Tag: faith

Restoring Trust

~ purplesage41 ~ Leave a comment

Trust is one of those tricky words with multiple meanings.  Among its synonyms are faith and belief, but they are quite different.   The Latin word credo (I believe) finds its way into English as creed, credible (or incredible), credentials.  The Greek word pistis, or Latin equivalent fides, has a more subtle meaning of confidence or trust. Clearly, they overlap, but the meaning that I find of greatest social value is the idea of trust.  Do we trust our own judgment? Do we trust people in whom we confide? Do we trust the police, the justice system, our elected officials? Do we trust corporations to produce products that are safe and beneficial? Do we trust banks with our money?  Surveys about trust suggest that most of the institutions of American society do not evoke trust.  That decline is aided by social media, but it is not new.

Faith is the connector between belief and trust.  Think about the huge difference between “I believe in you (faith, trust) and I believe you (I think that what you are saying is factually true).  That confusion has dominated Western Christianity since the 3rd century, when the many (sometimes conflicting) stories about the life, death, teachings, and resurrection of Jesus were parsed and hardened into factual truth statements that eventually became mandatory beliefs in order to call oneself a Christian.

Blind faith is belief without evidence. Blind faith, inf fact, often  resists contradictory evidence and only is receptive to confirming evidence. (Psychologists call this “confirmation bias.”) New information that does not fit our pre-established beliefs is rejected almost every time.) Likewise blind trust in the good intentions of people and institutions weakens rather than strengthening the ties that bind us together in community at all levels from the household to the community to the nation.

Without trust, the kind that led the signers of the Declaration of Independence to pledge to each other their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor, our nation will revert to a state of nature in which (the words of Hobbes) life is nasty, British, and short for most of us. So being cautiously trusting is a risky but necessary first step.

Beliefs are durable, trust is not.  Trust is easy to shatter and difficult to repair. Our beliefs are a part of our identity. Our shared beliefs create mutually reinforcing communities of believers. And most important, trust is the foundation of a functioning democratic society.  We need to trust the good intentions, the competence, and the honesty of our public officials and the institutions—courts, law enforcement, public agencies, election administrators.  It would also be a good thing if we felt we could trust private agencies, banks and other corporations, service providers, and the media. However, each of them has let us down time and again.

Our faith in government and elected officials, in corporations, and in the shallowness of motivations of many of our fellow citizens has eroded over time, with a rapid fall in recent years. How do we restore trust in one another, in government, in the news media in an age of AI and social media?

There are no quick and easy fixes.  But there are steps that we can take to restore our capacity to trust and to be the kind of person others would trust as they judge is us our words and actions. We can encourage and support those institutions that we trust and call to account those that fail to be honest, respectful, compassionate, just, and fair.

We can begin with our own inventory of whom and what we trust—people, news media, friends, family, organizations. None of them are perfect, but we can call them to ccount when they fail and affirm our faith when they serve us and the larger community well.   t s incumbent on each of us to question, to get information from more than a single source, th protest wrongdoing and participate in civic processes that can slowly but eventually restore our trust in one another and our institutions.

We can seek out individuals and organizations that affirm our shared values and promote them together. There is both safety in numbers and reassurance in mutual support.  Together, we can learn, act, protest, vote, and engage in other ways in creating a society resting more firmly on a foundation of mutual trust and obligation.

In whom and what do you place your trust? How can you being the work of restoration for yourself and the larger community?

In Whom Can I Trust?

~ purplesage41 ~ Leave a comment

Trust is one of those tricky words with multiple meanings.  Among its synonyms are faith and belief, but they are quite different.   The Latin word credo (I believe) finds its way into English as creed, credible (or incredible), credentials.  The Greek word pistis, or Latin equivalent fides, has a more subtle meaning of confidence or trust. Clearly they overlap, but the meaning that I find of greatest social value is the idea of trust.  Do we trust our own judgment? Do we trust people in whom we confide? Do we trust the police, the justice system, our elected officials? Do we trust corporations to produce products that are safe and beneficial? Do we trust banks with our money?  Surveys about trust suggest that most of the institutions of American society do not evoke trust.  That decline is aided by social media, but it is not new.

Faith is the connector between belief and trust.  Think about the huge difference between “I believe in you (faith, trust) and I believe you (I think that what you are saying is factually true).  That confusion has dominated Western Christianity since the 3rd century, when the many (sometimes conflicting) stories about the life, death, teachings, and resurrection of Jesus were parsed and hardened into truth statements that eventually became mandatory beliefs in order to call oneself a Christian.

Blind faith is belief without evidence. Blind faith, inf fact, resists contradictory evidence and only is receptive to confirming evidence. (Psychologists call this “confirmation bias.”) New information that does not fit into our established beliefs is rejected almost every time.) Likewise blind trust in the good intentions of people and institutions weakens rather than strengthening the ties that bind us together in community at all levels from the household to the community to the nation.

Beliefs are durable, trust is not.  Trust is easy to shatter and difficult to repair. Our beliefs are a part of our identity. Our shared beliefs create mutually reinforcing communities of believers. And yet…trust is the foundation of a functioning democratic society.  We need to trust the good intentions, the competence, and the honesty of our public officials and the institutions—courts, law enforcement, public agencies, election administrators.  It would also be a good thing if we felt we could trust private agencies, banks and other corporations, service providers, and the media. However, each of them has let us down time and again.

Our faith in government and elected officials has eroded over time, with a rapid fall in recent years. How do we restore trust in one another, in government, in the news media in an age of AI and social media? There aer n quick and easy fixes.  But it s incumbent on each of us to question, to get information from more than a single source, th protest wrong doing and participate in civic processes that can slowly but eventually restore our trust in one another and our institutions.

Trust but Verify

~ purplesage41 ~ Leave a comment

Or in an Arabic saying, Trust Allah but tie up your camel.  In a world of hackers, scammers, shooters, liars, and broken promises, in whom can we trust? Our national motto is “IN God we trust, but some of us need to have an actual person in whom to trust as well as institutions that we can trust.

The word used for faith in Saint Paul’s dictum “Faith, hope, love, these abound; but the greatest of these is love.”  If faith is a matter of factual belief, then it is most helpful to me. I do believe the earth revolves around the sun and smoking can cause cancer, but I do not believe that the myths of any of the major religions are true in the same literal sense. I trust science because that approach to knowledge has created major safeguards to avoid any false propositions to be confirmed.  Science doesn’t give us the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, but it does pretty well at offering truth and nothing but. I more or less trust science. 

The opposite of faith in either meaning, belief or trust, is doubt. When we no longer trust the systems and institutions that have served us well in the past, we tend to retreat to what theologian Paul Tillich described as a limited defensible fortress. His fortress was one of ideas, but it can also include people and institutions.

I used to trust the rule of law and the legal system, but recent events have raised serious doubts about the ability and willingness of elected officials to enforce courts decisions. I used to trust financial systems, but they are no longer as well safeguarded as they once were. Right now, I trust the accuracy of election results, but I’m not sure that the elaborate safeguards that protect the election process can be trusted in the future. I have serious doubts about crypto and artificial intelligence and ensuring peace by always being over-prepared for war. I used to trust the full faith and credit of the United States Government, but that was before our national debt grew to be as big as our GDP and growing faster. I used to trust the evening news, but now I have to seek confirmation.

Trust breeds hope, even optimism.  Doubt creates fear, and pessimism.  What can we as individuals do to reverse the direction of living under a cloud of doubt, at sea without rudder or compass, and no land in sight?

My answer, at least a partial answer, comes from three great minds.  One is Ben Franklin, who at the signing of the Declaration of Independence said, “We must all hang together or we will all hang separately.”  The second is theologian Joanna Macy, who argues that neither optimism nor pessimism is the foundation of any strategy—optimists believe that everything will be all right, and pessimism believe we are doomed and powerless to stop it.  She calls us to active hope, to fight the good fight, knowing that what we seek to accomplish may not be accomplished in our lifetimes. (Especially mine. I am 84!) We a called to active hope, to pick out parts of the perceived doomsday machine and throw a monkey wrench into the works.  The third piece of wisdom comes from Margaret Mead, who said, “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has. “

Together the sages Franklin, Macy and Mead call us into community, to find people we can trust and work with them to reclaim our democracy, our rule of law, and our country. And to do it is peaceably lest we become like those who lost or stole our trust (civil disobedience is fine,). Friends. Religious communities. Nonpartisan organizations. Women’s suffrage took 72 years. Civil rights came slowly and are being rapidly demolished  in many ways.

Finally, there is a matter of picking your fights—what issues and what tools.  Ask yourself what gifts you have and what issues you are passionate about. Those two questions may steer you in the direction of people, information sources, and communities that can get you out of the fug and on the path

My gifts are writing, speaking, and organizational leadership. My issues are protecting democracy. economic justice, and reproductive rights. I am careful about whom I trust, and I depend on several organized communities that share those goals and can offer me support and companionship. 

What are your gifts and issues? Do you have such communities? How can they help you use your gifts and passions to practice active hope?

Spiritual or Religious?

~ purplesage41 ~ 1 Comment

Binary #5

This strange description of one’s relation to whatever considers to the sacred has become the most popular response to a question about one’s faith understanding. SBNR (spiritual but not religious) is one focused expression of the extreme individualism that has always been a hallmark of American culture. It means that this thing, this religion, this spirituality stuffs just between me and whatever I call or don’t call God, and I don’t need any help, any companions on the journey, any guidance or answers to my questions that I can’t find on my own.

The opposite of SBNR, which few people will openly admit to, is religious but not spiritual. 
Religious because I belong to a church or because I like the companionship of lik-eminded people or because I like ritual or because it seems important to belong to some kind of community and Kiwanis or Rotary just doesn’t quite do it.

This particularly binary reminds me of an old Latin joke.  A popular motto in Roman times was mens sana in corpore sano—meaning, a healthy mind in a healthy body.  But a more contemporary formulation is mens sana auf (or) corpore sano—take your pick.

I consider my relationship to the sacred as requiring both a private spirituality and an affirming, embracing, challenging community of people who are my chosen companions on my journey of faith. Not that I would necessarily have chosen all the ones in my present religious community. But even the people I find to be difficult do what a good religious community should do.  They affirm, they challenge, and/or they inspire. Some do just one, others all three.

I know that if you ask people what they think is the purpose of a religious community, you will get many different answers.  My answer came to me in response to a question from a  friend who wanted to know what I thought was the purpose of a sermon. I considered a few minutes and finally said, “to affirm, to challenge, and to inspire.” That’s also the purpose of a church, or mosque, or temple. Such communities have rituals that retell and reinterpret their shared stories as well as the stories that people bring to the gathering to share, to be affirmed, cared for—and challenged and inspired.

Of all the binaries I have considered, and there are many more to explore, this is the one that I think works best as a both/and rather than an either/or. Without affirmation, we shrink. Without challenge, we cease to grow. Without inspiration, we drift. For a meaningful, purposeful, satisfying life, I need my congregation. And my congregation needs me. If there is a congregation in your life—the one that you attend or the one that you abandoned—but it doesn’t provide you with companions on the journey and affirmation, challenge, and inspiration, then perhaps you are in the wrong place, or perhaps you aren’t engaging this community with an open and well nurtured spirit.

In God We Trust–Who Else?

~ purplesage41 ~ Leave a comment

Faith is a virtue, but it is also word with multiple meanings.  Belief, trust, and loyalty are the most common ones.  Saint Paul’s use of the Greek word pistis is often translated as allegiance or loyalty, while the Latin version (credo) has come to mean belief (as in creeds).  These meanings are  not mutually exclusive.  However, to the extent that people interpret the term belief in a religious context as a set of statements about reality that they are asked to accept as factual truths, trust may be a more useful translation of faith as one of the core attitudinal virtues.

Loyalty is more a behavior than an attitude and is somewhat neutral as a potential virtue, because one can be loyal to something that is harmful or destructive. Our nation is currently deeply divided by mutual mistrust in politics, in part fostered and nurtured by individual and groups in furtherance of their own agenda.  In particular, they cultivate loyalty to their own group and distrust of everyone else—which supports the assertion that loyalty is not always a virtue. For our civic purposes, trust rather than belief or loyalty is the most useful interpretation of the virtue called faith.

Trust begins by listening to your gut, your instincts, but it does not end there.  There is also that all-important verify part when it comes to practicing trust in community.  Whom do you trust to listen and respectfully disagree, opening your mind to other ways of thinking?  What sources of information are credible? Just like active hope, cautious trust is an invaluable attitudinal virtue to cultivate and exercise for every aspect of our lives, not just governance. Democratic process is just “trust but verify” on a larger scale.  Knowing that there will be another election plays a key role in holding elected officials accountable to the public trust.

Trust lies somewhere between gullibility or naiveté as its extreme and paranoia or simply distrust as its opposite. Trust is not blind. Trust Allah but tie up your camel is an old Arab proverb. Former Soviet Leader Michael Gorbachev urged that both sides trust but verify. Doubt lies somewhere between trust and disbelief, and serves the purpose of calling us to ground trust in factual knowledge and demonstrated behavior by those people and institutions we have invited into positions of power and authority.

Trust is an important element of a nation’s social capital as described by Stiglitz et.al. in Measuring What Counts.  Social capital has been described as the glue that holds a society together—a shared history, sometimes a shared ancestry, holidays and celebrations, customs and usually language. Trust is a form of social capital that makes it possible to enter into agreements without spelling out all the details or constantly running to the courts to enforce them.  I recall a contract to build an addition on our home many decades ago.  The contract read, “build upstairs addition, $10,000.”  When he would tell me to go pick out light fixtures, or carpeting, I would say, “Do I pay for them?” He said  “No, it’s in the contract!” Contracts are less likely to be spelled out in detail in a small town where everyone knows everyone else.  I was a relative newcomer and had to learn the local customs, which were grounded in trust that was in turn grounded in networks of kinship and neighborhoods.

 Trust is not just an attitudinal virtue when it comes to civil society; it is also an asset that builds slowly but dissipates quickly. Inequality and diversity both can undermine trust in civic institutions., Inequality creates fear and resentment toward those who use money to gain power over others. Diversity encourages the creation of silos of people with a common heritage, and fosters distrust.

Trust begins by listening to your gut, your instincts, but it does not end there.  That’s the verify part.  Whom do you trust to listen and respectfully disagree, opening your mind to other ways of thinking?  What sources of information are credible? Just like active hope, cautious trust is an invaluable attitudinal virtue to cultivate and exercise for every aspect of our lives, not just governance. Democratic process is just “trust but verify” on a larger scale.  Knowing that there will be another election plays a key role in holding elected officials accountable to the public trust.

Historically, kings ruled by divine right, tyrants usurped authority and held on to it by force.  Only in modern times did the checks and balances of democratic constitutions provide a good reason to trust authority because no one had absolute power. In the United States, the division of authority among three branches of government and the sharing of power between the federal government and the states both offer constraints on abuse of power. But democracies have succumbed to dictatorship in the past. Our trust as citizens has been frequently undermined and challenged by social media and self-serving politicians who are careless of with the truth and opportunistic in the use of power, whose loyalty to party is placed above loyalty to the Constitution and the public. In a democracy, the survival of self-government or any other form of government depends on the faith, belief, and trust of its citizens in its elected leaders’ willingness and ability to govern in their interest.

Betrayal of that trust to seek to seize and retain power and/or exercise it for personal benefit will undermine authority. One of our biggest challenges as a nation is to affirm a “trust but verify” attitude as a habit of the heart that leads to respect for authority and for our fellow citizens,, civic participation, and willingness to compromise—all essential to the survival of democracy.

Historically, kings ruled by divine right, tyrants usurped authority and held on to it by force.  Only in modern times did the checks and balances of democratic constitutions provide a reason to trust authority because no one had absolute power. In the United States, the division of authority among three branches of government and the sharing of power between the federal government and the states both offer constraints on abuse of power. But democracies have succumbed to dictatorship in the past.

Our trust as citizens has been frequently undermined and challenged by social media and self-serving politicians who are careless of with the truth and opportunistic in the use of power, whose loyalty to party is placed above loyalty to the Constitution and the public. In a democracy, the survival of self-government or any other form of government depends on the faith, belief, and trust of its citizens in its elected leaders’ willingness and ability to govern in their interest.

In what or whom should we trust? Our instincts. Our doubts. And those voices and people an sources that have proved trustworthy in the past,whether they are scientists, public officials, personal friends, news sources, or communities and organizations that are open to other views and different perspectives. Trust is the foundation of democracy. Don’t let distrust take away our most precious possession as a nation.