Going out on a limb.

I am still chewing on stuff that was going around in my head about "intentional spiritual poverty," coupled with a few things Melanie wrote -- one comment here suggesting looking to the Litany of Humility, and a post about what rankled her when Heather King suggested (yes, I am oversimplifying) that if you didn't hang around with drug addicts and ex-prostitutes, you aren't getting out enough.

The problem with Heather's point is just that it wasn't general enough. The Christian life has to be, at least in part, about hanging around with people who are not, shall we say, respectable. And treating them as worthy of respect.

To give one example: Children are not very respectable. And yet, they deserve respect as persons. They deserve to have their needs met, to have the chance to voice pleasure and displeasure, to be seen and heard, to be loved as persons. Not petted as if they were toy animals, nor exploited for the whims of adults, nor stowed away when inconvenient; rather, loved as persons, talked to and heard as if they were intelligent creatures, protected and at the same time loosed to experience the world; in short, brought along with us.

Children are not the only unrespectable people we are bound to offer human respect to. How about the embarrassingly ignorant? How about the rude boor? How about the insufferably wrong? How about the laughable narcissist? The home-wrecker?

I understand disdain. I do. For me it has always been a protective mechanism.

"There's no point in reasoning with him."

"He's just a toxic individual and I stay as far away as possible."

"Typical behavior coming from her. What do you expect?"

"Don't feed the troll, you know what I mean?"

"I just try to ignore him."

Okay, so it can be psychically dangerous to engage with so-called "toxic people." And sometimes it is your duty to protect other people from harm, I get that, and of course you have the right to protect yourself from real harm.

But what if the risk were overstated? And what if we are enhancing the risk by following the wrong rules?

+ + +

You know what else I understand? I understand the deliciousness of well-crafted snark.

(And it isn't like our generation invented it. Not even Catholic snark. Ever read Chesterton?)

There's probably a proper place for snark. It is good to hunt down absurd arguments and lay their absurdities bare. But it seems to me the snark is properly aimed at the arguments and not at the arguer. And even then, it's blunted by overuse.

And if you really just use it to score points or to look smart -- to the "respectable" people -- well. That is a problem.

Let's take a look at that Litany of Humility again.

It asks deliverance from the desire of being praised and extolled, and from the fear of being rebuked and humiliated.

It might just as well ask deliverance from the desire for +1's, Likes, and retweets.

It might just as well ask deliverance from the fear of letting somebody be wrong on the Internet.

It might just as well ask for the grace to desire that others make wittier points.

Tough, that.

+ + +

We are supposed to look past exterior appearances. Instead we are supposed, it is said, to welcome and value people for the content of their character, for their invisible traits of kindness and intelligence and good humor; to look past the exterior appearances.

But wait -- perhaps we have to look even past the content of character. Perhaps we have to look past whether someone is physically attractive or ugly -- but not stop at whether a person is intellectually and morally attractive, or intellectually and morally withered. Perhaps we have to value and welcome into discourse an even more central core of common humanity. Not just the physically repulsive and morally attractive, but the morally repulsive, are human too, and deserve to be treated as such.

That is a tall order. Imagine the most horrible person you can think of. The leader of a Klan rally, or a serial rapist, or someone who made a fortune selling size 6x sweatpants with the word "Juicy" written across the butt. Imagine shaking his hand and looking him in the eye.

+ + +

Pope Francis is already upsetting respectable people. Did you read the text of his first general audience? Rocco Palmo has it posted at Whispers.

What does this mean for us? It means that this is my, your, our path. Living Holy Week following Jesus not only with the emotions of the heart; living Holy Week following Jesus means learning how to go beyond ourselves - as I said on Sunday - to reach out to others, to go to the outskirts of existence, to be the first to move towards our brothers and sisters, especially those who are most distant, those who are forgotten, those who are most in need of understanding, consolation and help. There is so much need to bring the living presence of Jesus, merciful and full of love!

Living Holy Week means increasingly entering into God's logic, the logic of the Cross, which is not first of all that of pain and death, but of love and of self-giving that brings life. It means entering into the logic of the Gospel. Following, accompanying Christ, remaining with Him requires a "stepping outside," a stepping beyond. Stepping outside of ourselves, of a tired and routine way of living the faith, of the temptation to withdraw into pre-established patterns that end up closing our horizon to the creative action of God. God stepped outside of Himself to come among us, He pitched His tent among us to bring the mercy of God that saves and gives hope. Even if we want to follow Him and stay with Him, we must not be content to remain in the enclosure of the ninety-nine sheep, we have to "step outside", to search for the lost sheep together with Him, the one furthest away. Remember well: stepping outside of ourselves, like Jesus, like God has stepped outside of Himself in Jesus and Jesus stepped outside of Himself for all of us.

...God always thinks with mercy: do not forget this. God always thinks with mercy: our merciful Father. God thinks like a father who awaits the return of his child and goes to meet him, sees him coming when he is still far away ...

Really, read the whole thing. It is exactly apropos to what we've been turning over this week.

 

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Comments

[Jamie]

I have to let people be WRONG on the INTERNET??

I'm not cut out for that.

[bearing]

Jamie, I know! Neither am I.

[LeeAnn Balbirona]

Let me be delivered from wanting to have the Last Word. :)

I understood Heather's post to be specific to her experience of life but relatable to my own, as a mom of 4 in school. I have met other mothers struggling with addictions (their own and family members'), divorce, infidelity, money troubles, vulnerabilities of all kinds.

There is a short time in life where motherhood is so all consuming that one's circle of friends may be limited entirely to one's own children and family, but I think part of Heather's point is to get outside yourself; don't refuse to make connections outside your safe zone, whether that's your home, your trusted circle of friends or whatnot. Get to know people well enough to share with them and you will find out their struggles soon enough. Not that you have to go downtown to the bars to do this, in your own neighborhood and your own parish there are going to be problems enough to confront.

[bearing]

LeeAnn - this is definitely true. For a lot of us there are problems enough in our own families.

Another thing I've been thinking of: Sometimes I think the years of shelter and protection and abundant safety, for those of us who have a few of those, function as a saving-of-strength, a growing, so we can go out of ourselves later. It's risky to use that as an excuse, going forth, but looking back sometimes you can see -- I needed *that* time so I could live *this* time.