Dear Episcopal Empathy Voters
I recently attended a clergy-only meet and greet at Procter Center for Episcopal bishop candidates of Southern Ohio.
Welcome back to Pro-Empathy Freedom Voters are the Solution and a big hello to all free Pro-Empathy Freedom subscribers. Our Fall one-hour-long Zoom discussions about applying cognitive science to political and moral discourse convenes one more Tuesday in September and the second and third Tuesdays in November all at 6:45 pm. We recess in October for early GOTV. We are focusing on George Lakoff’s Don’t Think of an Elephant: Know Your Values and Frame the Debate. Click the blue button on our website for enrollment information.
Dear Episcopal Empathy Voters
I am a pro-empathy freedom culture diplomat and a retired bi-vocational progressive Episcopal priest informed by cognitive scientist and activist George Lakoff. As a progressive Christian, I believe “the Spirit moves in beneficial ways in many faith traditions.”
I recently attended a clergy-only meet and greet at Procter Center for Episcopal bishop candidates of Southern Ohio. I have no vote in this upcoming election because I belong to a different diocese. Nevertheless, I’ve been invited by a clergy friend to join him and four other retired clergy, who have a vote, to discuss the candidates before the election. Here are my thoughts.
“I liked all of the candidates for bishop … because they are committed to pro-empathy Christian ministry…”
I liked all of the candidates for bishop - four women and one man - three white, one black, and one Hispanic - because they are committed to pro-empathy Christian ministry versus limited-empathy christianist1 ministry.
During Presiding Bishop Michael Curry's tenure, The Episcopal Church and the Diocese of Southern Ohio have furthered their vision of God as a lover and its vision of good people as a “beloved community.” Since our Baptismal Covenant2 is about acting, I prefer to frame good people as empathy ACTORS3 versus mere recipients of God’s love.
Progressive Christians are nurturers
My friend and mentor, Dr. Lakoff, describes progressive pro-empathy Christians as “nurturant who can function well in interdependent situations, where social ties, communication, cooperation, kindness, and trust are essential.” We who call ourselves progressive, pro-empathy Christians have a high calling, which most young people growing up today are not encountering.4
Dr. Lakoff and The Episcopal Church in Southern Ohio’s vision of a Christian God and a good person is in direct contrast to limited-empathy Christianist5 hate group lobbyists in Ohio, the Alliance Defending Freedom,6 and its Ohio ally, the Center for Christian Virtue.7 Dr. Lakoff describes christianists as “self-disciplined and self-reliant (because of fear of eternal damnation) who function well in a (white male) hierarchy, obey strict orders from above (white males and God as a white male) and give strict orders to those below - and enforce those orders with PAIN.”8 These christianist hate groups are very effective communicators.
Ohio Episcopalians must decide to protect and empower democracy in Ohio so other pro-empathy, non-Christian faith communities and we can thrive. I hope we will, but we must promote empathy’s politics of care more effectively.
Laity and clergy must remind one another that our Catechism9 says, “represent Christ and his Church” - politically - as pro-empathy nurturers versus limited-empathy brutilizers. Will we “bear witness to Christ wherever we may be? Will we “carry on Christ’s work of reconciliation in the world? If so, since cognitive science tells us that all conversations are political and moral, progressive faith communities must up our game and link “Christ and his Church” to a commitment to govern with empathy for and responsibility to humanity.
The stakes of Episcopal Church politics are too low.
All five Episcopal bishop candidates could be good and effective bishops in The Episcopal Church as it is today. However, my experience at Proctor triggered me because at age 74, after 45 years as an ordained person, I believe, to paraphrase Henry Kissinger, the stakes of Episcopal Church politics are too low. Our gratitude for God’s creation is too small.
The stakes articulated at Procter didn’t include saving democracy from autocracy or reducing the existential threat of our growing carbon pollution blanket. These two existential threats to humanity were not questions of concern from diocesan leadership on behalf of its clergy to the candidates. Consequently, no candidate spoke to these concerns.
Since 2004, I have committed myself to reframing conversations10 around empathy for and responsibility to humanity to reduce the harmful effects of the constant conservative culture war against empathy. This gender-neutral calling of constant culture diplomacy11 framed around empathy was spelled out 75 years ago this year in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights Preamble Proclamation.12
Where is the progressive communication system and infrastructure for reframing political and moral discourse around empathy?
Yet, because progressives lack a communication system and infrastructure for reframing political and moral discourse around empathy, human rights are still not the foundation of the rule of law in the United States. As an aside, The Episcopal Church and its progressive Christian allies HAVE a communication system and infrastructure that has effectively ignored applying cognitive science to political and moral discourse in the public square.
Dr. Lakoff continues to say that to overcome hypocognition - not knowing what we don’t know13 - there must be sustained public discourse about why and how empathy must be at the center of public and private debate. Most Americans are caring human beings yet can’t or won’t make the politics of care the center of the debate. Dr. Lakoff writes, “It is difficult to (hear) things that have not been said hundreds of times before.”14 Clergy could be helpful in this regard - adding the word empathy to every sermon - and calling on parishioners to make empathy the center of their conversations.
Recruiting and training pro-empathy freedom culture diplomats are crucial in creating the ideal person15 because all ideas are physically in our bodies and are strengthened with repetition. This phenomenon that can physically change brains over time is called reflexivity - consider the cognitive devastation Fox News has on our neighbors. Reflexivity for good is why I founded Empathy Surplus in 2009, which became Empathy Surplus Network USA, a 501c3 human rights empathy education collective in 2020.
Orthopraxis leads to orthodoxy - Consider adding empathy to orthopraxis reflexivity
Clergy know this reflexivity phenomenon as “orthopraxis leads to orthodoxy.” Progressive faith leaders have a special responsibility to promote to their flock a commitment to promoting empathy in conversation. Reflexivity can be used for either good or bad. “Accordingly,” writes Lakoff, “the frame-inherent world, structured by our framed actions, reinforces those frames and recreates those frames in others as they are born, grow, and mature in the world.”16
I hope any faith leader interested in applying the latest insights of the brain to their ministry will consider filling out this Google rank-choice ballot link. The ballot asks voters to rank eleven books - four by George Lakoff and seven by other authors - in order that they would like to read them. You can also find Zoom forum enrollment information on the ballot as well. Here’s the link to that ballot again. I hope you will share it on your parish, mosque, or synagogue Facebook page - https://bit.ly/forumpicks.
Lakoff, George, Moral Politics: How Liberals and Conservatives Think, Ch.14, Two Models of Christianity, p. 245-262, Uniersity of Chicago Press, 1996, 2002. Pro-empathy ministry is to “nurturant parent Christianity” as limited-empathy ministry is to “strict father Christianity,” that I will refer to as christianist.
The Episcopal Church (TEC), The Book of Common Prayer (BCP), Holy Baptism, p. 304.
United Nations, Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 1, All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act toward one another in a spirit of brotherhood.” https://proempathy.us/iudhrbk
Gabbart, Adam, The Guardian, Losing their religion: why US churches are on the decline, 01/22/2023, https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/jan/22/us-churches-closing-religion-covid-christianity
Hogg, David, March for Our Lives founder, NWFDailyNews Letter to the Editor, “Christian or Christianist: Your Souls Could Depend On It, 05/2022, https://www.nwfdailynews.com/story/opinion/letters/2022/05/26/letter-christian-christianist-your-souls-could-depend/9899378002/
Based in Arizona, the Southern Poverty Law Center hate group, Alliance Defending Freedom, effectively operates in Ohio: https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/extremist-files/group/alliance-defending-freedom
The Center for Christian Virtues’ headquarters is directly across from the Ohio Capital. They are a Southern Poverty Law Center hate group ally: https://ohiocapitaljournal.com/2023/06/20/ohio-lawmakers-and-religious-lobbyists-coordinate-on-anti-trans-legislation/
IBID., Lakoff
An Outline of the Faith: Commonly Called the Catechism, The Ministry, p. 855, Oxford University Press, 1979, https://www.bcponline.org/Misc/catechism.html
Lakoff, George, Don’t Think of an Elephant, Introduction: Reframing IS Social Change, p xi-xv, Chelsea Green Publishing, Vermont, 2014.
IBID., Ch. 6, The Private Depends on the Public, The Brain and Constant Public Discourse, p.52-56
United Nations, “Now, therefore, The General Assembly proclaims this Universal Declaration of Human Rights as a common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations, to the end that every individual and every organ of society, keeping this Declaration constantly in mind, shall strive by teaching and education to promote respect for these rights and freedoms and by progressive measures, national and international, to secure their universal and effective recognition and observance, both among the peoples of Member States themselves and among the peoples of territories under their jurisdiction.”
IBID., Lakoff, Ch. 2, “Framing the Unframed,” last four paragraphs, p. 34.
IBID.
IBID., Ch. 3, “Reflexivity: The Brain and the World,” p. 35.
IBID.