John J. Thatamanil, a professor of theology and world religions at Union, has written an important essay on the moral damage the Trump presidency is doing - unfortunately hidden from American eyes on an Australian page. Aside from material harm, he argues, the president's vileness (on daily display in the daily coronavirus misinformation sessions) is a spiritual threat.
Daily exposure to such debasement, whether by tweet or by briefing,
raises dispiriting questions: Is this the best our nation’s leader can
do? Is there in him any redeemable character trait that can serve as a
beacon of light in an otherwise dark and deadly situation? Under the
cumulative barrage of lies and life-threatening misinformation, the
questions morph and become broader. Rather than ask about just about one
man’s peculiar degradation, we begin to wonder about human nature
itself. Are some human beings irredeemable, incapable of learning and
growth? Are we naïve, even foolish, to expect human beings to set aside
self-interest and rise to responsibilities thrust upon them by
extraordinary times? Under the relentless of assault of his pettiness,
we are rendered vulnerable to rage, cynicism and a subtle, pervasive
lowering of moral expectations for ourselves and others.
Breathing in spiritual pollution is akin to the breathing in air
pollution in New Delhi. Just as air pollutants harm lung capacities, so
too our spiritual capacities, love, resilience, trust and confidence in
human goodness are diminished by constant exposure to such spiritual
toxins as hubris, venality and hate.
I'm surely not the only one to have felt this for a long time, and grateful for Thataminil's finding such powerful words for it. But what's even better in his essay is the source of hope he finds in the covid-19 inspired goodness we don't hear enough about.
[C]all to mind the number 76,000 — that is the number of volunteers who have answered Governor Cuomo’s
call to join the frontlines in the struggle against COVID-19. Many have
come out of retirement and so are in the age bracket most vulnerable to
this disease; nevertheless, they have stepped forward bravely.
We
are inclined to believe that heroic goodness is found only in a handful
of extraordinary people like Martin Luther King, Jr. or Mother Teresa,
but it seems that New York State alone has 76,000 Mother Teresas. Truth
be told, that is a vast undercount. After all, those of us who are
sheltering at home do so because we too want our neighbours to be safe
and healthy. This too is a form of quotidian kindness, an unheralded and
humble heroism.
Good bests evil, if only we have the eyes to see it.
And yet, as I used to point out when I was writing on "the problem of evil" - really, I argued, the lifeless half of the problems of evil and good - evil gets all the attention. Even if it's the focus only because of the damage it causes to goods, evil can seem more real to us than good. It's a genuine problem, since it isn't in the nature of good to try to commandeer us, to make us forget the world, to eat our brains. Evil will always win as clickbait. Something like that happened even with this essay, which some well-intentioned editor gave the title "Why Donald Trump is a threat to the United States' spiritual well-being." A better title might have been "76,000 Mother Teresas"!
