Mirrors and binoculars

May 3, 2023

Dear Leland and Everett,

I attended worship services the last two weeks. I grew up in the church, and continued my involvement into my early 30s. While I’ve continued to identify as Christian, I hadn’t been to church in over a decade. But I sense that the purely inward portion of my healing journey is nearing an end, and that I am now to begin my journey back out into the world. Going to church felt like part of that journey back out. I’m not clear whether I am looking for a support network, or perhaps folks who will join me on parts of my journey; perhaps those ideas are basically one and the same.

At last week’s worship service, we sang my favorite hymn. The scripture reading was one I memorized as a child. The sermon resonated, giving a sense (or reminder) that others are in fact on a journey similar to mine. The members of the congregation were earnest and welcoming without being suffocating; of all the churches I have attended as an adult, this congregation was the most inviting and welcoming. I felt connected: to myself, to those around me, to a higher calling.

After the worship service, a man introduced himself and struck up a conversation. Somehow, through the course of our conversation, he revealed that he has, at times, seen visions when he prays; he is my first encounter to acknowledge visions and talk about them openly. From my own visions, I sensed that there were others, and I sensed that I was meant to find them (at least some of them).

Put all together, I left worship that day with a profound sense that I went where I was meant to go, that God had somehow called me to be there on that day.

The sermons, each of the last two weeks, challenged the congregation to look inward, to identify honestly where we are blocked from seeing God or hearing God’s call, and to nudge us back onto our path with God. And yet, in the middle of each, the minister took a brief detour to identify some outrage out in the world, commonly reported in the news. As far as I could tell, he was encouraging the congregation to be aggravated or even outraged with the injustices he identified, and implied that we would be solving these injustices if we were really heeding God’s call. Unlike the bulk of the sermons, which resonated with their call to inward exploration, these detours encouraging judgement and righteousness fell flat. As I discussed previously, I do not believe we find goodness and truth in righteousness.

With reflection I found a useful metaphor: binoculars and mirrors. We use a mirror to examine ourselves. A mirror empowers us to see those things about ourselves that we otherwise wouldn’t due to our vantage point. How else will I see the stain on my face, if not for a mirror? A mirror helps us identify those things about ourselves calling for examination, for introspection, for healing, and for growth.

Binoculars, on the other hand, we use to look outward, and typically far off in the distance. Binoculars help us identify far off details otherwise unavailable to us. Binoculars encourage us to look for things only binoculars can help us find. When we pick up binoculars, we go looking for things they can help us see more clearly.

I am starting to view binoculars as the great distraction of the current era. We’ve always had negative headlines in the news; the differences are that now we 1) have virtually unlimited access to said negative headlines via the internet, and 2) local new sources almost always sprinkled in positive stories, in a conscious attempt to balance out the negativity and give their audience hope. We naturally gravitate toward negative headlines (thus why they have always dominated the news), and so in a world of unlimited choice we are digesting far more negativity, and far less positivity than we would otherwise.

Similarly, we’ve always had social networks, and at times those social networks devolved into gossip or other disempowering behavior. But while analogue social networks have counterbalancing forces (overly negative people are often encouraged to temper their negativity), online social media networks do not (yet, anyway) employ similar counterbalances. As a result, we are drowning in negativity and gossip, when really we are going to social media out of a desire to feel connected, hopeful, and whole.

Point being: most adults today spend too much time using binoculars, looking for details in the far off distance, stirring themselves and others into a state of righteousness over the imperfections we see from afar (those MAGA Republicans! Those Social Justice Warriors! Russia! China! Racism! The Elites! Aargh!). Today’s world of the internet provides far more opportunity and temptation for us to utilize the binoculars than ever before. And so we succumb to the temptation and spend our lives looking through binoculars, only vaguely aware that life continues around us in our immediate vicinity.

I am practicing putting down the binoculars and picking up the mirror. I am coming to learn that the binoculars are not an effective tool for solving problems: we are too far removed to impact what we see in any meaningful way, and so only work ourselves into a state of powerless, righteous indignation. Conversely, we possess all the tools we need to improve what we see in the mirror. The binoculars are more tempting, but it is via the mirror that God invites us to change the world. Doing the work we see laid before us in the mirror is uncomfortable and tedious, but it heals. We heal ourselves, and by healing ourselves we allow and encourage those around us to heal.

To be clear, the binoculars do have their use. What we see in the binoculars can stir deep, real emotion; as such, they can serve as a useful diagnostic tool. But diagnosis is where the purpose of the binoculars ends. In order to resolve the issues we identified using the binoculars, we must return to the mirror. In the mirror we find what stirred within us when we looked through the binoculars. The mirror helps us identify the emotion that needs to be heard, be processed, be addressed, so that we may heal.

In today’s world, we have no shortage of opportunities to use the binoculars. So while binoculars can be useful, we will continue to overuse them unless we completely separate from the modern world and retreat into a mountain monastery. And so I am practicing putting down the binoculars as often as I become aware that I am using them, or at least as often as I can. And whenever I find the patience and strength, I pick up the mirror, dust it off, and go back to work on the reflection I see before me. Working on what I see in the mirror is deeply humbling, but it heals; it yields a quiet strength I have never known.

I am coming to believe that, in order to heal the world, we must first heal ourselves. What I am curious to discover: do we ever move beyond working to heal ourselves? One possibility I can envision is that we take our healed bodies and souls out into the world, sharing the gifts of what we’ve learned with those we encounter. The other possibility is that we go out into the world in order to identify more work to do in the mirror. My sense is that a healed being encourages and empowers those who encounter it to heal, and so by healing we can set off a chain reaction of healing. I am very curious to discover the mechanisms by which that healing occurs.

I did reach out to the minister to give my feedback and impression, in the spirit of curiosity. Perhaps I misheard the minister, or misinterpreted his meaning; if so, I hope that by following up I grant myself the opportunity to look in the mirror and learn, heal, and grow. Or perhaps I identified a blind spot of the minister’s; if so, I hope that by following up I grant him an opportunity to look in the mirror and learn, heal, and grow. We shall see.

I love you,

Dad