I found that I am not alone in my choice not to vote. See Mark Van Steenwyk's Ten Reasons for Not Voting at Jesus Manifesto and "Not Voting" as an Act of Christian Discernment : Calling the Emerging Church Into a Different Kind of Faithfulness. The first and last time that I tried to vote was in the election of John Kennedy to the presidency of the USAmerica. It was in the election hall of Greenpoint, Brooklyn which just happened to be the parish hall of the parish church at which I was stationed as a Franciscan Brother.

I was not allowed to vote because I could not prove that I was a citizen. My family first arrived at Jamestown in what was then known as Ajacan or Axacan by the native born of the region on the thirteenth of May 1607. The family of the man running for president was the son of an immigrant, and the people that denied me my "right" to vote were Polish born. And I was the only person there who had to prove that I was a citizen.

Perhaps that was the beginning of my seeing that I was not a part of the system in which I was a pilgrim, when I realized that I am an expatriate here in Ajacan.

I do not vote because I am baptized; I pledged my allegiance, my life, my treasure, my future and my hope to my liege Lord, Jesus Christ, then, there, in this life and the life to come. I could never again share that life with any other Power in the universe, especially any Power that held control over not only my life but limb, in that the final proof the that Power's authority over its subjects is the judgment of whether or not one lives or dies.

And as a sign of that allegience, of that citizenship, I do not vote in any election of any nation in which I might be living at the time.

Jesus is Lord; God reigns. Alleluia, Alleluia, Alleluia.