Philosophy 2: The Root of Evil

Here is my second post in a series of brief personal philosophical statements stemming from my graduate course final. Like the first, it deals with axiology (study of values and morality, right and wrong, etc.).

Philosophy Position #2: The root of all evil and unhappiness comes as a result of attempting to make a god of oneself.

One of my favorite quotes to put on the board in my classroom and have students respond to in writing is from Thomas Merton: “To consider persons and events and situations only in the light of their effect on myself is to live on the doorstep of hell.” There’s no question that this is the great challenge of my life. I battle against this every day. When the alarm clock goes off, instead of being grateful for breath, the day’s possibilities, and my family, I curse about being tired and having to go to work. Instead of looking first to serve my wife and kids, I get frustrated about the lack of hot water, or being out of my favorite cereal, or the mess of toys I see everywhere. I seek to enter conversations in which I can offer my own complaints, and I see people as obstacles to productivity. This is a miserable way to live. Luckily, I don’t approach the world like this all day or every day. But that desire is in me - the desire to believe I deserve comfort, the desire to believe I deserve the world to revolve around me, the desire to be worshipped by others.

I see evidence of this in much of the literature that I teach, written both by Christians and non-Christians. The happiest characters are those who have discovered that joy is found in valuing others over the self and who see themselves as small in comparison to the rest of the world. Obviously I bring God into this and maintain that full happiness is arrived while focusing on Him. To be disconnected from God is to invite dissatisfaction with life, and that disconnection occurs most easily when my focus is on the self.

To Whoever Has Been Given Much. . .

My blogging activity in the past month or two hasn't been as productive as I'd like, primarily because I've been working on a final paper for my philosophy course. The paper is now done, and many parts of it are relevant to this blog. One of the parts of the paper asked me to describe 6 philosophies of life that I try to live by. I've decided to post several of these here over the next week or so. They're brief - a couple of paragraphs each - and simply attempt to lay out some of the guiding principles in my life. Hopefully you find the reading worthwhile. . .

Philosophy Position #1: To whoever has been given much, much will be expected.
This axiological (concerned with good and evil, right and wrong, values) statement addresses the question of what is required of me in life. I embrace this phrase. It is a great burden that I carry, but it is one that I am happy to bear. The bottom line here is that for me to engage in “right living,” I must live up to my blessings.

This is a challenge for me, because I have been hugely blessed. Reading and education have always come easy to me. Frankly, I rarely have had to struggle in any educational setting. Also, I was given a safe upbringing with two parents who loved me, supported me, and challenged me. I have been given a loving, sacrificial wife who I met early in life. Trouble has avoided me, not necessarily because I’m a “good person” but because I’ve never been in the wrong place at the wrong time. I was born passionate and competitive, and I have been spared a great deal of pain my life. Other than with Costa Rican coffee and Nutty Bars, I’ve never struggled with addiction. I’ve always been surrounded by good friends, challenging mentors, and instruction on God. At this point in my career, I’m financially secure. Life has been good to me.

My morality says that I must, therefore, produce a great deal of fruit in this lifetime. Learning is an obligation (though one I enjoy), because I have the ability. There are others in the world who know less, who have less, who have been loved less. It is my joy and responsibility to improve their lives in some way, to offer what I can. I’ve been given a great wife; I am held accountable for treasuring her every single day. I must help where I can, be who I can, and passionately pursue good. And a great deal of good is in the pursuit itself.

Attacked By Oswald

In my mind there is no greater author and no better text (outside of Scriptures) at quickly and effectively challenging Christians and providing a necessarily blunt wake-up call to all things spiritual than Oswald Chambers' My Utmost for His Highest. I'm not a "devotional" kind of guy; I never have been. But this book, set up in one page increments for each day of the year, is so full of reflection-worthy commentary that I find myself spending a great deal of time on each page. I highly recommend this text to anyone unfamiliar with it.

I've picked the text up off my shelf and have been carrying it around in my bag the last few weeks, reading a passage or two over my lunch hour and taking notes. In my last few readings, Chambers has had challenging words regarding the "death of the self" and truly being a living sacrifice. Christians like me tend to give lip-service to making our lives all for the purposes of God and "seeking His will" in our lives. Chambers has some piercing quotes that really question one's commitment to this idea:

• "We are not sanctified for ourselves. . . Things happen which have nothing to do with us; God is getting us into fellowship with Himself."
• "The first thing God does with us is to get us based on rugged Reality until we do not care what becomes of us individually as long as He gets His way for the purpose of His redemption."
• "If through a broken heart God can bring His purposes to pass in the world, then thank Him for breaking your heart."
• "If you are going to be used by God, He will take you through a multitude of experiences that are not meant for you at all, they are meant to make you useful in His hands, and to enable you to understand what transpires in other souls so that you will never be surprised at what you come across."
• "The circumstances of a saint's life are ordained of God. In the life of a saint there is not such thing as chance."
• "I have to learn that the aim in life is God's, not mine. God is using me from His great personal standpoint, and all He asks of me is that I trust Him, and never say - Lord, this gives me such heartache. To talk in that way makes me a clog."
• "If God has made your cup sweet, drink it with grace; if he has made it bitter, drink it in communion with Him."

Thought these might be worth sharing here. They really punched me in the gut, which Chambers is quite adept at doing. Hopefully something here challenges you the way they've challenged me.

Joe Paterno and Me

I have to be careful because it seems that so many are rushing to say something about Joe Paterno in light of all that's happened in the last week. I'd like to avoid that. Instead, I'd prefer to focus on the situation surrounding Paterno itself, not necessarily the man and what he should or should not have done. Here, then, are some reflections about the current fall of a coaching icon:

1. Many, many people are heart-broken to see a beloved football coach fall from grace so quickly. Others are "disappointed" in his actions or lack thereof. This disappointment is the logical and typical end anytime we as humans deify other humans. This was inevitable. It was inevitable because Joe Paterno is a human being. Joe Paterno is not perfect. Joe Paterno is, frankly, a sinner. And so am I. If you follow anyone long enough, get close to them, learn more about them, the inevitable result is that they will disappoint you. Somehow, someway you will not like a decision they made, an action they took or didn't take, or beliefs they hold. They will let you down.

This is what happens when we try to make a god out of a human being. We will be let down. Our history is full of such people. JFK and Martin Luther King, Jr. were/are both beloved leaders in our country. Both of them had extra-marital affairs. Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa "saved baseball" with an epic homerun battle, and then we found out both of them were cheating the whole time. Athletes, celebrities, politicians, and church leaders, over and over and over again, have fallen to some scandal or another. We see more of it today than we did in previous generations. I don't think it's because humanity is getting worse; it's because the time of privacy is dead. We just know more about our heroes now than we ever did before. And it seems like the more we know, the more inevitable it is that we will be disappointed in some way.

The rewards are different based on what we choose to worship. Worship humans - get disappointed. Worship God, and have a solid, unmovable foundation on which to direct praise.

2. While humans are not good targets for deifying, they are great for emulating. Not all the details of what Paterno knew or didn't know are out; however, many of the details of his 60 years of coaching are. Those actions are worth emulating. By and large, Coach Paterno did things the right way. He positively impacted thousands of people, a university, and a community. So much of what he did is worth celebrating and imitating. Joe Paterno, from what I know of him, is a sinner and a good man. His contributions are worthy of focus.

As I said before, JFK and MLK did magnificent things for our country. Those contributions are worthy of focus as well. Our culture wants to deify, then burn at the stake at the first sniff of wrongdoing. I'm suggesting a middle ground: Expect to be disappointed, but focus on the good. When I think about all the people in my life that I've looked up to, treasured, or even revered, I know they've all let me down in some way. Some of my heroes in life have been racist, impatient, mean-spirited, self-righteous, unfaithful, and on and on and on. But they've been so good in other ways that they've been worth emulating, worth befriending, worth learning from.

The situation at Penn State this week has shown that Joe Paterno isn't perfect and is a sinner. So are you. So am I. I know I've disappointed my wife, my children, my parents, my family, my friends, my players, and my co-workers many times over my life. Though at times it was unintentional, I still haven't perfectly lived up to any standards of great human behavior. I'm sure it will happen again. I just hope that those people will remember whatever good I've done, and focus on that, while seeking an example of perfection from above.

I will remember Joe Paterno, football coach, as a solid leader who made people better. I hope those in my life have it in them to see me with the same rose-colored glasses.

Running on Empty

Been on somewhat of a blogging hiatus the last two weeks. No time, no energy, and nothing to say, I was frustrated and wasn't sure where to go. Then I looked into the notebook I carry with me full of random notes I take, and I saw this appropriate quote I recently wrote down: "Take it as a rule without exception, that to be able to overflow spontaneously you must be full."

And there it is. I am most certainly not full. In fact, I've been running on empty for quite a while. I have failed to fill myself with time for thought and reading and prayer, so I've had very little to give. Frankly, I've never been this mentally weary heading into a basketball season as I am right now. This week I've taken some steps towards refilling and refocusing - fasting, reading some Oswald Chambers, dressing less casually to improve my focus, taking a personal day - and I hope to come out of it more effective and overflowing so that I might better serve my students, my players, my family, any readers I've still got, and myself.

While I attempt to refill, I do have a few random notes to offer that I've collected over the past couple of weeks. Hopefully, in the absence of overflowing, something here might prove helpful to you:

• Some great perspective from Arthur Ashe: "If I ask 'Why me?' as I am assaulted by heart disease and AIDS, I must ask 'Why me?' about my blessings, and question my right to enjoy them."
• If one key to connecting with people is through questions about their lives, Christians as a whole have some work to do: "Because Christians tend to be answer people, we're not especially skilled at asking good questions; questions that aren't simplistic, leading, or downright insulting." (Tim Downs, in his book Finding Common Ground)
• I wrote recently about living a "live musician" lifestyle. Here's more commentary from a preacher that echoes that sentiment: "I would rather preach than do anything else I know in this world. I have never missed a chance to preach. I would rather preach than eat my dinner, or have a holiday or anything else the world can offer. I would rather pay to preach than be paid not to preach. . ." (Samuel Chadwick) I hope I can say something similar at the end of my days.
• "Prayer is taxing and exacting. Prayer means enduring and denying self, a daily dying by choice. It is wrong when, instead of praying, we do things just to please others." (Leonard Ravenhill)