By 
You work 50 hours a week at a job you hate. You’ve got family problems. The Bills are piling up. The sour smog of politics fills the air. It’s more than you can Bear. All you wanted was a few hours on Sundays to escape, and now even that’s gone. I feel you.
But understand, for millions of people in this country every day is a Lions den and there are no Sundays to escape through. And it’s been that way since the first Patriots engaged in the slave trade. Every day, every hour, Ravens circle oppressively above with memories like Steel traps.
Also understand that when you kneel or don’t show up for the national anthem, someone feels that their son, or their sister, or their grandfather died for nothing. That all the years of blood, sweat, and tears that got us here aren’t worthy of a few minutes of gratitude. I know you’re not protesting the anthem, but you’re still stepping on graves.
So whether we stand for the brave and ignore those who aren’t as free, or kneel for the less free and ignore the brave, we’re both right, and we’re both wrong. It’s complicated. I don’t know all the answers.
But I do know that when contention wins, we all lose, no matter what the scoreboard says. One by one, things that used to unite us are now dividing us, and that’s the Cardinal crime here. This week it just happens to be football. What will fall next?
Our Chief concern should be for that flag to mean the same thing to every person on this roster of 323 million. And that’s not going to come by burning it, or through snarky remarks on Twitter, or by shouting at each other with signs and pepper spray. It’s going to take work. It’s going to take Charging out of your comfort zone to do something for someone you normally wouldn’t have. Or better yet, having a conversation. Find out how life is hard for someone else. Because it’s hard for all of us, and sometimes it’s more important to understand than to be understood.
So whether you relate more to a Cowboy or a Redskin, know that neither of them were Saints, and none of us are perfect. We can’t change bad calls made in a game that was played decades or centuries ago. But we can change the next play. And at least for now, we live in a country where we’re free to do just that.
Look down at your skin. Do you see black or white?
We’re all Browns.
So may we remember the Titans that paid the ultimate cost to buy us a country where we can get paid millions of dollars to play a game, and millions can happily pay their hard-earned dollars to watch it.
But more importantly, may we be Giants of humanity.
May we be Raiders of the dust
and may we be Eagles
and bring someone to the sky with us.
