Exceptionalism (Midweek Message)

Exceptionalism

Fr. Tony’s Midweek Message

May 6, 2020

For the decades I worked in the U.S. Department of State, I set up many programs to help foreign audiences (mainly in China) to better understand the United States.  The rationale for such use of U.S. taxpayer’s money was that if foreign audiences better understood us, they would be less inclined to reflexively reject U.S. government policies:  to know us would be, if not to love us, then at least then not to have a knee-jerk hatred of us.  And the fact is this rationale was generally accurate. 

One of the hardest elements of U.S. culture and politics to explain was U.S. exceptionalism, the idea that the U.S. was unique and that the rules and commonplaces that applied to all other nations did not apply to us.  I remember well one senior Chinese academic telling me in the early 1990s , “You know, we all see how special the U.S. is:  you generally try to do the right thing, try to be honest about your failings, and help others.  You are fabulously prosperous and grant unprecedented levels of freedom and autonomy to your people as a matter of national commitment.  Most of the time, you give us hope.  But then you can also make us very afraid:  when you don’t live up to your values, and when you think that somehow just by being you, the rules don’t apply.  The myth of American Exceptionalism, especially since it often is tied up with religious faith, makes you blind to your failings, and lets you at times act like monsters. Here in China, we learned in the Cultural Revolution that being willing to do anything for the ‘right cause’ is a short cut to bestiality and inhumanity. But you Americans do not seem to recognize this, precisely because you are special.” 

American Exceptionalism is mirrored in personal life by a belief that rules do not apply to me, and that my self-interest far outweighs the interests of the many.  As Bishop Greg Rickel in Seattle recently pointed out, our increasingly divided and selfish nation is theologically divided:  a theology of personal freedom versus one of the common good; a theology of rights versus a theology of call or self-sacrifice.

 

“You recognize [personal freedom theology] by people in the protests carrying signs that say, “Jesus is my vaccine” or during interviews saying things like, “it is my God given right to….” This is a personal God that only worries about you. This is the old Tom T. Hall song, “me and Jesus got our own thing going” theology. No one else matters. Or only those who can help me in some way matter. I find it very difficult to find much in our guide, Scripture, about this theology. 

“The other is a communion theology. It is based on a totally opposite idea, that the common good, the good of all, is the Gospel. “Laying down your life for a friend” is communion theology. “Blessed are the meek” is communion theology. “Leaving everything behind and following” is communion theology. “Losing your life” is communion theology. These are complete contrasts to the belief that your life is the only life that is really important.” 

Part of what sociologist Robert Bellah called our U.S. “Civil Religion” is the idea that somehow our nation is a manifestation of the Kingdom of God, an idea expressed often by permanently placing the U.S. flag in the sanctuary of churches right up there by the pulpit and the altar.    But even when we admit how special our nation is, we must never confuse it with God’s kingdom.   The Roman Empire congratulated itself for bringing the Pax Romana and prosperity to its world.  But it was the Empire that crucified our Lord. 

The fact is, a virus does not notice national boundaries or consider how exceptional someone is.  And it is only a seriously flawed, non-Christian theology that says “my personal rights are more important than the need to protect the elderly or the health compromised.”   It is only an unhealthy and unconstrained egotism that says, “my convenience trumps the needs of others.”  And it is only a cranky and solipsistic religious fanaticism that says, “my need to feel right with God  outweighs my obligations to serve and help others.”    In some ways, the error of American Exceptionalism is part and parcel with a self-absorbed “the rules don’t apply to me” belief that “I am the exception.”  It is only an overweening pride that says “what I think and feel is more important than the informed advice of medical experts.” 

It is clear that we need to begin to reopen our community life and economy.  In this we are serving others and advancing the common good.  But to do so haphazardly in disregard of scientific knowledge, again, is deadly hubris.  In some ways it is classically idolatrous—it puts gold and wealth before human life and our true ethical obligations to one another.  Pursuing such recklessness for partisan gain or to keep one’s ideology pure is tribalism at its brutish worst, akin to Mao’s murder of millions by social chaos “to keep the red flag red.”     

Rickel adds,

“We, in this pampered, and generally more and more every day, selfish nation, have the idea that this virus will recognize us as the greatest country on earth, and thereby, it will respect our borders.  So how it that working for us?  It doesn’t matter what happened everywhere else on the globe, it won’t happen here!” This is simply another symptom of the delusional after effects of personal freedom theology.” 

As we begin to discuss how we are going to reopen our common life, including the Church, we must remember that Christ calls us to be “smart as snakes, but harmless as doves.”  We humbly must admit that experts know better than we, and that facts are more important than opinions, especially political ones.  This is not just a critique of the right wing who want “the government out of our lives.”  It applies as well to left-wing “anti-vaxxers” in our midst. 

However we proceed, let’s be clear what our values are.  Christianity is not a religion of “looking out for number one.”  It is about caring for “the least of these, our siblings.”  It is not a faith in the power of the almighty dollar.  It is not a belief that the American Empire is any more God’s Kingdom than was the Roman Empire.  It does not say, “It is my God-given right to take care of myself and family, regardless of how this affects others.”  In fact, it is not a faith of rights at all:  it is a faith of calling, a faith of self-sacrifice, a faith of service. 

We will get through this, and get back to work and community.  But let’s make sure we pursue this wisely, always attentive to the needs of the vulnerable.  We are not the exception; we share a common life, including our responsibilities to each other. 

Grace and Peace.