 | | Marc Mullinax |
"When our heart is threatened, we respond in one of two ways. We either run or we attack. Thereës a scientific term for this. Fight or flight. Itës instinct. We canët control it. Or can we?"
ÇƒÏ Dialogue on Greyës Anatomy
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MARS HILL ÇƒÓ The 2,000-member Baptist church was filled to overflowing capacity one Sunday morning. The service was about to begin when two men, dressed in long black coats and black hats, entered through the rear of the church.
One of the two men walked to the middle of the church while the other stayed in back. They both then reached under their coats and withdrew automatic weapons.
The one in the middle announced, "EVERYONE WILLING TO TAKE A BULLET FOR JESUS STAY IN YOUR SEAT!"
Naturally, the
pews emptied, followed by the choir. The deacons ran out the door,
followed by the choir director and the assistant pastor.
After a few moments, there were about 20 people left sitting in the church. The preacher was holding steady in the pulpit.
The men put
their weapons away and said, gently, to the preacher, "All right,
pastor, the hypocrites are gone now. You may begin the service."
ï
The story may be
apocryphal, but its teaching is true. Our ethics may be most exposed
when we have a come into sudden life-or-death situations, and we have
the chance literally to "take a bullet" for another person.
Of course, to
take a bullet means that weëd sacrifice our lives for someone else, so
they could go on living. Most of us would take a bullet for a few
people, beginning without hesitation with family members. Then, most
would do it for a close inner circle of friends.
After that, Iëd
hazard, the list of people for whom weëd take that bullet is probably
very, very short. An extreme minority of persons would take bullets for
every kid on earth, but your kind is rare.
Some of us might
reach a respectable number of 50 persons on that take-a-bullet list.
Others of us might find it hard to reach ten. If the higher the number,
are you more ethical? Or more crazy?
Human nature
tells us to preserve the self in just about 99.999 percent of lifeës
encounters.
Self-preservation is critical action, especially if one is
imprisoned behind walls, or bars of prejudice, or fences of hate.
Human nature
preserves the self through the brain stem, that primitive portion of
the brain that disables critical thinking in critical fight-or-flight
situations. To think in such critical times means we hesitate, and are
lost.
As human beings
evolved, the brain enlarged, and rational thought could (again,
"could") override the brain stemës self-preservation directives. But it
takes thought, a biological process that requires concepts and words,
and requires a longer processing time than a fight/flight response.
So, returning to
our question, if one is willing to take a bullet for a rather large
group of people, perhaps you have overridden the brain stem. One way to
test this is to think of the people you usually donët care to associate
with (whether individuals, or a class of people, such as immigrants,
homosexuals, people with a different color or religion, etc.).
Got them in
mind? Would you take a bullet for any of them? The reasons why one will
not indexes a tiny ethic. But enlarge the heart, and embrace the world
one more person at a time, and youëll be realizing soon that all us
human beings are equally holy, and worth whatever sacrifice is called
for.
This holiday
season, may we enlarge the world so that it is always a place of
welcome, so that when God once again comes to be born, our hospitality
will not be an embarrassing open question.
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Dr. Marc S.
Mullinax, chairman of the philosophy and religion departments at Mars
Hill College, can be reached at mmullinax-at-mhc.edu.
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