a bit of a dream for advocacy
Posted on October 25, 2007 by Geoff Matheson
Filed Under Crazy Idealism, Emerging Questions
“If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even ’sinners’ love those who love them. 33And if you do good to those who are good to you, what credit is that to you? Even ’sinners’ do that. 34And if you lend to those from whom you expect repayment, what credit is that to you? Even ’sinners’ lend to ’sinners,’ expecting to be repaid in full. 35But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked. 36Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.”
- Luke 6: 32-36
I know that I said I was finished with the feminism conversation for the time being, but stick with me, that’s not what this is primarily all about. But in interacting with that discussion there were two, fairly obvious and unsurprising general trends:
- The strongest, loudest pro-feminist voices were primarily women
- The most reluctant voices with regards to feminism were from men
I realise that about now you’re wanting to award me the Nobel Prize for Pointing-Out-The-Blatantly-Obvious, but stop being so rude and let me finish. What if we, as followers of the man who spoke the words in the quote above, chose to live to a higher standard? What if our most passionate responses came in defence of causes that cannot benefit ourselves? This isn’t a potshot at those in either category 1 or 2 above - that’s just how I got here. But what if we passionately got behind the issues that mean letting go of our own control.
Imagine if the church’s loudest feminists were men? If the loudest advocates for the poor came from financially prosperous backgrounds? If the advocates for Aboriginal Australians came from the white people? What if we were able to give up the causes that could benefit ourselves the most, in place of those which benefited us the least?
OK, now if you’re willing to put up with one more rhetorical question: what if the loudest voices for improving homosexual rights came from the Christians who believed that homosexuality is a sin? What a church that might be.
About Geoff Matheson
Geoff is a 23 year old database administrator who has birthed amateurtheology.org from some crazy thoughts he had early one Monday morning. Geoff does his best to sound lots smarter than he actually is. He also runs some youth stuff at Yarra Valley Vineyard, and he is married to the very lovely Rebecca.
Geoff's site: http://www.geoffreport.com/wp/
Comments
18 Responses to “a bit of a dream for advocacy”
Leave a Reply
I’m not sure if that’s necessarily a dream that I think is worth attaining.
People advocate for things based on that fire burning within… and largely, that fire at one time or another, has burnt the person who feels it.
Advocacy without empathy risks being passionless and becoming an exercise in what we should speak up for, rather than an outworking of what we unequivocally stand up for.
If the richest were truly the greatest advocates for the poor, I don’t think they’d be able to last very long as the richest and still speak with any integrity.
The best biblical example that comes close, is Jesus. But he didn’t merely advocate. He became the very creature that he would later advocate to save.
Was your dream about advocacy increasing empathy? If it was, then I think you’ve got it around the wrong way. “For out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks.”
-Paul.
I find it difficult to know how to respond to this point. “Crazy Idealism” is right - it is not human nature to speak for something that doesn’t affect us. In the current state of prosperity and selfishness “Crazy Idealism” is a fantasy. And yet as Christians we are called, in the plainest and strongest possible terms, as in the above passage, to protect those who dislike us. Of course defending their equality is only part of this, but is the subject in question. So.
Personally I don’t think homosexual people have it that bad in this country. I mean there are plenty of people who hate them, but they do have the same rights as other people. They are allowed to be gay if they want.
By contrast illegal refugees have their human rights trampled more than terror suspects. Christians should be speaking out for these people of their own volition (I include terror suspects in that). It is for us to think of new and creative ways to better others, and not always be advancing our own position in the world. If we do that we have not obeyed God, and by inference, do not love Him.
Interesting thoughts Reinhard. I stopped short of giving examples of things that I think need to be advocated more strongly than others. Even if your thoughts are 100% correct and God himself gives you the thumbs up in terms of your practical application of scripture, it’s still going to be a highly subjective topic for those participating here. I think we’re best avoiding comparatives like gay rights versus justice for asylum seekers.
If anything, that just dilutes the discussion. It does point out the obvious though. You quite clearly advocate for the cause for which you have more empathy.
This is what I don’t understand about your idea Geoff. You’d be hard pressed to find a Westerner who is serving their self-interest by having a heart for the poor and the oppressed from which they give these people a voice. I still maintain that advocacy is motivated by empathy even when self-interest isn’t a factor.
On that basis, I don’t understand your point. Are you asking me to advocate for things before I develop an empathy for the cause? If that’s the case then I don’t think I can do it. I would just be meaningless, passionless words. If you’re asking me to start to find some empathy for things that don’t serve my interests, I think I’m eager to do that… but to avoid feeling hypocritical, for me, advocacy would have to come second to letting the plight of another person change my heart so that my words could have some integrity and value.
I guess my presupposition was that most people don’t advocate for things because there’s a tangible benefit to themselves. My hope would be that they advocate because they feel a sense of conviction or maybe just have a rationale that says “this is the right thing to take a stand for”.
I think your example about men arguing for feminism and vice-versa threw me a bit because no one ever really comes into that particular debate without some bias. I’ll advocate against oppression on the grounds of gender because it’s the right thing to do.
Without wanting to be too scandalous, I’m just wondering whether preferring to advocate for the things that help us the least is missing the point? In the convenience-based culture that we live in, I’d certainly like to be pursuing a moral conscience for things that don’t affect my consumption of those conveniences, or for injustices that I’ll be unlikely to ever personally encounter.
I think that’s important. In fact, anything less than an active willingness to engage like that makes us the small-minded Western consumer. I’m all for that willingness and I’m all for exploring things that we don’t get any kickbacks from.
I guess I’d just like to be doing that because I’m interested in looking out for what’s morally right in the world. The idea that we should “advocate the strongest when there isn’t a sense of self-interest involved”, for me just pushes upon being unrealistic.
True empathy naturally creates within us an emotional self-interest for the cause, even if it’s a really nice kind of self-interest to have. So, at least for me, to argue without self-interest or without bias, is to be devoid of empathy and to be advocating in a passionless vacuum. Read my last comment again in that light and I think you’ll get more of a feel for what I was trying to say.
OK, well that’s pretty much where we disagree. I’m of the opinion that it’s a little naive to think that self-interest doesn’t have a part to play (I don’t think it’s most of the story, but a part) in people’s decision-making around what they yell the loudest about. But I’m happy to leave it at disagreeing.
Maybe we are on the same page after all.
My hope that people don’t advocate based on self-interest is because it definitely has a part to play. So, my rationale is based on not fighting that reality but consciously choosing to overcome it as best we can.
If the aim of your crazy ideal was to remove self-interest from the equation, then that’d explain why I’d find the idea knocking me off my precarious little perch. For me, having the right kind of self-interest is a precursor for being the sacrificial advocate that I think you’re talking about.
Thanks for your post, 2 things strike me…
1) is the way this reflects the nature of God, how God relates to God and ourselves in a way that exists for the benefit of others rather than for ourselves - it’s the classic but poignant idea that Jesus was equal with God but he didn’t hold onto his equality, he gave it up his status freely.
2) this also reminds me about belief and action. We may say that our belief is that men and women are equal but if we don’t do anything about it then really our lack of action reflects our true belief. What we do reflects what we believe rather than what we say. Jesus did not just talk a good game about emptying himself somehow of his status he actually did it.
Interesting discussion - I just want to pick up on one thing…I don’t entirely agree that empathy must precede action. Empathy often develops OUT OF action - it is by being exposed to “the Other” - to other individuals, their life experiences, their realities etc - that one develops empathy. If we were only ever motivated by empathy, rather than boring old intellectual conviction or even guilt, then the world would be a sad place indeed. “Meaningless, passionless words” (VirtuallyPaul’s words) are better than no words at all. Further, I don’t believe that it’s possible to remain “devoid of empathy and to be advocating in a passionless vacuum” for long when you are actually engaged with the subject of your advocacy.
I feel very strongly about this because in Christian circles, I constantly hear the refrain that “oh, that’s your thing…I’m just not interested in the poor/refugees/the environment. Everyone’s interested in different things, and that’s ok.” Jesus commanded that we follow him - he didn’t say “oh, follow me if you feel like it, if you’re moved to, if you’re passionate about it.” Costly discipleship entails doing things when they don’t feel good, when we’re not particularly interested in or passionate about doing them.
None of the above should be read to suggest that God doesn’t move us in particular directions - I certainly believe God does, and I think God places particular burdens and passions on our hearts. What I’m arguing against is the idea that it’s ok not to act if we don’t feel particularly passionate about acting. Too often the idea that empathy and passion must precede action are used as an excuse for inaction.
Gee… it looks like this one is almost all chatted out. I find the tension between the idiology of altruism vs enligtened self interest very interesting. Fundamentalists tend to call enlightened self interest “humanism” and mean that its evil. Others may call altruism ‘unrealistic’ and ESI ‘honest’.
I can no more be bothered writing, than you can be bothered reading a long discourse on motivaional psychology… but I think its fair to say that the difference between enlightened self interest and pure altruism is mostly a matter of how deep you dig when you look at your driving motivation.
At the heart of empathy is the idea of simulating in oneself the emotion of another. In that sense advocacy based on empathy is a direct, emotionally focused application of the concept “do unto others as you would have done unto you”
Advocacy based on principle without emotion is the same thing approached through thought instead of feeling… but both are based on who we wish to be, and how we wish to be treated. Western Dichotomous thinking leads us to conclude incorrectly that self-interest, and care for others are opposing ideas. When we understand self in community, and even as in some indigenous cultures, self in country, then caring for one is caring for the other.
To me the failing of christians to advocate justice first and morality second is a syptom of our desire to control and conform the world to the image of our churches. We should, undoubtedly be the greatest advocates of liberty and freedom, of hope, peace, and sustainability. Instead we are, on the face of it, coniving, political, and advocates of control and restriction.
First came the freedom to sin, then came the freedom to choose Christ and die to sin. Without liberty there could be no grace.
that’s a little odd… the text is in my comment above, but its not showing up. Any thoughts geoff?
Here’s what I think Tim. Taking the commandment that we should “love our neighbour as we love ourselves”, we can take two valuable “things to do”. To love ourselves, and to love people who aren’t ourselves. And I reckon that the vast majority of things pertaining to this commandment that we do is about loving ourselves rather than loving others. So while self interest and caring for others aren’t necessarily opposing ideas - the things that benefit other people the most, often cost us something.
Sure but how does it stack up agains the real cost of not caring?
See I guess the point of “enlightened self-interest” is that it goes a little bit beyond the old “monkey-see, monkey-do” of primative human behaviour.
It makes the possibly eroneous assumption that we’re able to look outside the exact moment we’re living in, and plan for the future, and for eachother.
Its why I’ll be voiting green (labour)… because I believe that paying the cost of caring at the expense of fiscal comfort, will ultimately improve my experience of life as an Australian Citizen. Its not because I’m a flag waving, union backing, blue collar factory worker. Shhh.
It makes the assumption that quality of life can have as much to do with conscience and ideology as it does to do with our ability to afford comfortable couches.
I’m going to brew up a post on why I believe ‘ESI’ is not only a good idea, but also a responsibility, and why I believe its a theologically viable approach to living. You can put it under crazy idealism, and we can shoot me down in flames ;o).
But serioussly, I really like this poat, and the discussion it has stimulated so Well Done! (Get Bec to give you a nice sloppy kiss from me)
you must be! I don’t even know where you are! What? huh? hang on… you’re supposed to argue with me… where’s the fun in that? hehe
[...] A bit of a dream for Advocacy [...]