November 1, 2024- I am the last person on Earth who should be called “saint”, and that is not a statement of false modesty. I’ve done a fair amount of good, especially in the past twenty years, but have also made some world class faux pas.

Today, in many Roman Catholic countries, people are observing All Saints Day, in honour of the canonized icons of the Church. Other countries honour their moral titans at different points during the year, and this is all a good thing, overall. The thing about the canonized, though, is that they are also mortal beings, subject to human frailty, and therefore fallible.

Everyone deserves to be held to account, but also to be assessed on the balance of what they do. The former helps us grow and the latter keeps us honest. There is, essentially, no one living today who is perfect. The Messengers of God were perfect, and ‘Abdu’l-Baha was a perfect Exemplar of thought and behaviour. A few people, like Mohandas Gandhi and Coretta Scott King, have served as long-suffering, but stalwart, proponents of social justice, who were also willing to take themselves to task and work to resolve personal failings. Others have been promoted by the media as near perfect human beings, only to have independent researchers find out differently, after the individual’s death.

As Americans decide tho will be our next President, it seems a good idea to not place too much stock in the perfection of one’s choice or to place too little, in the ability of the other side to also do some good. I’ve known many conservatives and progressives who are exemplary human beings. I’ve also known less than savory characters, at both ends of the political spectrum.