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Perhaps, as you hear me say these words, you think I am preaching
right through the church walls into the world outside: that it
cannot apply to you. I am doing nothing of the sort. It does apply
to you. We are all to one extent or another afflicted with it. And
it is weakening us. Weakening us in subtle and elusive ways.
And I want to say some very simple, plain things about it. We are
sinners. About that there is no possible doubt. We have done badly.
There is not much doubt about that either. But it is absolutely not
true that we are nothing but sinners, or that we are drowning in
sin, and cannot be saved. And it is absolutely not true that we have
done nothing but evil and have proved incapable of good. We are good
people as well as bad people. And we do good deeds as well as bad
deeds. We have done evil things in the world. But we have also done
some very good things, even some rather magnificent and generous
things. The confession in the Book of Common Prayer that "we have
done those things we ought not to have done and left undone those
things that we ought to have done," is a large part of the truth.
But not all of the truth. And the final clause of that confession
which says that "there is no health in us," is just a mean-spirited
lie. There is health in us. And our hope is not in a miracle from
the skies, but in the health that is in us! We shall not be defeated
by fate; no, if we are defeated, it will only be by letting the
health that is in us decay and become a mortal sickness.
What we need, right now, in America is not so much repentance as
some common sense. Don't misunderstand me. I am not against
repentance. I am heartily in favor of it. And we have plenty to
repent. But I'm sick and tired of mush. I'm sick and tired of people
repenting and repenting and repenting until there is nothing else
they can do--except agitate for things that they don't expect to
happen. When we repent, the thing is to do it thoroughly and get it
over with. Then go ahead and make amends. Go ahead and put some
wrong things right, not weep over them.
Yes, and open our foolish eyes and look at what is coming upon
us--coming daily nearer. Look at it and recognize it for the evil
that it is. I repeat, we need most of all some common sense just now
here in America. And I think that is what God wants of us, too; not
prayers of confession. If we are a nation of sinners, it is
reasonable to hope that God will forgive us, but why should he save
a nation of saps? We are committing, even now, the worst sin of all:
the sin of not using the brains that God has given us.
So far as I can see, we are in a bad way. Our national defense seems
to be in a bad way: or at any rate, not in a good way. We are
slipping to the edge of disaster; yet, what we chiefly want to do is
maintain a prosperous economy. Whatever may be said about sin, folly
has more punctual consequences. For folly like ours, if it continues
much longer, there is no forgiveness. And the communist text-books
of the future will describe how we brought upon ourselves our own
downfall through escapism, obsessional guilt-feelings skillfully
worked upon by our enemies, and an indomitable resolve to die like
sheep!
But then, says the theologian obsessed with sin, to say things like
these is to sin the sin of pride. Do we not realize, do we not
understand that we of this age, we poor pitiful creatures hoping for
good but chained by evil, are unequal to such things? Do we not see
that this is our pride fighting against God? Surely we must be
humble. We must submit. We must repent and bow low. We must wear
sack-cloth and ashes.
When I hear these admonitions, so full of exact knowledge of what
God wants of us, and yet so urgent in demanding that we give up
every vestige of human self-esteem, I am reminded of the story of
the Catholic friar who belonged to one of the lesser orders. "Yes,"
he said, "in piety the Dominicans may surpass us, and in service the
Franciscans may excel, but in humility--ah! in humility!--we lead
the world!"
Well, I for one am tired of these people who in humility so
arrogantly want to lead the world. I see plainly that they will lead
the world to hell if they get the chance. I don't know whether God
is tired of them. I'm not so sure as they are about the will and
ways of God. But it stands pretty strongly in my mind--stands there,
too, in rather good conscience--that the most religious thing we can
do about evil, right now, is fight it; fight it and keep on fighting
it--everywhere we find it. When we are knocked down by it, don't lie
there, wailing, but get up and fight some more.
That is what God told Job, in the Old Testament--after his
sackcloth-and-ashes advisors had kept him repenting for so long that
he was toppling into a moral and spiritual breakdown. "Deck thyself
now with excellency and dignity! Pour forth the overflowings of
thine anger! Then will I confess of thee that thine own right hand
can save thee!"
We are sinners. Not a doubt of it. And we are in a bad way. But we
are good people, too! I say that very simply, because it is the
truth. And if we want to, we are good enough to get out of the bad
way and into a good way.
It's about time we stopped moaning and groaning that we are
helpless, hopeless, unworthy, unprofitable servants and only God can
save us. Why should he if we're telling the truth about ourselves? I
ask the question seriously. Why in the name of anything, anywhere,
that makes the slightest vestige of sense, should God save a pitiful
mass of broken-down whiners? If that's what we are, then the sooner
the better we're incinerated and the universe made more sanitary.
I ask god to save us because we are worth saving, and because I
believe such a prayer is answered not by miracles but by the use of
the powers that God has given us to save ourselves. I protest that
in spite of all the evil man has done, there is good in man. And I
say without hesitation that there is more good in free men than in
slaves and that free men are worth saving. I say as one sinner to
other sinners, that I freely admit my sinfulness but that down to
now, sin hasn't got me down. I'm still on my feet and the fight I'm
putting up may not be heroic but it is respectable.
And I say with the dreamer in O'Casey's play, "Within the Gates,"
that the people for whom there is no room left in the world are the
spiritual down-and-outs. Those who have "but a sigh for a song and a
deep sigh for a drum-beat." Let them make way for stronger life.
"Life that is stirred with the fear of its life,
let it die.
Let it sink down, let it die, and pass
from our vision for ever.
Sorrow and pain we shall have
and struggle unending:
We shall have courage with pain
and fight through the struggle unending.
Life that is stirred with the fear of its life,
let it die,
Let it sink down, let it die, and pass
from our vision for ever."
That is how sin will be conquered! By sinners! Sinners who refuse to
smother the flame of life that God has put into their souls. Sinners
who do their best. Sinners who never surrender--never abandon their
faith and hope that good will prove stronger than evil and that God
is on the side of courage, not dejection, and will give the victory
to those who never desert him but stand beside him in the fight.
If the world is saved--so it seems to me--it will be by those who
bring to God their sweat and toil, not by those who have nothing to
bring but their tears.
Prayer: O God, who art in us to save us, whose breath is our life,
whose courage is our endurance, be with us in the kindling of a new
and stronger hope. Amen.
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