Saturday, January 22, 2011

Wrestling Despair

Even though I don't think I should be living for an afterlife as much as for doing good in the here and now, I do hope that death isn't the end, and my intuition is that it isn't. By “intuition” I mean “hunch”, “gut feeling”, all those kinds of words. It's not a matter of weighing the evidence – there is none. It's just the fact that I have a hard time really believing in final mortality. Not in the sense of finding it logically problematic, but in the sense that my mind won't really accept it. I'm not alone in this – people have been believing in something after death probably about as long as we've been consciously aware of it. Cultures all over the world have developed traditions and rituals that speak to that belief. On the other hand, the fact that my mind won't believe in its extinction doesn't mean it can't happen. It could be that the belief is very adaptive – maybe it allowed our ancestors to deal with mortality without being overtaken by terror or despair, such that they were able to get on with the business of surviving and reproducing and passing on their genes. In which case, it wouldn't be necessary for the belief to be correlated with reality at all. So I can't tell, though of course I hope for existence over nonexistence.

Beside my own personal survival, I hope for something beyond death because I just don't see how things can be really put right for everyone otherwise. Various philosophers whose names I can't remember are scrambling around in my head trying to put their ideas forward – the one I remember the most is something along the lines of “finding it intolerable that the murderer should triumph over his innocent victim.” To me, that speaks of a hunger for justice – justice delayed perhaps, but justice in the end. Without that hope, I don't think I could live. On one hand, it might seem like it would be easy to say that it doesn't matter – God's going to take care of it all in the end anyway, so why work to improve things? But without some sort of sense that things will ultimately be put right, I don't know if I'd be able to even do my little bit – I'd just be paralyzed with despair.

It's an odd tension. During the dolphin sermon, another point mentioned was that God has given us freedom and invites us to be participants in bringing about God's kingdom – and that it doesn't make sense to ask God to save us from the very ills that we're causing through our decisions. That it is, to some degree, up to us to change the world. And my first thought was “Does He know we can't do it?” So much is wrong, and so much seems unchangeable, and furthermore there's all the suffering and death that has gone before – people who have lived and died in hunger and pain, without hope. If there's nothing else, those miserable lives have to stand forever. I could maybe accept permanent mortality if it weren't for that, if everyone had one good life, maybe that would be enough – but so many people don't, and even though, yes I can do something, I can't fix it entirely, and right now the number of people who are trying to fix it aren't enough, and there's still nothing any of can do for those who have already died.

So we need help. I don't know what kind of form that help can take, whether it's anything in the here and now or just hope that eventually Someone will finish the job. I understand that, as the priest mentioned above said, it doesn't make sense to ask God to “deliver us from the effects of climate change, no matter what we put in our car” and similar things like that – it doesn't make sense to ask God to protect us from the fire if we decide to leap into a volcano. But can we ask for clarity? For new ideas, for inspiration? For some clue as to how to really get ourselves out of this mess we're in? There are things I can do; there are things I am doing – but I doubt that they're enough; and I'm not sure that I can do enough while still being part of the culture I grew up in; and I don't have the courage to entirely leave that culture because I don't know what to do instead, and everyone I know is part of that culture and I don't think I could stand being entirely alone; and even if I did leave the culture, that alone wouldn't be enough to change things – it might protect me from being guilty, and it might slow down the damage a bit, but it wouldn't end injustice; and then would it actually be better for me to stay in the culture where I can do more overall and possibly do more good – is it selfish to just cut myself off from society to protect my own conscience but in doing so, actually do less to solve the huge problems we're facing – or is that just a case of trying to make the ends justify the means? Can we ask God to help sort that out? Please?

2 comments:

  1. I'm sure there are finer prayers out there, but I am often reminded me of AA's favorite prayer: Grant me ... serenity, courage, and wisdom. I suppose I'd also ask for the patience to listen and the strength and drive to try to seek the truth and to do the right thing.

    As for leaving the culture, I'm not there yet either. It would be sad to abandon my friends and family, but I'm also naive enough to envision an edenic paradise and harmony with nature. I think we should make strides toward this life - by being mindful of our choices, especially our consumption; and I think we should spread the word and build communities of loving people.

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  2. I definitely agree on the being mindful of consumption and the building communities. Harmony with nature would be good, but I don't know that it would be an edenic paradise - I don't expect disease and natural disasters to vanish. But mostly I want there to be justice and sustainability.

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