Civil Obedience as Social Ill
Yesterday my mother and I were doing some light touring of my current hometown. It's a cute little town, on the young side even for the United States, and it sits in the center of a broad swath of rural farms. It's all very 'Murican. We took a brief self-guided tour of the local "tabernacle" - a large assembly hall erected by the local religious founders for civic meetings, concerts, and other non-denominational and secular gatherings.
This tabernacle echoes beautifully. Normally, an echo is not ideal for these kinds of large rooms because when you have something noisy going on, or get a large crowd together, the sound multiplies to very uncomfortable levels, and you can get a lag, but in this case, since the crowd was me and my mum, it was wonderful. I couldn't resist, and sang Molly Malone, harmonizing with my own echo. I do think very well of myself, yes.
Then my mum sang America the Beautiful, and I joined in. But we got stuck on the third verse. Our alabaster cities have been dimmed by human tears, of late. Many human tears. So of course we started talking about how to help my youngest brother feel how much we love him.
I woke up this morning thinking about that verse, about the ending of one of the verses that offers the words "Confirm thy soul in self-control, thy liberty in law." And I thought about my faith, about other faiths, and why so many people ripe for the furor of the worst of our contemporary politics are Christians like me. Or Christians not very much like me, but Christians nonetheless. And I thought about that Marxist quotation that religion is the opiate of the masses.
I have always hated that (mis)quotation. It makes me angry, because religions are a rich contribution to any life, and should lead to being a better person, and by extension lead to better, stronger countries, fiscal equality, and general prosperity and abundance. Marx likely objected to it because religion is not an effective tool of the state, unless you're Hitler.
Most religions ask for a perpetual conscientiousness in daily actions as well as larger decisions. They ask for constant prayers, and offer moral guidelines. If we believe in the general human desire to do the right thing (not universal, just general), why are we where we are in the world?
I wonder if it is because very broadly speaking (which is always dangerous, but in which I am yet going to indulge) human culture and human nature both contain the yin and yang concepts of agency and obedience - liberty and law, sith and jedi. And if we lean too far in either direction, we are fragmented by centrifugal forces.
Like yin and yang, agency and obedience are not opposing forces, but complementary forces that should bring dynamic results. But if we enact an imbalance, then the whole system is thrown off - like a helicopter losing a blade. We spin out of control. The imbalance I see in our current scenario in which adherents to Christianity embrace distinctly unChristian policies and behaviors is not exactly what Marx complained of, but is certainly related.
What I think Marx meant, is that religion offers peace and rest to people who should be doing the work of changing the world so that EVERYONE can rest. I'm not sure how far he takes that idea because I don't love Marx or Marxism and don't read it much. I think that, like religion, he's another patsy for concerted human failings, and in both cases, we err on the side of obedience. We let someone else not just give us orders, but make our decisions.
Let me tell you something: even if God gives you a direct command, you are responsible for your part in that action. For every law, we have the opportunity to exercise a liberty. It is forced on us.
Nephi, when told of God to kill Laban, struggled with that order because he knew it is always wrong to kill, and even if God tells you to kill you still have to face the consequences of it and they are terrible. Did you ever wonder if Nephi had PTSD because of that experience? I guarantee you that there were repercussions in this life. People he loved and whose support he needed could have suddenly become terrified of him, would have seen him in different ways. And on his conscience, balanced by God's word that he was saving thousands of unborn souls, was this death under his hand. A life and body cut short. Who could forget that? The dirt and sordidness of it all. The blood.
Regardless of how the eternal scales weighed in the end, God did not force Nephi to kill, He only commanded and persuaded. Nephi's obedience was an action of faith - of a strong belief that what God wanted was more important than Nephi's own soul. Because whatever the reason, even in self-defense, killing is killing.
And this is the thing: Nephi got blame for killing one man, but he also gets some small credit for founding a righteous nation. Ultimately, God gets the credit for knowing how to achieve the end and for giving Nephi his orders, but Nephi still gets the credit for his part, just as he takes blame. We carry the weight, for good or ill, of anything in the range of our agency. Shouldn't that convince us to tread more deliberately?
Being given a commandment by any kind of leader or higher being (or lower being, I suppose) is not a free out. It never was. It should not be in our eyes, nor will it be for the person who chooses to obey or disobey. The action still holds its original weight, and inaction is still a form of action. A commandment is simply another valence in the decision-making process - a complication that offers another layer of rewards and consequences added to those that already exist because of the immediate structure and physical laws we function under. Religion increases the stakes and can offer insight into longer-term systems, but the local systems still function.
So how do we rebalance our local system? I don't know. If the Book of Mormon is anything to go by, as an historical precedent, people like me (and those in worse situations, because my anguish is currently only emotional and mental) may simply continue to suffer because of the policies of others. I suspect that in the end, the world and those in it will continue doing what they are doing, and we can only hope that by finding the balance within ourselves of obedience and agency, we can bless those around us.
This tabernacle echoes beautifully. Normally, an echo is not ideal for these kinds of large rooms because when you have something noisy going on, or get a large crowd together, the sound multiplies to very uncomfortable levels, and you can get a lag, but in this case, since the crowd was me and my mum, it was wonderful. I couldn't resist, and sang Molly Malone, harmonizing with my own echo. I do think very well of myself, yes.
Then my mum sang America the Beautiful, and I joined in. But we got stuck on the third verse. Our alabaster cities have been dimmed by human tears, of late. Many human tears. So of course we started talking about how to help my youngest brother feel how much we love him.
I woke up this morning thinking about that verse, about the ending of one of the verses that offers the words "Confirm thy soul in self-control, thy liberty in law." And I thought about my faith, about other faiths, and why so many people ripe for the furor of the worst of our contemporary politics are Christians like me. Or Christians not very much like me, but Christians nonetheless. And I thought about that Marxist quotation that religion is the opiate of the masses.
I have always hated that (mis)quotation. It makes me angry, because religions are a rich contribution to any life, and should lead to being a better person, and by extension lead to better, stronger countries, fiscal equality, and general prosperity and abundance. Marx likely objected to it because religion is not an effective tool of the state, unless you're Hitler.
Most religions ask for a perpetual conscientiousness in daily actions as well as larger decisions. They ask for constant prayers, and offer moral guidelines. If we believe in the general human desire to do the right thing (not universal, just general), why are we where we are in the world?
I wonder if it is because very broadly speaking (which is always dangerous, but in which I am yet going to indulge) human culture and human nature both contain the yin and yang concepts of agency and obedience - liberty and law, sith and jedi. And if we lean too far in either direction, we are fragmented by centrifugal forces.
Like yin and yang, agency and obedience are not opposing forces, but complementary forces that should bring dynamic results. But if we enact an imbalance, then the whole system is thrown off - like a helicopter losing a blade. We spin out of control. The imbalance I see in our current scenario in which adherents to Christianity embrace distinctly unChristian policies and behaviors is not exactly what Marx complained of, but is certainly related.
What I think Marx meant, is that religion offers peace and rest to people who should be doing the work of changing the world so that EVERYONE can rest. I'm not sure how far he takes that idea because I don't love Marx or Marxism and don't read it much. I think that, like religion, he's another patsy for concerted human failings, and in both cases, we err on the side of obedience. We let someone else not just give us orders, but make our decisions.
Let me tell you something: even if God gives you a direct command, you are responsible for your part in that action. For every law, we have the opportunity to exercise a liberty. It is forced on us.
Nephi, when told of God to kill Laban, struggled with that order because he knew it is always wrong to kill, and even if God tells you to kill you still have to face the consequences of it and they are terrible. Did you ever wonder if Nephi had PTSD because of that experience? I guarantee you that there were repercussions in this life. People he loved and whose support he needed could have suddenly become terrified of him, would have seen him in different ways. And on his conscience, balanced by God's word that he was saving thousands of unborn souls, was this death under his hand. A life and body cut short. Who could forget that? The dirt and sordidness of it all. The blood.
Regardless of how the eternal scales weighed in the end, God did not force Nephi to kill, He only commanded and persuaded. Nephi's obedience was an action of faith - of a strong belief that what God wanted was more important than Nephi's own soul. Because whatever the reason, even in self-defense, killing is killing.
And this is the thing: Nephi got blame for killing one man, but he also gets some small credit for founding a righteous nation. Ultimately, God gets the credit for knowing how to achieve the end and for giving Nephi his orders, but Nephi still gets the credit for his part, just as he takes blame. We carry the weight, for good or ill, of anything in the range of our agency. Shouldn't that convince us to tread more deliberately?
Being given a commandment by any kind of leader or higher being (or lower being, I suppose) is not a free out. It never was. It should not be in our eyes, nor will it be for the person who chooses to obey or disobey. The action still holds its original weight, and inaction is still a form of action. A commandment is simply another valence in the decision-making process - a complication that offers another layer of rewards and consequences added to those that already exist because of the immediate structure and physical laws we function under. Religion increases the stakes and can offer insight into longer-term systems, but the local systems still function.
So how do we rebalance our local system? I don't know. If the Book of Mormon is anything to go by, as an historical precedent, people like me (and those in worse situations, because my anguish is currently only emotional and mental) may simply continue to suffer because of the policies of others. I suspect that in the end, the world and those in it will continue doing what they are doing, and we can only hope that by finding the balance within ourselves of obedience and agency, we can bless those around us.
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