Indonesia comes to
Elektrostal
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The Institute in its
winter outfit
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It seems to me that the impulse to zoom back, take a wider perspective, is always important when we try to understand conflict. If we go wider, maybe some of the words and categories we use too glibly can become unstuck from their captivity to specific interests. Tort reform is a great example: on whose behalf is the law being "re-formed"? Advocates of this reform say that frivolous lawsuits and astronomical judgments must be curbed, but rarely reveal their sponsors' interests in being insulated from the consequences of damaging behavior. So they'll select the most scandalous anecdotes that support their position. (I'm sure that their opponents, the trial lawyers, are going to emphasize the unfairness of marginalizing actual victims--the ones who actually suffer from "reform"--and say less about their own economic interests in suing early and often!) We formed messages to empower citizens to zoom back and look at the actual goals and values of civil justice rather than the claims and counterclaims of biased activists. We didn't want audiences to be limited to choosing which highly-paid actors would be their proxy heroes; we wanted each audience member to be able to picture himself or herself as the hero who could discern the "true north" of justice and knew how to access and protect the institutions of law to pursue that justice.
Reformers and activists get into conflict all the time, even when they're supposedly on the same side. The "Occupy Wall Street" movements are a great example. It's not surprising that activists clash; most wouldn't be involved if they didn't have strong opinions, a clear sense of urgency, and personalities to match. The one who values tactical effectiveness is inevitably going to clash with the one who emphasizes consensus and community-building. Here in Russia, the "Honest Elections" movement, which has a lot in common with "Occupy," sometimes pits organizers who want to be as provocative as possible against those who want as broad a civic base as possible.
In all of these conflicts, I yearn for a strong Christian presence for this reason: in the widest possible perspective--the perspective of eternity--tactics and categories are subject to a much more basic test: do they glorify God? Maybe a more functional way to put it would be: do they increase access to the Kingdom? For me, the most basic value in any Christian participation in social reform is its evangelistic value.
There was a time in recent evangelical history when to emphasize evangelism meant to avoid social concerns in favor of soul-winning. That false dichotomy is, I hope, long gone. Those who are gifted in direct evangelism can work closely and lovingly with social prophets, tax refusers, Occupiers, no matter how tongue-tied the latter might be on doctrine. Of course they'll sometimes get on each other's nerves, but in an eternal perspective, those irritations are minor.
Working together, believers demonstrate that the Good News is concretely good. Without pious happy-talk, we can demonstrate the "signs and wonders" of behavior based on love rather than greed or violence or elitism; and provide a community where together we deal with the tragedies and bondages that we know will continue to afflict us. Here's what the church did for me: it taught me that the response to my sister's murderer was not to wish for his execution, but to ask why he became a murderer, and to work against the death penalty and violence in all its false claims of redemption. Either Jesus claims victory over violence and death or he doesn't--I choose to believe that he totally does. But violence and death still happen, and so my church also grieved with me and gave my murdered sister Ellen the funeral she didn't get within my family for twenty whole years.
Maybe the ultimate conflict humans find themselves in is total war. I'm in one of those life phases when I find myself going over and over World War II--the war that killed over 50,000,000 people and brought my parents together, making me possible. Two summers ago I reread Churchill's history; last summer I read the new history by Andrew Roberts, The Storm of War; and now I'm listening to the recordings of the CBS Radio broadcast day of June 6, 1944, and (while Judy's in the USA) I'm watching the HBO series Band of Brothers. It seems as if in that war, practically our whole species lost perspective. Those whose evil behavior seemed to have ignited the war were a microscopic minority compared to the ordinary soldiers and civilians who slashed and clawed away at each other, physically and verbally, for those long and bloody years--almost none of whom had any actual grievance against those on the other side. It was a planetary orgy of evil, but that evil was not the "Hun" or the "Jap" or any other objectified group; it had infiltrated and taken possession of millions, and our inadequate spiritual vision did not mobilize us for the Lamb's War that we really needed to wage.
This cartoon by Tom Tomorrow is right on target--as far as it goes. The missing dimension isn't supplied by Republicans or Democrats, conservatives or liberals. It's supplied by the Gospel and the community formed by the Gospel. Without this dimension, the pattern of the last panel repeats endlessly.
Another case study of a failure of perspective: "Why Last Saturday's Political Conclave of Evangelical Leaders was Dangerous."
Another argument for going wider and deeper: "The Wheel of 'I Want More'."
By far the most satisfying thing I read all week: "Give it up for George Kennan."
Artificial outrage, exhibit A: "Accusing WikiLeaks of murder."
Robert Gates, who served as secretary of defense under George W. Bush and then Barack Obama, ... spoke sternly of Manning’s leaks, accusing him of “moral culpability.” He added, “And that's where I think the verdict is ‘guilty’ on WikiLeaks. They have put this out without any regard whatsoever for the consequences."I believe that Manning and WikiLeaks did have regard for the consequences--namely the exposure of cynical power politics and a hoped-for end to impunity. It was those in power who seemingly had no regard for consequences--tens of thousands of lives lost, American credibility shredded, billions of unbudgeted dollars burned. It is the wider perspective that helps reveal who uses language honestly and who uses it tendentiously.
Artificial outrage, exhibit B: "Exploiting religion to call for the President's death is unacceptable." Just to show that progressive groups are not necessarily unfamiliar with exaggerations and selective quotations.... The header to the online petition to demand Kansas State House speaker Mike O'Neal's resignation mentions neither the larger context of his idiotic "prayer" (the widely-circulated, crudely jocular use of Psalm 109 to call for U.S. President Obama's demise) nor O'Neal's defense--that he was just "praying" for the end of Obama's presidency, not his death. There's really no defense against his circulating such garbage, but its juvenile banality is revealed by his e-mail's cover words:
At last--I can honestly voice a Biblical prayer for our president! Look it up--it is word for word! Let us all bow our heads and pray. Brothers and Sisters, can I get an AMEN? AMEN!!!!!!Come on, does anyone believe that O'Neal solemnly sits down, opens his Bible, bows his head, and literally prays for Obama's death? And, even more incongruously, that he would then be humbled by a petition from an Internet-based campaign organized by people who are probably far more liberal than Obama? O'Neal does apparently need a crash course in biblical literacy, but the Kansas State House is a better organization to determine whether they're fed up with their Speaker than petition-signers goaded by overheated rhetoric.
"Skin Deep": In his intro, Buddy Guy gives his mother credit for the inspiration of this song, which I'm using in some of my classes. At this concert, which I described here, I was just a few meters to the left of this videographer. The song gives me goosebumps.
I've been around a while
I know wrong from right
I learned a long time ago
Things ain't always black and white
Just like you can't judge a book by the cover
We all gotta be careful
How we treat one another
Skin Deep
Skin Deep
Underneath we're all the same
Skin Deep
Skin Deep
Underneath we're all the same
We all, all are the same
A man in Louisiana,
He never called me by my name
He said "boy do this and boy do that"
But I never once complained
I knew he had a good heart
But he just didn't understand
That I needed to be treated
Just like any other man
Skin Deep
Skin Deep
Underneath we're all the same
Skin Deep
Skin Deep
Underneath we're all the same
We all are the same
I sat my little child down
when he was old enough to know
I said out there in this big wide world
You're gonna meet all kinds of folks
I said son it all comes down to just one simple rule
That you treat everybody just the way
You want them to treat you
Yeah
Skin Deep
Skin Deep
Underneath we're all the same
Skin Deep
Skin Deep
Underneath we're all the same
We all are the same
Skin Deep
Underneath we're all the same
Skin Deep
Skin Deep
Underneath we're all the same
We all are the same
Yeah
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