A spirituality for winners and losers

Reflections by Ann Morisy, Community Theologian and former Director of the Commission on Urban Life and Faith

Address to ‘Building Blocks’ conference, Stratford Circus, March 2006

Some trip-wires to watch out for:

• Not to offer something that will be too heavenly minded to be of any earthly use
• Not to ‘diss’ the Olympics because it creates winners and losers – the Olympics is not alone in doing this!
• Not to drift down the well worn path of cynicism about ‘grand projects’, a cynicism that bubbles up whenever we are confronted by a project that has consequences for many – but is steered by the few.

Getting some perspective:

The Olympics… scope to look at the ‘world order’ unfolding… Henry James commented when the Olympics came to London in 1880 it was ‘the most complete compendium of the world’… but then the boroughs of London’s eastern flank have long been able to rejoice in this fact.  The coming of the Olympics to east London will enable to see into global practices rather than just look at them as we do with the ten o’clock news.

Offering an alternative performance to global practices

Alistair MacIntryre:  In the context of global capitalism the values that the nation state (national government) imbibes are those of profit, power and status.  I would want to suggest that despite the historic Olympic ideals, the real drivers of the International Olympics are also those of profit, power and status.  However, organising around the values of profit, power and status will not generate the ‘common good’.

Spirituality means rehearsing (continually practicing) in our hearts and minds and souls, the alternative performance that speaks of different values to those of profit, power and status.  This alternative performance that our spirituality needs to prepare us for involves ‘doing it like Jesus’.

Doing it like Jesus…

Jesus lived his life in a very distinctive way.  This included:

• Eschewing Power - Being alert to how easy it might be for him to become powerful in the land.  He seems to make a point of resisting the things that would lead to him becoming powerful in the world’s terms.  (Being powerful and being authoritative are not the same thing – you might like to discuss in what ways they are different)
• Willing to risk being overwhelmed - Always risking the possibility that he might be overwhelmed, not feeling he has to be in control all the time and being willing to take risks that might make the establishment people furious with him
• Subverting the ‘status quo’ - Challenging the taken-for granted ways of doing things and understanding things, including religious practice, and by the way… Don’t automatically assume virtue in the grass roots … There is a naïve habit that we are all tempted towards and that is the idea that that which comes from the grassroots is embedded or authentic – unlike that which comes down from above, from those with authority and power.  But what if the grassroots is also being shaped or ‘manufactured’?  What if grassroot values are contaminated by the values of global capitalism?  Might Karl Marx with his notion of ‘false consciousness’ have had a point?
• Wide ‘fraternal’ relations - Seeing our concern for others as going well beyond our own family or neighbours or ‘tribe’.  If God is our heavenly father all his children become our brothers and sisters.
• Avoiding tit-for tat’ behaviour – Avoiding escalating differences and trying to get one’s own back and have the last word – but also standing his ground
• Investing in the most unlikely – The people whom Jesus chose were not the most obvious ‘top team’, in fact very often they were people whom others had written-off

The spirituality for both winners and losers involves ‘rehearsing’ or practicing this alternative performance that Jesus demonstrated throughout his life.  This is the Christian’s equivalent of training for the Olympics.  This is the self-discipline that underpins our spirituality for winners and losers.

And a word about Grace

The wonderful liberating generosity of being treated better than we deserve is the ultimate ‘alternative performance’ that Jesus offers.  Grace doesn’t have winners and losers – all of us fall short of the winning line.  There are no winners without the grace of God.  But at this point I risk triggering a trip-wire… offering heavenly re-assurance… which is fine for those of us on the inside – but a little like a fairy tale to those on the outside.  So how do we make grace palpable?  How do we rehearse the alternative performance that speaks of grace?

My case is that the generosity of our Heavenly Father is such that we only have to move towards the way in which Jesus lived his life and a cascading of grace is triggered.  We are not called to do everything as Jesus would have done.  Grace comes flowing whenever we offer an alternative performance, regardless of how modest.

The Olympics: An example of ‘Placed’ Politics

The Olympics – and the processes that have been set in train since that announcement made on July 6th 2005 are an example of what is called ‘placed’ politics.  Placed politics is different from the routine politics of local and general elections and the role of the judiciary and established legal practices.  Placed politics is associated with a specific locality – and invariably it involves the encounter of corporate capital with multitudes of disadvantage with few structures to facilitate a healthy encounter. 

With ‘placed politics’ there is an equality of powerlessness between ordinary punters like you and me and those who have the authority associated with formal political systems i.e. the formal systems of politics – the local authority, local councillors and even MPs – all of us are confronted by powerlessness.

Powerlessness and competition … a powerful, scary cocktail that makes everyone anxious.  So the spirituality for those who feel powerless and in a competitive mode, has to be a spirituality that takes anxiety seriously.

What anxiety does to us all…

We react rather than respond: Heightened anxiety makes us react rather than respond.  Although there is only a split second difference between responding and reacting, there is a huge difference in the outcome. 

We become more instinctual / cold-blooded: When we react we become more instinctual, and our behaviour is likely to be extreme and unyielding.  In fact, research into brain activity indicates that when we are anxious the most primitive part of the brain, the reptilian brain in the frontal lobe, shows increased activity.  This extraordinary fact of our biological make-up says it all.  When we are acutely anxious or long term anxious we are more likely to act in a cold blooded, unfeeling way. 

We look for scapegoats: The disturbing feature of anxiety is that it inclines people to scape-goat, i.e. to put the blame on someone – or some group.  But there is more to it than this.  With anxiety comes the inclination to pick on or expose those who are different.  Unrecognised and uncontrolled anxiety exposes and makes vulnerable what is not alike.   At a time when the ‘most complete compendium of the world’ comes to our neighbourhood we cannot afford not to manage our anxiety levels.

We ‘herd’ and we ‘distance:  When we are anxious we are inclined to seek out others who will share our perceptions i.e. to herd with others prepared to take on our hurts, or we will look for others with whom we gain a cheap solidarity by taking on their hurts and indignation – or fury.  The other habitual way of responding to anxiety, especially when the anxiety is generated by conflict, is to distance ourselves from the person or situation that is perceived as being responsible for the conflict.  By distancing we ensure that the situation can never be resolved, and worse still, by continually revisiting the unresolved pain cause the wound to fester rather than heal.  Tragically for human relationships herding and distancing are not mutually exclusive.  It is quite possible for distancing to then generate herding, and before long the situation degenerates into hating.

Makes for low resilience: Chronic or acute anxiety has other surprising repercussions.  High anxiety often equates to low resilience.  Those who minister in poor communities where anxiety levels are high may have intuitively recognised this.  In particular it has an impact on the task of encouraging indigenous or local leadership.  When anxious people are put in positions of leadership they are likely to become more anxious, and therefore less resilient.

We forget about fun:  When we are anxious we forget how to have fun.  This fact alone makes for an unattractive individual or group.   Only the most contrary of people are likely to join an acutely or chronically anxious group and this gives energy to a downward spiral as anxiety feeds decline and decline feeds anxiety.

Responding to anxiety…

‘Step-down’ transformer: In a context of heightened anxiety Christians have a responsibility to lessen the voltage, to be a step down transformer.  This is not such a tall order.  There are precise and particular steps that can be taken to lessen anxiety, and they are essential to the community practitioner’s tool box.  Essentially it involves working as a ‘step-down’ transformer.   The Christian needs to cultivate – or develop the spiritual discipline of reducing the voltage of the emotion that is in the system.  One of the most important ways of doing this is to model or demonstrate ways of containing our own anxiety.  This capacity should not be confused with being ‘laid back’, although being able to resist being provoked is certainly an asset in anxiety prone contexts.

There are four spiritual habits to cultivate, and in which to coach others, in the art of anxiety reduction:

1. To become aware of one’s own reactive buttons.  These are (metaphorical) buttons that people can press inadvertently and repeatedly put us on edge.  Most likely they have their root in our family or community of origin.  Each of us will have our own constellation of reactive buttons that continually trigger unwarranted reactions.  Being aware of our own idiosyncratic buttons earns us that split second grace that allows reaction to become a response.
2. To discipline both our heads and hearts that problems have multiple and interrelated causes.  To settle on the idea that there is a single cause is to do violence to our intricate and inter-related world.  Our existence is shaped by ‘systems’ rather than single or isolated events.  This ‘systems’ approach is essential if we are to prevent ourselves from falling prey to scapegoating. 
3. A determination to resist picking up other people’s anxieties.  This requires a distinction to be made between listening and hearing people’s gripes but not siding with them, and getting caught-up in the process of herding.  The aim rather is to encourage people to take responsibility for their own feelings.  When your ear is bent by someone who tells of a substantial litany of offences that has been committed against them, the response might be: “What do you think you need to do for the best?”
4. Use humour and fun.   This is a most delightful kingdom reversal:  Instead of anxiety being reduced by extensive self and group analysis and intensive heart-searching, anxiety is lifted by fun and laughter.  In anxious situations laughter is, to use Peter Berger’s expression, a ‘rumour of angels’.   Unfortunately, when people are caught-up in the bad habits of herding and distancing the last thing on the agenda is play and laughter.  The wise leader recognises that the rhythm of a healthy community has to involve time for play and laughter, even if they do not consider themselves to be good at contributing humour and playfulness (When personal  anxiety levels are reduced our inclination to play and aptitude to generate fun and laughter all increase, not least because our ability to laugh at ourselves increases, and laughing at ourselves is probably the safest route with which the novice can begin to generate laughter!).

As well as specific practices and habits that can be adopted to help prevent the stoking up of anxiety, it is important to develop the capacity to be a ‘non-anxious presence’.  This ability is hugely important and straightforward to achieve – with a modicum of practice. 
   
Firstly it involves logging our own anxiety.  Only when we can sense and track our own anxiety do we have any chance of reducing it. 

Then it is possible to ‘park’ that anxiety – consciously putting it out of the way.  Somewhere in our brains there is a space that can hold anxiety in a way that limits its interference. 

There is a Buddhist practice that can help us locate that anxiety ‘parking space’.  It involves softening our eyes.  When we are anxious our eyes become hard and they also look hard, hence the expressions “Stop eyeballing me” or ‘Get out of my face”.  

We can tell the level of our anxiety by checking our eyes.  You can’t do fury with soft eyes.  Kids know the extent to which they can push you by the softness – or hardness of at your eyes.  When we soften our eyes we immediately increase the likelihood of responding calmly rather than reacting with our cold blooded reptile brain.  Buddhists recommend that softening the eyes becomes part of the discipline of prayerfulness.  It is part of the quietening that helps us to be more open to God – and to each other.  For those who are bemused by the bidding to soften our eyes there is one final clue to the process.  If it is difficult to find that mental and muscular process that enables us to soften our eyes then look upon a new born baby.  Our eyes soften and our hearts moisten.  This would seem to yet another gracious gift that has come from our Heavenly Father who knows all too well what desperately anxious creatures we are.

A Coda

In preparing for this afternoon I resorted to Google – in the hope of finding a beginning, in fact I found an ending, a tail piece:

It was a piece by a staff writer for dailybulletin.com  It was entitled “Games NOT to remember”.  He was reviewing the Winter Olympics that have just finished in Turin.

“The volunteers were always cheerful, and attempted to be helpful (with mixed success), but it was an Olympics without much spark.

Part of the lack of spark was a failure by organizers to get Italy, or even the local populace, engaged. Venues were small but still not filled. The streets were empty.  Sometimes, it seemed as if half the crowd were folks wearing volunteer jackets, not actual ticket-buyers.

The venues were uninspiring, even the new ones. Lots of concrete, a little glass, minimal charm. 
Running an Olympics is a difficult and almost thankless task. Thousands of foreigners descend on your city, destroy any semblance of normal life, and then complain about what they saw.”  (Paul Oberjuerge)

There are some clues in this excerpt about the ingredients that make for a successful Olympics.  But there is also a clue about the essence of spirituality for the Olympics as they come to East London, and it is that the reward will be in heaven – or not at all – and that has to be the essence of a spirituality for winners and losers.

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