Illustration by Øivind Hovland
“I will be your protector.” In September, the Republican presidential candidate vowed to protect the women of the United States. His campaign was scrambling to make up ground with the voters he’d alienated during his first term as president, when he stacked the Supreme Court with the intention of overturning Roe v. Wade. His problems with women voters went beyond the reproductive rights we lost when the court did in fact overturn Roe. He’d been convicted of sexual assault in a civil trial. He’d boasted of other assaults, cheated on each of his wives, and was convicted of 34 criminal felony counts in a scheme to cover up hush money paid to a woman during his first campaign. This made his offer to be the protector of women all the more ironic. With women’s reproductive rights overturned, the candidate now proclaimed that he, rather than the law, would protect us.
In contrast, his Democratic opponent pledged to protect women by restoring reproductive freedoms through legislation. She pledged to protect democracy by upholding the rule of law. She pledged to protect the borders by signing a bipartisan bill. Though married, she did not seem to be looking to her husband or any man for protection. She let us know that she owned a Glock.
About this time, the theme of protection entered my prayer life. It went deeper than politics. I found three prayers rising, seemingly from my unconscious, often unbidden. First, from Psalm 121:1–2: “I lift up my eyes to the hills—from where will my help come? My help comes from the Lord, who made heaven and earth.”
