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It's About Time: A President With a Subtle Turn of Mind
We have elected a president who is not only a person of faith but also a person of literate and subtle application of that faith. It's about time.
Let's hope he'll use his perspective to lead and to make a few things clear to his policy team and to the family of nations.
We know about President-elect Obama's turn of mind from what he's said, how he's said it, and from the insights we've been given into his education and intellectual life.
I'm thinking particularly of his reading of the Christian ethicist and theologian Reinhold Niebuhr (d. 1971). Niebuhr was a restless intellect and wrote and spoke widely on the importance of accepting the reality of evil in the world without giving up hope for simple justice and change. As far as I can see, Obama doesn't do what some neoconservatives do: happily appropriate a darling of "liberal" Christians to their own, often militaristic, course.
Obama is in tune with the political theologian in Niebhur in recognizing that however awful actions and even people are, it's a category mistake to equate to reduce politics or diplomacy to good vs. evil. "The injustices in society," Niebuhr wrote, "will not be abolished purely by moral suasion."
A first step is for Obama to very clearly, very forcefully and very publicly to begin educating us all in this truth. Terrorism is not simply a moral category, and it's not an expression of any legitimate faith practice.
Being realistic and compassionate while doing that act of separation will ground his policy and, I fervently hope, begin to change the perception of America fed by the last eight years of black and white thinking. Let him be vigorous, strategic and fearless in the face of terrorist action. But let him also be subtle.
I'm no adviser of presidents. But as a citizen and person of faith I simply hope our new leader might turn to and make his own - and ours -- what Niebuhr so memorably said at another dark moment in world history:
"Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our lifetime; therefore we must be saved by hope. Nothing which is true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history; therefore we must be saved by faith. Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone; therefore we are saved by love. No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as it is from our standpoint. Therefore we must be saved by the final form of love which is forgiveness." (from The Irony of American History, 1952)
By
William Tully
|
December 8, 2008; 5:07 AM ET
| Category:
Religion & Leadership
,
Religion & Politics
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Posted by: docbets | December 15, 2008 11:06 PM
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Excuse me, I don't know what Episcopalians are any more. Before, they were rich upper-class Protestants not known for gay bashing and Leviticus picking over Christ's words of love and exclusion. I understand there is now a Dobsonite version that spends more time bashing gays than teaching the love of God. Which version are you, Rev. Tully?
Posted by: coloradodog | December 9, 2008 2:40 PM
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There is some truth you stated above but there is also much that is troubling. To refuse to call something on a black and white scale could lead to relativism. Was Hitler not evil? Was slavery not evil? Was 9/11 not evil? Is inducing young kids to strap bombs to their body and blow up a crowded mall evil? Yes. Now, we may make a distinction between some groups who advocate this and other groups of similar religions and ethnicities who do not, but should we not call these evil?
In the Bible, Jesus did call some things evil. When we make light of evil we make light of the offense. Call it evil but build bridges to those who reject these as well. Would Wilberforce gotten rid of Slavery if he did not believe it was truly evil? Hume, the atheist, was right in saying that clear morality invokes action. Without clarity on such issue we will be stymied in our actions to stop evil.
Posted by: derickdickens | December 5, 2008 6:46 PM
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The comments to this entry are closed.
The worlds of politics and diplomacy require different vocabularies than the world of faith. To confuse this is to misread Tully and Niebhur both. Tully quotes Niebhur: "...that however awful actions and even people are, it's a category mistake to equate to [sic] reduce politics or diplomacy to good vs. evil."
A CATEGORY mistake. “Evil” is not in the political vocabulary book; not as a descriptor of people or nations. Jesus may well have used the word "evil" to describe or decry what he encountered in his world. That makes Rev. Tully's point. It is not for a political leader to declare what is and is not in the category of faith.
I recall Obama's considered reply to a debate question about evil. He did not equivocate about whether evil is, or is not, afoot in the world. There was nothing relativistic in his declaration that people and nations may DO evil but we need not LABEL them so. Actually, name-calling is not a diplomatic skill.
Further, it might not even be accurate to do so and it surely is imprudent to do so if one is to do our nation’s work in the area of repairing and sustaining relationships with other nations and people. This is not a political or a semantic trick; it is a crucial distinction for a president to make.
Rev. Tully is referring to exactly this in his comments. For a long time in this country, such distinctions have been ignored or, no better, unseen. Religious leadership and political-and-diplomatic leadership are not the same.
The world's people desperately need to learn to coexist without impinging on each other. I am cautiously hopeful when I note that Obama is aware of what he was elected to do.