To a Power Drunk Generation, the Vista of Eternity

"Just then a lawyer stood up to test Jesus. ‘Teacher,’ he said, ‘what must I do to inherit eternal life?’ And Jesus said to him, ‘What is written in the law? What do you read there?’ And the lawyer answered, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbour as yourself.’ And Jesus said to him, ‘You have given the right answer; do this, and you will live.’

But wanting to justify himself, he asked Jesus, ‘And who is my neighbour?’

As you know, this passage above is the introduction to one of the greatest and most memorable of the parables from our Lord's own lips while He walked on earth, that story of The Good Samaritan.  And the introductory passage itself is therefore sometimes overlooked, but it ought not to be.  "Do this, and you will live."

Our Lord did not offer us an exemption from sin if we call on His name, but forgiveness if that request is offered in true repentance, a recognition of our fault, and faith, and an active response to His command to 'go and sin no more.'  Otherwise calling on His name would be in the manner of an incantation and a compulsion, and not a plaintive call for His forgiveness with a right and repentant heart.  "Not every one that says unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that does the will of my Father who is in heaven."

It might be better to have been born without any knowledge of His word and His commandments, than to hear His words and then hypocritically parade in them and His sacraments, with intricate invocations of His holy name on your lips, as a call to hatefulness, pride, division, self-justification, and oppression.

For the first is the natural state of man, and weakness of the human condition, that might still hold out some hope of forgiveness and redemption, if the heart does not become too self-possessed and hardened through wickedness.

But for those who take great pains to drape themselves in the words of God and his faithful, in order to satisfy their own lust for power, righteousness, and superiority, dealing out hate, violent words, and scandal to others from their fearful and hardened hearts, there will be much less chance of forgiveness.

For this is the sin against the Spirit, about which our Lord himself warned when He walked on this earth.   It is not ignorance or weakness, but rather a willful distortion and perversion of the Word that gives scandal to others and spreads hatefulness.

I am speaking now, more directly, to those who embrace hatred and spread thoughts of violence and repression in the name of God, giving scandal to His faithful on earth. 

And I am not speaking merely of murder, and the more obvious atrocities that fanatics may commit in His name.  No these are terrible enough.  But I am speaking to those who stoke the fires of hatefulness, and violent words, gossip and namecalling, insults and hardness towards their brothers and sisters in this world, smugly asking, Who is my neighbor?

And you know who you are, if you are not already completely dead to the Spirit. 

Even a dog can love its offspring, and gratefully lick the hand of the master that feeds it. But if you cannot love those who may not have offended you but may do not deserve it,  who you do not know, or whom you look down upon, for the sake of the Lord, and give a reverent obedience to His two great commandments, then you may be truly lost, and perhaps even beyond any sorrow and reparation, God forbid this, in the life to come.

I caution you today, to look into your own hearts, and especially if you think you are without sin, to beg God to open your eyes, to chastise your conscience, to show you the many times you have wronged Him, and not been one of His faithful servants.   For no one is good, but God.

It is better to do this now, and to open your hearts and minds to forgiveness, that to persist in your stiff-necked pride, until a time when you hear the awful truth.

Pray for each other, and especially for those who may try you, or tempt you in any way to anger or violence. But try even harder to not look about judging others, and feeling satisfied with yourself.  For the love in your own hearts has grown cold, and selective, prideful and chastising of others.  Do not compare yourself to this one or that one, to justify yourself in your own eyes.  Pray for others, and judge only yourself, weighing your own conscience carefully in these perilous times, setting God and not yourself as the judge of your own righteous action.

When you have a hard thought or a harsh judgement for one of your brothers and sisters, pray for them.  Make yourself pray for them at each and every temptation to hatred and self-justification, for whatever sinfulness and weakness you may see in them, you have it in you.    I can assure you that if you commit yourself to doing this, every day and at the moment that such a hard thought may occur, it will at the very least keep you prayerful and well occupied.

We must do this, and be especially vigilant for our own souls and actions.   For His people are under a tremendous assault.   This truly is a generation made drunk with the will to power, that has been foretold for these dark times.  Do not worry so much about the wealth you may have on this earth, that you forget the only real and lasting possessions you may take with you to the next.

Don't worry about what they do, how they worship.  Don't worry about what I do, and what I think.  Rather, Let each person concern themselves with what they do, and how well they respond to their own call from God.   Examine your own actions and thoughts and behaviours first and foremost.  For you will not be called upon to answer for what they do, but what you have done.  Before you dare to try to convert and persuade and argue with anyone else, first make yourself perfect, so that they might be drawn to goodness by your very example.

May God have mercy on any who provide provocation and false teachings to others, and scandalous examples to their brothers and sisters, children and grandchildren, especially because of their willful selfishness, stubborn greed, and foolish pride.   And you know who you are, if you are not already completely dead to the life of the Spirit.

"You must come to see that it is possible for a man to be self-centered in his self-denial and self-righteous in his self-sacrifice.  He may be generous in order to feed his ego and pious in order to feed his pride.  Man has the tragic capacity to relegate a heightening virtue to a tragic vice.  Without love benevolence becomes egotism, and martyrdom becomes spiritual pride.

So the greatest of all virtues is love. It is here that we find the true meaning of the Christian faith. This is at bottom the meaning of the cross. The great event on Calvary signifies more than a meaningless drama that took place on the stage of history. It is a telescope through which we look out into the long vista of eternity and see the love of God breaking forth into time.

It is an eternal reminder to a power drunk generation that love is most durable power in the world, and that it is at bottom the heartbeat of the moral cosmos."

Martin Luther King, St. Paul’s Letter to the American Churches, November 4, 1956

Heroes and Saints

“If I could give you information of my life it would be to show how a woman of very ordinary ability has been led by God in strange and unaccustomed paths to do in His service what He has done in her. And if I could tell you all, you would see how God has done all, and I nothing. I have worked hard, very hard, that is all; and I have never refused God anything.”

Florence Nightingale

"A noble man compares and estimates himself by an idea which is higher than himself; and a mean man, by one lower than himself. The one produces aspiration; the other ambition for power or wealth, which is the way in which a vulgar man aspires."

Marcus Aurelius

 

No one is born a hero. Or a saint.  I think this is obvious in its very definition.

If a person has no faults or fears, they have no need of courage or character.  They are just doing what they do naturally as if by instinct. 

Courage is doing what one must do, in the face of even terrible doubts and fears that might paralyze the heart if our minds allowed it.  And it is critical that this imperative be deliberate and properly informed, not just some impulse of a flawed heart or a false voice.

And no hero is perfect. I don't know why, but that seems to continually surprise each generation. Some delight in 'digging up the dirt' on great leaders, to show their imperfections. And they have them! And some take comfort in this, when they rationalize their own bad choices.

John F Kennedy was a philanderer. Winston Churchill was an alcoholic. Abraham Lincoln was a chronic depressive. Mother Teresa was tempted by a terrible dryness of faith. Sophie Scholl was not a very effective protester.  And the two apostles in the story below showed a remarkable ambition of place, and a shockingly misplaced pride.

Human nature can be deeply flawed, and always an imperfect thing. This is how it is, for everyone. But the response of human beings to their natural weaknesses is what determines their character, even though no one is ever perfect in all things all the time.

Some give in to their every impulse and weakness without caring. Most like to think of themselves as upright, but rationalize their missteps and think them no transgressions in their case. Their conscience informs, but the mind rationalizes. And some of this inspires the tearing down of everyone else, of leveling all that is good, and calling the resultant lowest common denominator 'human.'

If you speak to anyone who has ever gone badly wrong, you see it usually not as one major life changing decision, but a hundred upon a hundred decisions and rationalizations that grow into something, one on the other. And through it all, evil whispers to their hearts.

And yet others are exemplary, heroes. We sometimes know the ones whose actions stand out. In a secular context we call them heroes, and in a religious context, we call them saints.

But there are many, many more who, despite their fears and doubts, continue to do the right thing, every day, in quietness and a devotion so something greater than their own weakness and themselves, whatever that may be.  They see that with freedom comes not only power, but responsibility and obligation.

And these are the hidden heroes, and those who live their lives 'hidden in God.' They may be drum majors of a sort, but as wives, husbands, parents and march to a very small parade that is not seen so much in their own time in this world, but in history, and always the world to come.

And sometimes their greatness shines across the ages, like a beacon of what a human being in its full manifestation and glory of goodness and greatness can be. We rise, by rising above 'ourselves' and so find ourselves.

And Martin Luther King corrects this tendency to be self-serving, rather than serving, in a most memorable way in this famous sermon about serving something greater than ourselves, an excerpt of which was played at his funeral observance.

That is a dirty word in this age of empire, to serve. Not even public servants want to serve anyone but themselves and their corrupt benefactors.  Ironically we all end up serving something or someone, even if it is only ourselves.  And we become defined by what we serve, and have an affinity for it.

Anyone can be a hero or a saint, not flawless, but faltering, not perfect, but persevering, not proud but pushing forward often in fear and trembling, not losing their own way but following the light of righteousness and goodness, even while stumbling and going forward again, because everyone can serve, if they choose something lasting and worthy.

 

It is a commonplace that those who are truly courageous and saintly do not think of themselves as such.  They are not looking at themselves, they are focused on the object of their true affections, that which they serve above their own fears and failings.

And what then is worthy? What does it mean to be truly human? This is the realm of religion and philosophy, and not science. It is the supra-rational, whether we would acknowledge it or not.

 

Your House Is Now Yours

"O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who murder your prophets,  and persecute those whom God has sent as messengers to you.

How often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her young under her wings. But you would not let me.

As you have willed, your house is now yours— but is made desolate.’”

 

We persecute our heroes and murder our prophets, to still the voice of conscience.  So that in our arrogance, we can have our way. 

And in our overwhelming hypocrisy, we may give them a parade, and a day. 

Martin Luther King gave his last public words on 3 April 1968 at the Church of God in Christ, in Memphis, Tennessee.

On 4 April 1968, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was murdered by 'a lone gunman.'

This was one year, to the day, after he gave his famous sermon A Time to Break Silence, delivered 4 April 1967, at Riverside Church, New York City.  A short excerpt from that is included below.

His death was intended not only as the silencing of a fateful voice. This was no coincidence, but a message. 

 

And there is little doubt that he knew, he knew he was going to be murdered by the darkness of this world for obeying his conscience, and speaking the truth to power, as he received it from the deepest recesses of his heart.

 

And so after decades of war, a military proliferation unparalleled in history, and the quest for power and riches, our house is now ours-- and is being made desolate.

 

Even if it is a powerful few who have blood on their hands, we are complicit by our apathy and in our silence, in the face of terrible injustice.

 

God have mercy, not on him, but on us.  He has done his duty and has found peace, and a rest at last.

 

This is my 6400th posting since February, 2007.   I have been writing about markets, money, and financial reform since 2001.