{"id":106618,"date":"2018-02-19T12:00:39","date_gmt":"2018-02-19T12:00:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=106618"},"modified":"2018-02-13T15:54:38","modified_gmt":"2018-02-13T15:54:38","slug":"where-to-resist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2018\/02\/where-to-resist\/","title":{"rendered":"Where to Resist?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sermon at St. Mark\u2019s Church<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

4 Feb 2018 – <\/em>When I began thinking about this sermon, two voices sounded in my mind\u2019s ear.\u00a0 One was the voice of my late friend and comrade, Eqbal Ahmad, a Pakistani scholar and anti-war activist with whom I worked in Chicago in the late 60s and early 70s.\u00a0 \u201cI hear a lot from my students about \u2018walking the talk,\u2019 Eqbal said.\u00a0 But I tell them that you can\u2019t walk the talk without first having<\/em> the talk.\u00a0 First you decide what\u2019s real and what\u2019s right; then you act on the basis of that understanding.\u00a0 Finally, the results of your action can force you to re-define what\u2019s real and what\u2019s right.\u00a0 That is what we call praxis<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n

A more recent sage, the Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Zizek, puts it even more briefly.\u00a0 His lecture that has been viewed by 800,000 people on You Tube is entitled, \u201cDon\u2019t Act; Just Think.\u201d\u00a0 Zizek wants us to resist the urge to act politically before we have decided what is really wrong with the current system and what a better system would look like.<\/p>\n

So, to follow Eqbal\u2019s and Zizek\u2019s advice, let\u2019s have the talk before we walk the walk.\u00a0 What acts of authority do our ethical and religious traditions require us to resist, and what forms should that resistance take?\u00a0 In today\u2019s America, there are more than a few possible answers to these questions!\u00a0 Fortunately, the readings in our service this morning help us to answer it.\u00a0 President Trump\u2019s recent State of the Union speech is also of great relevance.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s begin with the passage from Isaiah that starts by giving us a Gods-eye view of the earth:<\/p>\n

It is he who sits above the circle of the earth,
\nand its inhabitants are like grasshoppers; <\/em><\/p>\n

who stretches out the heavens like a curtain,
\nand spreads them like a tent to live in<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

What an imagination!\u00a0 But this is not just one of those \u201cI\u2019m God and you\u2019re not\u201d speeches of the sort one finds in the Book of Job, because the speaker immediately singles out a particular species of grasshopper that he particularly disdains: the earth\u2019s great rulers.\u00a0 The passage continues,<\/p>\n

[God] brings princes to naught,
\nand makes the rulers of the earth as nothing. <\/em><\/p>\n

Scarcely are they planted, scarcely sown,
\nscarcely has their stem taken root in the earth, <\/em><\/p>\n

when he blows upon them, and they wither,
\nand the tempest carries them off like stubble. <\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The great contrast drawn here is not between God and people in general, but between the true creator and ruler of the universe and the princes and emperors who claim legitimacy and authority over the nations.\u00a0 These rulers claim to be divinely appointed.\u00a0 They say that their power is a sign of their and their people\u2019s special virtue, and they create a cult of toughness and implacability.\u00a0 You might call the sort of thing Isaiah most detested \u201cAssyrian Exceptionalism.\u201d\u00a0 But Yahwe, by contrast, favors the weak, not the strong.<\/p>\n

\u00a0[God] gives power to the faint,
\nand strengthens the powerless.<\/em><\/p>\n

Even youths will faint and be weary,
\nand the young will fall exhausted;<\/em><\/p>\n

but those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength,
\nthey shall mount up with wings like eagles,<\/em><\/p>\n

they shall run and not be weary,
\nthey shall walk and not faint. <\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This is the God of Justice, not of Power, and, Isaiah makes it perfectly clear that he is the God of all<\/em> the globe\u2019s peoples, not those of any particular nation \u2013 not even the nation chosen to receive the Law.\u00a0 Isaiah\u2019s God tells the Hebrews that he is not interested in their prayers because their hands are \u201ccovered with blood.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cCease to do evil,\u201d he commands them,\u00a0 \u201clearn to do good, search for justice, and help the oppressed.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0 And he does not suggest for a moment that Hebrew lives are worth a shekel more than any other people\u2019s lives.<\/p>\n

In fact, Isaiah predicts, a time is coming when people will \u201chammer their swords into ploughshares, their spears into sickles\u201d and stop preparing for war.\u00a0 All the nations will be connected, and, recognizing that none of them is legitimized to rule the earth, each one will serve the others.\u00a0 The prophet summarizes this equality of peoples in one of his most visionary and moving statements: \u201cIn that day,\u201d he proclaims, \u201cYahwe of the Hosts will give his blessing in the words, \u2018Blessed be my people Egypt, Assyria my creation, and Israel my heritage.\u2019\u201c<\/p>\n

Now, with these words ringing in your ears, take another look at the State of the Union message that we heard last Tuesday night, a well crafted and well delivered speech whose central vision was what the President called the \u201cnew American moment.\u201d\u00a0 From beginning to end, the speech\u2019s ruling assumption was that Americans are superior to other peoples \u2013 more heroic, harder-working, cleverer, more determined, and more spiritually developed \u2013 and that American lives, prosperity, security, and happiness are worth securing even if that means leaving other people\u2019s basic needs unsatisfied.<\/p>\n

Trump filled the visitor\u2019s gallery with examples of self-sacrificing heroism.\u00a0 He glorified the armed forces and the police, praising the values of toughness, determination, and refusal to \u201cmake concessions,\u201d and promising to keep open the notorious prison at Guantanamo Bay.\u00a0 Finally, he lauded the American people, whom he labeled a family, and preached love and equality between them \u2013 but not<\/em> between them and groups or individuals outside the \u201cfamily.\u201d\u00a0 The message was America First, not Humanity First.<\/p>\n

One would think that Americans, who consider themselves a religious people, would recognize a false gospel when they heard it, and that religious leaders would be the loudest in denouncing it.\u00a0 The worship of a nation and the justification of its right to dominate others is precisely the idolatry that Isaiah and Jeremiah, Jesus of Nazareth and St. Paul, denounced most vehemently.\u00a0 Yet the President\u2019s critics were strangely silent about \u201cAmerica First.\u201d\u00a0 They accused him of being deceitful and manipulative, and of making inaccurate statements of fact.\u00a0 But we heard very few criticisms of his core doctrines of American superiority, the need for military force, and the primary moral duty that we owe other members of the national family.\u00a0 The New York Times even commented in a front page story that the speech had \u201cavoided nationalist rhetoric.\u201d\u00a0 I have been trying ever since reading this to figure out what the reporter meant!<\/p>\n

We can end this silence here and now.\u00a0 Not only does nationalist patriotism erect an idol in place of the God of all peoples, it denies the existence of the broader human community that constitutes our true family, and the planet that constitutes our true home.\u00a0 Of course<\/em>, the State of the Union speech avoided the topic of climate change.\u00a0 This is a logical result of the assumption that America\u2019s problems can be solved within national borders \u2013 that we can be strong, free, and prosperous whatever happens to the rest of the world.\u00a0 If I could recommend another reading on this subject, it would be Edgar Allen Poe\u2019s \u201cThe Masque of the Red Death,\u201d a story that tells what happens when a few wealthy people try to isolate themselves from the plague by holding a party exclusively for the benefit of their gated community.\u00a0 You may keep some immigrants from crashing your party, but the Red Death will inevitably join the dance, whether you like it or not.<\/p>\n

This is because globalization is not just the globalization of capital, it is also cultural, ecological, and<\/em> biological.\u00a0 Painfully, but inevitably, a human community is coming into existence.\u00a0 Therefore, when nationalists assert that our primary moral duty is to the people in our American \u201cfamily\u201d \u2013 that is, our tribe \u2013 they prevent us from growing up and playing an adult role in the creation of a genuine world community.\u00a0 This sort of patriotism fixates us in the stage of infantile tribalism.\u00a0 It prevents us from filling our destiny to become truly human by transforming strangers into neighbors.<\/p>\n

This is why we must resist \u201cAmerica First.\u201d\u00a0 But what does this sort of resistance mean?\u00a0 There are many possible answers, but this morning\u2019s reading from the Apostle Paul gives us two useful ideas to think about:<\/p>\n

First, Paul tells us in I Corinthians, resistance means preaching the true gospel.\u00a0 We need to make the Good News of a genuine world community as concrete and appealing as Paul did when he spoke of a coming world in which the differences between Jews and Greeks, masters and slaves, and men and women would become subordinated to their one-ness under God.\u00a0 The vision offered by the President\u2019s State of the Union speech may be horribly flawed, but at least it is<\/em> a vision.\u00a0 Simply accusing Trump of dishonesty and other character defects does not reveal the flaws of ultra-nationalism or offer a convincing counter-vision.<\/p>\n

Furthermore, Paul recognizes that preaching the true gospel it is a difficult and risky undertaking, because talking seriously about our global obligations in a world still governed by armed empires like Rome or the United States violates longstanding taboos.\u00a0 We know that, despite the risks, Paul never stopped breaking taboos.\u00a0 The quarterback Colin Kaepernick did something similar when he took a knee during the playing of the National Anthem at National Football League games to protest the glorification of police brutality and military force.\u00a0 He paid a price, too; he is still unemployed.<\/p>\n

But Kaepernick\u2019s act suggests another lesson as well: We must, as Paul said, speak as Jews to the Jews, as Greeks to the Greeks . . . and as Americans to other Americans.\u00a0 Just because the form of patriotism preached by the nationalists is idolatrous does not mean that it is wrong to cherish the national and sub-national groups that provide us with comfort, security, opportunity, and examples of right behavior.<\/p>\n

I love my family, my Capitol Hill neighbors, my fellow-Washingtonians, fellow Jews, fellow Workers, and fellow Americans\u00a0 (to name just a few of these groups).\u00a0 And because of this multiplicity of group memberships and loyalties, the road to broader affiliations \u2013 the road toward the human universality proclaimed by the prophets \u2013 is neither smooth nor simple.<\/p>\n

In fact, we wrestle with the angel of universality all the time.\u00a0 I remember arguing bitterly, if lovingly, with my father when he proclaimed once too often (in my view) that \u201cBlood is thicker than water.\u201d\u00a0 \u201cNo, it isn\u2019t,\u201d I replied with the total certainty of a radical humanist-in-training.\u00a0 But, at some times and under some circumstances, the family does<\/em> comes first!\u00a0 So let\u2019s not pretend that there are easy answers to questions involving a clash of loyalties.<\/p>\n

This leads to a final conclusion that may seem paradoxical.\u00a0 Clearly, there are many possible ways to express active resistance to a doctrine like \u201cAmerica First.\u201d\u00a0 Resistance may mean taking a knee at a ball game or sitting down in the halls of Congress.\u00a0 In the sixties it meant publishing the Pentagon Papers and pouring home-made napalm on draft board files.\u00a0 But it can also mean dialoguing with people whose views you detest!<\/p>\n

I believe that Colin Kaepernick was right to kneel at the NFL games.\u00a0 He bore witness against violence and provoked a national debate that continues to this day.\u00a0 One televised picture, you might say, is worth a thousand words.\u00a0 Even better, however, if Kaepernnick\u2019s heroism would lead us toward a national dialogue, not just another name-calling argument.\u00a0 Sometimes, a thousand words is worth at least as much as one picture.<\/p>\n

Those dedicated to transcending a narrow nationalist perspective badly need to talk face to face, and equal to equal, with people who feel a strong need for the protection, opportunities, sense of identity, and personal pride that they think nationalist patriotism provides them.\u00a0 A facilitated dialogue can help us answer hard, necessary questions.\u00a0 If the nation is the wrong satisfier for people\u2019s real needs, what would the right satisfier look like?\u00a0 If there are situations in which the nation is the right satisfier, what are those situations?\u00a0 And, how can we make it to the next rung on the ladder of human identity and community without betraying those who have helped us climb this far?<\/p>\n

Please, God, help us to resist the false idol of the Nation and the retrogressive ideology of \u201cAmerica First.\u201d\u00a0 But help us, too, to preach the Good News of the human community to Americans as Americans, recognizing that we share much in common, and that none of us is in exclusive possession of the truth.<\/p>\n

_____________________________________________<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Richard E. Rubenstein is<\/em> a member of the TRANSCEND Network for Peace Development Environment<\/a> and a professor at the School for Conflict Analysis and Resolution, George Mason University<\/em> in Arlington, Virginia.<\/em>\u00a0 His recent book,<\/em> Resolving Structural Conflicts, was published by Routledge in 2017<\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cI hear a lot from my students about \u2018walking the talk,\u2019\u201d Eqbal Ahmad, a Pakistani scholar and anti-war activist said. \u201cBut I tell them that you can\u2019t walk the talk without first having the talk. First you decide what\u2019s real and what\u2019s right; then you act on the basis of that understanding. Finally, the results of your action can force you to re-define what\u2019s real and what\u2019s right. That is what we call praxis.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":103021,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-106618","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-transcend-members"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106618","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=106618"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106618\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/103021"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=106618"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=106618"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=106618"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}