates this truth. 

In 1932, my paternal grandmother had recently given birth to her first child but she was stuck in an abusive marriage to an alcoholic (whom she later divorced). Due to the Great Depression, she and her then-husband were unable to find work and she was forced to live in squalid conditions with her in-laws. 

On Christmas Eve 1932, my grandmother was so despondent that she carried her infant child to the George Washington Bridge which connects New York and New Jersey and contemplated ending both of their lives by plunging into the icy waters below. (I know this because she recounted the story in a letter many years later.)

She did not jump, but, as I read her letter, I couldn’t help but reflect that had she given in to the pessimism of the moment, my father would have never been born and, ergo, I never would have been born. And, if I hadn’t been born, my two children would have never been born.

This past year, as I was going through my deceased father’s papers, I came across my grandmother’s original letter as well as an old steel file box containing quotes of wisdom she collected. Under the letter “M,” I stumbled upon a category labelled “M.O.I.”–which stood for “My Own Ideas.”

One card in particular in the files caught my attention. It read, “There is not always a way out but there is always a way through.” My grandmother was a wise woman and I hold her words close to my heart during these troubling times. 

The truth is this: There may not be a way out of the madness that America is currently experiencing, but I have faith that there is a way through.

This way does not rely on social, political or cultural change. Nor does it require massive institutional change. It instead requires–and demands–that we change ourselves.

If, however, we can change ourselves, we change our families. If we can change our families, we can change our communities. If we can change our communities, we can change our country.

I know this all sounds terribly naive and pollyannish, but let me ask you this: Is there any other way to change the world but by changing ourselves? True outer change must first starts with inner transformation.

I hope you’ll use your “Friday 15” this week to consider how you might change and become part of the solution.

P.S. Below is the Prayer Card from my Grandmother’s funeral in 1984. As best I can tell, she penned the prayer herself. I, too, pray that each of you is granted the grace of a worthy life.