Misleading Logic

Maybe it is because I have grandkids and sometimes, I think they are cute.  Whatever, I smiled recently when I read a Tweet that told a very short story that illustrates for me what I characterize as misleading logic.  I had one logic class in college, billed as a philosophy class.  I barely passed it, as I recall.  And I remember nothing about it, except it was like being mired in a story question from arithmetic.  I always found those story problems difficult.  For some reason, I felt like I could work equations, but put it in story form and it became impossible.  

The logic professor always felt like it was so simple as he tried to walk us from point A to point D or E.  By the time we left point B, I was lost---wandering down some back alley of logic.  “How did you get there,” he would ask?  I felt like that was a dumb question.  If I knew that, I wouldn’t be here!  And so is my background when I read this little story on Twitter.

The six-year-old comes in to announce to his father that the boy intended to marry his grandmother.  Perhaps nonplussed but managing to say something, the dad replies that it did not seem like a good idea, since they were related.  The little guy had a great response.  He did not see any harm in marrying grandma.  After all, he told his dad, “You married my mother!”  I am sure in that six-year-old brain, that logic made perfect sense.  It worked in his head.

Yet somehow, we know it doesn’t work.  We want to say it is not logical.  But that’s my point.  Some logic seems to work, and some logic is misleading.  This would be easy to deal with if it were the case that as folks get older, their logical abilities become sharper, and they no longer get trapped by logic that misleads.  But I am not so sure this is the case.  That would be like the argument that we necessarily get wiser as we get older.  Most of us know this simply is not the case.  I know some people who are just as dumb at 60 as they were at 16.  Age has made no difference!

So, what’s the point?  My point is to raise our awareness that in spiritual terms, at least, we can be on the lookout for what I’m calling misleading logic.  I am especially concerned when I see the role our secular culture does to all of us.  Even though my country touts itself as a religious nation, I have my doubts that makes us all spiritual.  I don’t doubt a majority of Americans claim to believe in God.  But for me belief does not necessarily mean spiritual.  Spiritual means a commitment and an intention to live a life responding to the message of the tradition and the living Spirit.  

For example, when I read the New Testament, I hear Jesus talking about forgiveness.  I hear him counseling us to love everybody---including our enemies.  I don’t see evidence in our country that we do that.  I understand our secular logic about national security and so on.  I get the point that we are safer when we have “first strike capabilities.”  There is a logic that says having all these weapons---many of them nuclear---makes us safer.  Somehow that seems a bit like the little boy saying his dad married his mom.  There is a logic there that is misleading if we follow it on out. 

I realize being spiritual puts us in a place where our logic makes no sense.  Why would you love your enemy when they can then take advantage of you and beat you, kill you or take over your country?  Being an American and thinking this way does not make sense.  American logic suggests we can’t afford that kind of logic.  With that goes the assumption that Jesus could not have meant it that way—at least for Americans.  

I also realize I take the pressure off myself when I go to the national level.  However, I think it probably plays out on my own personal level too.  There are things I simply don’t consider---even though I want to be spiritual.  For example, I can have too much of something---like money---and be afraid to share it because then I might not have enough.  To think this way operates out of what spiritual writers call a “scarcity” perspective.  If I am honest, I confess that I grew up with this perspective.  It is difficult to overcome. But I look at Jesus and see someone operating out of a “generosity” perspective.  The feeding of the 5,000 is the classic story of the generosity model of behavior.  

Love your enemies?  That is a very difficult piece of counsel.  To be honest, there are days I am not sure I even love my friends.  And some days, we don’t even love ourselves.  Clearly, there is work to do.  And as long as I am willing, there is hope.  What I don’t want to do is become exasperated and give up.  And I don’t want to completely individualize and privatize my faith, so I don’t have to deal with loving enemies and being an American who is willing to ignore others who don’t fit into my system.

Nowhere does Jesus tell us to dismiss those who bug us.  That is too logical.  “It’s a free country” can be my logic that says, “I’m outta here,” which really means I don’t want to deal with you, and I won’t be responsible to you or for you.

Writing all this reinforces for me that being spiritual is a challenge.  It will require commitment, discipline and community.  If I want to be spiritual, then I have to follow the logic of the gospel.