A recent sermon in church coupled with a number of newspaper stories has
had me thinking about guilt. People of my generation always laugh
about our propensity to feel guilty about almost anything, a result of
our parents' methodology in child-rearing. Guilt, in the aspect that
it shows a conscience if one has misbehaved, can be a healthy emotion.
Our society, however, is taking it too far.
The sermon in question had to do with Christ's admonition about the sheep and the goats, "If ye have done it unto the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me." For those not familiar with the Bible, he is referring to feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, visiting the sick, and visiting those in prison. Compassion for the less fortunate is the lesson at hand. Every world religion teaches this concept in some form and it is certainly a good lesson.
As the minister pointed out, however, in this day of multitudes who want to be taken care of without any effort on their part, it is easy to find ourselves in a quandary. Just how many of the people who hold their hands or vessels out on the streets of a city can we actually give to, practically speaking? How many worthy causes can we support? And why do we feel guilty when we have to pass one by, when we have already given so much? Keeping an unhardened heart, a feeling of compassion, can be difficult when the importuners are younger and healthier than we ourselves, and when they aggressively try to make us feel guilty if we pass them by.
If we are already making our best efforts, the answer is that we shouldn't feel guilty. As individuals, we can only help a certain number. The trick is to try to help those who are really deserving and not to let ourselves feel badly about not being able to help everyone. None of us wants to be a goat, but neither does any of us need to feel badly about being a sheep of limited means.
The same applies to political, historical, and social problems that are more secular in nature. President Clinton seems to be running around the world apologizing to everyone for America, not present-day America, but everything that preceded his election. I wouldn't have a problem with his explaining certain unhappy events in our past history as being wrong by the standards of today, but an apology implies guilt.
We should apologize if we have actually done something wrong, but we can't really apologize for something over which we had no control. I, myself, think we've made plenty of foreign policy mistakes, even under Clinton. He does not, however, so he won't apologize and I shouldn't because I had no control. I could explain to an aggrieved party that I disagreed with the action, but I shouldn't feel guilty - badly, perhaps, but not guilty.
There are few countries in the world which do not benefit from America's largesse. There are even fewer which haven't benefited from the example of democracy that America has set throughout our mistake-ridden history. There simply has never been a country in history which has had as much positive impact on the world as has America and it infuriates me for people to apologize for this country. Admit mistakes, by all means. No person, and certainly no country, can be mistake-free.
Put actions that look cruel now in their historical perspective - the prevailing mores of a time, the education or lack thereof of a period, the level of civilization and what it meant at a social level - and we have probably made fewer mistakes as a society than almost any other country.
Yet there are those who want us to feel guilty because the rapid strides in social justice which we have made were not made before the first ship landed. That is absurd. Instead of feeling good about ourselves because we have come so far, we are asked to feel guilty because our forefathers lived in a different social climate.
I certainly, as I'm sure most people do, have enough errors in my own life for which I must apologize. I'm quite busy enough being guilty about my various sins of commission and omission without being asked to shoulder the burden for almost four hundred years of ancestors. Guilt can be a destructive emotion unless it is used sparingly. A positive outlook will achieve a great deal more, will enable people to solve the unsolved problems working together. Pointing fingers tends to alienate people from one another and is counterproductive. Joining hands forms a bond that strengthens even the weakest link. That is where we need to be if we are to move forward.