COMMONALITY AND COMPROMISE

By

Karl H. Puechl

October 5, 1997

I could have entitled this talk, "Commonality Not Compromise"; I'm still not sure which is the best title, with the "and" or with the "not". You can decide for yourselves as I go along.

What brought on this topic was my reading a book of quotations; the newspaper reports of the rather gingerly approach to the possibility of combining four Protestant denominations; and, finally, some preliminary resource material that I received from the UUA in Boston entitled "Building Tolerance Through Interfaith Cooperation". I'll leave some of this material and the book here on the table so that you can examine it later. The book by James A. Haught is entitled 2000 Years of Disbelief: Famous People with the Courage to Doubt, and it is published by Prometheus Books, Paul Kurz's Humanist Publishing House.

I'll start out by providing two rather lengthy quotations taken from Haught's book. To make things interesting, try to guess the authors before I provide their names. Here's the first quotation; it takes up three paragraphs, so be patient.

"Jefferson knew history. He could look back on centuries of religious war in Europe: on massacre, burning, rape, pillage, and hatreds that tore nations apart and soaked the earth in blood. He knew from history and human nature how easy it is to arouse mass-murderous passion when religious demagogues cry that God wills it.....

"We have had narrow escapes. Americans are human beings, subject to the same temptations and the same pride and the same fears that afflict people of all nations. Puritans in Boston hanged Quakers in a grim public ceremony on the limbs of the Great Elm on Boston common. Baptists under Roger Williams had to flee Massachusetts... Joseph Smith, founder of the Cuurch of Latter Day Saints, the Mormons, was murdered by a mob.... Anti-Semitism is a stain on our history. For many decades, Jews could not buy houses in some parts of town. They were banned from many organizations... Their innocent children suffered the thousand daily humiliations that prejudice could heap upon them, and some suffer still.....

"Even as we celebrate our religious liberty today, killing in the name of religion goes on all around the world. At this moment, the Muslims of Sarajevo are being shelled by artillery from the supposedly Christian Serbs in the mountains above the helpless city. The peaceful, inoffensive adherents of the Baha'i faith in Iran are imprisoned and murdered by the Iranian government. Their crime? The Baha'is believe in the spiritual unity of humankind. Saddam Hussein carries on a campaign of terror against the Shi'ite Muslims in his Iraq. Muslim fundamentalists in Egypt machine gun tourists. Hindus and Muslims in the Indian subcontinent are at each other's throats. Northern Ireland blazes with gun fire between opposing sides who claim to worship the same Christ.... Throughout history, religious wars have always been the most brutal and cruel and merciless."

Any guesses as to who wrote this? It was Vice President Albert Gore, speaking at a Religious Freedom Day ceremony in Richmond, Virginia on January 14, 1994, incidentally, in a building designed by Thomas Jefferson.

Now here is a second quotation that, to me at least, sounds almost identical to the last paragraph of the quotation I just read. Watch closely for any philosophical differences.

"It is becoming quite clear that religion is at the heart of so many civil wars and international struggles. People seem willing to kill, maim, torture and die for a religious or spiritual belief which moves them to believe that their source of the divine is the only source.... Consider: In the name of God, a fatwa against Salman Rushdie. In the name of God, murder in the Balkans. In the name of God, the bombing of the World Trade Center. In the name of God, the siege at Waco, Texas. In the name of God, Hindus and Muslims kill each other in India. In the name of God, bloody warfare between Protestants and Catholics in Ireland. In the name of God, Shi'ites and Sunnis are at each other's throats in Iraq and Iran, as are Arabs and Jews in the Middle East. In the name of God, a doctor is murdered because he believed in a woman's right to choose. In the name of God, what is going on?"

Any guesses as to the author? It was given by actress Shirley MacLaine when addressing the American Society of Newspaper Editors in Baltimore at their annual convention in 1993.

Now let me comment on these two quotations, which for all practical purposes express identical sentiments. How can a Southern Baptist and a New Age mystic be so in tune? Further, how can these two be so in tune with the sentiments of most Unitarian Universalists? If we can agree on so large an issue, why do we most-often concentrate on our differences rather than on our agreements? Isn't it about time that we strive to find the areas where we do agree, and work from these, rather than proceeding from the areas where we disagree. Might this not lead to greater tolerance? To a, most-likely, slow but eventual coming together?

Hopefully, people are now taking this emphasis on commonality more seriously than they have in the past, although I have doubts. Is this emphasis on commonality verified by the recently announced associative moves made by the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (the nation's largest Lutheran church), the United Church of Christ, the Reformed Church in America, and the Presbyterian Church (USA)? According to the announcement they will now allow exchange of clergy and communion. Is this really a sign of emphasis on commonality rather than emphasis on differences, or are they doing this simply because their denominations are hurting seriously by declining membership?

Let me broaden this discussion somewhat by reading part of an editorial that appeared in the Wall Street Journal on August 25. The editorial was about Episcopalians and was written by Philip Terzian who writes from Washington, D.C. for the Providence Journal. The title of the editorial is "The Church of What's happening Now" and it is a commentary on the announced collaboration among the churches that I just mentioned. I quote:

"As Americans approach the millennium, they grow hungry for spiritual refreshment, for truth and religious conviction, while the main-line churches deliver constant change and the faith of the American Civil Liberties Union. They wonder why their numbers decline every season and seem to think that mergers are a form of salvation. Worst of all, from my point of view, politics has largely supplanted theology. The doddering old Anglican priest of yester-year may have bored his parishioners with homey sermons about his garden, or accounts of his annual vacation in Scotland. But nowadays Episcopalians in search of spiritual guidance are likely to be subject to diatribes on foreign policy, recycling, rain forest or the Christian response to the threat of Jesse Helms. The presiding bishop, who just stepped down, was best known for his opposition to the Gulf War and his promotion of an angry feminist church treasurer who embezzled millions of dollars and now resides in prison. Indeed, the recent general convention was largely devoted to secular --- one might say carnal --- matters, mostly with an all-too-predictable bias: the ordination of 'practicing' homosexuals, the blessing of same-sex marriages, the pros and cons of adultery."

After reading this, and assuming that it gives a valid description of what is going on in Episcopalian churches, I ask: Are Episcopalians much different from Unitarian Universalists? Our theologies might be far different, but since our concerns in the here-and-now are so much alike, does it really matter? Aside from some ritual, a frequent mentioning of God, and some praying, would not most of us feel quite comfortable attending Episcopalian services if their content is as described by Philip Terzian?

I point out that by striving to find commonalities, I do not mean striving for compromise. Compromise is a worthwhile tactic when it comes to politics; there it is worthwhile because it may allow one to, at least, move in a desired direction. But compromise is intolerable when one is concerned about principles. To take an extreme example, in science compromise would lead to the ridiculous. If for some strange reason there exist two extremely different results for an identical series of measurements, and each set of results leads one to a different theory about the underlying physical mechanisms involved, compromise would be completely irrational. Such varying results would not indicate a necessity to compromise, rather they would indicate that much more serious research is required.

Compromising principles often leads to an abomination. Consider the Pope's recent pronouncement regarding the Catholic Church's acceptance of the theory of evolution. Apparently, to him and his advisors the data that supports evolution is so overwhelming that the Biblical account of genesis is no longer believable. Then, if I read his pronouncement correctly, he goes one step further and says that evolution is believable because man is set apart from his ancestral life-forms since, somehow, God gave man a soul; which addendum, I might add, completely contradicts the theory of evolution and destroys its beauty. In a more general vein, the existence of the Church of Religious Science is predicated on their efforts to stretch or even misinterpret scientifically based theories, so that the results more-or-less agree with Christian theology. In my estimation, compromising principles is nothing short of cheating; it is also irrational and misleading. But I suspect, that if we try hard enough we will be able to find rather broad areas of agreement with members of the Church of Religious Science. On the other hand, with more fundamentalist churches, it may be difficult to find commonality; but I am convinced that such ground can always be found if we first start out with very narrow subject matter. For example, we may disagree about the need for physical punishment of children, but, most likely, we can come to agreement against child abuse, given a reasonable definition.

Some people might say that having principles and being unwilling to compromise is not being very democratic. There is a very good book, also by Prometheous Books, which directly addresses this issue. It is entitled: American Extremists: Militias, Supremacists, Klansmen, Communists and Others. In this compendium Laird Wilcox wrote: "... extremism is more an issue of style than of content. The extremist style... hampers our understanding of important issues, muddies the waters of discourse with invective, defamation, self-righteousness, fanaticism, and hatred, and impairs our ability to make intelligent, well-informed choices.... the extremist style is not only found at the fringes of the political or religious spectrum, but sometimes in the 'middle' as well. An individual who is uncompromisingly, intolerantly, 'centrist' may be far more dogmatic and prejudiced than someone who adopts more radical views but does so in an open and tolerant manner. Consequently, a guarded middle-of-the-road position doesn't necessarily provide a solution to extremism, and in some cases may only serve as a mask to conceal it. In fact, it could be argued that those beliefs that are accorded legitimacy by consensus, which is to say that everyone unthinkingly accepts them, may be even more prone to appear on the extremist agenda and more difficult to challenge or effectively debate."

Another quote taken from this compendium is by Robert F. Kennedy. He wrote: "What is objectionable, what is dangerous about extremists is not that they are extreme, but that they are intolerant. The evil is not what they say about their cause, but what they say about their opponents."

In general agreement with these quotations, I contend that having principles is not an extremist position, if one is, at least willing to consider other viewpoints. But in such discussions one must be wary of attempts to reach a compromise. This tendency to strive for and then accept compromise, which process is going on today in the debate over the meaning of separation of Church and State, may, in my judgment, lead to a devastating victory for the Radical Religious Right. Hence, my position: we should seek commonality but, in most instances, should avoid compromise.

Having established this position, I now come to the question: "What can be done locally here in Hemet and the San Jacinto valley to bring people together, to build tolerance? First I note that this is already being done naturally through organizations such as Valley-Restart Shelter, Inc., the Valley Youth Project, and the Interfaith Community Alliance. Obviously, we should continue to support these organizations as well as national organizations that have similar objectives. Frankly, I don't know what else we can do except to encourage interaction among different organizations and to stress commonality rather than divisiveness in all our interplay. Incidentally, members of many denominations agree that the Constitution should remain intact relative to the separation of Church and State; this illustrates a rather broad degree of commonality. One of the objectives of Project Freedom of Religion, which is sponsored by the UUSC and PSWD, is to bring about closer interfaith cooperation based on this commonality. Also, the UUA promised to send me a detailed resource and study packet sometime this month. Perhaps, it will be worthwhile to study this material at one or more of our Forum sessions.

In the extreme, why can't we be encouraged to recognize and reinforce our commonalities by advocating joining of multiple denominations? One can join both the Rotary Club and the Lions Club. Why can't one join a Baptist church and a Lutheran church; or better yet, why can't one be a Mormon and a Unitarian? Or still better, a Jew and a Muslim? Sure there will be large areas of disagreement, but there also will be many areas where the apparent-antagonists can agree. Such dual participation might build an ecumenical movement from the ground up! Perhaps I've gotten a bit too unrealistic or idealistic. But isn't it odd that in the good old USA almost no organizations, by law, can limit membership by discriminating on the basis of religion; the only organizations that are granted blanket exemption are the churches. Ironic, isn't it?

Getting back to reality, I believe that the public schools are by far the best vehicles for emphasizing and demonstrating commonality rather than differences. It is because of this that I am generally against a preponderance of private schools of any sort as well as home-teaching. A small fraction of these educational alternatives are good because they offer diversity and, therefore, channels for evolution; but there is hazard involved when they tend to predominate. The formal education may often be better than that which a child can obtain in the local public school, but I believe that the social interactions in the public schools far outweigh potential academic benefits that may be obtainable in private schools. I don't know, but I suspect that each religion in the former Yugoslavia had its own schools so that the children, besides getting their academics, were also taught to emphasize differences rather than commonality among their neighbors. We all know the result.

I guess that in summary I can say: "To start meaningful interactions, especially among different religious denominations, let's first try to find points of commonality rather than immediately high-lighting differences; but in the process let's be wary of compromise".