I had my sermon all but finished, but Saturday morning, a niggling voice told me it wasn’t where my passion lay, and I listened to it and wrote an entirely different one. I had been brooding over the economic news, but Bernie Sanders’s own sermon in the Senate this week–it sure hit me like a sermon–sent me over the edge. Our crazy economic system and how we are arguing about just how much crazier to make it–that was what I wanted to say about childhood in this country at this moment.

So with the couple of hours in the early morning of Saturday and Sunday when I’m usually up before my family, plus a strong dose of anger and grief, I wrote this. I’m glad I followed my instincts. I heard from many people how much they needed to hear it, and I think that was mostly because it was the sermon I most needed to say.

A Childhood Demon

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