The Intersection of Faith & Politics

Why I Will No Longer Say the Pledge

On allegiance, awakening, and a Kingdom that has no flag.

Students pledging to the American and Texas flags.

I can’t remember a time when I haven’t known and said the Pledge of Allegiance. I learned it before I could spell half the words in the pledge — hand on heart, eyes on the flag, voice in unison with every other child in the room. I’ve said it thousands of times since learning it, at assemblies, graduations, and civic events.

I’ve always loved this country. I’ve seen enough of the world to know what a rare and fragile thing our experiment in democracy is. I’ve lived and worked in places where freedom is not a given — where poverty, corruption, and instability weigh heavily — and I’ve met people who look to the United States as a symbol of hope. For all our flaws and the divisions we are currently living through, I still believe there is something remarkable about the ideals we profess: liberty and justice for all.

And then one morning, somewhere between prayer and pledge, I realized I couldn’t say the words anymore. It wasn’t anger. It wasn’t rebellion. It was just… clarity. The recognition that the words on my lips no longer matched the allegiance of my heart.

A Small but Honest Change

I am the chaplain of a parish school but am only on their campus once or twice a week. When I am, it’s usually for morning prayer (Eucharist is just once a month). Together we pray to the God who made us, redeemed us, and calls us to love our neighbors as ourselves. We proclaim Jesus as Lord and commit our hearts and minds to God’s work in the world. And then — without missing a beat — we turn to the flag and say the Pledge of Allegiance.

And after the national pledge, we turn to the other enormous flag in the room and pledge to that one too — to the Texas flag.

“Honor the Texas flag; I pledge allegiance to thee, Texas, one state under God, one and indivisible.”

I can’t even bring myself to whisper those words anymore. The language feels heavier now, as our state sends troops across state borders and defines “neighbor” more narrowly by the day. It’s one thing to honor the place you come from; it’s another to pledge your allegiance to it.

Don’t get me wrong. I will still stand. Out of respect for my students and colleagues, and for the freedoms this country represents, and because I refuse to give up hope that we might one day truly stand for liberty and justice for all. I will stand. But I will no longer speak the words. I will no longer place my hand over my heart.

It’s not defiance. It’s devotion.

Every time I move from “Jesus is Lord” to “I pledge allegiance,” I feel the dissonance in my chest. I can’t offer two ultimate loyalties. One of them — the first one, the only one, the one that matters — belongs to God.

As Jesus said, “No one can serve two masters.” (Matthew 6:24)

And as the apostles told the authorities, “We must obey God rather than human beings.” (Acts 5:29)

Those words aren’t about disrespect or rebellion. They’re about rightly ordered love — what Augustine called the “order of affections.” Patriotism has its place. But worship does not belong to any nation, flag, or political ideal. My heart already has a King.

The Pledge as a Morning Liturgy

The pledge was written in 1892 by Francis Bellamy, a Baptist pastor and Christian socialist who hoped to inspire unity and civic pride after the Civil War. His original version made no mention of God — that came later, in 1954, when Congress added the words “under God” during the Cold War to distinguish America from communists and atheists. What began as a civic statement slowly took on the tone of a creed.

By the middle of the twentieth century, the pledge had become a daily fixture in public schools. Civic groups promoted it as a way to instill patriotism, and soon generations of children began their day with hand on heart, reciting the same words before they even knew what they meant.

It was meant to unify us. But like any liturgy, repetition does more than remind — it forms. Over time, the pledge became part of our spiritual muscle memory. We said it automatically, the way we once said bedtime prayers or Sunday creeds before we had language for what we believed.

And as with inherited faith, there comes a moment of reckoning — a time when we’re called to examine what we’ve been taught and decide what still holds true. For me, that reckoning came somewhere between prayer and pledge, when I realized that what once felt like civic virtue now asked for something my faith could no longer give.

The Blurring of Worship and Patriotism

When I first came to my school, I learned that my predecessor had to rewrite the liturgy for morning prayer because the pledges had been placed inside the service itself. Imagine that: a civic oath inserted into a Christian act of worship. It’s such a small detail, but it reveals how easily civil religion seeps in — how quickly we stop noticing when patriotism starts borrowing the posture of prayer.

That’s where my discomfort lives.

I love this country. I give thanks for the freedoms I enjoy and for the countless people who have sacrificed to preserve them. But when I pledge allegiance, hand over heart, right after praying to God, something in me feels out of place, off kilter. The words ring hollow — or worse, divided.

Scripture speaks often about divided hearts. “You shall have no other gods before me,” says the first commandment (Exodus 20:3). “Set your minds on things above, not on things on earth,” writes Paul (Colossians 3:2). “Our citizenship is in heaven,” he reminds the Philippians (3:20).

Those aren’t calls to abandon the world. They are calls to remember where our truest allegiance lies.

From Patriotism to Christian Nationalism

Over the past few decades, that blending of faith and nation has helped something larger and more dangerous take root: Christian nationalism — the idea that America has a special covenant with God, that Christianity and patriotism are one and the same, and that to question either is to betray both.

It’s an idea that dresses empire in religious clothing. It turns discipleship into ideology. It takes the language of faith — blessing, chosen, redeemed — and applies it to a nation instead of to people made in God’s image.

When we teach children to say “one nation under God” without teaching them what it means to live under God’s justice, mercy, and humility, we’ve traded formation for familiarity.

Standing in Silence

So from now on, I’ll stand — respectfully, quietly, prayerfully — but I won’t speak.

I won’t do it to make a scene or start a debate. I won’t tell anyone else what they should do. I won’t even mention it in school. This isn’t about me modeling something for the students (although I’m not against that). This is simply where my conscience has led me.

My allegiance — my true, eternal allegiance — is already spoken for.

“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind.” (Matthew 22:37)

I will keep loving this country. I will keep praying for its leaders, its people, its healing. But I cannot pledge to it. Because I’ve already pledged myself — body and soul — to a kingdom that has no flag.

For me, silence while others are pledging will become its own kind of prayer — a reminder that love of country and loyalty to God are not the same thing, and that only one deserves my pledge.

~ Rev. Dana
The Privilege of Opting Out
How will anyone know they’re safe if we stay silent?

“Are you going to keep bringing politics into it?” Words I heard after a sermon in which I named lies told by politicians as being poisonous to a community — like the claim that Haitians were eating pets. Exactly what James warned against in the scripture we had read that day: a tongue of fire that can poison a whole body. (The person who said it left the church, never a happy day.)

And I’ve heard it outside the pulpit too. At a community event, where the hosts told tables of people, “Don’t talk politics.” The event wasn’t about politics at all, but there was such anxiety about the mix of opinions in the room that they wanted to cut off the subject before it began.

I understand the desire behind those words. People are weary of division. They want safe spaces where we can connect without tension. But here’s the problem: politics isn’t something we can just leave at the door. Politics is tied to the very survival of an untold number of people – anyone deemed “different” in any way at all.

To say “let’s not talk about politics” is to assume everyone in the room can set those realities aside. But that’s a privilege not everyone has.
- If you depend on insulin, cancer treatment, or Medicare, you can’t leave politics outside. Public health is political.
- If your kid is trans and lawmakers are stripping away their right to use the bathroom, you can’t leave politics outside. The physical safety of trans people is political.
- If your skin is Black and you’ve been followed by police or profiled in a store, you can’t leave politics outside. Skin color is political.
- If you look like you might be an immigrant — if your skin is brown, if your last name isn’t European, if English isn’t your first language — you can’t leave politics outside. Language, surname, and ethnicity are political.
When we banish “politics” from our conversations, what we’re often doing is silencing the pain of those who live closest to injustice. We’re prioritizing the comfort of those who are least affected.

That’s not neutrality. That’s complicity.

Here’s the deeper truth: Christians don’t have the option to disengage from the world. The Gospel is not an escape hatch; it is a summons to live with intention in the very places where the world is most broken.

The life of faith is not meant to be sealed off from politics but to shape it. When Jesus proclaims good news to the poor, release to the captives, and freedom to the oppressed, he’s not offering a private spirituality. He is announcing a kingdom that collides with the kingdoms of this world.

That means the church cannot be content with silence. Our liturgies, our prayers, our sacraments — they are not just “religious” acts. They form us to be the kind of people who carry Christ’s love and justice into the public square.

If worship teaches us anything, it is that our allegiance belongs first to God’s kingdom. That allegiance should make us careful with our words, humble in our actions, and steadfast in our love for our neighbor. And yes — it should influence how we live, vote, advocate, and participate in the life of our communities.

We live in a political world. The only question is whether we will be formed by the divisions and fears of the culture around us, or by the Gospel that calls us to another way.

But here’s the hard part: we don’t only bring our convictions to the Table. We also bring our differences. The Body of Christ is already broken and disjointed by the powers of this world — we have no business tearing it further apart by despising one another for our politics.

There are times when I look at the shape of Christian political life in this country and wonder how certain positions can be squared with the Gospel at all. And yet, I also know this: doubling down on hatred and division doesn’t heal anything. When the church mirrors the rage of the culture, we betray the one who reconciled us by the cross.

That doesn’t mean pretending differences don’t matter. It doesn’t mean ignoring the harm of policies that strip away dignity and humanity. What it does mean is refusing to let the world’s divisions dictate our relationships in Christ. Both the left and the right are responsible for gathering around the same Table. And at that Table, we are not Democrats or Republicans first. We are Christ’s own, called to love one another even when it costs us.

That love doesn’t erase our disagreements. It calls us to bear them differently — without contempt, without cruelty, without walking away.

Sometimes people tell me that by naming the failures of American Christianity or by critiquing policies that harm vulnerable people, I’m just adding to the fire. I understand that concern. But here’s the truth: my posts and my words are not aimed at changing the minds of those who already disagree with me.

I speak because silence is not neutral. Silence leaves the most vulnerable believing they are alone. When I share about politics on social media, I’m not trying to win an argument. I’m signaling to the ones who feel unsafe, unseen, or unwelcome that they are not forgotten. That someone sees them. That someone is willing to risk discomfort to stand with them.

It’s a pastoral act as much as a political one. It’s a way of saying: you belong. You are loved. You are not alone.

I think about my own daughters, one who left Texas and one who left the country, because they didn’t feel safe here as a gay women. They weren’t opting out of politics; politics shapes their daily choices, their future, their sense of belonging. That’s what it means to say politics isn’t optional. It’s not about red or blue, left or right. It’s about whether our children feel safe in their schools, in their neighborhoods, in their own skin. And if faith means anything, it means standing beside them in that reality—not pretending it can be left at the door.

~ Rev. Dana
Who I’m Angry At

ICE raids, faith, and holy anger

Last Sunday I preached about mustard-seed faith—about doing the hard things Jesus calls us to do, even when we don’t feel ready. (If you’re interested, you can read it here.) And I confessed that like the disciples who had just been told to forgive even seven times in one day and in response, asked Jesus to increase their faith, I too need Jesus to increase my faith. And I told what it was I am angry about right now.

Later, someone told me I should articulate who I’m angry at. So I’ve decided to do just that.

When the news broke about the ICE raid in Chicago — twenty minutes from my daughter’s apartment — I felt something twist deep inside me. Fear first. Then fury. My daughter was born in Mexico, and the thought of families ripped apart in the middle of the night hit too close to home.

So here it is. This is who I’m angry at.

I’m angry at every layer of this cruelty.
At Trump, who unleashed it.
At Stephen Miller, who refined it, called it policy, and is building the machine to keep it running.
At the charlatans — Pete Hegseth, Laura Loomer, Kash Patel, and the rest — who baptize it with talk of “security” while feeding on fear.

I’m angry at the men in tactical gear, masking their faces like cowards, dragging parents from beds, zip-tying children in the dark, pretending this is law and order.

At the bureaucrats who sign the orders and the politicians who look away.

And I can’t wait for our own Nuremberg trials when obedience will no longer be an excuse and “just doing my job” won’t wash the blood from anyone’s hands.

I’m angry at everyone who voted for this. Every single one. Who called us silly and accused us of exaggerating when we told them what we saw coming with Trump. Especially those who still claim to follow Jesus while supporting a government that brutalizes the poor, the brown, the stranger at our door.

And, I’m angry at my own parents. Because their votes helped build the world that now puts their granddaughter in the crosshairs.

But beneath the anger is grief. Grief that this is what we’ve become. Grief that cruelty passes for strength. Grief that I can’t do anything to prevent my daughter from being at risk.

And I’ll be honest: I don’t know how to forgive this. Not yet.

Jesus says, “If they repent, forgive them,” and repentance is nowhere to be found.

But I do know that faith still has to move, even when forgiveness won’t. So I pray — not to erase my anger, but to keep hatred from taking root. To prevent bitterness from growing in my heart. To avoid the emotional fatigue from being on high alert at all times.

That’s my mustard seed for now.

If you call yourself a Christian and you’re not angry, pay closer attention. Change channels. Read other news sources. Seek out the stories mainstream media and cable news are not showing. And join me in my anger.

But our anger must become fuel for mercy, not fire for vengeance. Otherwise, we’ll become what we hate.

So I’m still angry. I probably will be for a while. But I’m trying to let that anger stay holy, to be rooted in what I know to be true of the Gospel and what Jesus calls us to. I’m determined to let it drive me toward compassion, not contempt.

That’s the work of faith in a world like ours.

Rev. Dana
The Empire Will Fall. Love Will Not.
Let’s get something clear right from the start:

Empires fall.

They always have. They always will.
They fall not just because they’re corrupt, but because corruption makes them hollow from the inside out. Because eventually, the weight of greed and violence collapses the whole thing under its own swollen self-importance.

Ask Pharaoh. Ask Caesar. Ask Bull Connor.

Empires fall.

But here’s the real question:

Flowers that grew from seed dropped by the birds.

What survives?

What grows up through the cracks?
What roots itself deeper than power?
What refuses to be burned down?

Love.

Not soft, sentimental love. Not greeting card love. But truth-telling, risk-taking, table-setting, grief-honoring, justice-seeking love.

That’s what endures.

I don’t say this lightly. These days, the empire seems louder than ever. Louder and crueler and increasingly uninterested in even pretending it’s not. You’ve seen it. You feel it in your body.

They’re rewriting history.
Criminalizing compassion.
Turning schools and libraries into battlefields.
Twisting Christianity into a flag-draped idol.
Censoring books, banning healthcare, mocking the poor.
Flaunting Project 2025 like a manifesto for the next regime.

And meanwhile, people of good conscience are exhausted. Or numb. Or afraid that resistance is futile.

So let me say it again for the ones in the back:

Empires fall.

But love—real love—does not.

This isn’t just a political truth. It’s a theological one. Scripture is full of empires—and full of people who dared to dream beyond them.
- Pharaoh enslaved the Israelites, but he couldn’t stop Moses from saying, “Let my people go.”
- Babylon flattened Jerusalem, but it couldn’t silence the prophets or extinguish hope.
- Rome crucified Jesus, but three days later, empire found itself outmatched by resurrection.
The Bible is not the story of powerful people succeeding. It’s the story of ordinary people surviving. Of God showing up not in the palace, but in the wilderness. Not on the throne, but on the cross. Not with armies, but with a handful of terrified disciples, somehow still carrying the flame.

Here’s the flame I’m carrying right now:

Part of my job is to serve as chaplain at Trinity Episcopal School. At Meet the Teacher Night this past week, I set up a mini altar in the cafeteria. I brought a pack of unconsecrated priest hosts and a little grape juice, thinking maybe a few kids would be curious. Complete with a chalice, purificator, and linens, I stood and greeted families as they came in.

What I didn’t expect was the joy. The tiny hands breaking the bread, dipping it in the cup like it was the most natural thing in the world. The questions they asked. The way they lingered. The way they laughed.

One little boy whispered, “I don’t usually get to have communion because my mom says no wine.” I got to say, “We’re using grape juice this year—so maybe you can.”

A mom walked up, watching her kids with interest. Then she looked at me and asked, “Can I try, too?” She broke the host, dipped it in the juice, and as she received—her face softened. Her eyes closed. She’d never had communion before. Neither had her children.

And yes, I know—this wasn’t a consecrated Eucharist. But I also know this:

God is not confined to our rituals.

Christ shows up where he always has—on the margins, in the questions, in the ordinary things we break and share. That table held more real presence than some sanctuaries I’ve stood in.

So if you’re scared, I understand. If you’re tired, I am too.

But don’t mistake the volume of empire for the voice of God.

God is still whispering from the margins. Still marching with the outcast. Still setting tables in the wilderness and saying,

“Do this in remembrance of me.”

The story’s not over.

Empires fall.
Love does not.

~ Dana+
“You Do Not Fit the Strategy for My Diocese” — God’s Call, the Gospel, and Blessing LGBTQ+ Love

Favorite t-shirts

When I began discerning a call to the priesthood, I spent three years meeting annually with the bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Dallas. Each year, he affirmed my call. Each year, I hoped it would be the year he gave me permission to begin the formal discernment process.

Each year, he said no.

And finally, in our third meeting, he said it out loud: “You do not fit the strategy for my diocese.”

What was the problem? My support for gay marriage. That’s it. That’s the list.

Eventually, because of a move by General Convention, he “allowed” me to discern in the Episcopal Diocese of Texas, where they welcomed me, approved me, sponsored me for seminary, ordained me, and have invested thousands of dollars in my education and ministry. All because Dallas wouldn’t ordain me for believing that LGBTQ+ people deserve the blessing of marriage.

Here’s the thing: I could have hidden my views. I could have told myself that silence was just “being strategic.” I could have softened my stand in order to get ordained in Dallas. I could have played the game.

But if I had hidden my views to get ordained, I’d have been hiding the very heart of the priest I was called to be. My ministry would have gotten its start based on a lie.

And right now—in this country, in this moment—is no time for hiding. We’ve got a former county clerk, Kim Davis, back in the news, still defending her refusal to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, shamelessly disregarding her own multiple failed marriages. We’ve got anti-trans laws multiplying by the week. We’ve got school boards policing bathrooms and bookshelves. And I’ve got two gay daughters who have left Texas because they don’t feel safe—one who left the country altogether.

I believe in blessing the love between two people, no matter their gender. I believe this because Jesus told us we would know what is good by the fruit it bears. I have seen the fruit of marriages between two men, two women, and nonbinary partners: faithfulness, joy, care, perseverance, and love that endures. And if that is the fruit, then anything that seeks to uproot it—any theology that calls harm holy, or cloaks exclusion in the name of Christ—is already far from the Gospel it claims to defend.

This isn’t just about one bishop’s words to me years ago. It’s about a pattern that keeps repeating itself. The same logic that told me I didn’t “fit the strategy” shows up in the lawsuits against LGBTQ+ rights, in the bathroom bans and book bans, in the drumbeat of anti-trans rhetoric. Different decade, different stage, same script.

And it’s not abstract for me. It’s my own children building their lives far from the home they grew up in because they don’t feel safe here.

That’s why, back in 2020, I wrote a ten-day series after George Floyd’s murder, exposing the racism and privilege in my own life. And it’s why I’m writing this now. Because silence is never neutral. And the Church can’t sit this one out.

We’re seeing the wreckage of a failed movement—one that would rather tear down than build up, one that protects abusers and insurrectionists while tearing families apart and driving them into exile. And all the while daring to call it moral.

But the Gospel is not a strategy. The Holy Spirit will not be managed. God will not be mocked. Which means the only real question is where we will stand. With the wreckage, or with the love that outlasts it.

This is why I’m beginning to tell stories again, like I did after George Floyd. This is why I will again refuse to be silent, to hide my views in order to keep the peace, protect my position, or make myself more acceptable.

Because silence is complicity. And because the Church cannot sit this one out. Each of us has a choice to make—whether we will bless love, or betray it.

~ Dana+

To read more in this series, click here: https://invisibleleftovers.com/category/the-intersection-of-faith-politics/

P.S. If you are engaged and would like to talk about the possibility of being married by an Episcopal priest, I would be honored to walk with you. If you are already married and would like to have your marriage blessed, or if you would like a blessing for a new name, I would be glad to do that too. Love deserves blessing, and I would be grateful to share that joy with you.
How We Come Out: Notes from the Wreckage
Before every revolution, there’s a moment of quiet companionship. (Joan of Bark and Gidget, contemplating life.)

Some questions linger.

Like the taste of regret, or grief, or rage—or all three stirred into a casserole you didn’t ask for but now find yourself chewing slowly. Questions that hang out in your gut, refuse to be digested, and sneak back up when you’re just trying to fall asleep.

Here’s mine lately:
How do we ever come out of this?

I don’t just mean Trump. He’s more symptom than cause, more cartoon villain than criminal mastermind. He didn’t build the machine—but he sure figured out how to ride it.

No, I’m talking about the era.
The unmaking of truth.
The sanctification of cruelty.
The rise of white Christian nationalism dressed up in Jesus drag.
The celebration of power for power’s sake.
The children in cages.
The book bans.
The rolling back of rights.
The quiet normalization of authoritarian dreams.

I’m talking about the way you feel after scrolling headlines: hollowed out and reeling.

I’m talking about the gnawing fear that this country has been unraveling for a long time—and maybe we were never who we said we were to begin with.

So how do we come out of this? How do we survive the era of Epstein and Project 2025 and everyone pretending it’s just politics-as-usual?

How do we not go numb?

I remember the day after the 2016 election. I didn’t speak. Not one word. I walked around the house like a ghost—mute, stunned, gut-punched. Not because I hadn’t seen the possibility. But because the country had picked him. On purpose. It was like watching a car crash you can’t stop, only to realize it’s your house they’re crashing into.

Eventually, I numbed. I unplugged from the news, unfollowed the political accounts, stopped watching the commentators. Life went “back to normal”—or maybe we just normalized it. That’s what empire does. It makes the unbearable seem routine.

Then came 2024. And the morning after that election, Joan of Bark and I walked into the Pet Place.

We weren’t supposed to come home with anyone. I had rules. Requirements. No shedding. Medium-sized. Three years old, at least. And Joanie had opinions too. She turned her nose up at every dog they brought out—walking away, sitting with her back turned, clearly unimpressed.

Until they brought out Gidget.

A chihuahua.
Not just not on the list—the opposite of the list.
Tiny, shedding, high-energy chaos in a fur coat.

But Joanie’s whole demeanor changed. She ran to me wiggling and wagging like she’d found her long-lost sister. She sniffed Gidget all over, nuzzled her, looked up at me like: this one. we need her.

And she was right.

There was something about Gidget—her ridiculous sass, her puppy energy, her comic mischief—that broke through the numbness. We didn’t plan for her. But she was the unexpected joy we didn’t know we needed.

And sometimes, when the world breaks open and everything feels like rubble, the best you can do is choose love in an unexpected form.

Sometimes the revolution starts with a chihuahua.

Every revolution needs a fearless leader. Blessed are the stick-bearers, for they shall bring the chaos.

She didn’t fix anything, of course. But she reminded me what still matters. That joy is resistance. That companionship is sacred. That the work of healing doesn’t always come in the package we expect.

And that’s where I begin again:
- I tell the truth—in my preaching, in my teaching, in the stories I tell and the silence I refuse to keep.
- I build community—in shared meals and messy meetings, in the check out line at the grocery store, and in parking lot prayers.
- I refuse to rush hope—but I don’t let despair set up camp either.
- I get strategic—I pay attention, I protest where I can, I rest when I need to, and I stay in the fight.
- I hold close the people who remind me who I am.
It doesn’t fix everything. But it keeps me from shutting down. It keeps me human.

That’s what this series is about. Not answers, exactly. But breadcrumbs on the long road out. Not reheated platitudes, but leftover truth: sometimes bruised, often uncomfortable, always offered in love.

If you’re reading this and you’re tired, me too.

If you’re angry, good.
If you’re grieving, stay tender.
If you’re still showing up—at school board meetings or church basements or neighborhood food pantries—you’re part of the way forward.

I’m going to write my way through. If you need company, you’re welcome to follow along. I won’t promise answers. But I’ll tell the truth, as best I can. And maybe, together, we’ll start to remember who we are.

Let’s not pretend it’s fine. Let’s say what’s real. And then let’s figure out how to live like we mean it.

Dana+