In the classic movie, Forrest Gump tells us what his mama always told him: “Life is like a box of chocolates: you have to bite into them to see what they are,” or something like that. Which is true but only so far, like most metaphors. We know that, while you might get the pasty artificial strawberry flavor or the sought-after caramel nugget, both are going to be sweet (unlike so much of life). It can also be said of books. For instance, I got a book on audio for our long trip up north last week that was titled The Third Bullet by Stephen Hunter, featuring the return of Bob Lee Swagger as the seasoned man of action. Like the chocolates, we know what the overall flavor will be: action adventure with lots of gun play. But we don’t really know until we read (or hear) it what other flavors, or information or messages. it might give us.
This one, by Hunter, has given me quite a bit, from the interesting –but- not- unexpected to the totally unexpected. On the expected side, we are given an alternative scenario of the Kennedy assassination, which our man Swagger is tracking down some fifty years after the fact. It appears that a rogue section of the CIA was responsible, but was able to cover it up so well that the patsy, Lee Harvey Oswald, continues to take all the blame. What is interesting in this fictional cover-up is how well this book, published in 2012, mirrors the manipulations of the CIA, as well as the state department and the upper levels of the FBI, in their attempt to take down our oddest of presidents, Donald J. Trump. This book nails it, so much so that it wouldn’t surprise me if Hunter, or whatever his real name might be, is a rogue former spook who is taking his former company to task. Really excellent stuff.
What was unexpected, though, was how the ‘social glue’ among those in the government agencies detailed by Hunter was so pivotal. I was also surprised by how affected I have been by the old blue-blood Ivy League status symbols that form this social glue. It just might be, I found not long after this book, one of my worst personal devils among so many.
In the heartland, this form of snobbery is much less pronounced, with status leaning primarily on quantities of money, but in the East, especially the Northeast, knowledge of the blue- blood code is central to all the social climbers. It is also troublesome for a lot of otherwise-contented people who are confronted with this snobbery on a more or less regular basis. In this social climate, where you ‘came from’ is paramount, even if you don’t believe it yourself, because the connected people often run the innards of government, and own the most desirable properties. It is these people who call themselves the Best and the Brightest, who live the most enviable lives in material advantages and who tell you what you should think if you want to be acceptable to them, the trend-setters. No matter that they might take a 180 degree turn in policy or opinion on some cultural matter, they are always right, and if you disagree with them, you are not only wrong, but wrong in a vulgar, ignorant peasant sort of way. You are obviously not of the manor born. But they are, and they run things. If you are not of the class, or have not pushed your way into the class by admission to Harvard or Yale and fulfilled your role there as someone compliant with the ruling class, you are lesser, and your opinion worthless. Fight them or their power, and you will be destroyed by their righteous (and class-protective) wrath. As Hunter says of Kennedy in his book, the president was assassinated because he was running policy counter to the opinion of the ruling class, even though his family had made inroads into the very same class, albeit by immoral means. This conflict with the ruling-class is precisely what, I believe, is causing all the astounding drama whipped up since the inception of the Trump administration.
All interesting in an objective sort of way, but during a night not long after hearing this book, my old nemesis the unconscious struck again. I felt once again the pains of being outside of the class that my parents had so wanted me to belong to, even though they disliked it with a passion. And that was the rub – we, my parents and I, were made to believe that we wanted to be part of the aristocracy while still maintaining disdain for it. But you cannot do that if you wish to belong, not unless your pedigree goes back to the Mayflower and your treasure is as great as Midas’s. I had never thought that I bought into the northeast class snobbery, but it is quite clear by my dream that I did, because the feeling of failure I felt during the dream was so palpable. I had also thought that any sliver of that sense of class that may have snuck into me would have been cleansed in light of the greater wisdom brought by age. Again, that is apparently not the case.
This is a big deal, not only for myself but for all of us. Class envy is not merely a silly butt-sniffing ceremony we are compelled to repeat as humans, but a source of horrendous conflict, some of it almost deserved. Communism is based upon it, and communism has killed at least one hundred million people over the last century, with Chairman Mao, who is still revered in China, taking the dubious prize as biggest mass murderer in history. Class envy is not merely a social thing – it often dictates who gets fed and whose ideas run the nation – but it is largely so. All societies above simple family hunting bands have a class system, and in it the commoners are often stung by the notion that they are inferior. Regardless, they are compelled by the upper class to accept their status, as the upper class has most of the power and the money, but the rest resent it greatly. Add a little starvation or a losing war to this formula, and you get revolution and often-times mass slaughter. As I said, it’s a big deal for us all.
It is especially disappointing to me to find this sense of inferiority and envy still in myself because of my high regard for the greatest social class buster himself, Jesus of Nazareth. We are all well aware of his slighting of the rich and powerful. It is not that having wealth is the problem, but rather, that having wealth requires one to be both generous and wise. In the story of Lazarus, the rich man allows Lazarus to starve to death while he dines voluminously, where even his dogs eat better than he who sits dying outside his door. In the end, Lazarus goes to heaven while the rich man goes to hell for not caring for his fellow human beings. In another parable he tells us that one cannot serve two masters…that “You cannot serve both God and money.” If we are to be rich, it cannot be for its own sake, but as a consequence of worthy action or work that does not take us away from our primary duties: to love God with all out heart, and to love our neighbors as ourselves. These duties themselves, if properly followed, would cleanse the field of envy and greed and abuse of power.
It is what the founders of Plymouth colony, under Cotton Mather if I remember correctly, tried to do: create a ‘shining city on the hill’ to mirror the New Jerusalem, where all shared all and worshiped God continuously. This failed within the first full year, just as socialistic governments usually do and for the same reason: some were slackers who made those who worked, and had to share, justifiably angry. Saint Peter was well aware of this when he stated from his Christian community that “if one does not work, one does not eat.” But it is one thing when under the management of a living apostle, and quite another when under the management of mere men who are naturally subject to the culture of their birth. With the relinquishment of the dream of the perfect Christian community, the pilgrims went on to create Beacon Hill and the American version of aristocracy – whose members are exactly those who now rule our government from within, as well as create our cultural standards. They are the people of God who went from the “Shining City on the Hill” to Beacon and Capitol Hill in a few short centuries. It seems that it is not only my life that is affected by social status, but even those who once claimed the greatest of moral intentions.
It is this that is the greater point: that we all have to deal with our dark side. It is not only wealth and status that control us, but many other things inherent in our human nature. I wrote recently of the ethnic slaughter in Rwanda, where neighbors killed neighbors in such a frenzy. In this slaughter was not only hatred of the ‘other,’ but also hatred built on pride and all those other deadly sins such as envy and lust. We know, if we dare to know, that we are not far from the consequences of these failings ourselves. We, too, are a mess, and, just like the Pilgrims, are so far internally from our conscious ideals that we seldom can make our great moral plans actually work. It is this darkness that we have to acknowledge and confront if we are to make a better world.
We are told in the New Testament that this darkness can only be overcome by grace, a gift that is neither deserved nor guaranteed, but granted to those who make themselves available – as well as to some who do not. Prayer helps, because, besides communication, real prayer is a willingness to admit our failings and to act on the ultimate commandments: love God and neighbor. To do that, we cannot serve the masters that are money, or status, or prestige, for those build a house that cannot stand. So it has always been with societies, which always crumble. But we do not have to. Or if we do, we should know where next to turn. With a little grace and humility and a lot of mercy, we can find our way out of the dark underworld that relentlessly turns every City on the Hill into a city that has lost its ideals, then becomes lost in time.
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