Guess I should begin by saying, "See previous blog," or this won't make sense. Presuming you just did that, or are about to.... here goes with a few thoughts to ponder...
Okay, I realize some of my friends, maybe a lot of them, will read this and say something like, "Jesus, do you really sit around and think about this stuff?" Yea, I do... a lot. Call it a quirk, but then I've always been a bit excentric.
Back near the middle of the last century, Protestant theologian Reinhold Niebuhr wrote, Moral Man, Immoral Society. As the title implies, this is a central dilemma any person of faith must wrestle with. How do I live as a moral person in the midst of what is in so many ways an immoral society?
Okay, so "society" is a big subject. Let's break it down. That was essentially the topic of my last blog on United Health Group screwing your grandmother out of her insulin while putting billions in profits into their corporate and executive pockets. I reached the point where, as a Christian/Buddhist person of faith, I could no longer in good conscience justify--live with myself--working at a job where I'm on the phone telling grandma we're not paying the extra fifteen a month her insulin is going up, then attending a sales meeting where top execs are gleeful over UHG having made 2.7 billion last year, not to mention their six figure incomes. So I walked back to my corporate cubbyhole, scooted my chair across the aisle to my super and said, "I don't belong here. You have my notice."
Granted, not everyone can do that; at least, not immediately. The difficulty, however, in finding ethical employment cannot be avoided merely by saying, "times are tough." Being a person of faith demands we continually evaluate whether the way we earn our daily bread comes down more on the side of the moral than immoral side of the equation.
Put a bit differently, when does it become time for a person of faith to tell the corporate plantation owner to, "Take this job and shove it!"
There are no simple answers. I do have to eat. If I have a family, they too have that nasty and getting more expensive by the day habit. And no one can live without seeking shelter from the storm. Freezing to death is not an option. So we find ourselves in a quandry. If I really think what my company is doing is unethical, do I risk everything and quit without another job? Or is my greater responsibility providing food and shelter and college to my kids, even if it means participating in something I think is wrong, if not even--to this in a moment--evil?
This is not merely an academic exercise in splitting ethical hairs. Be absolutely certain, human history can turn on seemingly insignificant acts of defiant morality. Remember the African-American lady who refused to move to the back of the bus? How she inspired some young preacher to take a stand? And those black kids who had the audacity to order and burger and fries at an all-white lunch counter?
Deciding it was time to pursue more ethical employment was, for me, an act of moral defiance. I just decided I couldn't participate in what was happening to our customers any more; especially when I knew what was happening behind the scenes at UHG. I mean, really, couldn't these corporate types help grandma out by at least being willing to split the difference for her increased costs?
Had I stood up in that meeting and said, "Hey, how can you guys justify making all that money when the lady I got off the phone with is going to have to skip a meal to pay for her insulin?" Doubtless I would have gotten the response, "Look, we get it. This isn't personal. It's just business." And there's the problem Niebuhr recognized: As a person of faith it's impossible to separate the personal from the social.
As a person of faith I must share at least some moral responsibility for the impact of the decisions I make on my job. Those decisions effect the rest of humanity. So if you're my boss, don't tell me to quietly go out back and dump toxic chemicals down the city sewer. Poisoning the global water table is a bit much to ask a person of faith to do.
Yet, here again, there's the temptation to say it's just business.... I'm not responsible... Hey, I was just following orders... Hummm, where have I heard that sentence? And is there really any difference between, "it's just business" and "I was only following orders?"
I'm sure these execs are great guys. They go to church. They tithe. They don't beat their spouses and help the kids with their homework. They bought us a terrific lunch that day! Great private morality. Problem is I can't have one set of values at home, in my private life, and another when I sit down at my work desk. I have to make an honest effort to be morally consistant. My buisness decisions, those decisions I make at work every day, have an impact that goes well beyond my own backyard.
Another mid century thinker, Hannah Arendt, wrote of what she called, "the banality of evil." Evil can be very subtle, very ordinary, very every day and banal. So we have to ask ourselves about the larger picture. What impact does my company, my job, my actions have on the larger environment? How does it impact the people down the road whose well I may have just poisoned because I followed my boss's orders to dump paint thinner down the drain?
How do I live out the balancing act between being a moral person of faith and participating in what is in so many ways an immoral corporate and political environment?
Where is that line? (And why do they keep moving the damn thing?) Because be sure, there is a line. It's inside, or should be inside every person of faith. The first step in learning when to cross it, and when not to, is in knowing where it is.
I'm no pillar of virtue. I simply reached the line, for me, and decided not to cross over. Aiming at moral balance hasn't done much for my checkbook. I do, however, sleep better--at least until the next time.
