Spiritual Common Sense

“Remember, democracy never lasts long,” John Adams, America’s second president, wrote.  “It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself.  There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.”

I can’t help wondering if this process has begun and what, if anything, we can do to turn it around.

This comes from one who has spent his lifetime serving this country – in the military, at the U. S. Senate, and in the community through various charities and books written to teach and promote the values at the heart of America. 

Now, despite my best efforts, I fear all is lost.  The dogs of division have been released and are running wild.  The unthinkable seems almost inevitable.

My concern comes from watching what’s happening around us, the daily drumbeat of disasters on the news, and thinking about them in the context of lessons I learned from two survivors of the holocaust – two people who were dear to me:  Viktor Frankl and Henri Landwirth.

At the time, I didn’t see how the horrors they lived through could ever be repeated here.  It is increasingly clear we ignore that possibility at our peril. 

Gregory Stanton, the founder of Genocide Watch, has identified the stages that can cause decent people to commit indecent acts.  He says it starts when a one group defines another as “the other.”  “They” are said to threaten “our” interests.  Discrimination and dehumanization follow, eroding the in-group’s empathy for the other group.

This leads to increased polarization and the belief that – “You are either with us or against us.”  Then true believers are asked to demonstrate their commitment.  “Enemies” are identified.  Leaders of the opposition are targeted.  Death lists are made.  Weapons are stockpiled.  Physical segregation is enforced.  “We” don’t want to live anywhere near “them,” the in-group says.  The out-group is forced into ghettos or concentration camps.  There they are easily targeted, and the massacres and mass murders can begin.

We are not there at the moment; but we are not far from there.  You can see it bubbling up on the streets, seeping up through the sidewalk, and in the great undercurrents and tides of hate flowing back and forth just below the surface.

Let me be clear.  This is not about one side or the other.  For those who may think I am talking to the left or the right, get over it.  A reaction of that nature is just one more manifestation of how divided we have become.  It’s not about “them.”  It’s about us.

No one is exempt.  We all have to recognize our responsibility for the world we are living in.

Take a moment and consider that.  Have you ever seen our society so polarized?  Have you lost friends for political reasons?  Are there people you used to talk to that you now avoid?  When your family and friends gather are there places you just don’t go?  Do you get your information from a single source, or can you switch channels back and forth without getting aggravated by what you hear?

It’s hard to tell whether the acrimony we see in our political system is a cause or an effect.  What is clear is that each side of the political divide believes the other side is evil.  Both sides see the coming election as existential.  Neither side believes it can live with other side’s success.  If the election is close, neither side will accept the outcome without question. 

Inevitably, in that case, the divide will become larger and deeper.  This is a recipe for disaster.  It will take us to a dark place the likes of which we have never seen in our country’s history.

But there is a light in the darkness.  It begins with the recognition that we have a choice, that America is more “bottom up” than “top down”, and that this country will be whatever we are. 

The responsibility is ours, not theirs.  The solution to all the problems we see on the national level starts locally on the personal level with our love and respect for each other, the acceptance of those with differing views, and our denial of the forces that would separate and divide us from one another.  

When I was young, I had a running argument with my father. Dad was a simple, straightforward man with firm principles and unyielding values. He believed in hard work and straight talk. There were no shades of grey in Dad’s world. Right was right. Wrong was wrong. There was nothing in between.

To my young eyes, my father was a too rigid. I tried my best to make my case, telling him things were never that simple. Good and evil were antiquated concepts out of the Old Testament, untethered from the day-to-day reality of our modern lives. Like any budding lawyer, I knew there were always extenuating circumstances.

It took a while for me to realize I was wrong. I came to that understanding about the same time I realized I didn’t want to be a lawyer. Instead, I immersed myself in the well of goodness that is at the heart of American and surrounding myself with the best people I could find.

Forty years later, I know that is the best decision I ever made. The best thing about my life is the quality of my friends. I am truly blessed.

While I have encountered my share of bad actors along the way – and even investigated a few while I was working for the Senate – I have never seen the face of pure evil until now.

Until now, my experience with evil was always second hand, coming largely from conversations with friends mentors who had seen the face of evil up close. Two of these people, Viktor Frankl and Henri Landwirth, were among the most important men in my life.

Henri and Viktor were both survivors of the holocaust. Through the years, we talked extensively about their experiences in the concentration camps – virtually every time we were together. I pressed these conversations in large part because I was having such a hard time getting my head around the reality of horrors they experienced. How could people treat other people that way? Even now, it is difficult to believe human beings are capable of such atrocities.

Thanks to Mr. Putin that is no longer is in doubt. Now, for the first time in our lives many of us are confronted with the reality of evil on a massive scale. Now we see it. It is inescapable. Now we know. It is there before us in the all too vivid images on our television screens every moment of the day, every day of the week, every image more horrid, more heartbreaking that the last. We don’t want to see it, but we can’t look away.

Evil is no longer abstract, supernatural, and distant, divorced from our everyday lives. We now know evil has a human face. One man, for his own reasons or no reason at all, has unleashed the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse – conquest, war, famine, and death. The stain he leaves dishonors the Russian people and now permeates every segment of our existence.

For those who have been inclined to make excuses for President Putin in the past, let this be the end of that. The mask has been removed. We see him for what he is. If there was any doubt before, we now know there is a monster among us.

But that knowledge is not enough. We must understand where it leads. We must understand there is nothing this man will not do. The lives of other people mean nothing to him. He will not be dissuaded from continuing to crush civilian centers. He will not stop tearing lives apart and killing women and children.

We must understand such evil will not be restrained. It has no limits. Putin will not be deterred from using chemical weapons or even nuclear power by the universal condemnation it would bring. He is a pariah – in the world but not of the world. He could care less what we think.

The hard truth is that the only restraint on Putin is the knowledge that if he uses nuclear power, nuclear power will be used on him and targeted at him. Millions will perish, if it comes to that, but inescapably he knows he will be among them.

For Viktor Frankl, one of the benefits – if you can call it that – of living through the holocaust was the opportunity to prove his mentor, Sigmund Freud, wrong. Freud wrote and believed that under extreme stress and peril human beings would all revert to basic instincts.

“Freud was spared the concentration camps,” Viktor told me. “But those of us who were there saw diversity not uniformity. People revealed their true selves – the saints and the swine.”

Outgunned and outmanned, here is where the Ukrainian people have the advantage. People will admire their courage, dignity, and honor long after Putin has faded from the world stage.

We will remember the compassion of Ukraine’s neighbors.

We will remember the way a divided world has come together in response to Putin’s atrocities.

We will remember the way hundreds of thousands have responded to one man’s evil intent.

We will remember their love and kindness.

We will ever be reminded that even though evil has a human face, so do empathy, mercy, courage, and compassion.

The great overarching lesson in all this is that the worst of us reveals the best of us.

I chose not to attend my high school graduation ceremony, eager to head for Washington, D.C. where I had a summer job at the U. S. Senate.  Though it was not a conscious decision at the time, it is clear now I was making a clean break with my past.  I still think of the Rockies as home, but I never went back.

The separation was so complete I don’t remember – if I ever knew – who spoke to my graduating class.  Instead, I marked my transition to college and the real world by reading essays from Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.  This I remember clearly because one passage has always stayed with me and informed my life.

“As life is action and passion,” Holmes said, “it is required of a man that he should share the passion and action of his time, at peril of being judged not to have lived.”

Holmes’ observation came from the perspective of a civil war veteran injured three times in battle, a Harvard law professor, an Associate Justice of the U. S. Supreme Court for 30 years, and the oldest man to have ever served on the Court.  Clearly, he had “walked the talk” and lived “fully.”  I resolved to follow his example and embrace life.

A few years later, Doc English, my favorite teacher in law school, telegraphed another change of directions when he told me I probably would not make a good lawyer.  “You are smart enough,” he said, “but you have an overdeveloped sense of justice.”  It wasn’t meant as a compliment.

A Philadelphia lawyer with years of trial experience, Doc knew what he was talking about.  It took me several years, including a year clerking with a law firm, to figure out he was right.

These things – my overdeveloped sense of justice and my desire to share in the action and passion of my time – led me to the Mall for the culmination of Dr. King’s March on Washington.  The March on Washington was an unprecedented event.  I wanted to show my support and be part of it.

The collective memory of this event focuses on Martin Luther King and his powerful words, but the moment wasn’t so defined at the time.  King was one 18 speakers assembled for the occasion.  All of them had something to say.  It took history to show us King said it best.

My strongest memory of the moment, then and now, was not what the speakers had to say but the spirit of the occasion.  Everyone there knew we were part of something important, something special and transcendent.   The silent witness provided by the peaceful presence of so many people seeking justice spoke eloquently to the collective conscience of America, challenging us to live up our ideals.

The other indelible memory of the event was that it was permeated by fear.  The potential for violence was almost palpable.  Embedded in all that and perhaps feeding it was the unstated understanding that things were changing.  For most people, particularly those who embraced this change, Dr. King was a hero, a prophet who signaled the direction.  But some saw him differently.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) was concerned enough by the march and Dr. King’s speech to step up their investigations of the Southern Christian Leadership Council and target King specifically as an enemy of the State.  Speaking for the FBI, William C. Sullivan, head of Bureau’s intelligence operations, said, “We must mark him now, if we have not done so before, as the most dangerous Negro of the future in this Nation from the standpoint of communism, the Negro, and national security.   Prominent politicians lead by Senator Strom Thurmond were quick to agree and launched an attack on the March, labeling it Communist.

This animosity did not go away quickly.  When Dr. King was assassinated five years later, I was in law school.  I had just met my favorite law professor and was about to be drafted for Vietnam.  I watched as much of Washington went up in flames.  I remember seeing the smoke from the steps of the Capitol.  No one knew where it would lead or how it would end.

The elevator talk that day was all about Dr. King’s assassination and the tragic events it triggered.  On one of my runs, a passenger heard the discussion and held back.  After everyone else had cleared, he said, “It was about time somebody killed that son-of-a-bitch.”  In shock, I watched Senator Strom Thurmond walk off my elevator and head down the hall.

This Senator went on to be re-elected repeatedly. They named roads and buildings after him. Near the end of his career the entire Senate turned out to honor him at a dinner in the Capitol where people who should have known better hailed him as one of the Senate’s icons.

When I look back over the course of what is now fifty years, I see a lot of change. But I know a lot remains.  George Floyd made that clear.   

If anything, we are more divided now than then. At times like this, at times of turmoil, risk, and division, it’s worth remembering that America is always a work in progress and we must recognize that in the battle between love and hate, apathy is the enemy. 

If we truly want justice, if we want America to live up to her promise, if we stand with Dr. King and share his dream, we must make it happen.  We must be the change we seek.  Ultimately, America is and will always be whatever we are.

      What is the indispensable ingredient of life?

What is the most potent force in the universe?

Where can we find the solution to all our personal problems?

Where can we find the solution to the problems of the world?

What is our greatest gift?

How is God manifested in our lives?

There is only one answer.  The answer is Love.

Such is the design of the universe, that the only way to have love is to give it.

It is the one thing we can never get enough of and the one thing we can never give enough of. 

For it is in loving and giving that we find the meaning and purpose for our lives. 

This is the lesson of the season; the lesson mankind has long been taught, but yet to fully learn.

We are here to love one another.

History remembers John Adams as our first Vice President and America’s second president. He was on the drafting committee for the Declaration of Independence and argued eloquently for its passage.  After July 4, 1776, Adams traveled to France, where he proved instrumental in winning French support for our war of independence.

So it is something more than ironic that twenty-five years later, Adams expressed concern for the viability of the Republic he helped create.

“Remember, democracy never lasts long,” he said, “it soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.”

I find myself wondering if this process has begun. With every passing day, our country seems more divided and, as we all know, a house divided against itself cannot stand.

If we are honest, most of us will admit we have friends or relatives whose political persuasions trouble us. Many of us “shut down” conversations with these people because we are uncomfortable with where these conversations might lead. We find ourselves wondering how these good and decent people could be so lost and misguided without considering the possibility that they might be looking back through the looking glass and wondering the same thing about us.

Anyone bothering to check knows that those who watch Fox’s news, the largest cable outlet, get a totally different view of the world than those who watch MSNBC, the second largest network. These networks and others present alternative universes. They have alternative concerns, alternative facts, and alternative realities, while the algorithms that govern the social media we use are designed to tell us what we want hear, reinforce our pre-existing beliefs, and present nothing that challenges them. No wonder half the population thinks the other half is crazy.

At its core, this behavior reflects a loss of our sense of humility – the most misunderstood and least appreciated Biblical virtue. It symptom of a potentially lethal combination of ignorance and arrogance.

In 1944, Judge Learned Hand, the most distinguished jurist of his time, spoke to more than a million people gathered in Central park. The event was billed as “I Am An American Day” and focused on the 150,000 newly naturalized citizens included in the audience.

“We have gathered here to affirm a faith,” Hand told them, “a faith in a common purpose, a common conviction, a common devotion. Some of us have chosen America as the land of our adoption; the rest have come from those who did the same.

“What do we mean when we say that first of all we seek liberty? Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can even do much to help it. While it lies there, it needs no constitution, no law, no court to save it.

“And what is this liberty which must lie in the hearts of men and women? It is not the ruthless, the unbridled will; it is not freedom to do as one likes. That is the denial of liberty, and leads straight to its overthrow. A society in which men recognize no check upon their freedom soon becomes a society where freedom is the possession of only a savage few; as we have learned to our sorrow.

“What then is the spirit of liberty? I cannot define it; I can only tell you my own faith.

“The spirit of liberty is the spirit which is not too sure that it is right; the spirit of liberty is the spirit which seeks to understand the mind of other men and women; the spirit of liberty is the spirit which weighs their interests alongside its own without bias; the spirit of liberty remembers that not even a sparrow falls to earth unheeded; the spirit of liberty is the spirit of Him who, near two thousand years ago, taught mankind that lesson it has never learned but never quite forgotten; that there may be a kingdom where the least shall be heard and considered side by side with the greatest.”

That is our challenge. If our democracy is to survive, the spirit of liberty must be kept alive.   It’s not something anyone can do for us. It is something we must do for ourselves.