The Meanness That Ruins Us

I once heard Martin Marty explain how he believed we are arriving at a place where the theological divisions among Christians will no longer be classified primarily as liberal and conservative but rather as mean and not mean. While our religious convictions express our noble attempts to understand (and be faithful to) the triune God, any conviction that does not reflect the generous way of Jesus immediately reveals itself as a fraud. Sometimes it seems we’re overrun with religious blowhards (across the spectrum) whose every syllable drips with sarcasm, anger and scorn (not to mention ignorance, if not outright dishonesty, about the words and positions of those we despise). Thumping our Bible does not give us a pass on being a Grade A prig.

Note: “Speaking the truth in love” actually requires love. Even if I speak with the wisdom and authority of angels – if I don’t have love – then I’m doing nothing but clanging those cymbals. Have you ever heard someone (and it’s usually a child) just banging away on those blasted cymbals, like a hammer pounding your brain? Obnoxious, isn’t it?

I think Marty’s observation also makes sense for most every form of our public discourse. I wonder if our political divides may, if the current debasement holds, become less democrat/republican and more mean/not mean. Like many, I’ve come to loathe election season because it reveals the very worst about us as a people, our seeming inability to carry on a meaningful conversation about important ideals – a conversation exuding generosity rather than venom, a conversation eager to understand rather than merely score a kill, a conversation where we see the other as a beloved fellow human rather than an impersonal object or a despised enemy. We are so fearful, our patience so razor thin. It only takes a word, an image – and a hundred cat fights break out.

I’m an optimist, I suppose, but I believe that many of us will come to our senses. The antidote to meanness is, of course, the simplest thing: kindness. Kindness does not signal we’ve gone weak. Rather, when kindness takes root, it tells us we’ve abandoned our childish ways and let courage take root. We’ve learned we have no need to vilify another. We stand in the truth we understand, and we seek to understand more (and who knows how this will change us?). We’ve learned that meanness will only ruin us. We know now that if we fight savagely for some ideal, then even if we achieve what we claw after, there will be nothing left worth having.