Courage

Friends,

Consciously or unconsciously we are aware of the increased need for personal and societal courage during these times of the lack of courageous leadership. As we are increasingly tested by the eroding of our civil rights and the need to take challenging risks to protect ourselves, others, and our nation, it is important we begin by trying to examine what courage means to each of us personally. What personally impels us - or prevents us - to act courageously? ... a question that extends to the wider world of institutions, business and government as well, of course. I have no obvious answers, but I have at least been thinking as deeply as I can about the meaning of courage. Ultimately we are primarily responsible for our own actions before we can to expect that from others, including the issue of courage, so I have tried to start there.

Generally acts of courage are not high-risk acts of bravery to protect others or self from dangerous, immediate harm. We are more bound by the every day courage to continue to read or see heartbreaking news, to challenge familial or workplace conflict, to face an illness, or a broken relationship, or just to admit we’re wrong. Courage encourages (nice juxtaposition of words) us to keep doing what needs to be done and what is right to do in spite of our hesitation, fears and possible consequences. Poet David Whyte writes: “Courage is what love looks like when it is tested by the simple necessities of what it means to be alive.”

But the bigger question is how can we even begin to consider how we personally might expect and even demand integrity and courage from those who apparently will not - or perhaps cannot - oppose injustice,  and how can we  move them to support policies and laws that ultimately serve basic morality and the common good. For years I personally and professionally have seen so much of life through a Quaker lens of identifying injustice and attempting to find solutions, particularly in my field of criminal justice, that I can easily become overwhelmed, and I have to judge between having the courage and ability to speak out and act or ignoring or sidestepping the issue. I am sure many of you face those kinds of questions in your family or professional life as well. If we are fortunate and able enough, we will find ways to at least attempt to find ways to try to assuage our need to at least try to help. But, of course, depending circumstance, we may not be willing or able to do so.

So my attempt to examine the meaning of courage has led me to consider what is the source of a courage strong enough to enable us to face difficult situations that necessitate a riskier level of courageous action -- a courage that will ultimately guide us - or compel us - to do the right thing in spite of the risk? You will have your own ideas, but here are a couple of mine.

The most obvious answer is that we have courage to do the right thing because we have an established moral compass and an informed and trusted conscience. Conscience is defined as "an inner feeling or voice viewed as acting as a guide to the rightness or wrongness of one's behavior.” The capacity to be able to frame our actions on moral principle such as “do unto others how you want to be treated’ to the more trying process of discerning our actions against the complexity of acting on behalf of the common good, often at considerable risk. Or for those of us who claim to be followers of Jesus’ love ethic, how far are willing to challenge injustice by combining resistance to the status quo while also offering powerful, radical alternatives of inclusiveness and forgiveness as Jesus proposed. The risk factor of attempting to challenge injustice and the status quo, of course, like Jesus, can lead to severe consequences and death. . I am trying to better learn and courageously follow principles of nonviolent practice, a social conscience which I faithfully believe is the alternative to worshiping power and wealth. Will I have the courage to practice nonviolent civil disobedience if necessary in spite of the risk of doing so?

Some of us have already accepted this risk and been beaten or arrested, and we generally honor that experience in ourselves and others. I encourage those who have courageously faced this level of conviction and risk to share what they can about how that garnered the courage necessary to act. Nonviolent direct action is not for most of us, but when we have strong moral convictions, or a spiritual leading, that impel us to action, and the support from friends and affinity groups, we may well follow this now well-tested means of fomenting nonviolent change. 

I have not attempted to offer advice about what you may feel or think about courage. I will continue to ponder the meaning of courage amidst the contemporary turmoil that may demand more of us than we can now imagine. And, reluctantly and sadly, I will continue to try to understand those who seem captured by the opposite of courage, the endemic cowardice that has apparently controlled so much of our national leadership. And so I will pray not only for courage for myself and the righteous causes supported by so many people of courage, I will also pray for those whose cowardice has led them to abandon their conscience and responsibility for the common good at the price of so much suffering.

Peace,
Tom