Spirituality, Election and Sports

It would seem that only half the people can be happy half the time.  That pretty much makes joy a 50/50 proposition.

This autumn, two of the stories dominating the news were the Clinton/Trump presidential election, and the Indians/Cubs chase of their long-illusive World Series Championship.  Avid sports and political fans have reported unusual levels of anxiety, if not outright fear.

Don’t get me wrong: in no way am I equating the importance of sports and politics, although I know lots of folks who care a lot more about their teams than their candidates.  Nor am I suggesting that one, including myself, should not care deeply about the issues involved in this election.

I have been taking groups to Mexico and the border for the last 30 years.  I have met and know many amazing people who are undocumented, and I fear greatly for their future, and their families.

I have a child with Type 1: Juvenile diabetes. If she had not been able to stay on her parents insurance until she was 26, and if she had not been able to now buy her own insurance without being financially punished for her pre-existing conditions—well, let’s just say, we care about what happens to the Affordable Care Act.

I grew up in North Dakota among farmers, ranchers and working class folk who became such an important part of this election, and they have plenty of reasons for feeling that they have, indeed, been left out by the policies and priorities of the last political years.

So the issue is not whether or not we should care about these issues and what is going on in our country right now.  Our religious faith, in fact, calls us to care deeply about poverty, prejudice, injustice, oppression, and violence.

The issue I am raising here is not whether or not we should care, but HOW we should care.

According to Christian tradition, our human nature wants to win, take for ourselves without regard for others, and to get our own way in all matters of life (and death).  Christian doctrine often puts forth positions and tries to win.  For one person that position might be to stop abortion, for another capital punishment, and they will often be opposed to each other within the church.  Take our rightly beloved, present Pope.  Because of church doctrine he finds himself uplifting the rights of the refugee, including the undocumented, and at the same time reaffirming the secondary role of women in the church.

Christian theology terms the desire to get our own way, our “original sin.”  The desire to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil was the first attempt to try to take morality into our own hands and redefine what God had already established as the good (and the evil.)  If one sees spirituality in this way, then, we are destined to be happy only half the time--in those times when we get our way.  However, at a deeper level we might wonder if we can ever be happy. One could argue that the spiritual person also does not find joy in seeing others suffer because they have lost and been left out, similar to the poor man lying at the gate of Lazarus.

Spirituality is the attempt to find joy and meaning in life whether one gets one’s way or not.  In fact, the real power of spirituality is in helping us to be at peace with ourselves and the world in those very times when everything is not going the way we want it to.  The year after my first wife died, it was spirituality that saved me.  I had not gotten what I wanted, and now I had to learn anew how to find joy and meaning in life without Pauline. (See Post of 7/31/2015.)

Spirituality is always about assessing where we are, and then moving on, hopefully in the right direction.  It is not good for one’s spirituality to hear the winners lord it over the losers, and to hear the losers rehash again and again their arguments.  Neither of those things are loving things to do, and spirituality always seeks love.

Perhaps one of the greatest challenges of spirituality is to find joy and meaning in those times when we don’t get our own way, while at the same time finding new and creative ways to stand in solidarity with those who are suffering.  Sometimes spirituality calls us underground into the catacombs, where we can be reminded what the Gospel is really all about: not about winning, but about standing under the cross with those who are losing.  Spirituality may need to build a new underground railroad, where we can protect and give sanctuary to those who don’t seem to “matter” right now, not until the day comes when those who have lost finally win, but the day when our hearts have been transformed from hearts of stone to hearts of love where all people are valued. “A new heart I will give you, and a new spirit I will put within you; and I will remove from your body the heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. [Ezekiel, 36:26; NRSV]

As always, the Gospel sounds too naïve and idealistic.  As always, spirituality calls us not to give up on the vision of Jesus when it is quite obvious that little else is working