Touching God

Upon my return from Thailand, my family was wary of this “Baptist” (some thought Jesus freak) in their midst.  To assuage some of their concern, I chose to attend Catholic mass with them.  Just because I was a Baptist did not mean I rejected their Catholicism, a stance I affirmed when I refused to attend a Sunday evening “church school” at my Baptist Church in Bangkok because they were studying Cults, the first of which was “Roman Catholicism.”

At the service, I remembered most of the prayers and the ritual stances (standing, kneeling, sitting).  When it came time to receive communion, and feeling that as a confirmed Catholic I still possessed my union card, I joined the line heading up to the altar.  The first few people opened their mouths and the priest placed the host on their awaiting tongues.  What came next surprised me.  The next few people put out their hands and the priest placed the host into it, which they then put into their mouths. 

My shock was because of my experience the week after making my first Holy Communion, white clothes, white bucks and all.  After receiving the host from the priest and returning to my seat, the wafer became stuck on the roof of my mouth and I couldn’t get it off with my tongue.  What would a 7-year-old do?  I slowly took my index finger and knocked it down so that I could swallow it.  I assumed no one saw me but I was wrong.  Within seconds, I felt a hand tug hard on my ear to remove me from the pew.  It was Sister Ann Sebastian, who in my mind was the gestapo of Mother Superiors.  (When I studied Freudian psychology years later and came across his concept of the superego, the image of Sister Ann Sebastian came immediately to mind.)  When we reached the back of the church, she “blessed” me out asking how dare I, a puny little sinful boy, touch God.  (Of course, I didn’t really understand the difference between touching God with my tongue versus with my finger, but I wasn’t going to raise that objection given the Sister’s angry demeanor.) 

Of course, I apologized but that was not enough.  She demanded that I attend confession for the next several weeks and do penance for my transgression.  I complied with her demand.  Although she meant it as a punishment for my “sin,” I didn’t mind because I always felt cleansed by God when I emerged from the confessional.  If I got hit by a bus on my way home, I would go straight to heaven (until I found out about this place called Purgatory; given my propensity toward other transgressions it was a more likely after-life landing spot). 

As I looked now at what was happening before my eyes, I wondered what had changed.  Why was it now fine for Catholics to touch the host, to handle the body of Christ, with their hands?  Were people fine with it?

Theological education helped with answers to my question.  I learned about the Second Vatican Council called by Pope John XXIII to “bring the Church up with the times.”  I studied Greek thought that influenced the Church as they wrestled with conceptions of the sacred as holy and in some ways untouchable by human frailty:  sin and the holy cannot mix.  But there was also this strain regarding the immanence of God and how God was present in every creature.  A paradox to be sure.

Baptists view communion as a time of remembrance of the sacrifice made by Jesus once on behalf of humanity.  There was no transubstantiation taking place with the bread and wine (for Baptists, if there was drink to go with what I affectionately referred to as Baptist chicklets, it was grape juice.  Damn those tea-totalers!)  However, I always felt something was missing from the Baptist experience, a missed moment of grace.  I did think the Catholic Church made too much of the distinction between God and humanity.  After all, I was taught that Jesus was the God-Man.  How more connected can you get than that!  (Of course, Anselm’s treatise, Cur Deus Homo, Why the God-man, with its insistent Roman jurisprudence mindset, suggested to me that the divinity of Jesus was what made him distinctive, and I wouldn’t have been touched by the grace of God had it not been for his willingness to make the sacrifice.  That penal-substitutionary view troubled me, and perhaps it is why I felt more comfortable with Abelard’s view of Jesus' sacrifice as a model for others to follow, and the mystics’ emphasis on union with the divine.)

Anyway, when I attend Mass periodically at the Catholic and Jesuit college I teach, I continue to show my Catholic union card, tattered and weather-worn as it is, and receive communion in my hands, often with a wink and a nod from the celebrant distributing the host who knows the variations of my Christian background.  The grace I feel from the ritual is not because of some magical transformation taking place, but because I am with a community of people who not only participate in the ritual but embody the example of Jesus as they go out to serve others or work for justice.  In these ways, I know, Jesus is in them, a divine-human encounter, that helps make the world a better place. 

Beautiful Day

I went to see the film, Beautiful Day, the film about the life of Fred Rogers.  Only it wasn’t; not in the way I expected.  Rather, it was a story about how Mr. Rogers affected the life of a journalist assigned to interview him; a man who was struggling with his own demons of unresolved grief over his mother’s death and anger at the father who abandoned him at such a dark time.  I was not expecting the emotional response the film elicited from me.

Three moments in the film were the most pivotal for me.  The first, Mr. Rogers asked the journalist if he thought his mother would be proud of him. My mother died when I was 23, a sophomore in college.  She wasn’t there when I, in the words of my father, “finally graduated from college after 14 years.”  He was referring to my Ph.D. graduation from Emory University, where I received my degree in Religion, Ethics, and Society, while also working as a community organizer in public housing projects in Atlanta.  Would this have made my mother proud?  I think so.  As I wrote in the preface to my dissertation, my mother was the one who pushed me to complete my confirmation in the Catholic Church, and to finish high school even though she had to drop out to work to help with her family’s finances.  I often imagined her smiling when her Baptist minister son, returned to the Catholic fold by teaching at a Catholic and Jesuit college, where I have taught for almost 30 years.

The second moment was more troubling.  Because of his anger and resentment at his father’s abandonment, when the journalist’s father tried to reconnect with his son at his sister’s wedding, he didn’t call him dad, but by his first name.  As I have written elsewhere, I never called my mother mom but Kay, her first name.  It was driven initially by resentment toward her, for the over 20 years she wasn’t home because she worked second shift at a candy factory to support the family.  I too felt abandoned, seeing her only on weekends for most of my childhood; and those times with her were not the warmest mother-son affairs.  I was too young, too self-absorbed to notice the sacrifices she was making for the sake of her family.  When the resentment subsided after going into the military, I was too used to calling her Kay and can’t remember a time as an adult when I called her mom.

In the film, Mr. Rogers guided the journalist toward a reconciliation with his father.  In this way, the film was about Mr. Rogers, demonstrating the kind of person he was around everyone he met.  The grace the journalist received at the hand of Mr. Rogers was his ability to resolve the anger he felt and, as his father lay dying, once again called him dad.  Hearing this, I wept; not because the two had reconciled, although it was a beautiful moment in the film.  Rather, I cried because my mother would never hear me call her mom as an adult.  She was comatose the last time I saw her alive, the result of the loss of oxygen to her brain from a heart attack.  She died 10 days later.  I had chosen to call her Kay; a decision I have regretted every day since.

The third moment in the film was one of humility and gratitude.  Sitting at a restaurant with the journalist, Mr. Rogers asked if they could spend a minute thinking of all the people in their lives who had brought them into being, who had helped to make them the persons they were today.  The entire restaurant heard the request and sat silently reflecting on his request.  So did the entire theater.  No one talked, no babies cried, no cell phones were checked.  We sat collectively thinking of the people who had brought us into being the persons we were today.  I was at the film with my wife of 40 years and so she was the first who came to my mind.  I wouldn’t be who I am today without her love, her support, and her patience.  I thought of my son, who helped me to become a father, teaching me how to be nurturing, caring, and patient.  I thought of my mother, my father, and my family, most of whom I had spent time with recently at my nephew’s wedding.  I thought of my teachers:  Mrs. Kelly, who noticed I was having trouble hearing in second grade which led to having the operation I needed to save my hearing.  Mrs. Cody, who pushed me to do my best academically so that I graduated eighth grade first in my class.  Dr. Drayer, who taught me that it was fine to question and to doubt and yet still be a person of faith.  Glen Stassen, who demonstrated how one can be both an academic and an activist working for justice.

I thought of the people I had met and worked with over the years:  Jack and Gladys Martin, Baptist missionaries in Thailand who welcomed me into the family and nurtured my budding faith.  Mrs. Sanford, President of the Perry Homes Tenant Association, whose life embodied a commitment of service to others in her community.  My colleagues and students at Le Moyne College, who helped shape the kind of teacher and friend I have become. 

The list of people who came to mind went on and on, all in just one minute.  I experienced a deep feeling of gratitude and humility realizing how much of my being was interconnected with all these others who loved, challenged, and continue to inspire me.

In the end, I not only learned something of the kind of person Mr. Rogers was (masterfully portrayed by Tom Hanks), but I also experienced the affect his life has had on those with whom he has come in contact, whether it was the intent of the filmmakers or not (and I believe it was).  And while the emotions I felt at the end of the film were both warm and raw, I came away thankful for another Beautiful Day. 

Trump Administration and the First Amendment

I teach a class on Church and State in Comparative Perspective and one of the options a student can choose to demonstrate her/his learning is to become a teaching assistant.  The key role of that activity is to meet with me to discuss how the class is progressing and to make suggestions about improving the course.  The student who chose this option this semester noted how important the Constitution to the United States was to many of our discussions, especially the First and Fourteenth Amendments.  She suggested that the first reading assignment for the class might be to have every student read and discuss the Constitution, something that most natural born citizens almost never do but which immigrants who become citizens almost always do. In light of recent statements coming from the Trump Administration leads me to think that perhaps the same requirement should be made of all elected and appointed officials.

The comments made at C-PAC by Trump and members of his cabinet leads me to recall a moment during the Presidential campaign when the father of a deceased American Muslim soldier challenged the ban then candidate Trump was proposing on Muslims entering the United States: “Donald Trump, you are asking Americans to trust you with our future. Let me ask you: Have you even read the United States constitution? I will gladly lend you my copy.”  The answer to his question was not clear then, nor is it today.

It is possible that Trump and his supporters have read parts of the Constitution, the parts that they like, but not its entirety.  Or perhaps, as many people are prone to do, they cherry-pick those parts that serve their agenda.  We don’t have to go beyond the First Amendment to demonstrate what I mean.

Here's what Betsy DeVos said in her speech at C-PAC, after asking how many in the audience were college students:  "The fight against the education establishment extends to you too. The faculty, from adjunct professors to deans, tell you what to do, what to say, and more ominously, what to think. They say that if you voted for Donald Trump, you’re a threat to the university community. But the real threat is silencing the First Amendment rights of people with whom you disagree."[i]

First Amendment rights!?!  Hmmn…  I wonder if she has ever read the entire first amendment.  Here it is:

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”

It seems rather convenient that she focuses on one element of the first amendment:  abridging the freedom of speech.  Of course, I disagree with her basic premise.  As a college professor I encourage all of my students to share their views, whether I agree or not.  But as an educator, I would be remiss in my duties if I did not challenge ill-informed views and arguments; and that goes for liberal as well as conservative perspectives. 

And yet, to this date, the Trump administration, including Betsy DeVos, have violated the other components of the First Amendment at every turn.  Her own connection with “dominion theology” is well-documented, even stating that her efforts on behalf of school choice is in part a desire “to confront the culture in which we all live today in ways that will continue to help advance God’s Kingdom.”[ii]  The commitment to so-called “choice” in public education has primarily served to funnel monies to Christian private schools, which research has begun to demonstrate has left students less educationally prepared than when they left public schools.  So much for the notion that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion.” 

The same is true of the clause related to abridging the freedom of the press.  Whenever a story runs counter to what the Administration wants or likes Trump calls their reporting “fake” news and “lies” seeking to discredit them.  His advisor, Steve Bannon, labels the press as the “opposition party” in the hope that supporters will see them as politically biased.  Even Sean Spicer, the President’s press secretary, got into the act by barring some news organizations from press briefings. 

Of course, the challenges to the First Amendment are not limited to the Trump Administration.  Republican members of Congress are similarly raising issues with another clause of the amendment.  If people attend their legislators’ town halls and voice displeasure with the policies being enacted by this Republican administration and Congress, they label them as activists and outsiders instead of affirming “the right of the people peaceably to assemble” (unless, of course, it is 2010 and the Tea Party is supporting their agenda).

While these attacks on the First Amendment provide great fodder for my class discussions, they pose great concerns for those who care about the freedoms espoused within.  We are on a dangerous precipice and it is not clear to me whether or not we will back away from the edge or fall off the cliff.  In light of the continued efforts of millions of people and the “mainstream” media to raise issues with this Administration and its cronies, I am hopeful that not only will we refuse to be bullied but will restore these freedoms to every person in this country regardless of race, creed, or citizenship.

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[i] https://www.ed.gov/news/speeches/us-secretary-education-betsy-devos%E2%80%99-prepared-remarks-2017-conservative-political-action-conference

[ii] http://www.politico.com/story/2016/12/betsy-devos-education-trump-religion-232150

An Open Letter to Jesuit-Educated Supporters of Trump

 I teach at one of the 28 Jesuit Colleges and Universities in the United States.  I have noticed that some alumni from my school and some current students have decided to vote for Trump in this presidential election.  In light of the Jesuit principles taught at these schools, I am unclear as to why.  Let me highlight three of these principles and ask you to think about them in relation to your support for Trump.

Principle 1:  Cura Personalis.  This principle, loosely translated, means care for the whole person.  To embody this principle means that one seeks to understand and express empathy and care for the people one encounters.  For me, this means making sure that my students know that I do not see them solely as means to my ends but as persons with intellect, emotions, relationships, and needs.  I will seek to try to understand them as best I can and teach in such a way as to enable them to be their best selves.

Donald Trump has bullied those who disagree with him.  His misogynist tendencies lead him to treat many women as objects for his own sexual desires, engaging in unwanted touching, walking into dressing rooms of half-dressed teenage beauty contestants, and even downright sexual assault.  If they do not meet his standards of beauty, they are fat, ugly, even pigs.  He mocked the physical disability of a disabled journalist.  He dismissed the sacrifice of a Muslim American soldier and tried to bully the soldier’s parents, which he was unable to do.  He calls immigrants from Mexico rapists and murderers and he suggests that all Muslim Syrian refugees are nothing but terrorists.  He encourages bigotry, racism, and violence against those who challenge him.  He feigns interest in the plight of the working class but in every instance where he had a chance to make the lives of working class people better—through paying taxes, honoring his debts to workers on his projects—he took the money and ran leaving others to clean up his mess.  How do any of these actions embody this Jesuit principle?  Does this not matter to you?

Principle 2:  Magis.  This principle is often translated as “the more,” but it is best translated as the better.  When faced with numerous obligations and commitments, one should discern which of those things will contribute to the common good for all and commit oneself to those actions which will best bring it about.

Donald Trump has argued for more (make America great again, etc.) but his actions suggest that “the more” he wants is whatever aggrandizes him.  His narcissistic tendencies have been on display his entire life.  He seeks to promote the “Trump” brand every chance he gets, putting it on buildings, on universities, on reality television.  If anyone challenges his name or brand, he sues them in court.  If he stands to lose millions of dollars in his business ventures, he structures them in such a way that the losses go to others not him, or failing that he can at least claim those losses to avoid paying taxes that benefit the common good.  He uses the proceeds of his fame and fortune to buy airplanes with his name on them, yachts, and to adorn his penthouse suite in Trump Tower in gold.  How does his lavish lifestyle communicate anything other than self-interest and self-gain to you?  Doesn’t the common good matter?

Principle 3: “Men and Women for Others.”  The goal of Jesuit education is to develop persons who, regardless of their chosen vocation, look at how their actions not only benefit themselves but also those with whom they encounter.  Some take this principle and devote their lives to the service of others.  But at the very least this principle encourages all persons never to seek only their own good but always the good of others.

Donald Trump contends that his business practices have contributed to the communities in which he has engaged in development projects:  through taxes, through increased employment, and the like.  This may be so.  But his focus was never on what was good for others, save perhaps for his family, but only what was good for himself.  When his business dealings went sour, such as the Atlantic City casinos, he made sure that he went away with millions of dollars, leaving his creditors with nothing and his investors holding the bag.  The “university” he started with his name defrauded many people, making promises he knew would never be kept.  His family foundation takes money from others to distribute but he contributes little to nothing.  Even then he uses part of those charitable funds to purchase portraits of himself.  Even during the presidential campaign, he made sure to bring journalists and others to his properties, such as the hotel in Washington, in the hopes of bringing them business.  He prides himself on paying no federal taxes which contribute to programs that provide job training, health care, and services to those who live at the margins of our economy, the very people he says he wants to represent.  The policies he proposes will only make the inequity that dominates our lives worse.  Some will say that he will appoint Supreme Court justices who will overturn Roe V. Wade and end abortion once again.  Even if this could happen, it may criminalize abortion, but it won’t end it.  But this ignores the fundamental reality that most abortions occur for economic reasons.  When people are not desperate, the abortion rate drops precipitously.  How can you ignore these realities?

I imagine that some of you are voting for Trump because he is the Republican nominee and you support your party.  But why then are so many of your party’s leaders and rank and file running from his candidacy, concerned about the negative qualities he embodies and the threat to the party and to the country he poses?  Doesn’t your Jesuit education lead you to share their concerns? 

Of course, you have the right to vote for whomever you want and I support that right.  My question to you is this:  after this election is over, whether Trump wins or loses, can you honestly say that the person for whom you voted represents the best ideals of your Jesuit education?  Or do those ideals even matter to you anymore? 

A Different Kind of Mother's Day Remembrance

I never called her mom.  I always called her Kay.  She didn’t like it but I didn’t care.  Kay was a decent woman, something I did not accept until after I had left the projects where we lived.  She had worked every day of her life from the age of 15, when she was forced to quit high school to help out the family, a decision she regretted most of her life, the reason she pushed her kids to stay in school.  She worked second shift in a candy factory for over twenty-two years.  We only saw her on the weekends.  As a kid, I resented, at times hated, her.  She was never around.  Even when she was she wasn’t very nurturing.  She spent most of her time bitching about bills and the lack of money, making me lie to bill collectors when they would call.  Worse, she was emotionally unstable and a pain in the ass.  I can’t recall how many times I cleaned up the mess she would make during dinner when something would piss her off and she would throw her plate against the wall.  She chased more than one of us around with a knife threatening to kill us.   She smoked Pall Malls like a chimney and she got fat, really fat, so much so that when she would be pregnant, which seemed like every year, you couldn’t tell it.  My resentment boiled over during the last of her pregnancies when I said to her face, “I hope your baby dies.”  I was only 10.  Luckily I lived to see 11 (and my sister is now almost 50).  As a teenager, I never brought girlfriends around to meet her because she embarrassed me. 

My resentment subsided somewhat on my 18^th birthday.  I was about to leave for the Air Force and she felt it was time for me to learn the family secrets, while I drank a beer and she a whiskey sour.  “You always asked me why I never went to church with you even though I made you go.  Well, it’s because I am not welcome there.  You see, your father was married before to a woman named Marilyn.  He divorced her for good reason but that didn’t matter to the priest.  They would not let us get married in the church without an annulment.  He was a real jerk.  Who the hell has that kind of money?  Why should I even have to pay it?  Your father could take the sacraments but not me.  I was the one who married a divorced man.”  “What a screwed up system!” I said as I took another sip of my beer.  “Why didn’t you just walk away from the church—tell them to go to hell?” “Because I am a good Catholic!” she replied.  “I had a responsibility to make sure that all of my kids made their Confirmation.  Once that happened, then I had done my duty and you were on your own.”  When I left, I began to see her in a different light.

Eventually Kay’s poor health habits caught up with her.  She developed high blood pressure, double hernias, and adult-onset diabetes which forced her to take disability leave.  Her weight had ballooned up to over two hundred and fifty pounds.  She hadn’t slept lying down for several years due to high blood pressure.  She didn’t like taking insulin every day.  Yet she realized that if she was ever going to see all of her children grow up, she needed to take care of her health.  My oldest sister Kathy, a nurse, had told me she was doing better.  She started eating right, took her insulin regularly, and her weight had dropped some.  She still smoked unfiltered cigarettes, but not as many.

All that changed in 1976 when my brother, Bobby, committed suicide two days before Christmas.  In the death of her son—her most worrisome and troubled child—a big part of her had died.  I still hear the words Kay cried when she heard about the police prying my brother’s hands off the steering wheel after he shot himself in the face:  “It isn’t supposed to be this way. Kids should always outlive their parents.”  In my phone calls home after returning to school, I sensed that she was slowly losing hope and her will to live, even though she still had two children at home.  She smoked more, took her insulin sporadically, and stopped caring about her weight.  Eleven months later, at the age of fifty-four and a weight of three hundred and eleven pounds, she suffered a heart attack.  In the ambulance taking her to the hospital, her heart stopped.  It took well over four minutes to revive her, and her brain suffered irreversible and extensive damage.  After ten days in a coma, her huge bulk heaving to the rhythm of the respirator that kept her alive, my family chose to remove her from all life support.  She died shortly thereafter.

At her funeral, I wept.  The sentiment expressed in that old spiritual song now made sense to me:  “Sometimes I feel like a motherless child.”  Kay, like it is for many people who leave home, was my connection to my family, to my sense of place, to the world from which I came.  Her death threatened those connections.  Even more, I wept because her death cut short any hope I had of developing a deeper, more mature adult relationship with her, the kind of relationship I see so many sons have with their mothers, my son has with his.  But most of all, her death meant that I would never have the opportunity to see her reaction when upon visiting her on Mother’s Day, I would look into her eyes and tell her, “I love you, Mom.”  After all, I never called her mom.  I chose to call her Kay, a choice I regret every second Sunday of May.

The Footprints I Follow: A Personal Essay on Why I Teach

I have been working with colleagues for the past year on writing essays about why we do the work that we do.  What follows is a fairly complete draft of that essay (click here for a podcast version):

When I returned to college after Christmas break my freshman year, I told very few people that my 23--year--old, Irish twin brother had committed suicide on Christmas Eve. It wasn’t because I felt shame or guilt; in truth, I don’t know what I felt. I just hated the awkwardness that follows when someone finds out about such tragedy. Most stammer about how sorry they are all the while wishing they never asked and looking for any opportunity to get away. Even more, I just didn’t want to hear people tell me, as they are prone to do at the small Baptist college I attended, that they were praying for me and my family in the hope that God would make everything right again. Inside I would scream, “It'll never be right again no matter how much you pray!” You can’t say that to them, of course, because they mean well. And they wouldn't understand that the God about whom they spoke and to whom they prayed, a God who intervenes in history, who takes away pain and suffering, no longer made sense to me, was no longer a God I could believe in.

One friend, thinking she was doing me a favor, gave me a copy of the poem, “Footprints.”“Read it,” she suggested. “I know it will provide some comfort to you like it did for me when my grandmother died.” So, I read it. Instead of feeling better, I got pissed off. The poem is about a person walking on the beach with God who asks where God was when a tragedy had happened in his life. God’s reply was that, once the tragedy struck him, there was only one set of footprints in the sand because God was carrying him during the tough times. “Are you fucking kidding me?” I asked. “I'm sure losing your grandmother was painful, but can you honestly stand there and tell me that the pain that my family experienced, that my mother felt deep in her heart, when she heard about the police prying my brother’s hands off the steering wheel after he shot himself in the face could've been worse? Trust me, we looked for God, but God was nowhere to be found. The tears my mother shed that day tell me that she, not God, bore every bit of the pain that came when she lost her son.” I tore the poem up, threw it on the floor, and walked away. She called after me, saying she didn’t mean to upset me. But the anger and frustration I felt at her, at God, as I recalled the image of my mother sitting in her room crying uncontrollably while holding the picture of her dead child was more than I could bear. I kept on walking.

Halfway through the semester, while sitting in my required religion class, the fog surrounding my brother’s death began to lift. We were talking about the crucifixion and how in the moments before his death, Jesus cried out, “My God, my God why have you forsaken me!” The class was small, only 22 students. Most  were religion majors; it was the largest major on campus. I wasn’t surprised to hear many of them echo the belief they’d heard in their churches that this was all a part of God’s plan for the salvation of the world. That Jesus didn't feel forsaken; he only said it for the sake of those around him.

My professor looked to see how I was reacting to this discussion. Because of several conversations I had with him outside of class, he knew the struggles I was having, the questions I was raising. He also shared with me his own struggles connected with raising a special needs child. He listened patiently to the class before he spoke, but it was clear to me that he was as uncomfortable with the direction the discussion was taking as I was. With tears forming in his eyes, he asked how anyone could believe that a loving God could demand such torture, such suffering. In words that continue to echo in my mind thirty years later, he said, "Don’t you see? The horror Jesus anticipated in the garden of Gethsemane was now a reality. He prayed that God would take the cup from him. But God didn't. Jesus prayed again, but there was no reply. And now the time had come to drink. But where was God? He had lost that sense of presence. He felt alone. He experienced abuse and ridicule throughout his life but God's presence was real. But now, in his hour of need, he was hurting and alone and needed the reassurance of God that everything would turn out all right. But God was absent. He cried out: ‘I gave you my all God. I sacrificed everything. I have been faithful and you have been with me. My God! My God! Why now do you forsake me?’ The darkness that engulfed the land overwhelmed him. There were no signs of hope. God didn't respond. He felt alone, utterly forsaken by the God to whom he had committed his life. And in this darkness he died. I believe as Georgia Harkness wrote: ‘This was his hell - not merely to suffer, but to suffer and seek in vain for God's sustaining presence.’” Many students in the class looked quizzically at one another; their eyes revealed their discomfort. But no one said anything.

“Where is God when you need God?” he continued as he looked directly at me echoing the question my mother and I had asked on that fateful Christmas Eve. “In times of suffering, I'm not sure one can ever adequately answer this question. But I do know that simply saying to those whose suffer and who feel abandoned by God, ‘God is with you, you just don't know it,’ or ‘God will get you through this if you just believe and have faith,’ doesn't do justice to the sense of abandonment and forsakenness people who suffer experience. We shouldn't trivialize those legitimate moments of ‘unbelief’ or ‘unfaith’ that suffering, especially innocent suffering, often bring.”

One student worriedly asked, “But we have always believed that God loves us, especially in those moments. Are you saying we are wrong?” Realizing her concerns were genuine and sensing that others shared her sentiment, he replied, “Not at all. I'm just suggesting that God's love is not demonstrated by protecting us from the pain and tragedy of life, but in helping us to create new possibilities out of such tragedy. Illness, accidents, death are misfortunes that make no distinctions. They happen to all of us at one time or another. Senselessly, perhaps, but they still happen. The good news of the cross and the resurrection of Jesus is not that God protects us from harm's way, but that God suffers with us and will work with us to create new possibilities even out of the most meaningless situations.” With that, he wiped his eyes and dismissed class.

Out in the halls, students were talking about what our professor had said. Some were angered by it. “Who does he think he is telling us that our beliefs are wrong?” Others were confused, not simply by the words but by the emotion he expressed. They had never had seen a professor cry before. Was he teaching or preaching? I responded with tears of my own, not because his words made me sad but because he was the first to speak directly to my experience, to what I was feeling and thinking. The tragedy of my brother’s death was senseless. We never found out why he did it; we could only surmise. But his suicide brought my family together, really together, for the first time in years. Bobby’s death confronted us with the reality of how much we were strangers to one another and how little we knew about each other lives. His death rekindled our sense of what it meant to be a family and the love we felt for one another; a love that continues to this day. This was the meaning we were creating together. Was God a part of that? I didn’t know, but it made more sense about God’s role in our lives than anything else.

I was moved most, however, by my professor’s passion. He cared deeply for the ideas he taught and even more for the students whose lives he touched. He wasn't afraid to challenge us, to push us beyond the narrow confines of our own perspectives so we might embrace the ambiguity that is so much a part of life. But he did it in ways that invited connection and community—with him, with each other, and with the broader world of ideas and people. We spoke frequently about these things for the rest of the semester and he often provided readings—C.S. Lewis’A Grief Observed and Abraham Heschel’s essays on “Divine Pathos”—that helped me to make sense of it all. It was then that I knew what I wanted to do with my life, the path I wanted to follow—to teach, to express the same passion for the ideas, for the people who generate them, and for the students who encounter them that he did. Just as he had reached out to me, I wanted to reach out to students who bring their own stories and experiences to the table, often born of confusion and tragedy.

I changed my major from sociology to a double major in religion and psychology. I went to seminary and earned a Master of Divinity with a focus on pastoral care and counseling, a course of study I felt would provide a foundation not simply for teaching but more importantly for providing the understanding, care, and empathy future students might need. I was able to practice and develop these skills in my years as a hospital chaplain and a community organizer in poor, struggling neighborhoods.

My first teaching jobs while completing my Ph.D. in religion and ethics were in county, state, and federal prisons. In many ways they were some of the best students I have ever encountered. They had a thirst for knowledge, although often without the preparation most college students bring, and they certainly had their stories—stories of physical and emotional abuse, extreme poverty, and tremendous loss not only of loved ones but their personal freedom. Eventually I came to Le Moyne, where for over twenty years I have pushed students to take an active role and responsibility for their learning. I have challenged them to understand and to engage critically the religious and ethical complexities of our increasingly global, religiously-pluralistic world. All in the hope that when they leave they will have a stronger sense of themselves as moral agents in a world that desperately needs women and men standing up for what is right and good. At the same time, following in the footsteps of my professor, I have worked tirelessly to create a classroom environment where their own perspectives and voices can be articulated and heard, while offering a listening ear and a gentle sympathetic presence whenever they relate their own stories of confusion, loss, or tragedy.

The beginning of each fall semester and the advent of Christmas will always remind me of my brother and all those who suffer some affliction self-imposed or imposed by society, many of whom continue to sit in my classes year after year—like the father whose 9-year old daughter died of leukemia, the young man who buried his mother after her long, unsuccessful battle with cancer, and the countless young women who continue to struggle with the emotional pain of being raped by male classmates they thought loved them. I hope I will continue to feel the same empathy for them as my professor did for me, and offer to be present with them and provide some comfort. And, when the time is right, help them to find meaning even in the midst of the senseless, the tragic, and the ambiguous—meaning that often arises only in the context of renewed relationships with family, friends, and faith. To do this is an essential part of my vocation, my calling as a teacher and a person.

I'd Prefer Not To: Ethical sensibilities in the workplace

Recently, freshmen students at Le Moyne College were required to read Melville’s Bartleby the Scrivener.  They were even given t-shirts with the iconic statement of Bartleby every time he was asked to do a particular task:  “I’d prefer not to.”  For some students, that statement matched their own feelings about the reading of Bartleby (or for many, any academic reading that was not a part of their major).  For others, it illustrated the reason they were in college and seeking to become professionals in their own right where theycould resist work they would rather not do (and are probably doing to pay their tuition bills).

For those unfamiliar with the story, the work Bartleby was engaged in as a scrivener was to copy legal documents by hand and then spend time reading them over aloud with others to insure their accuracy.  Let’s face it: the work was rather mundane, repetitive, and boring.  (Personally, I would go stark-raving mad if this was the only work I could find.)  Of course, we can psychoanalyze Bartleby and suggest that his underlying, undiagnosed problem was some sort of depression brought on by his extreme loneliness or homelessness.  These are certainly issues with which we should be concerned, especially since in some instances they result in violent outbursts in the workplace


As an ethicist, however, I would prefer not to go down that road (pun intended).  Rather, I would prefer to talk about the frustration that I think the Bartlebys of the world are voicing with their refusal to continue in this type of work (which some suggest is exactly what the author Melville intends).  After all, ethics is the discipline that deals with preferences! 

What Bartleby is declaring is that he prefers not to engage in a world of work that, while it may sometimes be necessary (especially in a litigious society), is pure drudgery and dehumanizing.  Of course in a time of high unemployment many people would proclaim that workers should be happy to have a job and should take any job they could find.  All I can do in response is to quote Albert Camus, “Without work, all life goes rotten.  But when work is soulless, life stifles and dies.”  (Marx was also a critic of this kind of soulless work that alienates workers from the product of their labor where workers have little control over the nature and direction of their work, which is what happens when one is simply the appendage to a machine, a task, a desk, or an internet server.)

I would contend that there are many instances today where people are standing up to work places and declaring, I’d prefer not to.  For example, fast food workers who are taking to the streets to argue for living wages of ten to fifteen dollars per hour are saying they prefer not to work for wages that, while they provide many a quick, cheap meal, prohibit the workers’ ability to feed their families or to live in dignity.  I would contend that the Occupy Wall Street movement was (is?) in part proclaiming that as the 99%, they would prefer not to continue an economic system that continues to generate extremes of economic and social inequality even rewarding people with bonuses for unethical even if not illegal behavior (although some think laws were broken).

The establishment of a minimum wage (I would prefer living wages) and recent attempts by legislatures to increase it are a statement to the economic structure of our society that contends we, collectively, would prefer not to allow people to work below a decent level of income, especially when work and the money it procures are what sociologist Lee Rainwater argues are the fundamental means of membership and participation in our consumption-oriented society.  The generation of workplace safety regulations declares that we would prefer not to let employees work in unsafe conditions even if they are costly.  The implementation of workplace discrimination laws suggests that we would prefer not to allow employers to discriminate against workers on the basis of age, ethnicity, gender, or disability.   

What all of these laws and policies embody are our collective ethical preferences when it comes to work and the economy.  Are they sufficient?  Not at all.  Too much work will continue to be demeaning and soulless, too many workers will continue to have little voice or say in the nature of their work, too many employees will continue to be sacrificed to the economic gods of efficiency and profitability.  But they do at least state to the captains of industry the moral preferences that we as a community share.