The Morality Fog

I'm appalled. My sense of justice is stifled. My response is paralysis and a mild nausea.

Currently, I'm reading a rather overwhelming combination of books on Africa, India, poverty and justice. I'm slowly learning from these books that God is intolerant of injustice yet can courageously pronounce condemnation and compassion on oppressors and victims. Given that the conflict in Iran is still looming and is gaining world-wide attention and support, I said a quick prayer as I had the courage to finally open one of the links of the news stories. "God, help me to see and stomach what you see."

My response alarms me. Just as simply as I wanted to disregard the news feeds and sweep it under a rug with an "it's just Iran," "it's just the always explosive Middle East," I found myself downplaying the death of the movement's martyr Neda Soltani. "It's just death." "Murder happens everywhere." And thoughts I'm too ashamed of that result fro too much invasive CSI-like shows that explain cause of death, etc. I wanted to faint due to the sight of blood and my own faint of heart.

In a discussion in The Good News About Injustice, Gary Haugen discusses Dietrich Bonhoeffer's point that evil and injustice are allowed to parade about when there is a lack of moral clarity that throws even "religious people" like me off their foundation. Haugen argues that injustice (defined as the abuse of power) is able to produce a morality fog by faking right, faking left and then plowing through the center toward a path of evil and destruction.

This makes sense to me in my own fog about what to do with Iran and my own reaction. My American culture is too violent--through the television, computer screen and violent literature and speech. Yet my American culture is not facing the atrocities of genocide, forced labor, inaccurate and fake elections, censorship with threat of death, etc. Fake right. Fake left. Result: I see real injustice, real violence and do not know how to respond. I stand there not knowing what to do--and do nothing. Even worse, feel nothing.

My picture of Iran is a place that is too turbulent--always preparing to explode. A headline that a threat is imminent and that the country just needs to settle down and play nice. My other picture of Iran is that it is a place that is stifled by fundamentalism. Religion is forced, women are exploited, intellectuals are presecuted--the place needs to see change. Fake right. Fake left. Result: I'm left not knowing what to pray for and there is chance that I may turn my back away from them.

Lord, clear the fog. Don't let me trivualize or tidy things up with nice truisms. Give me new eyes to see. Help me to pray. What does justice look like here? Help me to stay with you, to not pass out, to regain consciousness and to follow you in the dark places--the ones the in the world and the ones in my soul.