I just finished reading a challenging article by David Brooks from the September 2023 issue of The Atlantic called “How America Got Mean” (You’ll find a link below). It’s an ambitious undertaking for sure, but Brooks focuses his argument quickly, writing, “The most important story about why Americans have become sad and alienated and rude, I believe, is also the simplest: We inhabit a society in which people are no longer trained in how to treat each other with kindness and consideration.”

In the wake of World War II, Brooks writes, as a reaction to the dangers of authoritarianism, there was a shift in emphasis from moral formation to individual self-actualization. We stressed the freedom and worth of the individual, but the unintended result was less attention paid to the common good and more to the needs of me and mine. Brooks cites a decades-long survey of incoming college students about their goals in life. In 1967, about 85 percent said they were strongly motivated to develop a “‘meaningful philosophy of life’; by 2000 only 42 percent said that. Being financially well off became the leading life goal; by 2015, 82 percent of students said wealth was their aim.”

Instead of finding self-fulfillment, we’ve found isolation. Brooks quotes Luke Bretherton of Duke Divinity School, “The breakdown of an enduring moral framework will always produce disconnection, alienation, and an estrangement from those around you.” A growing loneliness and sadness breeds bitterness, resentment, and fear. Let’s put it this way: We all feel put upon, left out, and threatened. So, what do we do?

Brooks argues that, lacking a morality of mutual care and inclusive community, Americans have looked increasingly to politics and tribalism for a sense of identity and purpose. “For people who feel disrespected, unseen, and alone,” politics offers “a comprehensible moral landscape: The line between good and evil runs not down the middle of every human heart, but between groups. Life is a struggle between us, the forces of good, and them, the forces of evil.” Righteousness is defined less by behavior and more by the purity of belief and opinion.

“Politics overwhelms everything,” Brooks argues. “Churches, universities, sports, pop culture, health care are swept up in a succession of battles that are really just one big war—red versus blue.”

I think Brooks has named an important truth. We Christians are as prone as anyone to what I call “ideolotry,” the idolatry of ideology. We draw excellent lines; we’re gangbusters at judging and labeling others; we thrive on the likes of the like-minded; and too many of us keep a rock handy, convinced we’re qualified to launch the first one if called upon. Look around. The landscape is covered with lots of nice, comfortable, safe towers of Babel, each populated by nothing but the purist of believers. And more are planned every day, as the purity of some of our tower-mates falls into question.

The most challenging call of Christ is the simplest, “Love your neighbor as yourself,” and seeking the good of the other is rarely our first choice. That’s the definition of Christian love, by the way: to seek genuinely the good of the other. It doesn’t come naturally, does it? Brooks is right; it takes moral formation. Love is beautiful, eternal even, and hard to do.

John Wesley, founder of Methodism, understood the challenges of Christian love. We have to grow into it, he believed. Our goal, he said, is “holiness of heart and life.” That means to love as Jesus loved. I don’t know about you, but I’m not quiiiiiite there yet. Wesley offers a way to approach the goal.

We mature in Christian love by doing the stuff of love—worshiping God, feeding the hungry, praying together and alone, sitting with the lonely and sick, advocating for justice and true community, studying the Bible, giving money to do good for someone other than ourselves, receiving Holy Communion, treating with respect the person standing in front of you, confessing your own sinfulness, forgiving others, trusting the help of the Holy Spirit. And, lest we forget, we’re also called to love our enemies, “even the enemies of God” (Wesley’s words). If we lack opportunity to do good to those who hate us, Wesley advised, “never cease to pray for them.” Does all that sound hard? Well, let’s start together in worship, seek the help of the Holy Spirit, then take another step, and another, and …

Is there life beyond meanness? I encourage you to read Brooks’ article; he offers intriguing suggestions for us as a nation. But as for us Christians, I think it begins with some fundamentals.

Remember: we are forgiven and embraced in grace. We are loved and called to love. And Christ DOES actually want us to label others. As it turns out, one label fits all: “Child of God.” Treat them accordingly. And so begins our moral formation.

In Christ,

Mark

Here is a link to David Brooks’ article.