68

A Birthday Meditation

I had childhood fears. Not of monsters under the bed, or of the dark, or other fantasies. I had real fears. Such as, when my parents argued, would they get a divorce? Many of us have had fears like that. And my generation grew up with a more existential fear: thermonuclear annihilation.

We were told nuclear war was survivable. We were told we could take cover under our desks or in the school fallout shelter. None of that really helped me. I don’t remember the Cuban Missile Crisis. I was only seven at the time. But I learned later how close the world had come to Armageddon.

I was in third grade when the principal announced that the President of the United States had been shot. We had a “moment of silence” to pray for him and our country. Before that, it had never occurred to me that a president might be killed in office. Most children want to believe the best about others. I consider it a moral failure when young kids must face the fact that not all people are good, or whenever adults add to kids’ fears or anxieties.

When I was in fourth grade, I read the “How and Why” book of Atomic Energy. I learned how nuclear fission works. Later, I realized that the two best places to be when an atomic bomb goes off are either very far away or at ground zero, and it still seems to me it would be better to fry instantly than to suffer for weeks or months in a radioactive world. And we have weapons today that make Fat Man and Little Boy seem like pop guns.

I apologize for focusing on fear. Yet, for 60 years I have hoped that the world would wake up and find a way to make doomsday weapons a thing of the past. We have not. The guys with the biggest clubs still think they can “win.” One recently threatened “fire and fury.” And we keep inventing more ways to kill each other, all the while wondering why some people shoot others in nightclubs, theatres, malls, and schools.

Some are afraid to leave the house. Others are afraid to leave the house without their guns. We seem to be the same old kill-or-be-killed hominids we were millennia ago, except now with “devices” that can kill millions in a flash. It’s bad enough we have guns that can kill dozens of school children in less than a minute.

We are steeped in fear. We have been told to be afraid of practically everything. Some are afraid of refugees or undocumented immigrants. Some are afraid of people who don’t worship like them, don’t think like them, or just don’t look like them. Some are afraid a more equitable job market represents communism. Some are afraid if the history of race becomes better known, they will be forced to examine their own lives. Some are afraid if others get more rights, they will lose theirs. Some are afraid climate change will end human life on Earth. Some are afraid of chemical or biological weapons. And some are still afraid a maniac will start launching nuclear missiles.

In 68 years on this planet, I’ve learned that people acting in groups can be incredibly ignorant. Lately it’s become obvious that the internet can amplify our fears, even though there is a vast amount of good information available. Unfortunately, there is also a vast amount of misinformation and disinformation as well. And perhaps nothing does more to increase our fears than sharing our ignorance.

People who want to identify with a group can become heartless – certainly not as empathetic as they are as individuals. Despite my hopes, the internet has become an incubator for the worst in people. I will not provide examples. There are just too many.

When fears win, rationality, civility, common sense, and compassion lose. I was born near the end of the “Red Scare.” Many were falsely accused then because those who wanted to be identified as “patriotic” rushed to believe the worst about others, regardless of evidence or logic. Like the Salem Witch Trials, mere belief trumped reason, and the result was cruelty. Fear, hatred, and violence often travel in packs. There must be a better way.

Phrases like “have no fear” or “fear not” occur frequently in the Bible. While our fears can multiply exponentially, ancient wisdom warns us not to let this happen, not to be controlled by or through fear. Some who stoke fear to control others also claim to fear the Lord. It seems to me “the fear of the Lord” means we should have no fear of lesser things and rely on God’s wisdom and judgement rather than our own. Maybe we should just do the work of caring for each other, solving problems, and building a better world.

I know I’m not qualified to judge anyone, much less condemn anyone. Like St. Francis, all I can do is “not so much seek…to be understood, as to understand; to be loved, as to love.” I still have so much work to do on myself that I don’t have the time or energy to be afraid I might accidentally tolerate someone I’ve been told to fear. If I make a mistake, I want it to be on the side of acceptance rather than rejection. I want to give others the benefit of doubt rather than denigrate them out of fear. I want to cast off my fears rather than compound them. That’s my birthday message for this year.