Throughout the history of Christianity, some pastors and churches have risen to the prophetic call to speak out against systems that oppress, systems that keep the poor poor and the rich rich, systems that keep the vulnerable, the elderly, and the children from receiving food, shelter, medicines, and dignity, but also throughout history churches and pastors have remained silent. We think back to the Holocaust and the silence of the churches. We think of the civil war and the theological crisis it presented as churches were divided, both using scripture as a way to achieve victory and we think back to the civil rights movement and remember the pastors that put themselves on the front line seeking equality for African-Americans, but also taking great risks in losing one’s job. In the midst of all these and other moments in history, some pastors have stood up and spoken prophetically against those who cannot see the Great Commandment given to us to love one another and knowing that this is not an emotion of love but an action of love. This is an action of love that means we who have more give to those who have less. This is an action of love that says we who have health benefits fight for those who do not. This is an action of love that says if I need to sacrifice some of my freedom and wealth to care for someone who has little freedom or wealth than let it be so, but yet I look around at our pastors today and today they remain amazingly silent. Where are the pastors in today’s talks on who should lose out? No taxes for the corporations and most wealthy, but cut Medicare and Medicaid and food stamps and don’t mess with healthcare because it’s a multi-billion dollar industry and we shouldn’t be helping those who cannot help themselves because we are unwilling to recognize that sometimes people simply cannot do it themselves! Most educated pastors know the Bible’s message of caring for the poor, the alien, the children, the widow and yet we remain silent and we remain silent because we are afraid to anger our congregations and potentially lose our jobs. We remain silent because we have bought into the individualism of America that says, “pull yourself up by your boots straps and let the best ‘man’ win!” And yet this goes against the great words of the Scriptures and we know it, but we remain incredibly silent.
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This reasoning I buy -
“…yet we remain silent and we remain silent because we are afraid to anger our congregations and potentially lose our jobs.”
FEAR keeps people, and pastors, silent.
Since September 11, 2001, our government has substituted fear for freedom, suspicion for self-reliance, and civil surveillance for civil rights. Black and white – resolute absolutes – have replaced introspection, reason, and compromise.
And what does fear engender? Distrust. Division. Intolerance. If you’re not with me, you’re against me. If you don’t believe like me you’re going to burn in hell. If you’re not like me, you’re dangerous. If you don’t do what I want, I’m walking away. Think like me…if you don’t your ideas are baseless. Since your ideas are baseless, I can dismiss you. We have no common ground. Discussion is impossible. Compromise is pointless.
The calculus of fear resolves to silence. Reasonable ideas require discussion, orderly debate, and a will to consider all sides of issues. Fear is easier. I’m right. You’re wrong. Don’t talk to me any more. And society stagnates. Our boldness and vision vanish. We become docile sheep, herded in whatever direction the loudest, angriest, and scariest voice directs.
Principled men and women of all faiths, and all political persuasions, have to rise against the overwhelming tide of fear and shout out that we’re tired of societal absolutes and utter moral certainty – no matter of what stripe. We need to take our society back from the fringes and rebuild an America – our government, our economy, and our churches – based on freedom from fear. Our nation is built on debate, discussion, and compromise. Until we end our mindless fear of different ideas and diverse opinions, we’ll never be able to talk, to understand, compromise, and move forward.
This reasoning I do not buy -
” We remain silent because we have bought into the individualism of America that says, “pull yourself up by your boots straps and let the best ‘man’ win!””
Americans as individuals, and probably pastors in particular, are remarkably generous. The loud and angry voices telling us to be afraid, be terribly afraid, of taxes or debt ceilings or the failure to deal with either – are not generous. Left and right they are penurious, bent on winning at any cost, and so self assured that they can not see the folly of their ideological single mindedness.
Yet despite incessant fear, an ever widening gap between wealth and middle class, national and state debt crises, and political gridlock, we have an “immigrant problem” with people flocking to the United States. New small businesses start everyday; America is still the land of opportunity.
Why?
Because within our societal rules, our laws, and our regulations – and notwithstanding the “Great Recession” of 2008 and the stagnant growth of the last several years – enterprising individuals can still succeed. Granted it’s not easy and it’s fraught with potential failure. But the opportunity is all many people want. Sure, those opportunities may be harder to find, but the American genius is our ability to reinvent ourselves, rise above our past mistakes, and carry forward to a new day.
Pray that our fear does not stifle that American genius. Pray that our elected leaders end their love affair with absolutes and embrace our historical tradition of reasonable compromise. No one wins it all, each wins some, and everyone survives to to continue to another day. That preserves opportunity and assures the best for all of society.
How can that be so hard to grasp?
Jim, thank you for your thoughts. They are good thoughts and while I agree with the America that you speak of, I struggle with the individualism that I see in segments of our society today. This is the individualism that says, “Don’t force me to get health insurance even if it is good for the financial state of the country!” It is the idea that the individual should not have any responsibility in action toward the society of which he or she is a part. Radical individualism takes freedom to its illogical and harmful end and if we look at the Tea Party, I believe it is born of a radical individualism as well as bigotry and it seems that they cannot even see the illogic of their own behavior. They appear to feel no responsibility toward caring for the elderly, the poor, and the vulnerable, but they feel they deserve ultimate freedom without any personal cost.
It appears that areavoices ate my post from about 3/4ths of an hour ago. I’ll try again…
Kristi, what you describe is not individualism. It is selfish small mindedness and unabashed greed. That is a far cry from individualism. Or at least individualism as defined by 20th Century progressives like Jane Addams, Gifford Pinchot, Robert LaFollette, and Theodore Roosevelt. Note the following, from Roosevelt’s August, 1910, address on “New Nationalism” -
“Practical equality of opportunity for all citizens, when we achieve it, will have two great results. First, every man will have a fair chance to make of himself all that in him lies; to reach the highest point to which his capacities, unassisted by special privilege of his own and unhampered by the special privilege of others, can carry him, and to get for himself and his family substantially what he has earned. Second, equality of opportunity means that the commonwealth will get from every citizen the highest service of which he is capable. No man who carries the burden of the special privileges of another can give to the commonwealth that service to which it is fairly entitled. I stand for the square deal. But when I say that I am for the square deal, I mean not merely that I stand for fair play under the present rules of the game, but that I stand for having those rules changed so as to work for a more substantial equality of opportunity and of reward for equally good service. One word of warning, which, I think, is hardly necessary in Kansas. When I say I want a square deal for the poor man, I do not mean that I want a square deal for the man who remains poor because he has not got the energy to work for himself. If a man who has had a chance will not make good, then he has got to quit…Now, this means that our government, National and State, must be freed from the sinister influence or control of special interests. Exactly as the special interests of cotton and slavery threatened our political integrity before the Civil War, so now the great special business interests too often control and corrupt the men and methods of government for their own profit. We must drive the special interests out of politics. That is one of our tasks to-day. Every special interest is entitled to justice…but not one is entitled to a vote in Congress, to a voice on the bench, or to representation in any public office…The true friend of property, the true conservative, is he who insists that property shall be the servant and not the master of the commonwealth; who insists that the creature of man’s making shall be the servant and not the master of the man who made it. The citizens of the United States must effectively control the mighty commercial forces which they have called into being.”
Individualism requires responsibility, respect and compassion for our fellowman, and a belief that what I, individually, wish to accomplish can not interfere with the opportunity of others. Individualism requires intellectual honesty, thought, and careful consideration. It requires the realization that for every right there is a duty; that I can not expect you to fulfill the social contract with me unless I fulfill the social contract with you.
What you describe is intellectually dishonest and essentially irrational. It is the shallow thinking that gives up protest signs stating “Keep Government Out of Medicare.” The kind of shallow thinking that raises political rhetoric above the essential operation of the United States government. The kind of shallow thinking that frets and fiddles with marginal income tax rates and turns a blind eye to the more dysfunctional sections of the tax code which incentive the export of jobs and wealth.
What you describe isn’t individualism. Maybe it’s just plain idiocy.
Maybe we need a new political lexicon. The old titles don’t work anymore it seems.
Ok I had this great post, but it disappeared. lets talk. It doesn’t get deleted.
OK…I’ll give you a call!
By the way, lest anyone misunderstand, you and I agree on the general principle that “[r]adical individualism takes freedom to its illogical and harmful end and if we look at the Tea Party, I believe it is born of a radical individualism as well as bigotry and it seems that they cannot even see the illogic of their own behavior. They appear to feel no responsibility toward caring for the elderly, the poor, and the vulnerable, but they feel they deserve ultimate freedom without any personal cost.”
We need to chart a path between the decline of individual responsibility in favor of expectation and a heartless society that fails to provide for the unfortunate and never offers a helping hand. Neither extreme is appropriate. Neither extreme can succeed in the long term.