“AN EYE FOR AN EYE” DOESN’T WORK

As human beings there seems to be something deep inside us that wants to redress any harm done to us by another that we believe to be unjust and certainly unmerited. We want to get even. And sometimes we want to go the other one better. An eye for an eye in that instance is not enough so angry are we at what has happened to us and with the one who perpetrated that evil.

The fact that this need to get even, to pay back, seems to be inherently human does not mean that it is morally all right to satisfy that need. Furthermore, just because there is a felt need does not mean that we are justified to actually respond to that need in some observable and actual manner. Civil laws, of course, are based on society’s need to redress affronts to society. We make laws to keep society orderly. When that order is broken, society sets up a system of punishments to redress the harm done and society is justified in doing so – for the good and good ordering of that society.

The real issue and the real problem at hand is that the harm done cannot be undone no matter what the punishment meted out may be. It is a done deal. The crime has been committed, the harm done. What causes society to want revenge and to actually take revenge and what causes so much angst is that the threat of punishment was no deterrent. The perpetrator was intent on doing what he knew was unlawful, would be punishable if caught, but broke the law anyway. Is it any wonder that society wants an eye for an eye, and sometimes even more?

And is it any wonder that we, even as Christians, desire the same? No sin, no affront, is accidental. It is deliberate. True accidents can and should be forgiven if they were truly accidents and not the result of foolishly doing what we knew we should not be doing in the first place. Deliberately and knowingly driving under the influence of alcohol, for instance, and causing an accident is inexcusable. As humans, let alone as Christians, we demand some form of punishment.

And yet there is that nagging feeling inside us that says there has to be a better way. A simple forgiveness of a deliberate hurt should be transforming. It should give the one forgiven pause so that he will take time to reflect on what he did, decide not to do it again and apologize for the harm done even though, regrettably, that harm cannot be undone so that no apology would even be necessary. We also know from experience that repaying in kind for the harm done does not change the person who hurt us and certainly does not change us. It only makes matters worse, meaning that the hurt inflicted next time – and there will be a next time – will only be worse.

As Christians we must be agents of transformation not by repaying evil for evil, sin for sin, an eye for an eye, but by doing what we can to lessen our own need to get even and trust that forgiveness without revenge will help transform the one forgiven and make us stronger in the process. In truth, we know that this is true. When, in the past, we have forgiven another or been forgiven, we have been an agent of transformation and we have been transformed in the process. Would that this always be the case.

EMPATHY

It is not easy to walk in another person’s shoes. In fact, we cannot even as that old Indian admonition tells us that we must walk in another’s moccasins if we want to understand that person, understand what he or she is going through at this moment in time. When we care about someone who is suffering, it is much easier to sympathize with that person rather than empathize.

In a way it is also safer. We sympathize from a distance. Empathy demands a hands-on response. We have to be there with the other who is going through a difficult and, usually, a painful time. That is what makes being empathetic so hard. It involves, demands, our deliberately entering into a painful situation when every fiber of our being tells us to run away as fast as we can. Only fools, our inner selves tell us, bring on pain and suffering willingly.

St. Paul calls this being fools for Christ’s sake, for the sake of those Jesus loves, namely, everyone. We are not Jesus, of course, and we cannot love everyone. We can only hope to love and empathize with those we do love and care about. It takes the grace of God, sometimes, to almost force ourselves into those situations where we must suffer along with the one we love in order to help that person deal with his or her suffering.

Empathy, of course, does not mean that we suffer physically with the one we love. It does mean that when we say “I feel your pain,” we actually do feel pain, that there is an inner hurt that we cannot really describe or define or even number – “Is it a three or a seven?” It is simply there and we hurt because someone we love is hurting or because of the vagaries of life in this world.

Life is complex and that is putting it mildly.  And while we may wish life’s issues were black and white, either good or bad, we know they are not. When they are not, when there is no right answer to a problem, no logical reason why this person is suffering and that person is not, why, for instance, in battle one soldier is killed and the one next to him survives – when we find ourselves in such confusing and complex situations, we suffer with the one grieving and in pain while at the same time being thankful we have been spared.

And sometimes the knowledge that we have been spared is often more painful than had we been the one to suffer in the first place. Much of the post-traumatic stress from war comes from having escaped that which your buddies in battle did not. “Why them and not me?” is empathy to the nth degree. Added to that is the empathetic pain we suffer when we deal with the question of why any of this is so, why we have to suffer in the first place and, even more, why we inflict pain and suffering in others.

What all this means, I think, is that empathy often means having to live with unanswered and even unanswerable questions and suffer the pain that comes with no recourse other than to know that we are not alone and that empathy is demanded not only if we are to be human but also if we are to make it through this life with some sense of sanity.

MORE THAN SKIN DEEP

Rachel Joyce in her novel The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry tells the story of a retired gentleman who goes on both an unlikely and unintended pilgrimage. Harold Fry receives a letter from a former colleague who tells him that she is dying of cancer. He writes her a  letter to cheer her up and promises to come see her, encouraging her to hang on until he gets there hoping that his visit will somehow lift her spirits and perhaps even reverse the cancer.

Harold writes the letter, places I an envelope, puts a stamp on the envelope and heads to the mailbox to send it on its way. When Harold arrives at the mailbox, instead of depositing the letter, he keeps on walking, eventually all the way to the nursing home where she resides – 500 miles away.

Harold has no change of clothes and his yachting shoes are not made for such excursions, certainly not 500 miles worth. He has no cell phone, indispensable these days, and little cash; but he does have a credit card which he uses to find lodging along the way when he can’t sleep under trees and pay for food to keep up his strength for the journey. The only problem is that he knows the money he is spending (wasting? he wonders) is depleting the retirement funds he and his wife are counting on to see them through the rest of their lives.

No one knows about Harold’s adventure in the beginning, not even his wife. But eventually word gets out and he begins to attract hangers-on who make part of the journey with him. He also attracts the attention of the press, print and video. He becomes a curiosity piece to many. But he also becomes somewhat of a folk hero as well. Joyce writes: “They believed in him. They looked at his yachting shoes, and listened to what he said, and they made a decision in their hearts and minds to ignore the evidence and to imagine something bigger and something infinitely more beautiful than the obvious.”

What people, at least some people, began to see in Harold went much further than skin deep. They saw what was not visibly obvious to those who see no further than their own noses, as it were. Those who saw with different eyes were able to look beyond the outward appearances and into the depths of this man, this pilgrim, and see so much more. And they knew deep in their hearts that if there were so much more to Harold Fry, then there was so much more to the one who looked back at them every morning in the bathroom mirror. And that gave them hope.

In many ways in his own unacknowledged awareness Harold Fry was a Christ figure. Jesus was constantly reminding those who could not see in themselves what he saw in them: they were good people, people loved by God even though society thought them to be losers, sinners, foolish, whatever. Jesus always looked beyond the surface, beyond the outer appearances, beyond the skin, deep into the person him- or herself. So must we.

We need to see in ourselves and see in others what Jesus sees no matter what the outward appearances may be: a child of God, beloved of God.

EASTER: IT’S NOT JUST HISTORY

There is an on-going debate, unfortunately, among fundamentalists and those who are not about not only the historicity of the Bible but also its factual truth. There are those who maintain, for instance, that Genesis’ six-days-of-creation story are actual fact when, in fact, the creation story is a profound parable whose meaning it would take volumes to explain. I have a volume or two on my bookshelf attempting to do just that. On the other hand it is easy, and simplistic, to say, as some bumper stickers do, that “The Bible says it. I believe it!” Good for them!

The Bible is filled with stated historical facts, many of them truly factual, many others embellished to emphasize a religious point. When we read Exodus, for instance, we are told that 600,000 people made the march from Egypt to the Promised Land over a period of forty years. The actual number is closer to 6,000, perhaps even 600. And did it take forty years when one could actually walk that distance perhaps in forty days? The point the biblical writer wanted to make is that God fulfilled his promise to save his people and, by God, God did – in an extravagant way at that, no matter how short a journey or how long it took.

And yet while the Bible is historical, it is much more than history. It is even much more than religious history. History, if it has any meaning at all other than a record of past events, must be relevant in the present as much as it was when the events remembered took place, if not more so. History is supposed to teach us something. We are to learn from it if only to not repeat the mistakes of the past. We ignore those lessons to our own pain, as history has also taught us.

Thus, in so many ways, the past, history, must be a present reality even if in a different manner and mode than what it was when it first took place. Easter, our remembrance and celebration of the resurrection of Jesus, was a one-time historical event. It happened on a certain date in history even if we do not know the exact date. Yes, there are those who claim it never happened, that Jesus was never raised from the dead. They have a perfect right to deny that the resurrection really happened, like those who deny people landed on the moon. To each his own.

But in truth it does not matter what non-believers believe about Easter. What matters is what you and I believe, More importantly, what matters even more is what we are doing about it, what our personal response is. Each of us needs to ask ourselves a simple question: “Does it really matter to me that on that first Easter Sunday that Jesus was raised from the dead?” And if it does, the next question I must ask is, “So what? What effect does it have on my daily life?”

Those are faith questions that are asked generically by this historical event. But they are answered only on a very, very personal basis. No one can answer those questions for me nor I for another. My response, as every response, will be unique even if those responses seem to be quite the same. But respond we must if we believe that what we celebrate on Easter is much more than an historical event, that, in fact, it is personal.

BLESS YOU, BLESS ME

The first actions of Pope Francis seemed to confound everyone present, from the commentators, to the amassed throng and especially to the members of the College of Cardinals who joined him on the balcony overlooking St. Peter’s Square. He was supposed to bless the people, his new flock, most of the crowd being members of his new Diocese, that of Rome. Inexplicitly he did not. Instead he asked the people to bless him. Imagine that!

 

Perhaps we should, all of us everywhere, even those of us who do not give obeisance to the Pope and, maybe even those who do, especially Pope Francis’ former colleagues in red. We clergy are often asked to bless others. How often, if ever, do we ask others, those whom we bless, to bless us? Like Pope Francis how often do we understand that if we want to do the ministry to which we have been called, we need to have the blessing of those to whom we are called to minister?

That is true, I think, not simply in doing the work of the church. It is true throughout all of our life whether one is a church-goer or not, whether one even believes in God or not. If we are to do our job, whatever that job is; if we are to fulfill our vocations, and we each have many (parent, spouse, child, boss, employee – the list is long, but it is a list), we must be seen as a blessing to the ones over whom we have some sort of authority and responsibility and they must bless our authority and responsibility.

None of this comes easily or readily, even if it is supposed to come with the job. Yes, the Pope is to bless his flock. But the flock needs to bless the Pope if he is to fulfill his calling, his responsibility, and if his authority is to have any meaning in their lives. Again, that is true for everyone everywhere. We cannot be good and effective leaders, however we define and describe that leadership, if we do not bless by our words and actions those over whom we preside. Nor can we fulfill our role effectively unless it is truly seen as a blessing by those over whom we have authority and for whom we have some type of authority. They must bless us in return by what they say and do.

In this life in this world we are to be blessings one to another. We bless the other and the other blesses us. When one or the other deems the relationship not to be a blessing, the relationship is in jeopardy. The more absent the blessing, the more readily the relationship will dissolve. People leave churches and leave the Church because they no longer see it as a blessing to them. And when they do not perceive they are being blessed, they will not bless with their words or their presence in return.

My hope and prayer is that Pope Francis’ example is more than a symbolic gesture but that it is real. It seems so. But I also hope and pray that it is a reminder to each of us, Roman Catholic or not, believer or not, church-goer or not, that if we want this life in this world to be what deep in our hearts and souls we want it to be, then we must bless one another and be a blessing one to another. That blessing is not simply in word, which is important, but more importantly – most importantly – in action, in how we treat one another with love, respect and understanding.

GOING ON A FAITH DIET

I have been on a diet all my life. But, then, we all have whether we realize it or not, which we probably do not. The dictionary’s first definition of diet is “one’s usual food and drink.” Our diet is what and how we usually eat every day of our lives. If you are like me, however, because my “usual food and drink” is not usually healthy, sooner or later I have to go on the second definition of diet, namely, “a regulated selection of foods prescribed for medical reasons,” those reasons being that I am unhealthily too fat.

The Lenten Season, which we are now in the midst of, has often been used by many of us who find ourselves overweight as an occasion, even an excuse, to go on a diet. Thus, whether with or without medical supervision, we go on a diet. We give up certain foods, like desserts – always desserts – and other too-fattening goodies in hopes that we will lose enough weight so that at the end of Lent we can go back to our normal diet – which will mean that come next Lent we will have to do it all over again.

Fasting from (that is, giving up) desserts for Lent can be a spiritual, faith exercise, if done as a means of spiritual and physical discipline rather than as an excuse or reason for going on a much-needed diet to lose weight. To call giving up desserts for Lent a spiritual discipline when it is really a medical demand is a misnomer. And it is wrong. And I am just as guilty as others in misnaming what I am doing when I decline that piece of apple pie with ice cream my mother-in-law sets before me by claiming that I am giving up desserts for Lent rather than being honest and telling her I am too fat and am on a diet, but thank you anyway.

That said, all of us, skinny and fat, in shape or out of shape, can go on a diet during Lent that is a faith diet and that will be beneficial even if it does entail giving up desserts completely or, on the other hand, if we eat desserts in moderation – as we should with all food groups. In fact, a faith diet should be a way of life, in the season of Lent and out of the season of Lent and throughout the whole year, throughout or whole life.

To paraphrase the definition of diet, a faith diet simply means the way we usually live our lives and not something that we do on occasion because our lives, spiritual lives here, are out of shape. If we kept our faith lives in shape all year around, there would be no need to spend a certain period of time, like Lent, to get them back in shape, to get back on a regimented and disciplined faith diet.       

But we don’t, most of us; and so we, hopefully, use Lent to get our life of faith back on track. We try to get back to living a faith diet during Lent and hope that we will remain on it once Lent is over and the rest of our life goes on. In what does a faith diet consist? Well, the admonition on Ash Wednesday says that “self-examination and repentance…prayer, fasting, and self-denial; and…reading and meditating on God’s holy Word” are all part of that faith diet.

That diet is not just for Lent, of course. It is to be part of our daily lives during Lent and all year long, all life long, not to lose weight but to become strong(er) in our faith.

DOES GOD REALLY LOVE ME?

When bad things happen to us – tragedies, unexpected deaths of a loved one, sudden physical ailments or disabilities – we sometimes wonder if God really does love us because what has happened seems to be so undeserved. Yes, we are sinners. But who isn’t? Yes, even though some of our sins may be terrible are they so terrible that what has happened is compensatory punishment from God?

We wonder. We ask. We wrestle with the question about God’s unconditional love and forgiveness and we worry. Oh, do we worry! Our faith is tested as our patience is tried and our questions only increase the longer the pain and the suffering endure. So we ask, even demand, “Do you really love me God?” The longer we struggle, the more we worry and the closer we come to asking ourselves not only “Does God really love me?” but even more we begin to ask ourselves, “Is there really a god at all?”

One of my spiritual mentors, Father Ron Rolheiser who I often cite, recently wrote this when he was speaking about anxiety: “Some years ago, I went on a weeklong retreat directed by Fr. Robert Michel.... He began the retreat with these words: ‘I want to make this a very simple retreat for you. I want to teach you how to pray in a particular way. I want to teach you how to pray so that in your prayer…you will open yourself so that in your deepest self you will hear God say to you: “I love you!” Because before you hear this inside you, nothing will be enough for you…. Only after you have heard these words will you finally be free of your anxiety.’”

Nothing makes our love for another more worrisome than wondering if the one we love loves us in return or loves us as equally. Most of the time we have no doubt that our love for another is being returned. But if or when those doubts begin to arise, we know that our relationship is in trouble. We worry. We become anxious. We wonder if we did something, said something, to put that loving relationship in jeopardy, perhaps even putting it on the road to wrack and ruin.

While that is true in our human relationships, it just as true in our relationship with God even though the one we deem responsible for this feeling of love being lost is ourselves. When we begin to wonder whether or not God really loves us, we also wonder what we must have done to cause God to love us less or at all and then punish us in the process. To deny that we sometimes feel that way or assert that such questions never cross our mind is to avoid the truth. In humanity’s relationship with the divinity, humans always remain human.

As Father Michel said, we have to hear God say to us “I love you” if we want to cease being anxious about life itself and especially about our relationship to God and, thus, God’s total and unconditional love for us. That does not mean that life will now no longer be free of difficulies, that all will be well, that we will no longer suffer pain or hardship, that tragedies won’t happen. That only comes in death. In the meantime, however, it does mean that knowing and believing that God truly loves us is one less thing we have to worry about.