To Suffer Is Not Enough

To Suffer Is Not Enough    click here to see the video

David Ketchum

September 30, 2018

         I know it may be difficult to remember those now idyllic times before the endless news cycle revolved around the tweets of a certain horrible person turned celebrity turned president, but that world did exist. If you happened to love obscure news, you may have noticed a social experiment in December 2014. The City Reporter, a Russian news website, decided to publish only good news for one day. They teased the experiment by asking, “Do you feel like you are surrounded by negative information? You don't want to read the news in the morning? … Do you think good news is a myth? We'll try to prove the opposite tomorrow!” And they did. They featured positive headlines, like, "No disruption on the roads despite snow.” They made announcements of mundane progress, celebrating “that an underpass would be built in time … .” 

         The result was overwhelming, but not positive. The website lost about 2/3 of its readers that day. The deputy editor reflected, “We looked for positives in the day's news, and we think we found them, … . But it looks like almost nobody needs them." (https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-news-from-elsewhere-30318261)  There’s a popular narrative that news outlets drive negativity, that consumers are hungry for something positive but just can’t get it. The trouble was that, when The City Reporterwent out of their way to report good news, the people went looking for bad news. 

         Earlier that same year, in March 2014, Marc Trussler of Vanderbilt and Stuart Soroka of McGill universities, wrote about “Consumer Demand for Cynical and Negative News Frames” in The International Journal of Press/Politics. In contrast to the assumption that “news norms” limit people’s choices by prioritizing bad news, they explored the notion that “news may be negative and/or strategy-focused because that is the kind of news that people are interested in.” They began with a survey asking participants to self-report their preferences for positive, neutral, or negative news. They then tracked the participants’ eye movements while they browsed news online. When they analyzed the results, they found that, “regardless of what participants say, they exhibit a preference for negative news content.” (http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1940161214524832?etoc=&)  People said they wanted and preferred good news, and that popular media overemphasized negative stories. Yet when presented with the opportunity, they chose the negative ones. (http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20140728-why-is-all-the-news-bad)

         This is probably more interesting than surprising. I’m reminded of an iconic line from that charming and problematic movie, Pretty Woman. Vivian remarks that, "People put you down enough, you start to believe it." Edward counters with a compliment, "I think you are a very bright, very special woman." But Vivian knows that it isn’t that easy, and says, "The bad stuff is easier to believe. You ever notice that?" And all of us nod – yes, we’ve noticed. Because psychologically, this is exactly the case. We recognize negative events more quickly and remember them more deeply. 

         From an evolutionary standpoint, it makes sense. The human nervous system is the product of about 600 million years of evolution, every bit of it depending on the ability to pass genes on to the next generation. Our ancestors needed to eat enough to stay alive, and stay alive long enough to reproduce. So an important part of our affect system focuses on what things we label as pleasant and desirable – the “I like that and I want more of it” parts of our brains. We like things that feel and taste good, or put us in a position to get more of what we want. Yet as essential as these things are to the survival of the species, a creature can’t do them if it is dead. So our affect systems also let us know when we are likely to be in danger and need to protect ourselves. When a threat arises, all the other stuff can be put on hold. We label some aspect of our experience as unpleasant, disgusting, or dangerous and we take action – the “I hate that and want to get away from it” part of our brains. This reaction needed to be strong and urgent. If we manage to survive, we can look for more food or mates tomorrow. But if we die, that’s the end.

         This negativity bias, as painful as it is to experience, has been very effective at helping us survive. Rick Hanson, a psychologist specializing in contemplative neuroscience and neuroplasticity, sums it up - 

“All this makes human beings super-sensitive to apparent threats. Basically, in evolution, there are two kinds of mistakes: (1) You think there is a tiger in the bushes but there isn’t one, and (2) You think the coast is clear, no tiger in the bushes, but there really is one about to pounce. / These mistakes have very different consequences. The first one will make you anxious, but the second one will kill you. That’s why Mother Nature wants you to make the first mistake a thousand times over in order to avoid making the second mistake even once.” (https://www.rickhanson.net/stephen-colbert-we-dont-need-to-keep-fear-alive/)

         Practically speaking, Rick continues, this means that,

“To keep our ancestors alive, Mother Nature evolved a brain that routinely tricked them into making three mistakes: overestimating threats, underestimating opportunities, and underestimating resources (for dealing with threats and fulfilling opportunities). This is a great way to pass on gene copies, but a lousy way to promote quality of life.” (https://www.rickhanson.net/how-your-brain-makes-you-easily-intimidated/)

         This is a fantastic line: the negativity bias “is a great way to pass on gene copies, but a lousy way to promote quality of life.” And I think we all know what Rick means: constantly “overestimating threats, underestimating opportunities, and underestimating resources” is a recipe for never-ending stress, making it difficult to sustain healthy relationships and communities.  But let’s acknowledge that the negativity bias would not exist if the world was nota dangerous place; sometimes there isa tiger in the bushes. 

         This last week, we witnessed one of the more public demonstrations of this fact, watching the unfolding drama surrounding the Brett Kavanaugh hearings. There were so many difficult moments, perhaps especially for those of us who have experienced sexual assault. Never mind that Kavanaugh’s judicial record already indicated he was unfit to serve as a justice on the Supreme Court. Never mind that the NAACP Legal Defense Fund released a 94 page report that revealed that - “Kavanaugh's record on affirmative action, voting rights, police misconduct and other key issues in the scope of racial justice and civil rights is ... deeply concerning … .” Never mind that Kavanaugh’s 

“jurisprudence will solidify the civil rights retrenchment with devastating consequences for the constitutional and legal protections of those who are most marginalized in our society for decades to come." (https://www.salon.com/2018/09/10/naacp-legal-defense-fund-lays-out-kavanaughs-extensive-and-troubling-record-on-civil-rights/)

         It is terrifying to me that none of these issues were sufficient to cause the Senate to reject Kavanaugh’s nomination. It is more terrifying still that a public display of classic abuser behavior – denying, attacking, and reversing victim and offender roles – was not sufficient to immediately end his nomination. (https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2018/9/27/1799292/-Kavanaugh-s-opening-remarks-are-a-masterclass-in-a-common-sexual-abuser-defense-tactic) These are moments when we understand clearly that powerful people do not have the well-being of most us in mind. 

         I stress this point because working with the negativity bias should not be confused with avoidance or denial. We are not trying to pretend that injustice and oppression don’t exist, or that we don’t experience loss and grief. An unwillingness to work honestly with suffering is unhealthy and counterproductive. We all need breaks, to step away and rest. But avoidance and denial is something different, transforming compassion into indifference. So here we are, in a dangerous and desperate world, full of suffering. We have to deal with our long histories of discrimination, exploitation, and oppression. None of us is untouched, and most of us are tired. Compassionate action, for ourselves and others, is both beautiful and excruciatingly difficult. We have a negativity bias, and we want to also have open, loving hearts. How?

         Let’s begin by cultivating gratitude for our negativity bias. For all of us, especially for those of us that belong to marginalized communities, we can be grateful that this bias has helped keep us alive. It is healthy to have healthy boundaries and wise to have functional mistrust. There are plenty of people who don’t care about our well-being, or who have their own ideas and agendas for what is good for our well-being. There are plenty of people willing to sacrifice our well-being for what they think is politically expedient, economically advantageous, or religiously comforting for them. It is healthy to have healthy boundaries; it is wise to have functional mistrust. 

         This might be one of the hardest lessons for folks who want to be in solidarity to learn, but it must be learned. We must honor the suffering in one another, and respect the lived realities of folk who are oppressed, without taking it personally. White folk, it is 100% legitimate for people of color to not trust us. Men, it is 100% legitimate for women and nonbinary folk to not trust you. Cisgender people, it is 100% legitimate for transgender folk to not trust you. Wealthy people, it is 100% legitimate for the poor to not trust you. Temporarily-able-bodied folk, it is 100% legitimate for disabled folk to not trust us. That trust may grow within mutual and equitable relationships, but no one in a position of privilege should assume it of a person in a marginalized community. When we expect it, and have our feelings hurt when we don’t receive it, that is a function of domination. When we act like we are entitled to the goodwill of any person from a marginalized community, we are only proving the necessity of the negativity bias. When the late and great Muhammed Ali was asked about the “good white people” involved in anti-racism and civil rights work, he replied: 

“There are many white people who mean right and in their hearts wanna do right. [But they’re so few.] If 10,000 snakes were coming down that aisle now, and I had a door that I could shut, and in that 10,000, 1,000 meant right, 1,000 rattlesnakes didn’t want to bite me, I knew they were good... Should I let all these rattlesnakes come down, hoping that that thousand get together and form a shield? Or should I just close the door and stay safe?” (https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/muhammad-ali-on-not-all-white-people_us_563a5e9ee4b0307f2cabb2e6)

         So we begin by honoring the wisdom of the negativity bias: this world is dangerous, and we have to be wise to survive. But this bias does have repercussions on our well-being. We have generally evolved to deal with acute, not chronic, stress. After all, the safest assumption for most of evolutionary history is that a creature will have an early death. If we live a long time with this kind of suffering, with no relief, it takes a toll. So we need tools for healing our bodies and minds. This is where discussions about universal health care, basic income, affordable housing, accessibility, and equity in education intersect. Eliminating poverty, racism, sexism, disablism, and gender and sexuality phobias would also reduce the negative experiences in our lives. All of it is connected and all of it is necessary. But it is a long road to travel.

         In the meanwhile, grieving is one of the most important and often overlooked aspects of social justice movements. We need to have spaces, places, and practices available that help us process and move through the grief. Otherwise, we can easily get stuck. Hanson’s description of the negativity bias as a tendency for “overestimating threats, underestimating opportunities, and underestimating resources,” is one that I think most organizers, activists, and social workers would recognize. We need robust networks where we can process the injustices we experience or witness. 

         There’s a story in the Mahayana Buddhist traditions of the bodhisattva Avalokiteshvara, who takes a vow to not enter nirvana until all beings are freed from suffering. For ages, he works tirelessly, until the ocean of suffering is emptied. Triumphant, he returns to the Buddha-of-Infinite-Light, Amitabha, who says, “Look again.” Avalokiteshvara turns and, to his dismay, sees the realms of existence already overflowing with miserable beings. Overwhelmed by the idea of working with such anguish for untold ages yet again, he doubts himself. “I cannot keep my vow,” he thinks, and with the thought, splits into a thousand pieces. But Amitabha gathers the broken pieces together and recreates Avalokiteshvara with a thousand arms and eyes. With this renewal, the bodhisattva is empowered to return to his work. 

         That image resonates with many of us. Even when we experience success, even when things go well, we look back at the world and see an ocean of suffering. We despair. How can we go on? Our hearts break. We break into a thousand pieces. But Avalokiteshvara’s story reminds us that this shattering may not be the end. If we are able to integrate those experiences, to grieve and heal, we may find an even deeper ability to bear with suffering and work for liberation. 

         This re-integration is possible because we have also inherited another set of tools, which let us enjoy well-being within ourselves and with others. When we feel safe and can trust that our needs are being met, contentment can arise – the “I can relax and enjoy this” part of our brains. Many creatures, including and perhaps especially humans, are able to nurture, care for, and connect with themselves and one another. But, living in an unjust and consumer-based society, this third part is often woefully under-developed. We usually bounce back and forth between the “I hate that and want to get away from it” and the “I like that and I want more of it” parts of our brains, leaving little time and energy to strengthen the “I can relax and enjoy this” part. Is it any wonder that activists  suffer from burn-out and compassion fatigue, and activist communities are rife with conflict? We don’t just burn the candle at both ends, we throw the candle into the fire. 

         My request this morning is that we not only honor our negativity bias, but that we also become increasingly intentional about cultivating the calming and connecting parts of our brains. Because self and community care can also be activism. Building trust in community can be activism. Understanding and supporting each of our strengths and limitations can be activism. Treating each other, including children, with kindness and respect can be activism. Making art can be activism. Planting flowers can be activism. Creating resilient and sustainable communities can be activism. Honoring and celebrating all types of activism and activists can be solidarity. 

         The Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh and his community faced the terrible suffering of the Vietnam War firsthand. Like Avalokiteshvara, I am sure his heart broke a thousand times. But what emerged from that honest engagement with suffering was a community of service during the war, and a lifetime of building communities of peace and justice after the war. One of his teachings, forged in the flames of that terrible conflict, was simply this: “Life is filled with suffering, but it is also filled with many wonders, like the blue sky, the sunshine, the eyes of a baby. To suffer is not enough. We must also be in touch with the wonders of life.” (http://www.awakin.org/read/view.php?tid=168)

         It has been another rough week, and we know there will be rough weeks ahead. Our negativity bias will have plenty of fresh material. And we will need to find ways to keep going and not give up and never stand idly by. Because the work we are doing, the anger we feel, the hope we muster - all of this is directed toward living into a future where our activism is unnecessary, because we’ve finally come to know community that is truly just and equitable and full of love. The negativity bias can also remind us of just how crucial it is to keep recognizing, appreciating, strengthening, and enjoying the healthy connections we have right now. “To suffer is not enough.” The negativity bias is only meant to help us survive. But to live, we learn to cherish the ordinary, the mundane. To live, we learn to love, to celebrate love, to create, and to support creativity. “To suffer is not enough. We must also … touch the wonders of life.”

To Suffer Is Not Enough,September 30, 2018

Summary: 

We swim in a sea of suffering, never far from the injustice and inequality in the world and in our own communities. Anger and grief are our close companions. What are some of the ways we can also stay connected with the “wonders of life,” to sustain our work in subverting injustice and building communities of hope and love? 

Prayer of Confession: 

When so much of the news is bad news,

When we grow accustomed to the outrageous and unjust,

When we are exhausted by the slow work of change,

         we feel just how easy it is 

         to give in to cynicism or despair.

We look to one another for encouragement,

We ask one another for accountability,

We offer one another community,

         that keep us connected with the reasons

         to keep learning, loving, and living. Amen.

Wisdom Lesson: 

“… although the world is full of suffering, it is full also of the overcoming of it. My optimism, then, does not rest on the absence of evil, but on a glad belief in the preponderance of good and a willing effort always to cooperate with the good, that it may prevail. …  Such is the force of this beautiful and willful conviction, it carries itself in the face of all opposition. ... I never can be argued into hopelessness.” - Helen Keller

“Are any among you suffering? They should pray. Are any cheerful? They should sing songs of praise.” - James 5:13

“Life is filled with suffering, but it is also filled with many wonders, like the blue sky, the sunshine, the eyes of a baby. To suffer is not enough. We must also be in touch with the wonders of life. They are within us and all around us, everywhere, any time.”  - Thich Nhat Hanh

“Faith Defined by Radical Compassion”

“Faith Defined by Radical Compassion”    Sept 23, 2018   Dr. Roger Ray     

click here to watch the video

Paul Gilbert and Choden writing in Mindful Compassion: “However, it has been understood within the Mahayana Buddhist tradition for a long time that what really changes the mind is the practice of compassion, which is the second main skill. Furthermore, in order for deep change to take root, we need to apply both mindfulness and compassion together, as these skills work together like the two wings of a bird. This is also the understanding that is emerging from both neuroscience and psychology – that compassion transforms the mind, but mindfulness provides the basis and stability for such change.”

I keep an autographed picture of Jon Stewart by my desk. I have said many times over the past few years that I aspire to one day be as good at preaching as this Jewish comedian was on TV for very many years. Stewart was able to say things with such naked honesty and with the persuasion of cutting humor that I believe he should be regarded as having been one of the great preachers of our age.

One of my favorite quotes from Stewart is this: If you don’t stick to your values when they’re being tested, they’re not values: they’re hobbies. That’s witty but it is also painfully true. So many people in our culture say that they are “spiritual but not religious.” And I resonate with a lot of what is behind that sentiment, but I also feel compelled to ask, “how you do practice your spirituality?”  Because, if what you mean when you say that you are “spiritual” is that you have a smug and superior attitude and that’s about it, then maybe what you really mean is that you are neither religious nor spiritual. 

I have known lots of people who like to identify themselves as being Buddhist but mostly what that means is that they watched a PBS special on the Dalai Lama. 

I can be as critical of organized religion as anyone but then I have spent years in the trenches and I have the scars to prove it. To simply be dismissive of things you don’t really understand is more about being a bigot than it is about being spiritual.

We are just finishing a discussion of this book which I highly recommend to our viewers, Paul Gilbert’s “Mindful Compassion,” in which he looks at certain Buddhists beliefs and practices from the vantage point of a psychologist. A vital argument in the book that I believe is applicable to people of all progressive faith practices, is that a genuine spiritual path involves both mindfulness and a practice of radical compassion. The authors get a bit deep into the weeds in definitions at times but for short-hand’s sake, please allow me to say that mindfulness, a careful and attentive awareness of one’s surroundings and the life and experiences of those around you, is an aspect of what it means to be spiritual but for it to take root it must be married to a practice of compassion, as if the two were two wings of a bird. While each has inherent value, and may help to enhance your life, it takes both to be a spiritual person.

But I want to read that through the lens of Jon Stewart’s proverb: that if you only practice compassion when your life is not really under any substantive stress, then you are not really talking about compassion as a spiritual value, it is more of a hobby. That may mean that you are the person who will put your shopping cart back into the corral in the parking lot, but you are not running into a burning building to rescue a child. If your practice of compassion doesn’t risk your own comfort, or safety, or assets, then what you are really talking about is being polite or being civil.

This is Molly Tibbetts. You may remember having heard about her in the news last month. She was an Iowa college student who went missing after having gone out for an evening run. Her bloodied body was found in a corn field where her remains had been hidden under a pile of leaves for nearly a month. 

Forensic evidence led quickly to the arrest of an undocumented farm worker who had lived in the area for

several years. Cristhian Bahena Rivera confessed when he was arrested. He had seen Tibbetts running, he stopped his car and ran along beside her. When she took out her cell phone and warned him that she would call the police, he became enraged and he abducted and murdered her.

Iowa’s governor, Kim Reynolds, called the family and expressed her condolences, adding that our immigration system is broken because it had allowed this “predator” to live in their state. Iowa Senators Joni Ernst and Chuck Grassley also sent condolences and called for action on illegal immigration. Vice President Mike Pence and President Trump spoke about the Tibbetts’ murder as being the product of a disgraceful and broken immigration system. 

Even the disgraced Fox News talk show host, Bill O’Reilly, took to Twitter, to say that this horrible fate would not have befallen Tibbetts if only we had more strict immigration enforcement. Of course, there are about 17,000 murders committed in America every year and very few of them are committed by undocumented immigrants but conservatives only seem to get interested when they can make political capital out of a tragedy. 

One of O’Reilly’s twitter followers, Delilah O’Malley, of Brentwood, TN, replied to the man who had paid out more than $30 million in sexual harassment settlements that Tibbetts would be alive if only men understood that “no means no.” Let the people say, “Amen.”

I know that at a certain level that it is just as wrong to personalize a tragedy like this as it is for politicians to use it to further their political hysteria. But as the father of a beautiful young daughter who goes hiking, mountain climbing, skiing, and snowboarding in the Colorado Rockies, who believes, and I agree, that she has the right to go hiking or camping all alone just as much as any man does . . . still, if something were to happen to her, I cannot imagine how I could keep from going to the dark side in demands for retribution. 

I guess that’s where we all learn whether we have values or just hobbies. If we are spiritual or just well mannered. If compassion is something we choose to live by or if it is just a condescending claim to civility.

This is Rob Tibbetts, Molly’s dad. When Trump and others were using Molly’s death as a talking point in their stump speeches calling for Americans to “Build that Wall” and blaming undocumented immigrants for unspeakable crimes, Rob Tibbetts wrote a letter to the editor of the Des Moines Register. It is too long to read in its entirety, but I want to read a significant portion of it to you. The father of the tragically murdered college student said:

The person who is accused of taking Mollie’s life is no more a reflection of the Hispanic community as white supremacists are of all white people. To suggest otherwise is a lie. Justice in my America is blind. This person will receive a fair trial, as it should be. If convicted, he will face the consequences society has set. Beyond that, he deserves no more attention.   …

To the Hispanic community, my family stands with you and offers its heartfelt apology. That you’ve been beset by the circumstances of Mollie’s death is wrong. We treasure the contribution you bring to the American tapestry in all its color and melody. And yes, we love your food. …

My stepdaughter, whom Mollie loved so dearly, is Latina. Her sons — Mollie’s cherished nephews and my grandchildren — are Latino. That means I am Hispanic. I am African. I am Asian. I am European. My blood runs from every corner of the Earth because I am American. As an American, I have one tenet: to respect every citizen of the world and actively engage in the ongoing pursuit to form a more perfect union. …

Instead, let’s turn against racism in all its ugly manifestations both subtle and overt. Let’s turn toward each other with all the compassion we gave Mollie. Let’s listen, not shout. Let’s build bridges, not walls. Let’s celebrate our diversity rather than argue over our differences. I can tell you, when you’ve lost your best friend, differences are petty and meaningless.

I don’t know what has happened in Mr. Tibbetts life that could have prepared him to be able to make such a saintly statement just 10 days after the body of his slain daughter was found. In fact, honestly, I am not sure that I could muster the moral strength to even want to be as charitable as he is being about this tragedy. But we have seen it in others. 

A few years ago, Dylann Roof, went into a Bible Study at the Mother Emmanuel Church in Charleston, South Carolina to start a race war by murdering nine innocent black people, including the church’s pastor, in that historic church. But when he appeared in court for his first bond hearing, the survivors of the shooting were there, not to confront him with hate but to offer him both their grief and their forgiveness along with their sincere prayers. I’m not sure I could find that kind of stuff inside of me at a time like that, but I know that is the real thing, that is the stuff the world is needing.

Charleston could have erupted into a bloody, neighborhood to neighborhood, race war. I rushed down there with a gift from our church and rather than a war I found the streets lined with floral arrangements and tokens of both sympathy and peace. They were not allowing people into the church when I arrived because they didn’t want any spectators coming to gawk at the blood stains and bullet holes from the massacre, but a church member met me on the sidewalk and we embraced and shared a moment, surrounded by the good will of a city that had the sanity and the spirituality to absorb the grief without retribution. 

Scott Peck talks about how, when there is a hurricane, that the children of the rich work side by side with the children of the poor, filling sand bags, and forming barriers to save their town from flooding but as soon as the crisis is past, the old lines of segregation snap back into place. 

What we keep coming back here looking for, week after week, is the kind of character, the mindfulness and the compassion, to be able to break down those familiar lines of separation, of prejudice, that great wall of ethnic insanity, that divides us, without a Dylan Roof, without a hurricane, or without the loss of a charming young woman like Molly Tibbetts. Could members of a liberal mostly white church fully embrace the members of a mostly black evangelical church without some well of grief to call them together?

Could we muster outrage at the lead tainted water given to children in Flint, even if we live a thousand miles away with clean water on tap? Can we find compassion for native Americans now cleaning up hundreds of thousands of gallons of spilled oil on their reservation lands from a pipeline they tried to stop in the first place? 

 Can we spread our wings of compassion and mindfulness and say with Rob Tibbetts that I am Hispanic. I am African. I am Asian. I am European. My blood runs from every corner of the Earth

Because we have put away the ignorant prejudice of race, and we refuse to blame an entire nation for the criminal offenses of the few. 

We are being invited to be united through hatred and fear of Mexicans, of Muslims, of Native Americans, of minorities, and even to loath the timidly outspoken victims of decades old sex crimes. 

We will not live chained in the darkness of prejudice. We have wings and we are ready to fly.

“We’re All Mad Here”

“We’re All Mad Here”      Sept 16, 2018     Dr. Roger L. Ray   

click here to see the video 

“Anthem” by Leonard Cohen

The birds they sang At the break of day

Start again I heard them say
Don't dwell on what Has passed away

Or what is yet to be
Yeah the wars they will Be fought again

The holy dove She will be caught again
Bought and sold And bought again

The dove is never free
Ring the bells (ring the bells) that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering
There is a crack in everything (there is a crack in everything)
That's how the light gets in
We asked for signs The signs were sent
The birth betrayed The marriage spent
Yeah the widowhood Of every government
Signs for all to see
I can't run no more With that lawless crowd
While the killers in high places Say their prayers out loud
But they've summoned, they've summoned up A thundercloud
And they're going to hear from me
Ring the bells that still can ring...
You can add up the parts You won't have the sum
You can strike up the march There is no drum
Every heart, every heart to love will come
But like a refugee
Ring the bells that still can ring...

            My father was not much of a theologian or a philosopher but like a lot of the elders of rural Kentucky, he maintained a treasure trove of proverbs that helped him to navigate the complexities of life. Often, when faced with either the shortcomings he discovered in himself or in his very small circle of friends, he would say, “There’s only been one perfect person and they killed him.”

During my graduate school training in Biblical studies, I discovered that the narrative that described that one person as being perfect was little more than a useful fiction, still, he was enough better than his peers that they did, in fact, kill him. I cannot recall what first brought the lyrics of Leonard Cohen’s “Anthem” to my attention but the lines “Forget your perfect offering There is a crack in everything (there is a crack in everything) That's how the light gets in”caught my attention. Forget about trying to be perfect . . . more realistically, forget about trying to convince yourself or others that you are always innocent and stop with the perpetual multi-generational lie that people try to get us to repeat about our parents, “Well, they did the best that they could.” I didn’t. I could have done better. I know that my parents could have done better. The more I get to know folks, the more certain I am that their parents sure could have done better! No one does the best that they could. The only virtue to be found in that arena is if you actually want to do better rather than constantly trying to polish your alibis. 

Give up on your pretense of having done your best. . . there is a crack in everything. Everyone is broken in one way or another. The Cheshire Cat was just being frankly honest: We’re all mad here. Cohen’s “Anthem” makes the claim that the cracks are where the light comes in. I don’t want to be Pollyannaish about this. Mental illness is serious. Autism is serious. Addiction is serious. Depression is serious.

Look, folks, suicide is now in the top ten causes of death in America. You can’t just post a meme about how in Japan they repair broken vessels with gold so that the factures become the most beautiful aspect of the pottery. Folks, you are not a potted plant… ok, most of you are not a potted plant. But still, it is true that our brokenness is a part of who we are. Our failures are more instructive than our successes. I learned more about marriage from going through a divorce than I did in all of my marriage and family counseling courses. And I learned more about theology, psychology, and myself by being fired a decade ago than I learned as a post-doctoral student at Harvard. There is something very educational about failing hard. 

The mortality rate is 100%. We are all going to die somehow. Statistically, most of us will die from heart disease, cancer, or a respiratory disease. But of all of the lethal factors in the world, suicide is the only one that is actually rising on the list. Suicide is more common than death from car accidents and gun violence. So isn’t it about time we start to get really honest about where it hurts?

This is the DSM-III, the third edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. I am now almost 40 years behind since there is a DSM-V on the desk of most mental health professionals but my other primary text is over 2000 years old so I have not felt the need to update my DSM. 

When I was doing my clinical placement in a mental health center during my graduate school education, the state of Kentucky was trying to trim their mental health budget . . . a chronic problem in the field of mental health. The legislature passed a budget that would no longer pay for treatment for most of the things we were treating our clients for. So we had a long night in Bowling Green, KY in which we took out all of our files, opened our DSM’s and re-diagnosed all of our clients with something the state would pay for. 

Now, I know that sounds fraudulent, but it is as not as fraudulent as the DSM itself. This is not a physics or a math text book. Psychology is not the same as astronomy or biology. In fact, it is more like philosophy or theology. 

The DSM is not based so much on research as it is based on the collective opinions of the therapists who sit in their offices all day, talking with the people who have come to them for help. I have worked in a mental health center. I have known the therapists fairly well, and, given fifteen minutes, I could have found plausible reason to diagnose every one of them with one character disorder or another and some of them possibly with a psychosis. But then I hale from a profession in which most of the practitioners believe in invisible angels, demons, and heaven and hell so I will readily confess that my roots are dug deep in what is clearly a lack of orientation to reality. 

We are all mad here. Everyone is, if not broken, at least cracked. Sadly, many people allow themselves to become so aware of the brokenness in others and so blissfully unaware of the brokenness in themselves, that they become increasingly isolated, judging first this person and then that one, until they find themselves to be almost entirely alone.

We live in a nation of 350 million people and one of the primary sources of suffering is loneliness. That’s just crazy. 

When it comes to the issue of suicide, research gives us a few clues as to what is leading so many people down that dark path. There are reasons in many cases . . . an incurable illness, an unbearable social humiliation, or economic despair. But more often we see social isolation, we see people who don’t want to be a burden to others, people who feel that they have no worth, no purpose, they feel that they are not needed, that they don’t belong anywhere. 

Many do not have access to appropriate mental health care. Now, there are outliers, my guess is that none of this would apply to some of the high-profile cases of people like Anthony Bourdain, Kate Spade, or Robin Williams but, folks, there is not a satisfying explanation in every case. There just isn’t. Some fish just inherently always swim upstream and they don’t all make it.

But here is what I really want to say today. I have worked in mental health. I have worked in addiction treatment. From a pastoral role, I have been a counselor to people struggling with depression, with their sexual orientation, with their history of sexual and physical abuse, and, as a pastor, I have been the victim of any number of would be career executioners who were clearly suffering from paranoia, narcissism, or a borderline personality disorder. I am all in favor of greater access to mental health care, medications, and all supportive treatments but I am totally convinced that this is not the total answer nor even 10% of an answer. 

My good friend, Dr. Jim Davis, convinced me years ago through his research in positive psychology, that neither talk therapy nor anti-depressants were nearly as effective as having close friends and exercising in sun light. You should not rely on me for medical advice. As my daughter liked to tell her friends when she was little, “My daddy is a doctor but not the kind that can help anybody.” But what my friends who are experts in the field of psychology and pharmacology do tell me is that the whole universe of serotonin drugs – Prozac, Zoloft, Celexa, Lexapro, Paxil – they all have very limited effectiveness. Again, don’t stop taking them because of what you hear me saying. 

Suddenly stopping any anti-depressant can lead to a suicidal crash. But what researches have convinced me of is that taking serotonin decreases your body’s natural production of serotonin. The benefits of taking serotonin can wear off pretty quickly but then there is a serious danger of stopping because your body is not used to making it and without it, depression can fall on you like a ton of bricks.

What Jim Davis has suggested to Olympic athletes and his college students as well as his aging friends, is to get 30 minutes of vigorous exercise outdoors every day, even when it is cloudy or cold. The combination of natural light with exercise is more effective than any prescription medication for depression. I’m not talking about medications for bi-polar disorders or any psychosis, I’m talking about the popular SSRI’s that promised so much when they first came on the market 30 years ago but the simple fact of the matter is that even with billions of pills consumed in our nation, the depression rate has gone up, the suicide rate has gone up, and the happiness of our nation has not improved. 

A psychiatrist that I referred a lot of people to when I lived in Kentucky used to tell clients, you get out of depression by putting one foot in front of another, even when you don’t feel like it. The cure is not quick or easy, but you put one foot in front of the other, then you drag the other one up and plop it down in front of you. He said, “You walk your way out of depression, both figuratively and literally.” 

I’m not saying that this is a “cure all” but I am saying that it is the most effective cure. When I am trying to help a person who is depressed, I always try to arrange for us to walk together while we talk. 

David Ketchum, our associate pastor, and I try to meet once a week to talk for mutual support and coordination of our work, but we often take that time to walk together while we talk. Look at these two images:

The solitary figure on the beach might be doing exactly what I have suggested. He is out walking in nature, and there is no where I would rather be than on a beach. But when you check your feelings, looking at a solo person on the beach and a couple on a beach, your visceral reaction is quite different isn’t it? 

Take the prospect of romance out of it entirely. Just the image of walking on the beach with friends clearly is much more effective than just walking on the beach.

For that matter, take away the beach, the prospect of romance, and even take away nice weather, and you can look at this picture and realize that walking in the company of another person makes you feel better than the thought of walking alone.

That being said, I do most of my walking alone. I listen to podcasts, I work out sermons and articles in my head while I am walking alone. I don’t mean to sound like there is not much to be said for silence and solitude but I can tell you clinically that you will never find a case of suicide caused by being overly socialized. There are people I know that I sometimes have to get away from just to let my ears rest for a while, but, you know, I always go back. 

Solitary confinement is one of the most cruel forms of punishment we know of because we evolved to be in a pack, a tribe, a community. We become avoidant of other people because people can be mean, ignorant, cruel, dishonest, and abusive. But most people aren’t. Close friendship isn’t easy because it does take volumes of trust, tolerance, acceptance and sometimes sacrifice but we shouldn’t be afraid to reinvest.

I don’t have anything against therapists, psychologist, psychiatrists, counselors, or, for that matter, pharmacists, I just think it is better not to need them. 

We tell people in addiction recovery that they need to change their playthings, playmates, and playgrounds if they want to lead a sober life. If you worked your way into alcoholism by hanging out at a bar with your friends and playing cards and you think that now you are going to just go on hanging out in the same place, with the same people, doing the same things, only with a diet coke . . . well, good luck with that. After years of sobriety, maybe that can work for you but almost everyone falls back into alcoholism unless they change their playthings, playmates, and playgrounds.

I’m trying to lose weight but I don’t resent my friends who still eat bread and french fries, but I also don’t spend my days hanging out in the donut shop. If you want to be sober, spend time with sober people. If you want to have a successful marriage, make close friends who also have and want to have a successful marriage. 

If you know that you have some serious mental health issues whether that’s depression, or phobic fears, or anxiety, then, and I’m not telling you not to see a therapist or not to take medications, I’m just saying, what I know helps is to form close connections with other people who are also trying to be healthy.

On one of our recent walks, David and I were talking about finishing our current series in our adult class and getting ready for our next book. And David was a little concerned that we don’t always get around to talking about the book in our classes but we agreed that the most important part of class is getting a number of people to engage one another in serious conversation about things that matter to them. We may not be doing the book justice but we are doing one another a great deal of good. Even when it does not feel good because there are people who irritate you. 

Community building was never about finding people who agree with you on almost everything, who share your age, gender, sexual orientation, economic class, and political affiliations. Community buiding happens when you learn to love, respect, and befriend people who are not like you and who may have extremely irritating idocyncrsies that just happen to be slightly different from your extremely irritating idocyncrisies. 

The most effective prevention of suicide is not a weekly meeting with a therapist or a pill you take when you brush your teeth in the morning. 

The most effective is to have conversation partners. Not someone who is your caregiver, your emotional comfort lap dog, but a real peer, a partner, a thinking, sentient, partner in conversation who will tell you when you are full of it and who will applaud your successes. 

A.A. is comprised of pithy little wisdom sayings and one of my favorites is, “Don’t tell me how sick you’ve been; tell me how well you want to be.” You may have been diagnosed as being borderline or bi-polar, but don’t take that as a liscense to treat your family and friends badly. You may have a mood disorder and the people around you may have to try to understand that, I know people who are clearly sociopaths, I know that, but I still expect them to do the best that they can while I try to be as tolerant as I can be. Because, folks, we all need one another and we owe one another the heathiest version of ourselves that we can bring to the conversation today. Recognizing that, no matter what, we’re all mad here. 

“The Free Press”    Sept. 9, 2018                           Dr. Roger Ray, pastor

 click here to see the video 

From JFK on April 27, 1961

"No President should fear public scrutiny of his program. For from that scrutiny comes understanding; and from that understanding comes support or opposition. And both are necessary. I am not asking your newspapers to support the Administration, but I .am asking your help in the tremendous task of informing and alerting the American people. For I have complete confidence in the response and dedication of our citizens whenever they are fully informed.

I not only could not stifle controversy among your readers--I welcome it. This Administration intends to be candid about its errors; for, as a wise man once said: "An error doesn't become a mistake until you refuse to correct it." We intend to accept full responsibility for our errors; and we expect you to point them out when we miss them.

Without debate, without criticism, no Administration and no country can succeed-and no republic can survive. That is why the Athenian law-maker Solon decreed it a crime for any citizen to shrink from controversy. And that is why our press was protected by the First Amendment--the only business in America specifically protected by the Constitution--not primarily to amuse and entertain, not to emphasize the trivial and the sentimental, not to simply "give the public what it wants"--but to inform, to arouse, to reflect, to state our dangers and our opportunities, to indicate our crises and our choices, to lead, mold, educate and sometimes even anger public opinion."

                               

   

I grew up in a Christian Puritan household. You may think that you did but I can tell you, I grew up in a home where happiness was suspect and we called “Devil’s Food Cake” “white cake,” and “deviled eggs” were called “dressed eggs.” I wish that I was kidding, but I am not.

But even Puritans have to go to the grocery store and when my mother took my  brother, Billy, and me to Houchens on the way home from school, I was exposed to salacious gossip rags in the check-out lane. I don’t know that anyone in Glasgow, KY actually had what could be called an Enquiring mind, but as soon as I could read, I was reading the headlines out loud and asking my mother, “Is that true?” 

My mother didn’t have a day of college education in her background and she was not above going for a deep dive in the local gossip in the beauty shop she made us wait in every two weeks, but she looked at me as if I had been brain damaged in birth when I was drawn in by the fantastic headlines of the Enquirer. “Momma were those people really probed by aliens?” “Roger Lee, go wait in the car.” 

But the tabloids evolved into being less about movie stars, the Kennedys, and space aliens. The editors took a decidedly right-wing perspective and published outrageous lies about the political opponents of Donald Trump. You would think that when people had seen headlines about Obama being gay, about Oprah having months to live, or Bill Clinton hiring an intern with 3 breasts . . . and no, I’m not making any of that up, that even the most jaded of right-wing nuts would realize that this is not an actual source of information. 

I think, though, that they went too far when they claimed Ted Cruz was having affairs with five women. That’s just nuts. There are not five women anywhere so desperate as that. 

But you know who does take these gossip rags seriously? It is humiliating, but President Trump has not only said that they are a major news sources but that the Enquirer should receive a Pulitzer Prize. This would make Charles Darwin blush but the facts coming out now is that the Enquirer bought and killed stories about Trump’s marriage infidelities as well as what has been called a “safe full” of stories they have conspired to keep secret which might reveal his illegal connections to Russians and organized crime . . . all this while Trump has called such main stream news sources as the New York Times and CNN “fake news.”

The advent of the internet and all of the related social media platforms it has provided has done both good and bad things to the universe of journalism. On the one hand, the internet is unfiltered, preventing corporate media from censoring our news and feeding the public only what they want the public to know. But on the other hand, the internet is unfiltered, like a giant, digital, Enquirer, allowing all manner of conspiracy theories, foreign propaganda, and lunacy to appear in our Google searches as if they were all the same as legitimate journalism.

Fifteen and twenty years ago I had to lecture my college students about sources. They all, simultaneously, forgot how to use the library and refused to be guided to primary sources over secondary or tertiary sources, or sources that were not sources at all but the academic equivalent of what stands under an ordinary outhouse. We no longer have a Walter Cronkite on the TV news and we don’t have a thoroughly trustworthy Encyclopedia Britannica in the reference room of the library. 

However, fifteen years ago, if one of my students cited Wikipedia as a source in a paper, I gave them a chance to re-write the paper. Wikipedia was no more a reliable source of information than a bulletin board in college frat house. But Wikipedia has changed. They have raised their standards and have recruited an army of reliable editors of which, I am one. Face Book and Twitter are having to go through the same process of getting better at filtering out foreign propaganda, lunatic conspiracy theories, and hate mongers. 

The internet and the 24-hour news stations have changed the way that we get news. 

As recently as 10 years ago, I had almost no anonymity in the town because most people read the newspaper and people on the street recognized me from my picture in the paper. I could count on 40 to 50 thousand people reading each column that I wrote. I now meet people who tell me, “I used to love reading your columns when you wrote for the NewsLeader,” and I tell them, “I still write for the NewsLeader,” and they reply “you do?” Because no one reads the papers anymore. More people read my column from my Face Book page than read it in the city newspaper which is supposed to serve a city of nearly half a million people. Print journalism has died a rapid death.

We have called the media the “fourth estate” because they are neither voters nor elected officials. They are a disinterested party that is necessary to keep the government in check. Some very clever people came up with the title

“the fifth estate” for their 2013 movie about the explosion of influence from Wikileaks. Frankly, I think that I know as much as I want to know about Julian Assange, but I can never resist a Benedict Cumberbatch movie. But, it is an appealing idea. The corporate media have been a disinterested, neutral, free 4^thestate but lately they have gotten a little too biased . . . not as liberals or conservatives but as corporate propaganda arms. 

We need for the media to be a watchdog on the government and on corporations but both tv and print media came to rely too much on government sources and corporate dollars and so a literal fifth estate has arisen to take over some of what we once depended on newspapers to do. 

The fifth estate is not like the fourth estate. They don’t have corporate sponsors, but they also don’t have editors or anything that smacks of journalistic ethics. I am both grateful for and suspicious of Wikileaks. The Obama administration tried to mess with Assange on a personal level and Assange has struck back against an insufficiently guarded nation. He has done bad things though I think that I can understand why. 

He exposed bad things that our government was doing and our government tried to trump up fake criminal charges against him which sent him into hiding in the Ecuadorian embassy in London and from there he apparently colluded with Russia to retaliate by hurting the whole world by helping Trump into office. The fifth estate will not be easy to control so we will get both blessings and curses from it for the foreseeable future. 

The world is changing. I miss the days when newspapers were ubiquitous and the people you know around town were likely to have read the same articles you had. You could immediately launch into a conversation about current events or, more importantly, insightful opinion columns; but whether it is newspapers, television news, podcasts, or the internet, we cannot do without access to free and unbiased news reporting and we must hold ourselves up to the standard of being informed. 

When our nation was in its first decade, Thomas Jefferson wrote to a friend that if he had to choose between a nation that had a government but no newspapers or a nation with newspapers but no government, he would not hesitate to choose the later. 

But he added, people have to read the newspapers. Jefferson regularly shocked readers with his comments about how to curb government abuses. He helped to create our government and he was one of our first presidents, but he knew that governments can only be kept honest if the population remains informed. As soon as citizens refuse to read, to be informed, and to question their government, then they are holding the door open to government corruption.

It is journalism’s check against corruption that makes our current president hate the media so much. Dictators and tyrants always hate the media. Labeling the media as the enemy of the people is a phrase that was used by some of history's most vicious thugs — Robespierre, Goebbels, Lenin, Stalin, Mao — they vilify reporters and as NPR’s Scott Simon observed, many of these were often murdered.

In the middle of last month many news agencies tried to fight back against Trump’s constant reference to the media as “fake news,” and now his more serious charge that the media is the enemy of the people. This is a guy who now averages more than six lies per day in his tweets and statements, who watches Fox News and declares that the Enquirer deserves a Pulitzer and he calls the New York Times and CNN “fake news.” It would be laughable if there were not so many gullible people who fell for it. Just as the radio hate-mongers have always referenced the media as being the “liberal media.” 

Folks, TV news and newspapers are owned by for-profit corporations. They are by their very nature, extremely conservative. Honestly, it seems to me that conservatives seem to think that facts are both inconvenient and, by nature, liberal. 

They remind me of that Lily Tomlin, one woman show, the Search for Intelligent Life in the Universe, in which Tomlin plays a schizophrenic homeless woman who believes that she is talking to space aliens. . .

Trying to explain to them the difference between a can of soup and an Andy Warhol painting of a can of soup: This is soup, this is art…..

No, art is not soup, soup is not art,

This is soup, and this is art.

I’m trying to tell people: This is news, and this is uninformed hysteria.

This one helps you to make good decisions, this one makes you the crazy uncle at Thanksgiving. 

4^thEstate – Twilight Zone. Critical thinking – zombies eat your brains.

The founders of our nation were rebels and non-conformists. It took them eleven years to write a constitution and even then only eleven of the colonies were willing to ratify it. Two years later, they drafted 12 amendments, a bill of rights, in order to assuage the fears and doubts of Rhode Island, and North Carolina. It was the bill of rights that united the 13 colonies into the United States of America.

The first of those amendments offers indisputable protection to the rights of freedom of religion, an individual’s freedom of speech, a free press, and the right to assemble to protest the government. 

The church and the news media are the only two institutions named in the constitution and bill of rights as being specifically protected from government interference. 

We are protected from government regulation because we are deemed to be vital to the maintenance of a democracy but only if we both speak truth to power, only if we both strive to keep the citizenry informed about both current events and moral deliberation about those events. 

Profit driven news media gave Donald Trump disproportional attention in 2016 because he was shocking, comical, and controversial and that drove viewers and readers. Churches with educated, progressive clergy, were nearly silent out of fear of alienating any of their precious donors. And with the media and the church simultaneously fail to do what they were given constitutional protections to do, you end up with a tyrant. So I have a modest proposal:

Get up, stand up, stand up for your rights. . .