Worth Dying For?

I was listening to a podcast the other day (It’s called Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History, and if you have any interest at all in human nature or war history, I would highly recommend it). At the beginning of the very first episode I listened to, he asked the question “What would you die for?” 

As this is a fairly typical question, echoed in other forms as ‘until you know what you would die for, you’re not really living’ and so on, it is something that I’ve thought about in since I was a teenager. This contemplation was also probably sparked around the time of the Columbine shootings. As a teenager, the things on my list were straightforward and idealistic. The first three items, for instance, would have been something like: Faith, Family and Freedom. It could’ve been one of those rustic country signs that are so popular for fans of Magnolia Farms. And the things on that list are pretty standard. They are also extremely vague.

As a sidenote, I rather romantically wanted to add Love to that list, but even as a teenager, I never was that romantic. I mean, what is the point of being in love if one of you is going to die right away? That loved and lost stuff is nonsense. Anyway, moving on…

As I’ve grown older, I’ve come to recognize, at least to a point, that I couldn’t possibly know the truth of what I’d be willing to die for unless I was put in the position of actually dying for it. This has nothing to do with bravery or even, I think, resolve, as the brain has an amazingly selfish desire for self-preservation. Some circumstances might make it possible for me to give up my life, but I don’t know if throwing myself into a hail of bullets in order to protect someone, or something, would actually be possible. For example, I was in Guatemala when someone lit a string of firecrackers outside the women’s bathroom, where I was showering. I was crouched down on the tile floor before I even really registered what the noise was.

Currently, I suppose my list would be much like many people’s. It’s a little less vague, but not much more developed. I would die to protect members of my family, or rather than renouncing my faith, and I’m certain there are cases where I would die rather than submit to some form of evil ideology. There are other circumstances as well that are harder to define. I was willing to die when I went to work in Iraq. To be honest, something of the danger made that trip that much more exciting, and I don’t know exactly what made that choice so clear to me. In the normal course of the day, I’m not willing to die in order to do my job. But then again, it isn’t normally asked nor expected either.

So think about it for a moment. Wherever you are in life, whatever is most important to you at this time, what would you considering worth dying for?

After you’ve thought about it and made your list, here is the follow up question that he asked, which intrigued me even more. Having already thought about this second question before I wrote the section above may have changed my own answer to the first questions by proxy. It was just that powerful. His second question was this: What happens when the things on your list clash? In other words, what things on your list would you sacrifice to protect other things on your list?

For example, if you say you would die for freedom, what would you sacrifice in order to secure that freedom? What if it wasn’t just your life you were risking in your fight? What if your choice to fight put your family in danger, or made them exiles? Would you sacrifice your home and your family’s lives for that same freedom that you would risk your own life to protect?

At what point, do the items on your first list begin to outweigh one another, and at what point do you draw the line?

This made me think. As Americans we are obsessed with the idea of freedom. Everyone’s freedom looks different, which makes it hard to pin down, and that’s why I call it an idea rather than a fact. In America, we have freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom to act as we want, to travel where we want, to live where we want, freedom in person and in business, to the point that the idea of dying for freedom is sort of a national catchphrase. But what would I sacrifice to keep say my freedom to choose my own profession? If the alternative was a life in prison, or financial punishment, or consequences for my family, would I be willing to fight the idea that the government could tell me where and how I should work? Would I be willing to lose my life just so I can work where I want? I think not.

And that is where it becomes especially interesting. Because freedom, in the modern age, is unlikely to be lost all at once. Unless we were to be taken over by a neighboring country, say Canada suddenly decided to invade and enslave all Americans. In that case, all freedom would be at risk and fighting and dying would seem a reasonable alternative to simply watching the world be overturned. Also the amount of emotion and turmoil in such an invasion would fire up those sentiments of ‘live free or die’. But what if the world is overturned slowly? That’s harder to imagine, because it’s nearly impossible to visualize what the grinding away of any one aspect of freedom looks like and the course it will take. It’s harder still to make a particular stand and draw a certain line when you aren’t entirely sure if it is worth upsetting the status quo. To make it slightly easier, take for example, the idea that one day freedom of speech is taken away all by itself. People would be outraged, certainly, but is that one simple piece of freedom something I personally would be willing to die for all on its own? Are there more important things? And if so, what are they?

Living without the freedoms we have today would be unpleasant, and more so by comparison to our current state, but it would not be impossible. Of the freedoms that exist today, I believe that only the freedom of religion is one that I would fight for with all my heart. That is certainly something I would die for. One of the worst things I’ve heard about North Korea at this time is that parents who are secretly Christians never share their faith with their children for fear of either being reported by them, or of putting them in danger themselves. I don’t want to judge them in the least, but it makes me extremely sad, because I know that those children are in far greater danger if they don’t know Christ. Fear the one who, as they say, who can destroy the soul.

Of course, all of this is only speculation. And there is a difference between fighting and dying for a cause, and living and suffering for that same cause. Death is easy. Suffering, however, gives ample opportunity for one to change their mind.

All this in the podcast was in the context of what he called the “Celtic Holocaust”, or the destruction of the Gauls by Julius Ceasar. The Gauls, amid a whole mess of historic points that you’ll have to listen to the podcast to learn about, decided that fighting Rome was better than living under Roman rule. And Rome absolutely annihilated them, destroying not only the men who stood against the Romans, but starving out all the people and utterly destroying their way of life.

So I ask you again, what is worth dying for? And what is worth losing everything for?

The Instagram Perspective

A snippet from the Instagram Welcome email reads like this:

“Share your perspective by capturing and sharing photos and videos from your day, whether it’s your morning routine or the trip of a lifetime"

On the face of it, the words are accurate. You are in fact literally sharing your perspective by showing whoever happens to be following you what you are seeing… or what you want them to see. But the previous statement also has the implied promise that if people see what you see they will feel what you feel.

Is it actually true?

Certainly I appreciate pictures of clear blue waters that show up on my feed from my coworkers vacations. But do I actually know what it is to be there in the sun and the sand? Or does it instead inspire a sometimes vague and sometimes less so sense of envy and discontent? There have been multiple articles in the recent past that suggest it is very much the latter.

Why then do we continue to use such technology?

Because when it all boils down to it we do, very much, want people to feel what we feel, to share our perspective of the world if even for a brief moment, because in that sharing we feel that we ourselves might become known.

And there is very little knowing going on in current culture. I was fortunate to have grown up before the technology boom and can therefore survive for several hours and sometimes even days at a time without my phone or indeed any electronic devices.

But I’ve recently run into a problem. While I am perfectly capable, judging by past relationships and ongoing friendships, of starting and maintaining a conversation, the people around me are growing less and less capable of providing the other side of such a conversation.

I spent the last two days at a leadership conference here in Rochester. It was at a location that I’d never visited before, and the only person I knew there was my brother, who came as my guest.

The first day, the only people who deigned to talk to us were the greeters, and one random pastor that I met in the lunch line. Even the people sitting at our lunch table were entirely involved in their own conversation and their phones, so much so that they didn’t even say hello. At a leadership conference.

I would like to point out here that there is a certain amount of humorous irony in that.

The second day I made the extra effort to strike up conversations during the meal, and I was rewarded with a tepid stream of basic facts that wound down into painful silence. Once we were the past the where are you from and what do you do part of the questions, no one seemed willing to go any farther. Why?

Personally, I was tired of trying to draw out even the dullest facts. Small talk is a tapeworm to my soul. It’s all well and good if you have to talk to someone in the grocery line, but it isn’t meant to last any longer than that. After that you have to have something else to say, something of substance and value.

Unfortunately, many such topics have at this point been ruled politically incorrect. Taking the risk of mentioning anything of gravity opens you up to all sorts of possible vehement and critical responses. Of course, you might also have the nice surprise of finding that the other person agrees with you. Or you might have the even better surprise of discovering that they don’t, and are still able to discuss their opinion with you in a manner both respectful and casual.

And that, dear reader, is what actual perspective sharing is about. Listening. Learning. Talking. Thinking. Not necessarily agreeing, but considering with grace and respect.

This is not something that can be captured in a photo or selfie, no matter what the current exchange rate of words/photography.

It isn’t something that is being taught in our schools, our universities, or our churches. I failed to mention this was a Christian leadership conference and therefore much of the normal fear of being shot down shouldn’t even have come into play.

And yet…

Could I have started something more serious myself? Certainly. Do I have a truly good excuse for not bringing up some facet of the day’s teaching and gathering opinions? An excuse, no. But an understanding as to why I didn’t. Yes. Conversation, any kind of conversation that goes deeper than the shallow subjects of one’s number of children and current career path, requires at least a modicum of interest in having a conversation to be shown on both sides. If even getting you to say hello is like pulling teeth, no one is likely to want to sit down for a nice chat about the current theological/political climate, or the state of the gender wars.

Sharing perspective is important. It is vital for communication that moves people forward. And it is dying, if not already dead and cremated, because this rich tool that, properly wielded, can bring together diverse people from cultures and countries around the world has been substituted for something no thicker than a single moment captured on a digital print that will itself vanish in 25 hours.

On America

It’s Independence Day in small town USA. The country pride is high.

Outside my window, fireworks crack the sky open. I think of mortars falling, of distant and not-so-distant gunfire. Of countries where there is no such thing as independence. And I think that America is great. I also think that it has grown so great that it no longer remembers why this holiday is so important.

Americans like tout the word freedom as if it is the secret pass-phrase into a superhero hideout. We celebrate ourselves as victorious heroes who overcame great odds, but the truth is that, for a very long time, this country has not known what it is not to be free. It has forgotten what it is to be small, powerless, beleaguered and belittled. It has forgotten the days when those flashes and that rumbling were made by cannon and muskets of enemy forces coming across the fields. More importantly, it has forgotten why those battles were fought in the first place. Those revolutionary battles were not fought to give us a birthright to luxury, but to give people the chance to strive for a better life.

One would think that a better life would make a better kind of people, more gracious, kinder. But separation from hardship has inured this nation to freedom. The desperate huddled masses are forgotten apart from a few media feeding frenzies if they get the proper pathetic photo or have the right political slant for the day.

 Consequently, the days of expansive welcome that inspired the poem “The New Colossus” to be placed on the Statue of Liberty, have been forgotten in proportion. Commiseration and compassion have on many levels been abandoned for nationalism and an ugly, fierce pride in something that begins to look more and more dystopian with every passing year.

Perhaps, America will remain great in terms of size and political power. But is it good? And what, dear friends, will it take to make it better? Don’t look to politicians. Or soldiers. This isn’t truly a matter of immigration policy or gun control or even desegregation. Legislation is never going to fix what is wrong with this country. What is wrong lies inside our hearts, our minds, places sacred and intangible—in our very souls. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal. And until we are able to look at people, any people, and see that their souls are no different than ours, that their children are no different than our children, then we will continue this downward spiral, desperately grasping at whatever we think we need to keep us afloat, never realizing that all of these things we cling to so greedily are what is weighing us down.

I long for my country to be good, noble and worthy. I want to be able to be proud to live here, not because the country is amazing, but because it is full of people who are truly trying to be great.

“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she

With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

THE NEW COLOSSUS

Emma Lazarus