The older I get, the more I become certain of what I do not know. Here’s something I do not know: I do not know if my fierce passion about the subject of evil is learned or inherent.
The older I get, the more I become certain of what I do not know. Here’s something I do not know: I do not know if my fierce passion about the subject of evil is learned or inherent.
Sometimes I think the passion is a consequence of my history. My life experience. That the passion was/is a spontaneous adaptation helping me to survive. I learned it, and that of necessity. I became keenly alert to the subtleties of energy wishing harm to me and others.
More than one therapist has suggested that my passion on this topic is some retro-advocacy for the boy I once was. I don’t doubt this largely correct.
Other times I wonder whether that same passion was/is nothing more than an inherent part of my personality. That I was born with it. In religious language, a charism (gift.) I’m saying it’s possible I would be this way even with an idyllic personal history.
Perhaps it’s both. At once.
What I do know is that, throughout much of my life, some part of my consciousness has been ever alert to malice, whether conscious malevolence or the much more common unconscious variety. I am quick to sense it. To feel it. To smell it. I have often wondered if this passion is a large part of what called me to be a priest. I know I was fascinated learning about the anthropology of the shaman, the elder, the medicine man, the priest, because I quickly saw all these names as naming the same role. All significant cultures find some way to identify in their midst individuals with special gifts for discerning and distinguishing light from darkness, good from evil.
These people have a knack for putting their finger on the deception. The way truth is concealed or lies advanced to conscript the rights and liberties of others.
I know that I shudder every time I think of Edmund Burke’s (1729-97) quote “All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.”
I know that everything you need to know about M. Scott Peck’s (1936-2005) book “The People of the Lie: The Hope for Healing Human Evil” can be found in the title.
I know that my favorite line from the movie “Gandhi” (1982) is when the Indian leader says, at his sentencing for sedition, “and I will save the court’s time by stating under oath that to this day I believe noncooperation with evil is a duty, and that British rule of India is evil.”
But, as with most any passion, there is a light side and a dark side. Even the most noble passions can become exaggerated, distorted, overly dramatized and idolatrous.
The useful part (the light side) of my passion shows up in clinical practice. It helps me to help people tell themselves the truth. To get radically honest about motives, even when what is revealed is unlovely.
In some cases, disgraceful. When we admit we are lying, we instantly become perfect tellers of the truth.
I didn’t see the dark side until I was in my 40s. Ruth, a gifted therapist I met in Colorado, simply observed to me one day that this ever-present vigilance to interpersonal evil and injustice looked … well, exhausting. And perhaps it was exhausting to others, too.
I protested that a man has no higher moral duty than to name evil, to unmask it, and to stand against it at all costs.
She shrugged, unimpressed.
“I’m not asking you to renegotiate your moral values. I’m more asking whether you have any other values.”
And then she changed my life. “Of course we should take evil seriously. Of course it’s wrong to abuse power, to hurt children, to savage reputations for personal gain, and so on. But, wouldn’t it make more sense to spend a disproportion of your time teaching beneficence?”
It seemed ridiculously simple when she said it out loud — helping human beings find what was right within them, and developing that. In myself, too. Helping husbands and wives learn to love. Helping mothers and fathers learn to identify malicious projections, and to replace those destructive energies with powerful moves of love, nurture, sacrifice, leadership and advocacy for their children. The applications were and are endless.
Indeed, the world contains evil and injustice. But human beings each have a light of goodness, just waiting to be coaxed and encouraged.
Yes, justice matters. But redemption matters more.
Steven Kalas is a behavioral health consultant and counselor at Las Vegas Psychiatry and the author of “Human Matters: Wise and Witty Counsel on Relationships, Parenting, Grief and Doing the Right Thing” (Stephens Press). Contact him at skalas@reviewjournal.com.