August 23rd, 2016
What do the following people have in common?
A young man who watches his best friend get raped and not only fails to try to stop the assault but later frames this friend as a thief.
A convicted thief who escapes from prison and then steals valuable objects from a priest.
An aspiring writer who plans and carries out the murder of a moneylender.
The answer will come in a few paragraphs. Meanwhile, the upcoming election has been a regular topic of discussion in our household, and these discussions have often involved our children. Recently, my youngest son (aged 5) said this:
"I know what we have to do. We should vote for Hillary and pray for Trump."
I’m not sure where this incredible insight came from, but I haven’t really heard anyone on either side of the political spectrum advocating prayer for either candidate. It is amazing to think that we are called not merely to pray for but also to love enemies. In the Christian context, in the safety of a church sermon, or even in the trite advice we give our children, it seems like a noble thing to aspire to, but in an American cultural setting it feels like escapism at best and appeasement at worst. Our society is not one in which we can afford to love our enemies. People who love enemies are exploited. They’re weak. They are the antithesis of American.
I have been trying to reconcile these two ideas over the last few weeks because I am not sure how an American culture which professes a deep and enduring belief in God or at least in the Judeo-Christian values on which it was founded can run counter to what we are actually called to do as Christians. It seems that the Sermon on the Mount, from which emanate values that many people of all backgrounds, creeds, and persuasions can agree on, is more a series of platitudes, not Beatitudes. Of course, what makes them so radical is that they are actually incredibly difficult to live by and truly living by them would surely transform our society. I would argue that is that it is our deeply held belief in the morality of capitalism and the “American Way” that prevents us from being open to loving our enemies.
It seems preposterous, for example, to imagine a society where hate really is considered as bad as murder, or lust the equivalent of adultery. Loving our enemies? Is that how the US resolves foreign threats?
Let’s go back to the beginning and our examples. Here’s a fourth one for you: a man who devotes his life to the hunting down, persecuting, and even the murder of Christians.
Our individuals are: Amir (from The Kite Runner), Jean Valjean (Les Miserables), Raskolnikov (Crime and Punishment), and, finally, a chap named Saul (Acts 9). What do they have in common? Each of them experienced powerful redemption that enabled them to atone for their heinous actions and become new people devoted to doing good in the world.
I find it curious that this inability to love our enemies is juxtaposed with the fact that our culture values redemption as one of the strongest, most powerful themes. When someone is redeemed it gives us hope; it reinforces our belief in the power of grace. A moment of true redemption is the poignant, lump in the throat, transcendent change that moves us perhaps more than any other.
We had a guest speaker in church on Sunday, and he preached on Acts 9. Saul, who, of course, changed his name to Paul, experienced one of the most profound redemptions of all time and became almost instantly the greatest proponent of the very religion he had hoped to stamp out. In that story, argued the speaker, we learn that loving our enemies is essential because we never know who will be saved or who will be redeemed. If Paul conversion is possible, isn’t anyone's? And most importantly, there was Ananias, called by God in a vision to go to and minister to this man who was a known enemy.
We love a good redemption story, but let us remember that we are, like Ananias, called to be the people that make that redemption possible by giving others a chance to be redeemed. And in this modern day, that is not easy, for our culture teaches us that justice is more important than redemption, and that retribution is more important than forgiveness. If those statements sound wrong let us apply them to our own lives and situations in which we have been the victims. We long for justice. We long for our enemies to be laid low. We oppose voting rights for those who have served their time in jail. We oppose education for those in jail. We are more interested in keeping criminals locked up than in actually rehabilitating them. We are skeptical when murderers find Jesus in prison. They don’t deserve it. It’s unfair. They broke the law. They need to be held accountable.
I provided examples from literature, for I found it difficult to find many real life examples. They seem a lot harder to come by. This had me tempted to rail, again, against our disingenuous society and our own hypocrisy, but I realised that I need look no further than myself to find an example of redemption. I have received forgiveness at moments when I least deserved it. I have received grace without asking for it or even knowing it at the time. And I think that if we are honest, each of us either needs redemption or has been redeemed. Each of us has been an enemy who has been loved.
Every time I wrestle with issues like this, realizing that I am broken and morally inept helps me turn the problem on its head.
It’s not about Hillary or Trump. It’s about me.
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