heroes & villains

2007-02-04T12:33:00.000-08:00

Something I wrote about heroes and villains earlier this year:

At the end of 2006, an AP/AOL poll asked roughly one thousand adult Americans (apparently Alaskans and Hawaiians didn’t count as Americans, for reasons I don’t know) which famous person they considered to be the biggest hero and the biggest villain of the year. George W. Bush was considered the biggest hero and the biggest villain of 2006, which may not be much of a surprise considering the love/hate relationship the American public has with him. What is interesting is that 25 times more people considered Bush a bigger villain than Satan. In the alternative, for every person who thought Jesus Christ was the biggest hero, there were four times as many people who would award that title to Bush.

This got me thinking about who were the biggest “christian” heroes and villains of 2006. I am using the term “christian” as a compromise. When I had mentioned my thoughts on this subject, somebody questioned whether some of the individuals were Christian (for obvious reasons), but I explained that using the word “religious” would not count. I wanted to consider individuals or groups who would call themselves “christian” and attempt to hold themselves out to the general public as followers of Jesus Christ. Therefore, the term “christian” is used as a compromise, with quotation marks and no capitalization.

Often it seems much easier to find a villain than a hero. Finding somebody who upsets us by their words or actions comes much more quickly than finding somebody who embodies the good things that inspire us. Admittedly, my quest to label the “christian” hero and villain of the year followed the same path. In this case, I considered more than one villain since they were clearly identified as a group.

My 2006 “christian” villains of the year were Fred Phelps and the members of Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kansas. Maybe an easy and obvious choice by many people’s standards, since they clearly earned the title. In fact, through their consistently wicked words and actions, a person may argue they could be repeat winners from previous years (although this is my first year in bestowing the “christian” hero and villain titles). With their “God Hates Fags” and their “God Hates America” websites, they could almost be automatic winners every year. However, they are not content to keep things static but instead look for new ways to spew forth their message of hatred and hostility.

Their detestable demonstrations directed at gays and lesbians apparently failed to fill their social calendar, so they also started spitting their verbal venom at certain Christian churches, groups and individuals by labeling them as “queer friendly” and “fag enablers.” Somehow, their current mockery of slain U.S. soldiers has reached a new low, even for them. Their present activities involve protesting and cheering outside the funerals of those soldiers, since these “christian” villains basically claim the U.S. problems and soldiers’ deaths in Iraq are a result of our country’s embrace of homosexuality. Whether people agree or disagree with the gay lifestyle or agree or disagree with the U.S. invasion of Iraq, they can still understand how whacked out these Westboro Baptist Church people are. Thankfully, the Patriot Guard Riders have been there to help protect the soldiers’ families from these “christian” villains.

I am not perfect, but I find no reflection of Jesus Christ in these haters and harassers. When they call themselves “christian” it makes me ashamed to share the name. I can only hope most people see them as the twisted distortion they truly are.

In comparison, the 2006 “christian” heroes taught the nation much about forgiveness, mercy and grace. I feel I can freely ditch the quotation marks and keep the capitalization when it comes to these people, these Christian heroes. I think they have something to teach and show everybody, not just those of us who attempt to be followers of Jesus Christ.

Early October in an Amish schoolhouse. A lone executioner. Five girls dead. Several other girls bound and wounded. Girls. Children. Then the executioner killed one more person: himself. Not just a community, but a nation in shock.

First shock and then awe. Not the shock and awe of a violent assault and invasion of a foreign country, but the shock of seeing something so ugly and then the awe of seeing something so beautiful arise out of one community’s resistance to such terror. Here is a community that rejects some of the elements of our modern society and have even faced ridicule and rejection for their stance. Yet, they forgave the executioner. Forgiveness. It seems to be in short supply in our culture, so we as a nation had a reason to be surprised at the Amish community’s reaction.

Then came the awe as we saw this community rise up and collect money to assist the executioner’s widow and children. One Amish woman apparently made the comment that this was normal for them and that it was what Jesus would have them do. Contrast this with the previously mentioned “christian” villains who had even planned to protest at the Amish children’s funeral, and it would seem that these two groups do not follow the same Jesus, do not follow the same God.

I’ve already indicated I’m not perfect and would not presume that the Amish are perfect, but when you compare that Amish community with the Westboro Baptist Church members, who is a more accurate reflection of Jesus? Both claim to follow Jesus, yet the Westboro Baptist Church members clearly seem like villains, especially when their actions are compared to and contrasted with the forgiveness, mercy, grace and kindness of the Amish community.

Kindness is the quality of being warmhearted, considerate, humane and sympathetic, with the tendency to be forgiving. I was reading Volume 1 of Bob Dylan’s autobiographical Chronicles, where he recounts an incident of meeting an individual who asked him, “You a prayin’ man, huh? What do you pray for? You pray for the world?” It was Dylan’s response that got me thinking, because he stated that he had never really thought about praying for the world, but answered the individual with “I pray that I can be a kinder person.”

Maybe some would see that as a simplistic and even a somewhat self-centered response, but I know that if I was kinder and if we all were kinder, the effects would be significant, even earth-shaking. The kindness of the Amish community in their response to the tragedy resonated not just within the local community, but across the nation and even throughout the whole world. Not that I normally go around quoting the singer/songwriter Jewel or even consider her a source of philosophical and theological wisdom, but there is something truthful when she sings that “in the end only kindness matters.”

While a villain can show us the very evil we are capable of performing, a hero serves as inspiration, to give us an example of worthy behavior and qualities to follow. Our world serves up a strange mixture of truth and lies and beauty and ugliness. It’s so easy to get caught up in the lies and ugliness, only focusing on the villains of our time. However, when we open our eyes to the heroes and their responses to those lies and ugliness, we get a picture of how much better this world could be, if only we were kinder people.

So now I pray that I can be kinder person. A simple prayer to say, but one of the hardest to live.

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heroes & villains