Devaluing People

There is so much talk about values these days.  But I have to wonder where those values are – and what those values are.

One of our local opinionators was on the radio the other day.  He had an example of someone who clearly seemed to be taking advantage of a program for impoverished students.  What struck me was not that there was a dishonest person taking advantage of a program that was intended to help people who truly need help.  What struck me was the glee with which the opinionator pointed out this sponger to the listener, and then the “lesson” to be learned – that programs that help poor people are a waste of taxpayer dollars.

I realized, as I turned the radio off in disgust, that these are the values by which many in our country now function.  I hate to sound THAT old … but it didn’t used to be that way.  Well, not completely.  John Calvin, long ago, preached that wealth was a sign of God’s grace and poverty a sign of God’s wrath.  But the overwhelming majority of people rejected that idea a long time ago. … Or did they?  I'd thought they had - hoped they had.

I remember as a child and then as a youth, a maxim that was a foundation stone of our system of justice … “Better ten guilty persons go free than one innocent person be wrongly convicted.”  In case you haven’t noticed, that maxim has eroded rather dramatically of late.  Now we are approaching a maxim that says, “Better ten innocent persons go to jail than one guilty person go free.”  We aren’t there yet, but this is the direction we are heading.  And few seem to notice.  Or if they do notice, few seem to comment.  But I digress.

My point is that the same erosion is taking place in our sense of an obligation to be our brothers’ and sisters’ keepers.  Our system of health and welfare safety nets are not perfect.  No sane person would pretend that they are.  But what the radio “news” opinionator seemed to be saying was that it was better that ten poor people go hungry than take the risk that one crook might game the system.  Think about that.  Ponder it.  This is the direction we are headed.

Last year our Congress, Democrats and Republicans, voted to pull the plug on an organization whose purpose was to ensure that the disadvantaged of our country could still have a voice and be able to vote.  Some say “Acorn” was innocent and set up.  Some say “Acorn” had, if you will, some very bad seeds.  But we return to the new mantra.  Better that ten people lose their right to vote, than one person working to help them game the system. 

How did we get here?  I don’t think there’s a simple answer.  And that may be why no one is asking the question.  I mean, really, who has time to deal with something complex?  We want our answers simple.  We want them unambiguous.  And we want them now.  That’s a part of it.  In this complex world, we crave simplicity.  But that’s not an answer.

And I’m not here to propose answers – even if I had any, and I don’t.  I am here to beg us to ask the question.  And more than ask the question, to ponder it.  Why is this the direction we are moving?

This is all on my mind as I begin pondering next week’s sermon, “Remembering Lincoln: Greatness Does Not Mean Perfection”.  What is it that we value?  Where are our values?  Our values.  It’s easy enough to complain about other people – but what do we value, and why?