Sin
P. Schultz
March 18, 2012
Many years
ago now, I remember that once I said in a class, I believe it was an American
Government class, that what had adversely affected this country was an
underdeveloped sense of sin. This was not a planned assertion; it just came out
of my mouth I know not from where. The students looked at me as most would,
with that look of utter disdain or shock that is reserved for those who are,
not to be sophisticated about it, loco. I myself thought that perhaps this was
true.
And I am
still of the latter opinion. But when I read articles such as the one above,
from today’s New York Times, on the what war does to human beings, I begin to
wonder anew: Are we really aware of what we are doing? That is, are we really
aware of what war does to the human soul?
We have
these categories like post traumatic stress disorder that allow us to think
that we know what is going on, but one should wonder about the adequacy of
these concepts for understanding the affects of our actions. A man deployed
four times to places utterly foreign to him, where he thinks and must think
that almost anyone would like and even try to kill him, is said to suffer from
post traumatic stress disorder. And then he seems to confirm this by massacring
16 people who are sleeping, including children.
Post traumatic
stress focuses our attention on the mind, not the soul. This could be too
intellectual, but not surprisingly for we moderns who tend to embrace
Descartes’ maxim, “I think, therefore I am.” [One of my favorite authors, Tom
Robbins, has a Catholic priest say in one of his novels, correcting Descartes:
“I stink, therefore I am.”]
There is, however, more to
consider. What had happened to this man’s soul during and as a result of his
four deployments? What sin had he witnessed? What sin had he committed? How did
he seek redemption, if he did at all? After all, redemption is not really one
of our common concepts, a concept, for example, that the military would take
seriously enough to structure a man’s service around. We think that talking, therapy, is the way to
go and perhaps it is. But what of silence? What of prayer? What of getting in
touch with the all inclusive ALL, sensing our place in a universe that is at
once mysterious and magical? What of meditation?
Yes, I know. There is that look
again, the look of disdain and surprise, accompanied by the thought: “This is
what happens when people spend too much time in school!” But I can take it. I
even smile. And I do because I know that some where in you, deep in you, there
is a doubt, there is a place that is saying to you: “He could be right!” After
all, this isn’t anything new. A long, long time ago, a man named Socrates tried
to wake the Athenians up, to get them to see what they were doing to their
souls because, as even Billy Joel knows, “It’s All About Soul.”
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