In the Old Testament, young Samuel mistakenly believes he is being called by Eli. Eli says “the Lord was calling the youth.” The Lord is calling Samuel for allegiance to a War Lord, King David, and to a warrior nation, Israel. In the Gospel, Andrew believes he is being called by Jesus. Jesus says nothing of Old Testament belief, nothing of War Lords, nor warrior nations. Instead, Jesus asks Andrew, “What are you looking for?” Andrew is looking for knowledge of Jesus and thus asks him, “Where are you staying?” Jesus answers, “Come, and you will see.” Andrew “stayed with Jesus.” Andrew experiences a peacemaker and tells others he “found the Christ.”
Samuel and Eli from the Old Testament represent people whose belief is certain in a War Lord and a warrior nation. But that belief is not well balanced with a healthy challenge of critical thinking . Critical thinking has three ingredients; 1) it is based on criteria, 2) is self-correcting, and 3) is aware of context (M. Lipman). What happens when we challenge belief with critical thinking? 1) Whatever we believe about belief, we recognize it is relationship with criteria, an objective agreed upon standard, like facts. 2) We realize life’s certainties come about through critical thinking’s self-correcting process, which includes stages of uncertainty. 3) Critical thinking’s awareness of context makes distinctions, for example, between an Old Testament War Lord and a Gospel peacemaker. Failure to balance belief with critical thinking produces an unbalanced, unthinking society, such as the present U.S. society. It is dominated by Samuel and Eli types, unthinking conservative believers certain in their War Lord and their warrior nation. This is ironic, since for much of the global media era, religious conservatives have lamented the loss of critical thinking; William F. Buckley (Up From Liberalism), Fox News’ Bill O’Reilly (Culture Warrior), and Victor Davis Hanson (The Case for Trump). But this cadre of lamenting conservatives, especially Fox’s, have for decades been proven to regularly communicate not facts, investigations, and truth but lies, biases, and disinformation. They have specifically done so around the recent presidential election. Let’s think about this. Have religious conservatives been lamenting the loss of critical thinking; the loss of criteria, self-correction, and context? Have they instead been lamenting the loss of conservative propaganda? 1) Conservatives have propagandized the just war tradition as “Christian” except all factual criteria proves Jesus Christ was a peacemaker. 2) Conservatives are certain the ‘word of God’ is without error, and thus they are too, and never need to self-correct, except they have an entire theological category called ‘backsliding’. 3) Conservatives assert “God uses imperfect people like Trump… (after all,) King David wasn’t perfect,” except that proves they operate out of a context, War Lords and not the peaceful Christ, yet are unaware of it. Religious conservatives cannot be compared with critical thinking peacemakers like Andrew in the Gospel. 1) Andrew validated “Christ” as the criteria for Christians by staying with Christ Jesus and learning the facts about him. 2) Andrew’s thoughtful belief goes through self-correcting uncertainties because Jesus keeps challenging the holy books and dogma of the religious conservatives of his time. 3) Andrew’s context of the “Christ” is as a peacemaker, a man persecuted by believers certain about War Lords and warrior nations. Let’s think about this. Conservatives, without facts, believed the election was stolen, rejected self-correcting thoughts about dealing with it, and practiced violence – to inaugurate a new War Lord. Let’s help them think about their self-title, Christian.
“You can dwell in the most atrocious dream world and call it religious faith – all the while planning the destruction of the world.” (Daniel Berrigan SJ)
Prayer: Spirit of Belief and Knowledge, keep us well-balanced peacemakers.
Question: What can I do to not be an unthinking conservative but a critical thinking peacemaker?
January 17, 2021 Gospel John 1:35-42 Second Sunday in Ordinary Time