Holiness and Imperfection

In Paul's letter to the Roman church he writes, "Welcome those who are weak in faith, but not for the purpose of quarreling over opinions. Some believe in eating anything, while the weak eat only vegetables. Those who eat must not despise those who abstain, and those who abstain must not pass judgment on those who eat; for God has welcomed them. Who are you to pass judgment on servants of another? It is before their own lord that they stand or fall. And they will be upheld, for the Lord is able to make them stand."

In his devotion for today, Richard Rohr speaks of imperfection as "a clever place for God to hide holiness, so that only the humble and earnest will find it!" He goes on to say, "It becomes sort of obvious once you say it out loud. In fact, I would say that the demand for the perfect is often the greatest enemy of the good. Perfection is a mathematical or divine concept; goodness is a beautiful human concept. We see this illusionary perfectionism in ideologues and zealots on both the left and the right of church and state. They refuse to get their hands dirty, think compromise or subtlety are dirty words, and end up creating much more 'dirt' for the rest of us, while they remain totally 'clean' and quite comfortable in their cleanliness."

Both Paul and Richard Rohr prompted me to think about the partisan divides that are so much a part of our political as well as religious endeavors these days. In both cases the various sides often think that they have the truth, and good happens when their view of truth prevails. I think most of us tend to consider our version of truth as the best and most right one. Why would we embrace it as our truth if we thought other truths vastly superior. 

I suppose it is nigh impossible to live anything approaching a principled life without some truth that is "non-negotiable." Yet these had best be well chosen, and even then, they may turn out to be wrong. As Paul writes in another letter, "For now we see in a mirror, dimly, (mirrors in Paul's day produced a distorted, inexact image) but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known." And so, in the face of this dim, partial hold on truth, love is the one truth we can fully count on.

I have noticed that, for all their faults and failings, families tend not to get caught up in the same sort of partisan divides that seem to dominate both secular and religious politics. There are exceptions, to be sure, and there are plenty of fights and disagreements in families. But the kind of ideological zealotry that often makes political compromise difficult seems much less prevalent in families. Surely this is because we all know one another's imperfections too well for any of us to claim a monopoly on the truth. Even the very best of families are born of a myriad of imperfections and dysfunctions. And if there is anything that points to divine relationship in families, it is most certainly a holiness hidden in imperfection, to borrow from Fr. Rohr.

In healthy families, even when we are upset and angry with one another, there is this sense that we have to love one another. It is unavoidable. We may forget it in particularly heated moments, but without this sense, the family will fracture and disintegrate. I've often argued against using "family" as an image or metaphor for church congregations. I think the image is too limited and unhelpful in many circumstances. But no doubt the practices of the best families have much to teach us about living as children of God.

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