According to Walter Brueggemann, “[W]ords, speech, language, and phrase shape consciousness and define reality.” Words are important, so it is imperative that we use them well. As significant as words are, however, if our actions are not aligned with our words, then our words may lose their import. After all, Jesus made it clear that he is more interested in what we do than what we say. (See Matthew 7:21-27, 21:28-31).
I have noticed two specific words that are frequently being used by, pardon the label, progressive Christians: "marginalized" and "oppressed." I have used them many times myself. These and other similar words are popular for describing the kinds of folks for whom Jesus seemed to have special concern, and who accordingly should receive the church's special attention. In many gospel passages, Matthew 25 and Luke 4 being common examples, Jesus echoes Hebrew prophets by proclaiming that the poor, the blind, the hungry, the sick, and the imprisoned are important to God and must not be neglected. Thus, the words "marginalized" and "oppressed" have come to signify many different kinds of people who find themselves excluded from mainstream society, often characterized by diminished opportunities for education and lack of access to meaningful employment, and who may be scorned by the wealthy and powerful members of the community. Marginalized and oppressed people are the opposite of rich and influential. They may be homeless, incarcerated, or illegal immigrants. Recognizing that such people receive special attention in the scriptures, "marginalized" and "oppressed" have become familiar and convenient shorthand for Christian speakers and authors who have a social conscience, who are trying to discern how to follow the teachings of Jesus in the postmodern era, or who simply do not ascribe to the prosperity gospel or the notion that individual salvation after we die is the main point of the gospel. And it is good for the church to be discussing such things.
Here's the rub with the popularization of terms such as "marginalized" and "oppressed," however. While I believe it is true that the people these terms are invoked to describe are in many ways at the heart of the gospel, repeatedly saying so is of little use if I do not know any such people. I can say "marginalized" and "oppressed" over and over again, and I may sound hip and forward-thinking, not at all like Christians who have no regard for the poor, the unhoused, or the imprisoned. But until I am actually friends with such people, of what use is my socially-conscious talk? It is far easier and more comfortable to use such words in a book, a sermon, a conversation over coffee, or a blog post than it is to go to someone who actually is oppressed or lives on the margins of society, learn the person's name and story, enter into a relationship with the person, and stick with them for the long haul. It is tempting to repeat these words and ascribe to these ideas about Jesus' care for the poor but never venture outside my suburban life of privilege. But of what use is it to keep saying "marginalized" inside multi-million dollar church buildings in the wealthiest parts of town? What good does it do to read or write a book about oppressed people from within a gated community of McMansions? If I do not know or hang out with anyone who meets the definition of "marginalized" and "oppressed," what is the point of all my talk? Short-term mission trips are not much of an improvement because there is precious little opportunity for an actual relationship to develop, and they tend to be somewhat paternalistic, with rich people parachuting in to do something that the marginalized people can't manage to do for themselves, then leaving after a few days.
In Romans 12:16, St. Paul does not tell Christians to talk about poor people. Rather, he instructs followers of Jesus to associate with the lowly. In all my years as a Christian, despite countless allusions to Romans 12, I have never heard a preacher focus on this simple command. "Associate with the lowly." Perhaps it is because many preachers are too busy rubbing elbows with the rich and powerful members of their congregations and communities. Bills (and salaries) have to be paid, after all. Perhaps it is because the people in the pews do not want to be told to make friends with homeless people and prisoners. In a church culture that looks more like a country club than a revolutionary movement of love, is it any wonder that we would prefer to drop an occasional allusion to marginalized and oppressed people without ever getting to know any of them? Is it any wonder that we would rather remain insulated in our luxurious suburban bubbles? Is it any wonder that I often ignore this command and instead opt for one more social event with people who look like me and have what I have? I tend to pass over Jesus' instruction in Luke 14 to not host one more dinner for my rich friends and family. I have not one time hosted a party at my house for the poor, crippled, lame, or blind. Merely saying "marginalized" and "oppressed" does not change this embarrassing fact.
Wednesday, April 30, 2014
Monday, April 21, 2014
Reflection on a Parole Hearing
This morning I spoke in support of a friend who was up for parole. My friend has been incarcerated since 1989, when he killed a man during a robbery. My friend was 18 at the time. He has taken remarkable steps to rehabilitate himself, gaining an education and becoming a leader and peacemaker at the prison. The family of the victim also spoke in opposition to parole, noting the pain they have endured and citing a need for my friend to pay for his crime. The parole board member who presided over the hearing voted to deny parole for a year, stating that while my friend had changed in dramatic ways, the seriousness of the offense demanded that he serve more time. Apparently twenty-five years is not enough. We await the votes of the remaining six parole board members.
It seems to me our punishment-based approach to justice does us all a great disservice. The threat of punishment provides a disincentive to offenders to accept responsibility for the harm they have caused. Victims expect to gain a sense of healing and closure from the knowledge that the person who harmed them is being harmed, but I fear we are writing checks to victims that we cannot cash. The myth that violence is redemptive is a falsehood. If the church has anything to say, it is that redemption comes through confession, repentance, and forgiveness, all of which are militated against by our current retributive approach to justice.
Perhaps most importantly, our obsession with punishment, with procuring a pound of flesh from offenders, leads us to regard others as less than human. My friend is not a monster, but the family of his victim cannot see that, even after twenty-five years. They are invested in the notion that he is subhuman, no more than the worst moment of his life, with no capacity for good. These are dangerous thoughts. We must never lose sight of the humanity of even people who have committed heinous acts. After all, half of the New Testament was written by a murderer, and according to Karl Barth, the first Christian community was Jesus and two condemned criminals who were suffering the death penalty alongside Him. An approach to justice that fails to account for the image of the divine within all people, even violent criminals, is doomed to fail.
It seems to me our punishment-based approach to justice does us all a great disservice. The threat of punishment provides a disincentive to offenders to accept responsibility for the harm they have caused. Victims expect to gain a sense of healing and closure from the knowledge that the person who harmed them is being harmed, but I fear we are writing checks to victims that we cannot cash. The myth that violence is redemptive is a falsehood. If the church has anything to say, it is that redemption comes through confession, repentance, and forgiveness, all of which are militated against by our current retributive approach to justice.
Perhaps most importantly, our obsession with punishment, with procuring a pound of flesh from offenders, leads us to regard others as less than human. My friend is not a monster, but the family of his victim cannot see that, even after twenty-five years. They are invested in the notion that he is subhuman, no more than the worst moment of his life, with no capacity for good. These are dangerous thoughts. We must never lose sight of the humanity of even people who have committed heinous acts. After all, half of the New Testament was written by a murderer, and according to Karl Barth, the first Christian community was Jesus and two condemned criminals who were suffering the death penalty alongside Him. An approach to justice that fails to account for the image of the divine within all people, even violent criminals, is doomed to fail.
Thursday, April 10, 2014
On Suffering
I was asked by a friend to respond to questions about suffering. Here is my response. "In all honesty, I've not suffered much myself. I have been around folks who are suffering deeply, many from being judged, labelled, dehumanized, isolated from family and friends, and warehoused for years and decades. Less than two weeks ago, a friend awoke on Saturday morning to find that her eleven-month-old baby boy had passed away in his sleep. I cannot imagine the degree to which she and her family are suffering.
Suffering, as our Buddhist friends teach us, is a reality of life, although some people clearly suffer more than others. Sometimes if we look deeply we can understand the root of our suffering. Sometimes it seems there is no why. In any event, I have found that it is not particularly helpful to try to explain to a suffering person why it is that they are suffering, though it is an understandable response and defense mechanism. It tends to come across as trite, contrived, even patronizing. Suffering people are not projects or problems for me to fix, and they do not need me to spoon feed them quick answers to age-old questions that confounded the very authors of the Bible. There are no easy answers, biblical or otherwise, and in my opinion, to presume that there are is simply shallow thinking. I believe it is more helpful to simply be present with our suffering friends. I want them to know that I am not afraid of or uncomfortable with their suffering. I want to be willing to bear it with them. I don't want to be too quick to try to get my idea of a good God off the hook. I want to listen to my friend without judgment, hear the questions and affirm that they are valid questions without offering some convenient platitude that might ease the tension and discomfort in my own mind, but will do little to alleviate the suffering of my friend. I should be willing to say I don't know and mean it. If I am willing to be present to my suffering friend and even enter into their suffering with them, then my presence and compassion may ease the suffering a bit.
If my friend insists on some kind of guidance from me, as it seems your friend may be, then I would encourage my friend to think about what good might come from the suffering. For example, it may be that my friend comes to recognize that we all suffer. Then my friend may grow in compassion for the suffering of prisoners, the homeless, the lonely, the hungry, the victims of violence, etc. When we feel compassion for other people, particularly people who are different from us, when we relate to them at a very basic level and see that we are all the same, that is a significant step towards truly loving our neighbor. And then my friend may be able to bring comfort to others who are suffering in a similar way. So I would encourage my friend to think about whether some good might come through the suffering. I think about the suffering that Mother Teresa saw, the steps she took to try to ease the suffering, and the way that the world was inspired. There are seeds of goodness in suffering, I think, if we are able to discern them.
Although I have not really suffered much, I have had and do have doubts. I have come to understand and accept that I do not know what God is. As your friend's questions demonstrate, it often does appear God, if God exists, has fled the field. As your friend points out, we should be careful how we talk about God. For every cured illness or job promotion that we claim represents an answered prayer, there is a corresponding dead child or innocent person executed that seems to indicate prayers are not working. Your friend's logic is sound and should give all believers serious pause. When I am confronted with the sheer number of children who die each day from malnutrition, preventable diseases, lack of access to medicine and clean water, I wonder where in the world God is. Of course, I recognize that many of these deaths are indirectly caused by the greed and excess and indifference of selfish Westerners like me who couldn't, for example, find the Congo on a map. But why would a good God allow an innocent child in sub-Saharan Africa to pay the price for my callous self-indulgence? Yet I do not believe that such doubts are indicative of a lack of faith. As I said earlier, I find your friend's questions much more faithful than the certainty I sometimes hear from professed Christians. As Thomas Merton wrote, "[D]oubt is by no means opposed to genuine faith, but it mercilessly examines and questions the spurious 'faith' of everyday life, the human faith which is nothing but the passive acceptance of conventional opinion." I commend your friend for her brave questions that many in the church dare not utter, though we find similar questions in our scriptures.
Lest you think I have stopped being a Christian, Clarissa, I will say this: In my mind, if the Christian story has any value whatsoever, it is in the claim that God suffers. I do not know what God is, and I tend to be suspicious of people who think they've got God figured out. But if God is love, and if that Love was revealed in Jesus, who showed such compassion for the suffering of mourning widows and unclean lepers and former prostitutes and people with deformed limbs and repentant tax collectors and crucified criminals and his own disloyal friends, and if he was willing to suffer death at the hands of sinful religious leaders and political tyrants in order to demonstrate this Love for all people, then I believe that this Love is present even and especially in the midst of our suffering."
Suffering, as our Buddhist friends teach us, is a reality of life, although some people clearly suffer more than others. Sometimes if we look deeply we can understand the root of our suffering. Sometimes it seems there is no why. In any event, I have found that it is not particularly helpful to try to explain to a suffering person why it is that they are suffering, though it is an understandable response and defense mechanism. It tends to come across as trite, contrived, even patronizing. Suffering people are not projects or problems for me to fix, and they do not need me to spoon feed them quick answers to age-old questions that confounded the very authors of the Bible. There are no easy answers, biblical or otherwise, and in my opinion, to presume that there are is simply shallow thinking. I believe it is more helpful to simply be present with our suffering friends. I want them to know that I am not afraid of or uncomfortable with their suffering. I want to be willing to bear it with them. I don't want to be too quick to try to get my idea of a good God off the hook. I want to listen to my friend without judgment, hear the questions and affirm that they are valid questions without offering some convenient platitude that might ease the tension and discomfort in my own mind, but will do little to alleviate the suffering of my friend. I should be willing to say I don't know and mean it. If I am willing to be present to my suffering friend and even enter into their suffering with them, then my presence and compassion may ease the suffering a bit.
If my friend insists on some kind of guidance from me, as it seems your friend may be, then I would encourage my friend to think about what good might come from the suffering. For example, it may be that my friend comes to recognize that we all suffer. Then my friend may grow in compassion for the suffering of prisoners, the homeless, the lonely, the hungry, the victims of violence, etc. When we feel compassion for other people, particularly people who are different from us, when we relate to them at a very basic level and see that we are all the same, that is a significant step towards truly loving our neighbor. And then my friend may be able to bring comfort to others who are suffering in a similar way. So I would encourage my friend to think about whether some good might come through the suffering. I think about the suffering that Mother Teresa saw, the steps she took to try to ease the suffering, and the way that the world was inspired. There are seeds of goodness in suffering, I think, if we are able to discern them.
Although I have not really suffered much, I have had and do have doubts. I have come to understand and accept that I do not know what God is. As your friend's questions demonstrate, it often does appear God, if God exists, has fled the field. As your friend points out, we should be careful how we talk about God. For every cured illness or job promotion that we claim represents an answered prayer, there is a corresponding dead child or innocent person executed that seems to indicate prayers are not working. Your friend's logic is sound and should give all believers serious pause. When I am confronted with the sheer number of children who die each day from malnutrition, preventable diseases, lack of access to medicine and clean water, I wonder where in the world God is. Of course, I recognize that many of these deaths are indirectly caused by the greed and excess and indifference of selfish Westerners like me who couldn't, for example, find the Congo on a map. But why would a good God allow an innocent child in sub-Saharan Africa to pay the price for my callous self-indulgence? Yet I do not believe that such doubts are indicative of a lack of faith. As I said earlier, I find your friend's questions much more faithful than the certainty I sometimes hear from professed Christians. As Thomas Merton wrote, "[D]oubt is by no means opposed to genuine faith, but it mercilessly examines and questions the spurious 'faith' of everyday life, the human faith which is nothing but the passive acceptance of conventional opinion." I commend your friend for her brave questions that many in the church dare not utter, though we find similar questions in our scriptures.
Lest you think I have stopped being a Christian, Clarissa, I will say this: In my mind, if the Christian story has any value whatsoever, it is in the claim that God suffers. I do not know what God is, and I tend to be suspicious of people who think they've got God figured out. But if God is love, and if that Love was revealed in Jesus, who showed such compassion for the suffering of mourning widows and unclean lepers and former prostitutes and people with deformed limbs and repentant tax collectors and crucified criminals and his own disloyal friends, and if he was willing to suffer death at the hands of sinful religious leaders and political tyrants in order to demonstrate this Love for all people, then I believe that this Love is present even and especially in the midst of our suffering."
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