One of my favorite religion writers, Liz Bucar has a new Newsletter. If you’re interested in the intersections of religion, politics, and society, it’s well worth subscribing. One of her recent articles included a subheader that totally bowled me over: “You can’t meditate your way out of fascism.” Now I’m a huge proponent of regular spiritual practices. I preach often about filling our own cups and ensuring the well doesn’t run dry. I even talk about the importance of these practices to our social justice work. But I’m also, decidedly, not a fan of fascism, so I read on with attention. Bucar offered some observations that are crucial for spiritual leaders and people of faith to take note of at this moment in history.
She was critiquing journalist Ezra Klein’s discussion of his own meditation practice in an interview with author Ta-Nehisi Coates. Coates says that as a Black American, he’s always understood that “preaching love can get you shot,” citing MLK as an example. Klein responds to this painful truth of systemic suffering with a meditation from his individual practice that brings him comfort. Bucar says of Klein, “When confronted with a moment that demands moral and political clairty…he retreats into his practice. Not to deepen his commitment to collective struggle, but to find personal equilibrium. The meditation becomes a way to process overwhelming information internally rather than a practice that connects him to social obligation and action.” For Bucar, this represents one example of a larger problem known as “spiritual bypassing,” or using spiritual practices as a way to “avoid dealing with what’s actually happening” rather than to “transform ourselves or engage with reality.”
Bucar’s piece is not a criticism of meditation or spiritual practices in general, but a criticism of the American propensity to remove these practices from their origins, contexts, and associated religious ethics, and package them into something easily consumed. To sell them as a tool to soothe and distract, no different from lavender bath salts or fancy chamomile teas. Bucar contrasts this with the “three-legged stool” of Theravada Buddhism that situates meditation and mindfulness practices alongside social engagement and ethics. The three can’t be separated. Bucar writes, “practices extracted from their religious contexts become tools for individual comfort rather than collective transformation.”
Dear ones, we are living in truly disturbing times. Fascism is at our door step. It is hard to overstate how horrifying it is to watch the President declare American cities “war zones,” as a way to justify mobilizing the U.S. military against its own citizens. This is only the latest in a long string of threats to freedom, democracy, human rights and human dignity. We are in a moment that demands moral clarity and spiritual courage. I keep looking at the picture of the Presbyterian minister in Chicago who was pepper-sprayed directly in the face for living into the call of his faith. I see videos of clergy and congregants there chanting at ICE agents, “‘Love your neighbor, love your God, save your soul and quit your job.” I know we too are called to live out our own faith in visible, tangible ways. There is no time for spiritual bypassing.
This doesn’t mean we can’t make time for comfort, stillness, replenishment and joy. We have to make time for those things if we’re going to survive and flourish. But those things need to happen in a broader context that sees them as part of the work of love and justice rather than ways to avoid doing that work or to avoid confronting the realities that necessitate that work.
So our job now is to get really clear about all of the legs that hold up our own stool, as individuals and as a church community, and understand how they work together to support a full-hearted faith. We need to get acquainted with the unshakable truths that live in the depths of our soul—the truths that we feel in our bones and will keep us rooted firmly in place even when we’re confronted with the destructive weapons of empire. It could be a belief in a God of liberation, Jesus’s calling to “take up your cross and follow me,” the inherent worth of each human life, the radical interdependence of all creation, or the fundamental human calling to “tikkun olam” or healing the world. And yes, we need to know what practices sustain us, but we also must ask,”sustain us to do what?” Are those practices helping us to look squarely at the truth? Are they helping us confront our neighbors' pain and suffering or are they numbing us to those realities? We need a faith deep and resilient enough to help us meet this moment and that’s going to require us asking some hard questions of ourselves. This work is urgent, life-giving and life-saving, and impossible to do alone. Thank God then, that we have each other.
In these coming days, may we come together with courage and hope to practice a faith worthy of the times in which we live and the values we claim to profess. I’ll be here alongside you in the work.
In love,
Danielle