We need to recognize that sometimes people look at the same set of facts and come to different conclusions.
Learning to live with one another and coming together where it matters most
R ussia’s attack on Ukraine seems to be a bit of a Rorschach test for Americans who have the luxury of freely voicing opinions. A Republican candidate for the United States Senate voiced that she identifies more with the Christian values of Vladimir Putin than with Joe Biden. Solme television hosts seem to say something similar. “Genius,” our most recent former president sarcastically called the invasion. These aren’t healthy human responses.
As it happens, Joe Biden’s position on abortion grieves my heart. But I don’t want the Ukrainian people to pay for it. I can’t help but see Putin in the lens of recent history and what the Ukrainian people have had to endure. There’s more to the world than the American context.
Back home, I was rattled a bit hearing a scientist talk about how Jesus said, “The truth will set you free.” The scientist was using the words to say that all people should be vaccinated. To not be vaccinated is to deny the truth, in his mind. But the science of coronavirus vaccines is still developing. And Covid is less of a threat that it once was. Some of the blanket statements deriding people who have chosen not to be vaccinated ignores that there are people whose doctors have recommended they not get a Covid vaccine because of autoimmune conditions. Many a young woman I know struggled with whether or not to get vaccinated because of fertility concerns. Some of them are doctors. Others have moral concerns about how the vaccine was developed. Catholic theological authorities have given their blessing to Catholics getting vaccinated against Covid-19 but have also stressed that vaccination should be voluntary. These are not conspiracy theories. These are people making decisions about their health. And one of the things about religious freedom is that we defend a person’s right to be wrong.
There is definitely a crisis of truth in our country, seen quite clearly by the recent Ivy League swimming competition where we don’t point out the obvious — a man should not be competing with the women. Gender dysphoria is a real, grueling condition. Which is why Amazon should not be banning Ryan T. Anderson’s book When Harry Became Sally — February 2022 marks a year since it’s been censored there. It’s an honest, compassionate look at a critical human-rights issue. Doctors are giving children puberty blockers! And then we are seeing that they sometimes come to regret that their reproductive health has been damaged because the adults in their lives were not protecting them from their awkward feelings (anyone else remember being a teenager?) and the damaging trends of the culture.
One of the reasons that religious freedom is so critical is that we all seek meaning and purpose. Having faith that we are created beings made for more than our jobs and presidential elections makes things like virtue and the Beatitudes leaven in our mess of the world. One of the opportunities that the pandemic has afforded us is a moment to reflect on what we are doing with our lives. Many a workplace, including mine, changed. We that saw people didn’t have to brave long commutes daily to get the job done. Some do. But not all. I know I developed a newfound appreciation for those people who do jobs in which they had to leave their homes daily, throughout the height of the unknowns of the pandemic, to make the lives of the rest of us possible. And yet, I fear, any opportunities for gratitude and self-reflection have been crushed by a desire to return to “normal.” What’s normal if we are not wiser? Isn’t normal a false sense of security?
Hearing that the truth of the vaccines will set us free was so jarring to me because, if we believe that a jab or three — or however many boosters will ultimately be prescribed — is the sum total of truth and the moral standard by which we will all be judged, we’ve missed learning the most important lessons from this pandemic time we’ve lived together.
I’m vaccinated, and I’m grateful for all the people who worked to save lives. It was a terrifying time, early on. And Covid-19 was a massacre for some, especially the elderly in nursing homes. People who were caring for them remain traumatized from what they saw — the deaths, the anger of families, the directives, some of which led to more deaths. They were working in battlefields. But we are also living in a different time now. Shaming people who have chosen not to be vaccinated — I’m not sure of the point of that. Many of those unvaccinated have had Covid. Many of those vaccinated have had it, too. Some of them are doctors. That should give pause. And March 2022 is different from March 2020 or 2021 — this is a different day, and we need to move forward together.
In both politics and pandemic, we need to recognize that people do look at the same set of facts and come to different conclusions sometimes. Or they don’t see the full argument we are making, and maybe we need to be more creative about how we communicate. And we have got to be mature enough to recognize that our disagreeing with someone on some fundamental things doesn’t mean he is always wrong. I don’t wish that Vladimir Putin was our president, and I don’t wish suffering on the Ukrainian people because Joe Biden is president. The land of the free and the home of the brave ought to be more generous in our regard for free will and in gratitude for our guarding of it. Despite some of our rhetoric and mandates and censorship. Mercifully, our daily choices can be about way more than the divisive fray. But that’s a choice for us to make and, increasingly, one that we seem to fail to make.
This column is based on one available through Andrews McMeel Universal’s Newspaper Enterprise Association.