Small Things and Simple Pleasures

This past week my work was extremely stressful. I felt, as I often do these days, that my responsibilities far outstrip by capacities to meet them. I feel beholden to my colleagues, my students, my friends and family members. I worry. I pray, I meditate, I remind myself of all my blessings, and then I worry some more. Sleep can elude me and I come to the end of the day and the week physically and emotionally spent.

While the nature of my work does not really end when the weekend begins, there is something about Friday that allows me to let down. However this week seemed extra special. When I came home last night my wife had cooked a simple meal: hot dogs, fresh corn, and beans and tomatoes from a friend’s garden. Not elegant, simple – yet so refreshing and delightful.

Then on Saturday morning as I often do, I got on my bike for a long ride along the Schuylkill River Trail and then off into the hills north and west of the river. In the beginning the air was clear and fresh, and lots of people were out walking, running, rollerblading and biking. The sun was bright but not harsh, and when I happened to ride through a shaded area, it was cool and invigorating. As often happens when I take my morning rides, I felt  sluggish at first and somewhat out-of-sorts, but after a few miles the endorphins kicked in and I felt alive and at times almost euphoric. At about mile 16 I was going up a long hill and though my legs had to work there was a rush at just being alive. At mile 28 I bent low and pumped my legs on a long straight stretch, and was aware of how fortunate I was to be strong and healthy enough to feel the rush that comes in such moments.When I finished after 32 miles, I felt tired but complete.

Part of the stress of my week is normal work stuff, some is related to changes taking place in my job leading to feelings of uncertainty, and a lot of it comes from considering the state of the world: the violence, the cold-hearted hatred of some leaders, the desperation of migrants seeking refuge and rescue, the poor state of our educational systems especially for the poor, and wars all over the globe. I wonder, as did many a psalmist where God is in all of this, is there any reason for hope, is there any point in trying to change things, and no clear answer comes. So I need these moments of simple pleasure not to escape these other things, but to balance them out.

As I rode my bike I was reminded of some advice the poet Ranier Marie Rilke gave to a young protégé in his classic work,  Letters to a Young Poet, where he describes what Buddhist writers call “mindfulness”, that attention to the wonder of ordinary things and taken-for-granted pleasures. He wrote:

Here in this vast landscape, swept by the winds and sea, I wonder if there is any person anywhere who can answer the questions that stir in the depths of your being. For even the best miss the mark when they use words for what is elusive and nearly unsayable. But nonetheless, I believe you are not left without a solution, if you turn to things like those that are refreshing my eyes. If you ally yourself with nature, with her sheer existence, with the small things that others overlook and that so suddenly can become huge and immeasurable; if you have this love for what is plain and try very simply, as one who serves, to win the confidence of what seems poor: then everything will become easier for you, more coherent, and somehow more reconciling, perhaps not in your conscious mind, but in your innermost awareness.

Small things and simple pleasures are always available, if I simply take time to note them and then take them in.

[Photos taken by the author]

The Myth of Redemptive Violence

As we approach Veterans Day (Nov. 11), I am moved to reflect on another year in which our nation has been involved in the Iraq war with no resolution in sight, and now is threatening to attack Iran to involve us into yet another conflict. Meanwhile wars of various intensities go on between forces in Sudan, Palestine/Israel, Turkey/Kurdistan, Pakistan, and many other places. Theologian and political scientist Reinhold Niebuhr (Children of Light, Children of Darkness; Moral Man and Immoral Society;, The Nature and Destiny of Man) said that such conflicts are inevitable and necessary because nations, like individuals, are inherently self-centered, and therefore can only be restrained from forcing the will and way on other nations by the threat and use of violence. Niebuhr, who was a pacifist early in his career as a pastor and activist with autoworkers in Detroit, rejected pacifism as impractical and unrealistic in a spiritually fallen world. However, the pacifism of Niebuhr’s day had not been informed by Gandhi’s concept of satygraha (truth-force), nor had it seen the incredible power of nonviolence used in the U.S. Civil Rights movement or the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa. The pacifism of Niebuhr’s day was passive, calling for nonresistance and nonintervention in issues of social injustice. It did not engage injustice or violence; it simply avoided it.

In contrast theologian Walter Wink has called this perspective on the inevitability of violence, the “myth of redemptive violence.” In short the myth of redemptive violence states “that violence saves, that war brings peace, that might makes right. It is one of the oldest continuously repeated stories in the world” (The Powers That Be, p. 42). Wink goes on to point out that this myth is repeated and reinforced in Greek myth, in Saturday morning cartoon shows, in shows like “24” and movies like “Diehard” and in any number of religious texts including the Bible. It is also the ideology of most governments, including our own. Wink concludes: “In short the Myth of Redemptive Violence is the story of the victory of order over chaos by means of violence. It is the ideology of conquest, the original religion of the status quo. The gods favor those who conquer. Conversely, whoever conquers must have the favor of the gods” (p. 48).

The problem is that violence and war give birth to resentment, oppression and eventually more violence and war. The wars mentioned above all were birthed out of previous wars. World War I planted the seeds of World War II, which gave birth to the Cold War, which birthed numerous small “hot wars,” including Korea and Vietnam, which led to our involvement in suppressing countries in the Middle East, which led to 9/11, which led to Iraq and potentially Iran. Now while this analysis is admittedly simplistic, it does illustrate my point: war does not and has not brought peace or order, but rather quite the opposite. Despite the overarching acceptance of the myth of redemptive violence, there have been a few exceptions to this pattern, such as Gandhi’s movement to throw off British rule in the 1940’s, the U.S. Civil Rights movement, and the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa, all of which used assertive non-violence to fight oppression and injustice rather than war. South Africa took the process to the logical, but rarely tried, next step with the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in which whites, Boers, and Africans, oppressors and oppressed, went before the nation to tell their stories, confess their crimes and seek national reconciliation. Instead of hiding one’s crimes and injustice behind a patriotic violence as a “just cause,” the South Africans confessed their crimes and have achieved national reconciliation and healing to an unprecedented degree.

No doubt as we approach Veterans Day we will hear a great deal about how soldiers past and present have “fought for our freedom” as Americans. I would only ask how much freer we feel for having engaged in all our many wars. The notion that fighting a war in Iraq somehow preserves my freedom as an American shows the utter absurdity of the myth of redemptive violence. In this time when war is enshrined, I hope that in our more sober moments we see the myth of redemptive violence for what it is, and seek a better way.