What’s your response when you see something wrong?
Happened to me recently. I won’t share the details of what happened or how I responded, as those don’t matter. I just want to ask us the question.
I’ve read a bit of Dietrich Bonhoeffer recently. It’s hard to escape his sense of dismay with churches who sang hymns while trains rumbled past their stained-glass windows on the way to concentration camps.
I can’t help wondering – what would I have done? Would I have turned away, pretended I didn’t see?
None of us can know how we would respond in life-or-death circumstances. But it is fair to ask how we respond to everyday situations.
Do we shrug when an obvious lie is presented as truth?
Do we turn away when the marginalized among us are belittled?
Do we judge before examining our own vision?
Do we use “what about them?” to rationalize our compromises?
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I hope you note – I’m not pointing fingers, I’m talking about we, you AND me – maybe mostly me.
Thinking through this, it clearly needs to be about me looking in the mirror FIRST.
What’s my response when I see something wrong?
I don’t want to turn away.