Cross The Line

On July 29, 1990 Lou Guntzelman, Pastor, Good Shepherd Parish in Montgomery, Ohio gave the following address to his congregation.

If you let it, it will provoke your thinking deeply as it has  mine all of these years. It is especially important as we come to the most important election in our lifetime. Please give it your total attention and send it throughout the nation.                                                 Pn

Go ahead:  Cross the line, pay a moral price

There is a line that runs through every society. Whether that society is in the middle of Africa or at the north pole, whether it exists in this century  or in past or future centuries, every society has a line. It is a very important line.

On one side is what the people of that society consider moral, and on the other side what they consider immoral; on one side what is considered good and beautiful, and on the other side what is vulgar, ugly and destructive. On one side is what is sacred and valuable, and on the other side what is trivial and base.

It is also a movable line. It can be, and actually is, moved by the people of a society. If we pull that line too close  to ourselves, then we bind up, suffocate and restrict ourselves; we become rigid, scrupulous, unhappy with little creativity, joy or spontaneity. For with it drawn close and tight, almost everything is then located on the other side of the line and is considered immoral and unseemly.

However, if we push that line back too far, we also disrespect and hurt ourselves as well. For then we permit all the things that were immoral, antisocial, ugly and violent to surround us and even be welcomed in our midst. Then nothing is sacred or valuable. Where, then, do we place that important line? An old Latin saying puts it well, “ virtus stat in medio,” “virtue stands in the middle”. Trying to find that middle ground becomes the endeavor of society.

I have been thinking a lot about that line lately, have you? When I heard Roseanne Barr disgrace our national anthem as a joke, I thought of that line. When I hear the filthy lyrics of the group, “2 Live Crew,” that put down women and make sexuality an act of violence instead of love, I think of that line. When I see people actually pay admission to listen and laugh to the alleged humor of an Andrew Dice Clay, I think of that line. When I observe humans acceptingly admire a photograph by Robert Mapplethorpe  of one man urinating into another man. I think of that line. When I see a society be so approving of abortions as a means of controlling births, I think of that line. We have become so calloused to the dignity of human life, that if I stood here with an American flag in one hand , and a live fetus – a developing human – in the other, many people would find it objectionable to burn the flag but perfectly fine to destroy the fetus. If I have the “choice” of destroying the fetus, should I not also have the “choice” of destroying the flag?

I think that line is being pushed back farther and farther and farther, and there are few of us who object. If someone should object  to what is happening, they feel the crushing weight of public and peer pressure.

They are laughed at, cajoled, accused, “What are you a religious fanatic?” they are asked. “Don’t you know this is 1990? Get with it!” or “Are you psychologically repressed or a “goody-two-shoes?”

A more recent threat hurled at those seeking to reinstate that important line in our society is the threat of being un-American or in favor of censorship. “This is a free country!” I have my rights to say and do what I want!,” is a familiar cry today. “What are you trying to do, chip away at the Constitution and Bill of Rights?”

You know, we Americans have a confused notion of what freedom means. We think it means the ability to do what we want. That is untrue. Freedom is the ability to do what we ought, license is the ability to do what we want. And sometimes what we want and what we ought to do, are two very different things. Those who believe that we are creatures who have come ultimately from the hand of God believe there is a certain “ought-ness” to that relationship, that we “ought” to choose to carry out the will of that One who made us.. We are free to choose that “ought-ness” or not, but our choosing it does not turn our choice into virtue.

Though in my own humanness and pride, I too often resist that line delineating the valuable from the base in our society, I believe in it. I likewise believe that I, we, have the responsibility of restoring it to a healthier place in our land. We are suffering and our children will suffer all the more. Perhaps it is time to check and see where that line is in our own hearts. Secondly, to pay close attention to living it out well in our families. Thirdly, we need to see where we want it drawn in our own society. “This land is your land, this land is my land….” we sing, and it is. The people of a society are responsible for the integrity of their own land.

Whether we realize it or not, we have great power in establishing that line in our land. We have three great sources of power that work very well in changing things. Three of the great catalysts or powers for change are: to speak up, to vote, and to determine to whom we pay our money. We have the power to speak up in letters to our representatives, newspapers, executives, companies that sponsor programs, etc.

We have power to vote out politicians who seem not to have drawn a “line” in their own lives, and cannot recognize the need for one in society. Personal integrity does matter in government . It is often the difference between a politician and a statesman. Finally, one of the most influential vehicles of power is as close as our wallet. Refusing to place money into the one hand of those who with their other hand are pushing back that line in society, will really get their attention. Before our society is desensitized any further, before grossness is loosed all around us, we need to say firmly with our actions and words, “That’s enough!”