Keep Being Human

About fifteen years ago, I watched a sci-fi series called Being Human. The show revolved around the lives of three people: a ghost, a vampire and a werewolf. All of them were trying in some ways to maintain some of their lost humanity. Truth be told, it wasn’t the greatest television show, but the premise was sound. In a world where everyone around them urged the protagonists to give in to their monstrous natures, the fight to remain caring and kind was a never-ending struggle.

Being Human seems to be an allegory these days of what is happening to America during the second term of Donald Trump. There seems to be a lot of monstrous behavior going around, and this leads me to wonder: what is Donald Trump doing to our souls?

Two related news stories made me think about this. The New York Times and CBS News interviewed two men who both voted for Trump and are now dealing with their wife/partner being taken away by ICE. Both men have had their beliefs in the president shattered. But I think more than their belief and trust in the president was shattered, it was also a trust in the government, a trust that life could be fair. Next was a Facebook post by a Mennonite pastor telling the story of a pastor working on his immigration status who was also taken by ICE. Then there was an article from a few months ago from Mockingbird editor Cali Yee on her rage and mourning for her home state of Minnesota because of Operation Metro Surge. Writing during the surge, she talks about how the assault by the federal government created a festering rage:

In Minneapolis and St. Paul, numerous bridges over I-94 hold messages of protest. Small businesses have signage posted with reminders of their rights. A hostess at a local Mexican restaurant has to buzz you in at the door, which is locked for the safety of their staff. Community groups wait outside the Whipple Building with winter coats, food, and first aid for those released from detainment who have only the clothes on their backs. Neighbors station themselves at bus stops in order to escort children home. Volunteers deliver groceries to immigrant families who are afraid to leave their homes. Those same volunteers look over their shoulders to ensure no one is tracking them. My sisters carry copies of their passports that prove they are U.S. citizens, just in case.

I feel anger for Renee Good and Alex Pretti, among many others, who have been killed, pepper sprayed, arrested, or beaten. Anger for my immigrant neighbors, who have, for the last few weeks, not left their homes for fear that they or their loved ones will be taken away — who are unable to go to work or to school or to church. Anger at my fellow neighbors and even friends who have seen such violence and cruelty and still don’t believe the injustice happening right in front of their eyes. Anger at myself for my anger.

The phrase I keep hearing is “If you aren’t outraged, you aren’t paying attention.” I am paying attention, and I am outraged. And this anger, albeit justified or righteous or whatever the heck you want to say about it, festers like an aching wound.

I could add all of the corruption, the war on truth, rising gas prices because of an illegal war and other shocks to the system that have left many people reeling. His constant actions remind me of the passage from Matthew when the Magi come looking for Jesus and ask King Herod for directions. Knowing there was another king out there left him troubled. The passage concludes with the phrase, “and all Jerusalem with him.” The people in the capital were aware of the madness of the king and lived in fear of the next shoe to drop.

Tony Robinson has a name for all of these actions: moral injury. Of course this isn’t his phrase, but a phrase used in psychology. It amounts to a broken trust that leaders that we believe that leaders will act justly and that we can trust them.

And he notes that Americans right now are living in this relentless state of moral injury. We can no longer trust our federal government.

Americans now live — amid the Trump Presidency — in a perpetual and relentless state of “moral injury.” It’s neither a one-off nor an ambiguous case, but constant violation of the norms that define decency, civilized behavior and morality. It is day after day after day. The examples of Donald Trump, someone who holds power by virtue of his election to office, “betraying what is morally right in high-stakes situations” are mounting up as fast as the national debt, pegged just this week at forty trillion dollars.

Whether it’s pardoning those who violently attacked police, selling Presidential pardons, politicizing the justice system for personal vendettas, self-enriching crypto schemes, insider trading, extorting foreign governments and their officials, shaking down corporations, starting and waging an illegal war or simply the firehose of daily lies and insults . . . it never stops, never lets up but only keeps coming.

We can’t trust them to do the right thing no matter who’s in charge. With all of this sense of rage and anger and betrayal, the question remains what does this do to Americans?

What does it do when your sense of the country has been betrayed, and where does grace fit in?

The next few years will be rough for America. If the Democrats win the presidency in 2028 and Trump leaves, we shouldn’t expect that things will go back to normal. There will be a desire among many who oppose Trump and even former supporters betrayed by his actions for payback.

I live in the Twin Cities. I lived through Metro Surge. I didn’t have to deal ICE, but none of this means I wasn’t affected. There are scores of people who face the brunt of this administration’s policies and there is a human desire for not simply justice, but revenge. We have been hurt and we want to hurt people back. An eye for an eye.

Sadly, I don’t think that there will be a Lincoln, someone who is willing to focus on bringing people together I think that those people will be few and far between.

There aren’t politicians who can bring us back together, at least not on the horizon. But if politics can’t bring us together, what about the church?

Maybe we need to look at the Good Samaritan.

Tara Korpi shares a recent post about people who protected Jake Lang, a right-wing agitator and pretty much a racist from an angry crowd. This all happened during the height of Metro Surge. An African American and two women protected him from the angry crowd. These people were the very people you wouldn’t expect to protect a racist. They were diametrically opposed to Lang.

These three people didn’t have to protect this man. He surely didn’t deserve it.

In trying to understand, she looks at the story of the Good Samaritan found in Luke 10. It’s a story that we all know, a story that we normally think is one about how we should be more charitable, how we should care for those in need.

But she looks at it differently.. The lawyer, the one who asks who my neighbor is, is trying to draw a boundary, kind of trying to find what the limit is.

But Jesus turns the story around. Instead of asking who our neighbor is, Jesus asks who the neighbor was. The Samaritan is a cultural enemy. The lawyer who asked the question would not see him as a model of righteousness, and yet this is who Jesus lifts up.

Kropi shares that the Good Samaritan is not simply a model of charity. It’s really about being human.

The Samaritan in Jesus’ story is not an ideological friend. He is a cultural enemy. He is the one the lawyer would never choose as his model for righteousness. Yet Jesus makes him the embodiment of neighbor love. Mercy becomes the interpretive key to the law.

The Good Samaritan has always been more than an example of charity. It is a witness to what it means to stay human when the world gives you every reason not to. We all live among ideologies, prejudices, injustices, and rejections that try to shrink our hearts and calcify our compassion. The Samaritan refuses that shrinking. He practices a humanity that is cross-shaped.

In the next few years, there will be calls and probably actions for payback, for revenge. It’s not hard to understand why. That’s why caring for an enemy can seem rather offensive. Why should we show mercy? Wouldn’t that ignore justice?

But as Korpi notes, the call for mercy doesn’t erase the need for justice. They work side by side. The church doesn’t and shouldn’t ignore the injustice taking place right now. We must speak and protect “the widow and the orphan.”

But we are also called to love our enemies and pray for persecutors. This seems superhuman, but as Korpi notes, showing mercy is what keeps us human. The model for our humanity is found in Jesus, who loved his enemies, actually forgiving his killers on the cross.

We can’t expect that society will be forgiving. Maybe the church can show a different way. As imperfect people, we will fall short. But there is grace in that God in Jesus doesn’t give up on us. We seek to be faithful to God, because God is faithful. Maybe we can show, as Korpi shares, that mercy doesn’t erase justice, holding both together.

The characters in Being Human had to fight day in and out to keep their humanity amidst monsters. Real life is not really that different. As followers of Jesus, we are facing monsters that tempt us to give up our humanity, to fight the monsters of our time by becoming monsters and giving up our humanity.

But Jesus shows us another way. The One who came to us, the God who became human, shows how to be human, and stay human.

May God keep us human in a time of growing in humanity.