A third way?

I was listening to NPR yesterday during the noon hour, which is when our local station (KIOS-FM, Omaha, NE) broadcast the program, City Arts and Lectures.  I didn't listen to the entire program yesterday, but what I heard intrigued me.

The two people on the show were Malcolm Gladwell and Adam Gopnik.  I'd not heard of either of them before, but they apparently are good friends and also do a lot of conversation-type programs together.  During the course of this particular conversation of theirs, Mr. Gladwell was talking about a new idea on which he was working.  He is Jewish,as is Mr. Gopnik, and they were talking about people who historically have been oppressed over the centuries.  He said that groups generally respond to oppression in one of two ways - they either get stronger, or they get smarter and more devious.  In other words, when people are oppressed they tend to decide that they will put all their efforts into becoming so strong that no one ever will be able to oppress them again, or else they put all their efforts into becoming so smart that they will be able to outwit their oppressors every time.  His examples were Israel and African-Americans.  Israel decided to build a military so strong that neither the likes of Hitler nor radical Arabs would take them down again.  African-Americans decided to outsmart their slave owners by developing an underground system of learning, songs, art, and traditions that allowed them to free their minds and spirits, even though their bodies were still enslaved.  Now, although I'm intrigued by his proposition, I don't completely accept his analyses here.  But that's for another conversation, perhaps.

What did intrigue me, though, is what he next said.  He shared that he's been reflecting on this for a while, and he's found himself going back to his experiences in Ontario, Canada where he was a Jewish boy raised in a predominantly Mennonite community.  He vividly remembers seeing a 10-year-old boy who was riding his bike and went out into the street between two cars.  He was struck by a car going down that street, driven by a teenage boy.  The child was critically injured, and ultimately died the next day.  What Gladwell so movingly remembers is seeing the mother of the young boy, who was a Mennonite, coming on to the scene, seeing what had happened.  She immediately ran over to the police car, where the teenager was in handcuffs in the backseat, and pleaded with the officer, "Take care of that boy!  Please take care of that boy!"  Naturally assuming that the distraught woman was asking about her son, the officer said that her boy was in the ambulance, and would be taken to the hospital where everything possible would be done for him. The woman shook her head and then said, "No, take care of the boy in your back seat.  He's got such a heavy burden to carry now.  Make sure he's treated well."  Gladwell had a hard time relating that story, saying he tears up every time he remembers it.

What Gladwell has been reflecting on from this is that there perhaps is a third way that people respond to oppression.  He said that, like both Jews and Africans, Mennonites historically have been an oppressed people.  However, instead of responding to oppression by either striving to become stronger or smarter, Mennonites have chosen to forgive and to move on in their lives.  Instead of saying to their oppressors, "I'm going to be strong so I can beat you," or "I'm going to become smart and outwit you," Mennonites have chosen to say, "I'm going to forgive you, and then go on with my life."

We Christians routinely, regularly, sometimes daily ask God:  "forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us."  For us, Gladwell's "third way" of responding to oppression - or responding to anyone who has hurt us or wronged us or mistreated those we love - should always begin with forgiveness.  To be sure, our "moving on" with our lives should often involve other responses as well, but it seems that Jesus taught us that we should begin - must begin - with forgiveness, with compassion, with love.

For us, this "third way" ought to be our first way.