23 November 2005

This being the week of Thanksgiving in the U.S., we will make this the last posting for this week. Again it is from "Do No Harm" and looks at sin-talk.

...demonization depends not on an observation of how people actually live their lives, but only on how their essential identity is rendered in public discourse. So for the set of relationships represented by the idea of defilement/essentialization, what we have is a depiction of persons who, because of the way their very being is discursively rendered, are deserving of extraction from the social body.

We must realize that we all who do things...actual expressions of our original sin...actual sins, that need to be addresses in each of us. Often that means that someone helps us...becomes our mirror...our confessor...or serves to take on the task of an intervention in order to help us turn from our ways that are harmful to others and self. But here, Ray is talking about "those" people who become "those" people because they have been labeled that way by others within the everyday talk of life. For example, have you ever heard the comment about someone who was able to bring a price down from what was an asking price. When I was growing up, we simply said - without thinking about it - "I jewed them down to...." It became so common in our speech that I didn't even know I was using it until someone pointed out the use. This is just a small example of another way we depict people in a way that defiles them in language we don't watch. Imagine what happens when we intentionally take our sin-talk learn to project images of hatred and defilement on a group of people. I find it frightening - even as I look in the mirror.

Connection: Language can shape how we look out at the day but it can also bring ideas and images into the minds of others. Therefore our language needs to be something to which we direct our attention along the way.

Remind us, O God, of the many ways we see one another. Remind us of how we are to hold all people as beloved and honor their lives as we would honor our own. Remind us also to not be afraid to talk of sin but to be wary of how that talk has and will continue to damage the lives of whole groups of people and it will be done quite often in your name. Forgive us and inspire us. Amen.