WHEN RIGHT IS LIKE WRONG

We live in a world of right and wrong. By that I mean, we live in a world where we believe that we are right, and those who disagree with us are wrong. If you disagree with that statement and think I am wrong and you are right; well you have just proven my point.

If we pause and think, most, if not all, of our associations or groups are based on a belief that the way we think is right. In addition to believing that we are right we often distance ourselves from another group that we believe is wrong. If we dig a little more we might even begin to see that we inform our beliefs and draw our identity from the other group who tells us what we are not. It seems that few can exist without an opposite to compare and contrast against. Which causes me to ask, "If you are convinced you are right, then why get so upset when someone disagrees or questions you?"

When was the last time you engaged in a civil conversation about politics and spoke only about what you believe? When was the last time you were able to speak about your faith without speaking in less than flattering terms about another view? When was the last time you were able to speak about anything without some reflection on the competition, the other, or the enemy? These conversations seem to be in short supply in our world today.

It seems that the more deeply held the belief the more vitriol is poured out on the other. We dehumanize those who think differently, for if he is a lunatic than I must be in my right mind. And after all a lunatic cannot possibly be right. So we look at a group who we feel speaks and acts in a degrading way toward us. We think to ourselves, “What a bunch of awful people.” The response? To degrade them back. Yet the more we speak and act against them … the more like them we become.

In the end then the very group we have tried to distance ourselves from becomes the group we end up looking most like. This is why the groups that we become most like are the groups that we hate the most. Because for everything we hate about them, deep inside we know that the same resides inside us.

But, it does not have to be like this. When we speak of the other, the antagonist, the enemy, or the competition we ought not be speaking of our disposition. It is interesting to note that the word for “enemy” in the biblical narrative speaks not about how you feel about the other, but how the other feels about you. The slant in the Bible is to presume that you are not the one who harbors hostility, but that others may harbor hostility toward you.

So when Jesus says, “Love your enemy.” He is not saying, “Love the people that you do not like, want anything to do with, and that you constantly compare yourself against to give yourself a feeling of superiority.” What he is saying is, “Love the person who does not like you, want anything to do with you, and who constantly compares himself against you to give himself a feeling of superiority.” Jesus does not presume loving your enemy is a foreign concept, because enmity has no place in the heart of his followers.

Instead of living in such a way where we attack what is different. Compare and contrast against others who look, think, or believe differently. Rally around hatred, fear, and a common enemy to create solidarity in our particular group. All of which only leads us to be like those we think are different … we should take a better path, which in the end might just have the same result, minus the hate.

Let’s start by finding what we share in common. We can all admit we that all human beings are made in the image and likeness of a loving God. We can all admit that all human beings are due the same dignity, honor, love, and grace that we would demand for ourselves. As we move down this path we just might find that we are like our enemy and our enemy is like us.

When this happens, rather than hate them more, we might love them more. We might end up “loving our neighbor who is like us.”

All of this begins with refusing to live in a world where we believe we are right and those who disagree are wrong. It begins with recognizing that each of us has beliefs, worldviews, opinions, and experiences that shape us. These things give each of us a unique viewpoint rooted in faith. But our viewpoint is only a view from a point. And the other's viewpoint is only a view from a point.

If we see things this way, we might begin to wake up to the fact that they are like us, and we are like them. Much of it is just a point of view.