COMMENTARY: Readers’ Comments Reveal Passion Still Rages on `Moral Issues’

c. 2004 Religion News Service (UNDATED) When the flood subsided, I assembled the many comments on “moral issues” that readers of my daily online meditations submitted after the presidential election. It was a humbling exercise. Humbling, first, because of the sheer volume of responses. I received three times as many as I expected. You can […]

c. 2004 Religion News Service

(UNDATED) When the flood subsided, I assembled the many comments on “moral issues” that readers of my daily online meditations submitted after the presidential election. It was a humbling exercise.

Humbling, first, because of the sheer volume of responses. I received three times as many as I expected. You can find excerpts on http://www.onajourney.org. Look for “SPECIAL: Readers’ Comments on Moral Issues after 2004 Election.”


Humbling, second, because of their intensity. Responses came from all quadrants of opinion, including some that were critical of my writing. I decided to pass all of them along without comment. But when you read them, I hope you also will be humbled by the intensity of feeling, concern, questioning. Whether or not this election turned on moral issues _ the pundits are still deciding _ feelings are high.

Humbling, third, because of the trust that readers showed in sharing their comments. Trust in themselves, trust that their comments are worth making, trust in America as a place where words freely spoken have high value.

I urge you to take the time to read this lengthy document. It is a rare window into what people actually are thinking and feeling _ not in the slogans and self-serving summaries of politicians, but in citizens’ own words.

You won’t like everything being said. Depending on your political and ethical perspective, you will find some of these opinions obnoxious. In the end, every word will strike someone, somewhere, as wrong-headed. It is important to remember that free speech, not moral consensus, is the heart of democracy.

Who are these writers? They range widely, from college student to retiree, lifelong Democrat to lifelong Republican, male and female, homosexual and heterosexual, liberal and conservative, lay and clergy, happy and unhappy, confident and frightened.

Why should you care what others think? That’s the big question, isn’t it? One reason, of course, is humility itself: always in short supply in our lives, profoundly absent from the political stage. Faith is never about right opinion or moral perfection. As Micah wrote, “What does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with God?”

Another reason is perspective. Most religious people think their brand of faith is correct, perhaps 100 percent correct _ indeed, perhaps so correct that any other belief is 100 percent wrong and to be avoided, even punished. Such hubris will sink our commonwealth faster than a weak economy or a foreign war. The antidote to hubris is perspective: knowing that opposing points of view exist, are held by basically decent people, not monsters, and deserve a hearing.


Power ebbs and flows. Today’s winner will be tomorrow’s loser. In politics, the ascendant tend to strut their hour and to mock those whom they just vanquished. The soldiers who mocked Jesus were engaged in the timeless delight that the powerful take in tormenting the powerless. Jesus broke the cycle by not firing back. He absorbed the mocking, rather than store up anger as a weapon for another day.

If Christians make any claim to being Christian _ any of us, whatever place we occupy on the polarities dividing us _ we need to hear Jesus saying “No” to worldly power. Not just “No” to the currently powerful, but “No” to such power altogether. For the future of his kingdom didn’t depend on his followers ever occupying earthly thrones or having dutiful allies among the powerful. The future depended on their believing, serving, and loving as Jesus loved.

To love, we must listen deeply to the people around us. We must hear the many accents of faith, the many cries, the many yearnings, the many joys and sorrows, the many voices asking only to be heard. Religion needs to break its historic tendency to disparage opposing viewpoints.

I would be interested in hearing your responses, as well. Write me at tehrich(at)earthlink.net.

(Tom Ehrich is a writer and computer consultant, managing large-scale database implementations. An Episcopal priest, he lives in Durham, N.C. Visit his Web site at http://www.onajourney.org.)

MO/RB END EHRICH

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