The Third Option

I hope you all had a great weekend!
It’s Monday and time to get back at it.

Today I’m going to add a final piece to my thoughts on “Third Options” as regards the current political activity surrounding Black Lives Matter.
To be clear, I fully support this movement. For, a movement it is. People from all walks of life have seen enough injustice and pain. Those of us who have retained remnants of the Civil Rights Movement and other movements led by activists seeking systemic change to our culture are happy to be a part of this.
But, alas, we are also saddened and frustrated that these issues still need to be addressed.
Baby steps, I guess.

Last week a wrote about how our culture tends to view all issues of morality, culture, politics, and society through binary lenses. Our worldview sees everything in black/white; right/wrong; us/them.
This is not only counter productive to a healthy culture, it is simply wrong.
Our entire universe and existence is made up of not only black and white. But, it contains all of the millions and millions of colors that live between those extremes.
Our reality is not either/or. But, in almost all cases it is both/and.
Please understand that.
We exist in a paradox.
Even if our tiny gray cells can’t seem to grasp that entirely, it is the truth.

So, what does that have to do with so-called ‘Third Options’?

I recently saw an interview with a guy named Miles McPherson. He is the pastor of a large church in San Diego as well as a motivational speaker.
He published a book in 2018 entitled, “The Third Option: Hope for a Racially Divided Nation.”
I have not read the book, but here is a link to a YouTube presentation in which McPherson discusses its contents.
What struck me was how he changed the idea of having ‘Conversations’ about race to having ‘Race Consultations.’ This may seem like splitting semantic hairs, but there is something new about the approach.
And, it is an approach that I think is inherently aligned with what should be the position of anyone who claims to follow Christ.

Let me explain.

I usually don’t go in for wide generalizations, but bear with me for a minute as I muse about a couple things.

I wrote last week that I have spent most of my adult life informally studying religion. I am by no means expert on the subject. But, there are a couple observations that I would like to make. Please don’t hesitate to call me out in the comments if something I write is glaringly inaccurate! You won’t hurt my feelings. And, I might even learn something new!

Form where I stand, I see most of the world’s great religions focused on what the practice can do for me.
For instance, Buddhism was developed by a guy named Siddartha Gautama after he witnessed human suffering. He desired to help people move beyond suffering toward a higher, (better?), existence in the world. It is primarily a way for people to live peacefully in this life. The hope that is eventually, the individual will be caught up into a universal nirvana where individuality merges with the Cosmos.
Other religions also look to enabling adherents to reap some kind of eternal reward for following certain rules or principles.
Even many indigenous religions seek to perform rituals in order to please the spirits of ancestors or deities that can help with crops and weather and fertility. All of these are in one way or another, self-seeking.
Not self-seeking in a selfish way. But, the deity or spirits or disciplines are sought and practiced for ‘My Benefit’ in this life or the next.

I know that I’m painting with a really broad brush here. But, this is, after all, only a blog post and not a doctoral dissertation.

I want to preface this next part by saying that I am aware that people who claim to follow Jesus are fallible humans who, by and large, get it wrong. As I wrote in earlier posts, we are programmed by evolution to watch out for ourselves and our tribes. That is why what I am going to write is so counter-intuitive, yet so bloody important to understand.

As I read and study the Christian Bible, particularly the Gospels, I am struck by something that seems unusual.
The person, Jesus, doesn’t seem to behave like a normal person. The words he speaks and the actions that he performs all tend toward the ‘Other.’
He “sees” lepers. He “looks intently” into the eyes of those who are possessed by evil spirits. He has compassion and weeps over someone else’s loss.
In Jesus I see empathy in action.
Jesus modeled what McPherson might call “Consultation with the Other.”

Now, please don’t get me wrong. I am in No Way saying that someone must believe in or follow Jesus in order to live a life that looks outward. That’s just not true. There are many people of various beliefs or no belief who live this type of virtuous life.
What I am trying, however successfully or not, to say is that religion is a major factor that mitigates or controls(?) the actions of people. Not saying that’s good or bad. It’s just a fact.
So, if there is a religious example that may be helpful as we move forward toward what I hope is a brighter and more inclusive future, Jesus is not the worst example that we can have.

I don’t think that I can overstate the importance of empathy in our lives together. We absolutely must learn, not just to live together harmoniously, but to look deeply into the eyes of others and see the spark of common humanity that resides there. Then, use what ever means we can to flame that spark into a fire that consumes the hatred, fear, and distrust that lives and festers within.