Hope, Work, Spirit: From my book Better Angels, out now
The past will not always illuminate the ideal, and the present may seem destined for the damnation of a nearing future, but, as Theodore Roosevelt believed, “when the tale is finally told, I believe that it will show that the forces working for good in our national life outweigh the forces working for evil, and that, with many blunders and shortcomings, with much halting and turning aside from the path, we shall yet in the end prove our faith by our works, and show in our lives our belief that righteousness exalteth a nation.”
This book is an attempt to join in the mission of knowing ourselves. The Scriptures tell us to “Rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope.”
So, too, must we embrace the American struggle, knowing that through our courage, freedom is strengthened; through our toil, ideals are better realized; and through our hope, the truth and promise of our creed endures.
The American struggle between founding ideals and living contradictions is all too real, but so, too, is the enduring hope of our creed—the belief that, despite stumbling and falling, America can and will become something greater than it ever was, not for Americans alone, but for all people everywhere.
More than a recounting of events, this volume invites you to reflect on the enduring American ethos and join in the pursuit of a more perfect Union. Only by understanding our history can we hope to choose what Abraham Lincoln called “the better angels of our nature”—the greatest of all American tasks.
May this book invite you, as Gerald Ford put it, to “the hope, the work, and the spirit” of the American story—an unfinished struggle that is ours to know and our destiny to continue.
And may we never approach the task lightly.
About the book: Better Angels: Reflections on American Courage, Struggle, and Hope gathers more than 40 columns by Dakoda Pettigrew, spotlighting defining moments of moral courage and national reckoning—from colonial resistance to modern political turmoil. Called “a must-read” by the Knoxville Daily Sun, Better Angels is out in paperback on Amazon.com, and will release as an eBook on September 10.