Sermon 8.16.26 Who Do You Trust?
- standrewcin
- 6 days ago
- 8 min read
“Oh how good and pleasant it is, when brethren live together in Unity.”
In a provocatively titled editorial for the political newspaper, The Hill, opinion editor John Mac Ghlionn gives an answer to the question,
“Why Americans hate each other more than ever.”
The premise of the piece is based on a new Marquette Law School Poll, which shows the level of trust that each generation of Americans has in their fellow citizens.
Unsurprisingly, those born before 1960 have more basic trust in their neighbors than subsequent generations.
On a basic level, trust is gauged by questions like whether people thought that their neighbors would steal from them, if given the chance.
The surprising thing is that the distrust is not just a small gap.
For those born before 1960, about 77% trust their neighbors.
For those born in the 2000s after 9/11, it is about 35% who have a general trust of their neighbors.
(Maybe less surprising is that the level of trust in neighbors has waned at the same time as religious affiliation has also waned, but maybe that is correlation and not causation)
Mac Ghlionn goes on to discuss a second research poll from the Pew Research Center.
This poll compared 25 countries on questions of morality: what is morally acceptable and what is morally unacceptable.
That poll suggested that 53% of Americans don’t just see their fellow citizens as wrong about certain questions of morality, but that their fellow citizens are morally and ethically bankrupt.
And, I have to say, if I were to answer that question myself, my answer about whether I thought Americans were moral and ethical would probably depend on the day and what kind of news had come out.
I wonder if that sentiment resonates with anyone else.
We see in the news the building of huge AI data centers, which are an environmental nightmare; I've actually seen two in person.
One is just up the interstate between here and the Procter Camp and Conference Center where our family went to summer camp last week.
We see news about the Iran War, on again off again, on again off again, and remember all of the people who were convinced less than two years ago that our current president would get us out of forever wars.
Along with this war, we have also seen in recent months the rise of “mention markets,” which you’ve probably seen commercials for, but didn’t realize it.
Companies like Kalshi and PolyMarket take Americans’ love for online gambling out of sports and allow people to bet on current events or even words and phrases that political dignitaries might say.
You may remember a report from the beginning of the Iran war, where someone was making hundreds of thousands of dollars by placing bets that the president would announce a cease fire at a press conference.
These bets were consistently made about one hour before these press conferences.
It turns out that it was the president’s teleprompter operator.
On NPR this week, I was listening to a segment about a 299 page report put out by scientists across the globe calling for the end of research into something called "mirror cells."
Did you know that all DNA in all life on the planet earth is right-handed?
Apparently, the helix of DNA all twists to the right, and there are scientists who are trying to create a cell with DNA that twists to the left. They’ve already been able to create a few small protein molecules.
This may sound benign, but when you hear what scientists say about the possibility for the accidental creation of bacteria cells or virus cells that have never existed in the 5 billion year history of the planet and how that could affect plants and animals as well as our own bodies…
I don’t know about you, but I tend to think, maybe just because we can, doesn’t mean we should.
Now, if you asked me whether I trust my fellow citizens after listing off a series of news stories like that,
I think I would probably say, no I do not trust my neighbors and I do not think that they generally have any clue about moral or ethical rectitude.
And actually, this is the point that John Mac Ghlionn goes on to make in his opinion piece.
The fact that I would not trust my neighbor after hearing the news, or seeing the effects of our current stage of almost unregulated capital markets is a money-maker.
Building distrust between us, fomenting our political enmities, encouraging our baser instincts, all of these things are creating vast amounts of wealth at our expense.
And, unlike Joseph, whose foresight in saving up grain for famine was shared with his brothers and the Egyptians,
We don’t have the sense that this vast amount of capital that is being hoarded away will be shared or helpful to ordinary people in time of crisis.
So, the question becomes, what do we do about this distrust before it tears us apart.
How do we get back to “How good and pleasant it is when brethren live together in unity?"
For me, there are three intertwining answers to this question:
The first is understand the root cause of my distrust.
The second is to double-down on interpersonal relationship building and community.
The third is to understand the importance of our common story.
What I notice in myself, as I have been pondering our growing distrust in society is that what seems to be at the base of it is a lack of control.
Of the things that I have listed from the news this week, I notice the common thread, that these are largely systemic issues over which I have almost no control.
It often feels like even if we gathered more than a million people at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington DC and professed a better Dream for our common future,
We still wouldn’t be able to move the needle on things like starting wars, prediction markets, AI data centers, affordability, or immigration policy.
And, when I see these things happening, my gut instinct tells me that if it is happening, it must be because most people support it, or in the case of AI that we have all just accepted the Kool-Aid;
That my neighbors aren’t to be trusted.
But, this is actually not the case.
These things are not supported by the majority of our fellow citizens, they are supported by vast amounts of wealth that use our distrust as an investment strategy.
Instead of feeling isolated in my lack of control and capitulating to the system’s desire that I hate and distrust my neighbor,
I need to move into the second solution: to double-down on interpersonal relationships.
You cannot build trust with an amorphous, abstract system.
But, you can build trust with people.
If watching the news makes me feel less trusting of my fellow citizens, I find equally that being with people makes me feel better.
When we have our parking lot events, when I stop at the pantry, or sit at Cream and Sugar down the road,
When I go to my kids’ sporting events and see some of the culture turning from parents screaming on the sidelines toward respecting the game and supporting the players,
I feel a social contract of civility beginning to re-emerge on the sidelines (not perfectly, but slowly).
When I engage in actual activities that bring me into personal contact with my neighbors, I remember the goodness that God created, the empathy and compassion of my fellow human beings; real people not far off systems.
This is what changed Jesus’ mind in our gospel lesson for today.
He finds himself in a land of non-Israelites, in Tyre and Sidon.
He is in a place, where the people are defined by their broad culture, by the religious systems that were in place at the time.
Jesus says, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the House of Israel.”
What this Syro-Phoenician woman does is to turn a huge amorphous group of non-Israelite, non-chosen people into a specific person sitting directly in front of Jesus demanding his humanity as well as his divinity.
Being with people and identifying with people across our differences changes us.
Which leads me to the last piece: the need to understand our common story.
For the past several decades, for good and for ill, the word Mythology and some of our common mythologies have come under suspicion.
In a general sense, modern societies have been de-mythologizing many of our ancient and not so ancient stories.
We have become skeptical of mythological claims, we have asked questions like, “Yes, but how historical is it? How could Jesus have seen ‘every nation’ from the pinnacle of the temple, the earth is round. It’s scientifically impossible.”
And so, some have doubled-down on the mythology: “the earth is flat, Jesus obviously could have seen it all.”
Some have re-oriented, “well, it is a metaphorical seeing of every nation.”
Some have rejected, “It’s all bogus, there’s nothing to learn or see here.”
Similarly, in our own American mythology, we have to admit that even though much of the dismantling has been important and necessary;
Like taking down statues of confederate generals, uncovering the veil of colonialism and westward expansion, calling into question the narrative of a nation that was built upon the labor of enslaved people;
The mythologies of the happy and ignorant, or the evil and dangerous black man, which evolved from minstrel shows to modern news reporting, edifying audiences and confirming their suspicion that our systems of oppression keep us safe.
I’m sure those whose mythologies of race have been unravelling feel a loss of control similar to those associated with the news that I shared earlier.
And so, even if we know it is necessary, we can see why they cling to it so tightly.
What I want you to see is that our de-mythologizing has been important and necessary, but unlike those who would just do away with mythology altogether,
It behooves us to notice that as we have de-mythologized, we have also lost a deeper sense of “We;” who “We” are together.
In some sense, we’ve become too analytical, too skeptical, always tearing down, but never building up.
I saw the Odyssey movie this week, Homer’s ancient Greek myth brought to life.
It’s a good case in point. So many people online have been arguing about whether a trans person should play a Greek soldier, or whether its “historically accurate” for Helen of Troy to be played by a black actor.
(I love when people bring in “historical accuracy” to cover for their implicit biases, especially in stories that have no actual historical basis
“There can’t be people of color in a totally made up universe that shares similarities with our medieval societies, blasphemy!!!”)
It’s all ridiculous.
What’s the Truth? What’s the thing that we all look at in our myths and learn?
What binds us together?
The power of mythology lies in what’s universal, its Truth (with a capital T) not just its scientific facts.
Mythology is a glue for society, that is its entire point.
It creates a common framework, it reinforces societal norms and morals.
It creates a “We.”
Joseph’s story shows us what it is like when a brother sees his mistreatment not as an opportunity for vengeance, but for Grace and Mercy;
For tears and joy and reunion.
The Syro-Phoenician woman shows us what the Apostle Paul’s ministry later cements into the Christian ethos;
That Jesus came to save everyone.
If all are disobedient, and God’s Grace extends to all, then to find common ground with those whom you distrust, those who seem morally and ethically opposed to you is part of God’s plan.
That is the literal truth.
Our God created a universe of diversity and gave us the ability to tell ourselves stories about ourselves so that we could bind ourselves together through trust in our common goodness.
250 years into this grand experiment of brethren living in unity, being united in states across this continent,
We need to ask ourselves, whether we want to live into God’s plan of unity and find a revised common mythology, a renewed moral and ethical framework, an interpersonal ethos that allows us to trust our neighbor and curb the excesses of a runaway wealth gap,
Or do we continue to be manipulated by a system that is set up to make money off of our refusal to love our neighbor as ourself?
Do we choose the pleasantness of unity, or penury of disintegration?
I honestly don’t know how it will turn out, if we will learn the lesson in time.
I do know that if we trust each other’s humanity, there are glimpses even today of the goodness of our neighbors.
In either case, even if we refuse God’s plan, even if we remain disobedient in this lifetime, though we may lose all else, at least we will not lose God’s irrevocable promise of mercy.
The Good News is that God will win in the end. Amen.
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