Are Faith and Hope American Values?
In reflecting on Tuesday's big event, the inauguration of the 44th President of the United States, Mark Toulouse, a Texan turned Canadian, Disciples historian, considers a comment made by a reporter -- that faith and hope are American values. He reminds us that these are more than American values.
Indeed, Americans are too inclined to put their hope and their faith in leaders and the nation, both of which will disappoint. Tuesday was a historic moment -- as Mark reminds us, here was an African American man moving into a house that was built with slave labor.
Mark notes that Obama himself reminded his listeners that we must put our faith and hopes in someone/something that transcends nation and leader.
The key here, Mark suggests, is recognizing and affirming a common humanity.
Mark's post entitled "Faith, Hope, and American Values" can be found at the Religion and Ethics Weekly blog
Indeed, Americans are too inclined to put their hope and their faith in leaders and the nation, both of which will disappoint. Tuesday was a historic moment -- as Mark reminds us, here was an African American man moving into a house that was built with slave labor.
Mark notes that Obama himself reminded his listeners that we must put our faith and hopes in someone/something that transcends nation and leader.
Here, using language of his own faith, President Obama emphasized that hope must rest in something greater than ourselves. “It is,” he argued, “precisely this spirit that must embody us all.” Whether Muslims or Jews or Hindus or Christians or nonbelievers, all Americans can place their hope, or express their faith, in something greater than themselves. But Americans, perhaps more than any other people in the world, need to learn that genuine hope and faith cannot rest in either nations or charismatic leaders. Instead, these must rest in something transcendent to our self-interests, something capable of teaching us to recognize, affirm, and support the common humanity we share with all who inhabit this globe. If only we could claim that as an American value.
The key here, Mark suggests, is recognizing and affirming a common humanity.
Mark's post entitled "Faith, Hope, and American Values" can be found at the Religion and Ethics Weekly blog
Comments
Toulouse's "Common Humanity" is a value which has no claim to transcendence. It means nothing to except to those who intentionally embrace it as their value; and there is nothing uniquely American about such a value - it is the core value of the French Revolution.
I hesitate to appear so cynical, but I cannot help but confront non-belief, in philosophic terms, when it claims any notion of transcendence. Non-belief is just that, a lack of faith in anything but the will and ability of the non-believer, and perhaps, a working assumption that most people behave as the non-believer behaves, motivated by similar needs for security and love.
Any operative philosophy premised on any principles beyond that is faith, no matter how it is articulated. Even Marxism was a kind of faith - in the inexorable movement of human history marching toward the evolutionary growth of human society into a Marxist Utopia. The tenets of Marx's faith were the truth of Marx's Utopian vision and the certain movement of human history toward that vision. Communism was nothing more than a theory intended to jump-start humanity down that unavoidable historical movement towards its PREDETERMINED end.
I pray for the faithless, that they will find peace, and security, and love, and even more, that they will find their way home to the God that offers them the only certain peace and security, and the only certain love.
John