The Dialogue Venture

Posts Tagged ‘God’

If you pray the Daily Office, you may have run across this passage earlier in the week: 

You shall not hate your brother in your heart, but you shall reason with your neighbor, lest you bear sin because of him. You shall not take vengeance or bear any grudge…but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord. (Leviticus 19:17-18, RSV) 

This comes from part of the Torah known to many scholars as the Holiness Code. According to the text, God has called the people of Israel to “be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy” (v. 2), and now he’s telling them how to do it. The list of commandments is an inspiration to anyone with high ethical standards: do not oppress your neighbor, do not be partial to the rich (or the poor) in judgment, leave produce in your field for the poor. 

And reason with your neighbor. 

It’s hard to reason without dialogue. Can we say, then, that God called the people of Israel—and, by extension, is calling us—into dialogue? 

Maybe. Speaking for God with certainty is risky business, of course. But it is interesting to find this command ensconced amid so many others that lay out the basics of just, fair, merciful behavior. 

Even more interesting is how close this passage ties “reasoning with your neighbor” to matters of love and hate. You shall not hate, so you must reason. You shall not hate, so you must love your neighbor as yourself. 

That says two things to me. First, dialogue is an alternative to hate—even a way through hate. It’s difficult to hate someone when she’s talking with you. 

The second thing keeps us talking: a commitment to love. When, in our hearts, we can commit ourselves to seek the other person’s good, for better or worse, we don’t give up. We might take a break from dialogue to clear our heads or let the emotion dissipate. But love keeps us coming back to the table—if not to agree, then to learn how to respect each other within our differences. 

Imagine what would happen if, say, the warring factions within the Christian Church acted this out. Might they actually find a way to live together, conflicts and all?

I wrote last week that for dialogue to work, we have to open our minds and hearts and keep them open, even when the discussion boils over. But how on earth can we do that?

I don’t think we can—not on our own.

Yes, there are things we can do. The longer we practice openness, for instance, the more it becomes woven into us. Eventually, we become open almost by habit. 

But practice alone is rarely enough to effect lasting change. One reason is the typical failure of sheer willpower: think dieting and you know what I mean. A second reason is the position in which openness places us: by definition, we become extraordinarily vulnerable—especially to those who attack us and defend themselves. The willingness to be open is one thing; the emotional capacity to be open is quite another. It calls for an inner strength that few can muster alone.

This is where the Divine comes in. 

As we seek to encounter God on an ongoing basis—in prayer, in meditation, in reflective reading of sacred texts, in communities of believers, in the world—the Divine Spirit fosters a connection with us at the core of our being. In the process, that same Spirit also molds us, gradually, into people more “in the image of God”: people of peace, of justice, of compassion. The Benedictines call this conversion of life: a slow, persistent turning of one’s life, from the inside out, to something better.

That has two profound effects on dialogue. First, through this conversion process, we find ourselves not so much practicing virtues like openness as watching them flourish within us. The connection with the Divine opens us automatically to the world beyond our own skin. We begin to see things from a larger perspective. We become acutely aware of our place in the universe: as one person among billions, with one perspective among billions. We almost can’t help but be more open.

Second, when we enter into this encounter, we no longer need to muster the inner strength alone—because we no longer are alone. In the Christian and Jewish scriptures, God continually reassures his people with the words “I am with you.”

This, I think, is why people of faith are uniquely positioned to lead the movement toward fruitful dialogue—because they are connected with a transformative Power than can orient them toward fruitful dialogue. How ironic, then, that many people of faith have developed reputations for the very shouting and contentiousness that plague us today.

It is time for us to act out the words of the magnificent Shaker hymn: “To turn, turn will be our delight, till by turning, turning we come round right.” If we turn toward God, we turn toward dialogue—and take up a critical role in transforming a world that so desperately needs it.