When my bishop informed me that my next assignment would be the cluster of congregations that includes my home parish, I was both excited and apprehensive. Returning to Ellinwood, Kan., my hometown, was setting up another of those violent showdowns, for which the West is famous. I would once again face my old nemesis, the schoolyard bully, Jerry Wirtz.
When we were classmates in parochial school, Jerry and I did a lot of tousling on playground grass. It ended inevitably, often rather quickly, with my shoulders being pinned to the ground by Jerry and my being forced to say, “I yield.”
I did have my one moment of if not victory then partial vindication. Jerry and I were wrestling right after lunch. Instead of saying, “I yield” I unintentionally threw-up on Jerry and myself. We called that one a draw.
Am I the only one who does this—fashion my own foes?
Here is the amazing thing: Now that I’m back in Ellinwood, Jerry, who was always larger and who has been a farmer during my four-decade absence, has not tried to wrestle me to the ground. Indeed, he treats me quite kindly! Is it possible that he wasn’t a schoolyard bully? Is it possible that I was a smart ass?
Sadly, here is what I now realize. Looking back, through the years, there was always a foe. I can remember having a rival in Boy Scouts. In high school and again in college, I can call to mind those to whom I compared myself and with whom I competed. Sadly, I can return in memory to any place and any period of my long life and some face will come to mind as the one whom I did not trust and did not like. Someone who, I was sure, was working against me. Am I the only one who does this—fashion my own foes?
A lot of scholarly effort has been expended in trying to understand why it is that human beings need to identify enemies. Is it an evolutionary engine that allows us to excel? Nationalism, which many think is the final stage of political evolution, depends upon the same mechanism: Here are my nation’s allies, and there are her enemies.
It is truly terrifying is how quickly we move from opposing the opinion of the other to outright hatred of his or her person.
The Gospel would gainsay evolutionary theory and ask if our enemies are truly discovered by us. It also asks, do we possibly concoct them? Are self-created foes a very sad result of our fall from grace? Of course, typically as nations and as individuals, we can righteously point to some truly wicked thing that our opponent has done. But perhaps we should ask ourselves if the suspicion, the distancing and the very invention of the enemy did not happen long before that.
How appropriate that the New Testament word for devil, diabolis, comes from Greek roots meaning, “one who scatters.” There is a separation from others that begins within the human heart. It comes from a sinful, fearful impulse to assert ourselves, to push against others lest they push us down first. Fear feeds so many sins!
Christ had enemies, but they were not of his creation. He could look right at them and, with all the divine truth that he was, he could tell them what was wrong with their hearts, but we don’t sense that he hated those hearts. Instead, he surrenders himself to them, allowing them to pierce his own heart.
The Gospels draw their greatest division right through the human heart itself.
The frightful thing about modern life is not that we disagree with one another. Strength and creativity are born of struggle and engagement. What is truly terrifying is how quickly we move from opposing the agenda or opinion of the other to outright hatred of his or her person.
Christ warns us about drawing lines against others, even more so against sanctifying those lines with his name:
Do not prevent him.
There is no one who performs a mighty deed in my name
who can at the same time speak ill of me.
For whoever is not against us is for us (Mk 9:39).
We can only surmise the varied motives of those who work so assiduously to expose the moral lapses that they find in the church. Yet, however painful, this ultimately leads to a purified, a holier, church. In regards to the sexual abuse of adolescents and children, we might ask if they could do even greater good to society by shining their investigative lights in a broader sweep.
The heart divided against itself can do such great evil in the world and in the church.
What I find more interesting in the church’s current sexual abuse crisis is how the Catholics whom I know personally seem to receive it with great sorrow but with even greater resolve to remain faithful to their church. Others, whom I only encounter online, seem filled with hatred for their church. Is it possible that “their church” has always been something of a self-begotten dream, and that what they so detest is the sheer reality of the Catholic Church?
They write as though they delight in the current turn of events. They impugn the worse of motives to those whom they have never met and propose the most draconian solutions, without measure or mercy. Why are we so mean on the web? Perhaps it is evidence, profound proof of our original fall from grace. Social media holds the promise of drawing the entire world into conversation, yet it also exploits the exponential power of the web to draw division.
Here is the great Gospel irony. The church knows that she is not the kingdom of God. She exists to serve, to bring about that kingdom. She knows that others, with whatever motives, also help to usher in the kingdom. The kingdom cannot come to its fullness without engagement with others.
The Gospels draw their greatest division right through the human heart itself. Why must we push down and against others, thinking to raise the self? Before the fault, the sin is seen in the other, it is already at work within the self.
Jesus speaks with Semitic exaggeration about the need to confront sin within ourselves:
If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off.
It is better for you to enter into life maimed
than with two hands to go into Gehenna,
into the unquenchable fire.
And if your foot causes you to sin, cut it off.
It is better for you to enter into life crippled
than with two feet to be thrown into Gehenna (Mk 9:43-45).
Yet the Lord has such good reason to speak so stridently. As we can now so painfully see, the heart divided against itself can do such great evil in the world and in the church:
Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin,
it would be better for him if a great millstone
were put around his neck
and he were thrown into the sea (Mk 9: 42).
The evil that we encounter in the world and in the church comes from only one small part of God’s wide creation. That little nucleus he endowed with freedom: the human heart.
Readings: Numbers 11:25-29 James 5:1-6 Mark 9:38-43, 45, 47-48
I wonder if this male author's description of competition, hostility, paranoia and hatred from his youth is shared by as many women as men. I don't know if we "need" to create enemies, so much as our ancestors have trained us to do so, probably for our own survival in times of perceived scarcity and insecurity. The trouble today is that we still perceive scarcity. Nationalism, while IMO detestable, is probably the "natural" consequence of a rapidly changing economic order in which jobs are relocated to people who are willing to work for less, often because of long standing global economic inequities. Sadly, the creation of a common enemy, which usually involves stereotyping the other to build antipathy, also serves the purpose of building the social bonds with people who are like "us."
Here is an example of identify formation by means of stereotyping - applying the (negative) traits of a few people to the entire group of the constructed other and assuming the worst of the whole group... so that "we" can feel better about ourselves.
"Is it possible that “their church” has always been something of a self-begotten dream, and that what they so detest is the sheer reality of the Catholic Church? They write as though they delight in the current turn of events. They impugn the worse of motives to those whom they have never met and propose the most draconian solutions, without measure or mercy."
I don't think one can analyse the variety of responses to the current crises without recognizing that about 25% of Catholics worship weekly. The number of non-practicing Catholics in this country is great, and this is not because of the clerical sexual abuse of minors. No one looks at this current situation from a blank page, we all have lenses which have been influenced by our own life experiences. Fr Terrance is right to suggest that the sheer reality of the church might be considered detestable to many people. Although, his (draconian, yet biblical) rhetorical strategy, which involves creating a demonized "out-group," (to use the language of cultural anthropology) might not be helpful in building up the church. IMO, we should think more critically about how we create identities that will work for building up a universal church.