October 16, 2019

The stubborn myth of human goodness is astonishingly difficult to dispel. And that is despite the hard evidence of the greed, violence, hedonism and general indifference that comprise a daily newsfeed.  I suppose the tenacity of the myth shouldn’t be astonishing since we have so much invested in thinking well of ourselves, while locating the blame on the “bad people” of the world. Still, among those who should know better, one hears with regularity “he’s a good person” or “the real goal is to raise good people.”

When the rich, young ruler addresses Jesus as “good teacher”, Jesus responds, “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone.” (Mark 10:18) (By the way, Jesus IS good because He is God and may be answering the brash young man with a double entendre.) Had it been written, Jesus could have responded with Article IX of the Episcopal Church’s 39 Articles. We are “very far gone from (our) original righteousness and is of (our) own nature inclined to evil.”

I see this sober assessment of our nature as very good news. It doesn’t mean that we are entirely wicked or that we are not capable of goodness. As Bruce Cockburn sang, “I’ve never had a lot of faith in human beings, but sometimes we manage to shine.”It just means that our faith is not wrongly placed in ourselves, but rightly placed in God alone. For God alone is good.

“Most holy God, the source of all good desires, all right judgments, and all just works: Give to us, your servants, that peace which the world cannot give, so that our minds may be fixed on the doing of your will, and that we, being delivered from the fear of all enemies, may live in peace and quietness; through the mercies of Christ Jesus our Savior. Amen.” (A Collect for Peace – BCP p. 123)