Deconstruction, Grief, and Pledging Allegiance

This week I have been in Gettysburg, PA for a pastor training event. Each morning, as is my custom while in Gettysburg, I’ve taken the opportunity to do six miles runs on the battlefield.

The battlefield at Gettysburg is a paradox. The mornings are often peaceful in nature – quiet. There aren’t many people or vehicles. The rush of the tourists hasn’t hit yet. If you are lucky, you are there on a day when there is a mist and haze over the battlefield, which give it an almost dreamy effect.

The paradox is that while it feels so very peaceful, a person is also very aware that this is the location for one of the bloodiest battles ever. This is a location of death – violent death.

A paradox is when two opposing things are both true at the same time. The battlefield at Gettysburg is one of those paradoxes.

As I was running this morning, I was contemplating the paradox. I was thinking about the Confederates who stood on the ridge line that is now Confederate Avenue. They believed they were right. They believed they were the good guys of history. They came to fight for what they believed. They were willing to die for it. Certainly willing to kill for it.

And when made it over to the Union line on the next ridge line over, it occurred to me that these men had the same thoughts.

Let’s be really clear here – I’m not offering some kind of moral equivalence. The Confederacy was a traitorous state that believed that some humans were less than human and could be property. And while the Civil War ended, the belief system of the Confederacy did not die off. It still rages on causing immeasurable harm.

We live in a society that has never really dealt with that reality. Confederate VIPs didn’t lose their property or wealth, they ended up getting elected to various political offices, continued to have influence. They even created a national myth – the Lost Cause Myth – a propaganda story designed to turn a loss into a reason to fight on. They believed they were on the right side of history after all.

Deconstruction is about examining one’s identity, or part of one’s identity. I’ve gone through this myself a few times. It’s not fun. When you are in the process, it is disorienting, which makes sense because what you thought you knew is revealed to no longer be the case. Deconstruction puts you in a liminal place – a place of in-between where you just don’t know anything, or aren’t certain of anything anymore.

An essential part of deconstruction is grief. Grief is about letting go of something or someone you cared deeply about. Grief, at its core, is embracing the reality that what was is no longer. And when you embrace that, it’s painful. You feel the loss.

When someone you love and care about dies, it’s not just that person who dies and is gone. Your relationship with that person has permanently changed. And you didn’t have a say in it.

I think the same can be said when it comes to identity. As children, we take on certain identities. And as we get older, some of us examine those identities and start to ask questions about them. We discover that those identities no longer serve us because we have outgrown them. Or maybe we’ve experienced something that forced a change on who we are. We go through a time of grief while we figure out who we are going forward.

Which leads to the last part – pledging allegiance.

If you google what pledging allegiance means, you’ll get something like this: making a formal, solemn-promise of loyalty or faithfulness to a country, leader, or cause.

When I read that, what I hear is a public declaration of identity.

Becoming a Lutheran clergy involves a type of pledging allegiance. When you are ordained you promise to uphold the Scriptures, teach the Lutheran confessions, and faithfully serve the congregation you are called to. Part of that also calls you to be a public witness.

For me, I have difficulty pledging allegiance to both identities. In fact, I never have pledged both at the same time. I stopped doing the pledge of allegiance to the country about ten years ago. I took ordination vows about eight years ago. And before anyone makes some lazy comment about how higher education somehow radicalized me, no it didn’t. I was already on this journey well before seminary. How I see faith and how I saw what we have done as a country are in conflict and I couldn’t continue to identity with it. Maybe you can – that’s your business. I’m not suggesting anyone follow my lead on this. I don’t make a scene around this. I don’t create any type of disruption. I don’t try to convince others to stop saying the pledge. This is my own struggle with being a faithful follower of Jesus as I understand it with being a citizen of a country.

I pay my taxes. I have served on jury duty. I vote. I recognize that I am a citizen of the US. But I sure do struggle with what that represents.

This goes beyond the current administration. We have a full range of unresolved issues. And in many cases, we have intentionally decided to put blinders on rather than deal with those issues. We seem to prefer the comfortable lie rather than the inconvenient truth. And that’s what I struggle with.

Countries do things that are harmful. I think I’m safe in saying that every country that has ever existed is guilty of some horrible thing. I’m not looking for perfection here. There isn’t a perfect country.

I’m just looking for some honesty. Just a microscopic level. Instead, as a country, we have continually decided with intentionality, to not acknowledge the harm done groups of people too numerous to list. We have continually decided we will do nothing to try to repair the damage that has been done to these folks. We have continually decided that on adopting myths that tell fairy tales about who we are, rather than looking at reality and dealing with that.

And that’s why I can’t pledge allegiance. It’s just too painful for me. I don’t like that I can’t pledge allegiance. I grieve every time I am at a public function where the expectation is that everyone will pledge allegiance, or when the national anthem is played. Another piece of me dies.

But all is not lost. In many ways, this has motivated me in my call and life. If others won’t see the reality and history, and the refusal to repair the damage done, so be it. I do the work I do because I see the impact it can have on people. My faith compels me to see the image of God in others, to offer grace and mercy, to love my neighbor. My faith compels me to be a public witness, to speak out, to act.

Living in reality of the past and present is not always a pleasant place to be. But it’s real. We are called to do what we can to make the world a better place. But you have to start by seeing the world as it really is. That’s what I pledge myself too. I pledge to continue in that work. To offer healing where I can. To proclaim the truth. To work to set people free from whatever is holding them captive.

I’m reminded of the paradox of the battlefield at Gettysburg – both the peace and the violence that have been present. I’m reminded that just because you win a battle or even a war, does not mean that the identity or belief system surrenders or dies off. I’m reminded that you have to keep going. You have to stay true. You have to grab hold of the life preserve of faith because otherwise you’ll drown from the flood of the horrors of humanity. And most important, you have to be open to see the humanity in those that have determined that you are their enemy. They believe they are right after all, regardless of the reality of that.

And you aren’t going to win them over through force. You aren’t going to win by imposing. You aren’t going to win by killing them either. In fact, if winning is your main focus, then you’ve already lost. Because no one wins when we are too busy fighting and seeing monsters and enemies to be defeated. People dig in their heels. They will hold on to their beliefs as if that will save them. Because preserving an identity will become most important.

We can only invite people into a different path. Just as we have been invited. We can only see the humanity of others, just as our own humanity has been seen. We can only love how we have been loved.

And until we embrace that reality, we are going to keep doing what we do. This doesn’t change in one big instant. And I’m not convinced that it large groups of people that make this change all at once. Instead, I’ve encountered individuals and small groups of people who have embraced this. Who remind me that I’m not alone in this. And that’s what keeps me going. That’s what keeps me pledging allegiance to Jesus’ way.