On the day Hitler entered Paris, Clementine Churchill wrote a note to her husband. “My Darling Winston,” she wrote, “I must confess that I have noticed a deterioration in your manner; and you are not as kind as you used to be.” He had been acting “so contemptuous” toward subordinates in meetings that “no ideas, good or bad, will be forthcoming,” she told him, so “you won’t get the best results.” The letter was torn up. But after giving it more thought, she sent it anyway. We need people like Clementine in all the strongholds of power, people who have the courage and ability to not only speak the truth, but gain a hearing for those whose voices have been silenced. And we do have those people—individuals within and outside organizations who pay attention to abuses of power, who courageously call out the abusers and insist on being heard. We have them in the Church where, for more than three decades, many have worked tirelessly to bring the issue of sexual abuse to the ears of the Vatican. Events of the past two weeks have put this shameful history in the headlines again, and it is turning the institution upside down. We need to hear these stories. We need to take a long, hard look at a culture that continues to produce what Francis has called “little monsters” and use our voices singly and in unison to insist on systemic change.
Lord David Owen, a British neurologist who became a politician in the mid-60’s, included the story of Clementine Churchill in his 2008 book titled In Sickness and in Power. The year before he had written another book, The Hubris Syndrome: Bush, Blair and the Intoxication of Power. In the May 2009 issue of Brain, a Journal of Neurobiology published by the Oxford University Press, Owen and his co-author Jonathan Davidson define the ‘hubris syndrome.” They call it a “disorder of the possession of power, particularly power held for a period of years with minimal constraint on the leader.”
We see this disorder flagrantly demonstrated in the disgraceful events of sexual abuse and cover-up in our church as well as in many diocese and local parishes where the bishop or priest exercises power with impunity. And we certainly see it grossly splashed across headlines daily where presidential power runs rampant, reckless and unchecked. Owen and Davidson make the case that “hubris syndrome” is an acquired personality disorder with a pattern of behavioral traits that include: “viewing the world as a place for self-glorification,” where a person “acts primarily to enhance their personal image” while exhibiting “excessive self-confidence and contempt for the advice or criticism of others. There is a loss of contact with reality as well as reckless and impulsive actions.” The authors ask: “How may we usefully think about a leader who hubristically abuses power, damaging the lives of others?” This is a question confronting all of us as we witness the hubris of church and government officials playing out before us in shocking detail. The challenge to hear, to see and to speak clearly falls upon us all.
When Jesus takes the person who is deaf and whose speech is impaired aside in today’s Gospel, and commands those ears to be opened and the tongue to be loosened, we can imagine him standing before us! With a deep sigh he looks up to heaven. “Ephphatha! “Be opened!” As our ears snap open we hear what’s happening around us. As the barriers to speech are removed we, finally, have a voice. How might we use that voice in this tumultuous time of history? Do we have the courage to leave the impediment of fear behind and really listen? Do we dare speak our own truth plainly, calmly, non-defensively?
Our future is dependent on genuine conversation. We can no longer avoid the challenges we face. Speaking up to powerful forces begins by standing in our integrity, speaking from our center without rancor, and listening with an open mind and heart. Finding solutions to our common problems requires that all voices be honored and welcomed. Clementine Churchill was right. We won’t have positive results if we silence those the hubris syndrome deems inferior. Those are exactly the voices Jesus set out to free.
In the letter of James we can observe the human tendency toward favoritism that gives more credence to those with status, wealth and power while urging us to dismiss or ignore the voices and experiences of the poor. This is how power and authority gets invested in those gold rings and fine clothes. Favoritism breeds hubris and hubris leads to contempt, recklessness and an inability to hear anything other than one’s own voice. To move beyond the crises of our present age we need courage and a willingness to see clearly, to hear through a filter of compassion and to confront the favoritism stowed away in the unconscious realms of our own cultural biases and conditioning.
The constant bombardment of soul-crushing news can lead us all toward feeling weary, frightened and hopeless. The effect of hubris-wielding lords of power is to render everyone else impotent. God is not in the false winds of merciless titans. God is in the voices of the poor. God lives in the integrity of our own humble experience. Ours are the eyes and ears God struggles to open, the speech impediments Jesus wants to remove. In our weariness and in our fear we may resist those holy efforts but the church, this nation, the world-at-large needs our willingness to be open and present to the challenges of our time.
When our eyes are fully open and our ears finally clear, when we find the courage to give voice to the truth as we know it in spite of possible backlash, insult or ridicule, then truth and justice can emerge on the human stage. Courage! God says through Isaiah. “Do not be afraid!” Through your own eyes, ears and voices “your God is coming. God is coming to save you.”
“Ephphatha! Be opened!
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