Neither Denial Nor Despair

Neither Denial Nor Despair

There are two ways for a Christian to get this wrong. One is to deny that injustice is real. The other is to organize identity around it. Both fail. The gospel offers a third way.

The First Temptation: Denial

The temptation of the comfortable is to insist that injustice is not real, or that it is not serious, or that anyone who raises it is a troublemaker. This response is not Christian. The prophets are relentless in their condemnation of those who turn aside the needy from judgment.

A faith that cannot name injustice is a faith that has made peace with the world. The men who wrote the Psalms of lament — Psalm 13, Psalm 22, Psalm 88 — did not pretend things were fine. They cried out. They accused. And they were not rebuked for it.

The Second Temptation: Despair

The temptation of the wounded is subtler. It is to insist that because injustice is real, nothing can be done except to name it, rehearse it, and organize around it. This response is understandable. It is often the product of genuine suffering. But it is not Christian either.

The gospel does not say that the world is fine. It says the world is broken and being redeemed. The redeemed are called to participate in the redemption — not merely to denounce the brokenness.

The Third Way: Prophetic Lament

The biblical model is neither denial nor despair. It is prophetic lament — the honest naming of wrong without the permanent organization of identity around it. The prophets do not suppress their anger. They express it. But they express it to God, and they express it in hope.

Habakkuk complains to God: How long shall I cry, and thou wilt not hear! God does not rebuke him for the complaint. He answers it. The lament is not a defect. It is a form of prayer.

Solzhenitsyn on the Line

This is the sentence that makes the argument Christian rather than merely conservative. The line runs through every heart. The man who resents is not a different species from the man who is resented. He is the same creature, in a different position, making a different choice.

Augustine on the Two Cities

Augustine, writing in the fifth century as Rome fell, distinguished between the civitas terrena — the earthly city, built on love of self — and the civitas Dei, the City of God, built on love of God. The Christian lives in both. He is not fully at home in either.

This is the theological foundation for the third way. The earthly city will always be broken. The Christian who demands that it be otherwise before he consents to live in it has misunderstood the terms.

The Christian Alternative

1. Name the wrong. Do not pretend it is not real. The prophets did not.
2. Do not organize identity around it. The wound is not the self.
3. Direct the anger toward God, not toward a permanent enemy. The Psalms of lament model this.
4. Work for repair. The Christian is called to participate in the redemption, not merely to denounce the brokenness.
5. Forgive, and keep forgiving. Forgiveness is not a single act. It is a direction.