Social Justice?
“Social justice” is one of those buzz words that we preachers give a lot of credence too. Almost all of us look up to the great champions of social justice throughout history, from Martin Luther to his namesake King. I too have a long-standing interest in social justice going back to my seminary training and interest in liberation theology. Liberation theology was the first theology to really make sense to me. It took experience seriously, and demanded that our actions take as much precedence as our words. Liberation theology was radically relevant and it called for a kind of Christianity that was boldly engaged with the social ills of our world.
I still remain committed to “social justice,” but I’ve become increasingly leery of the term. More and more I question the clarity by which liberation theologians tend to see their causes. I wonder how “just” any cause can really be. It seems to me that most of our social ills are more complex than they may first appear. It is not easy to say what is “just.” Even more, I question the value of a commitment to an abstracted concept of “justice.” I find myself inclined to be committed to certain communities of people, to want to advocate on their behalf, to want to join with them in their quest for their own version of justice. At the same time, I’m less and less interested in “causes” however just they may seem.
In thinking about justice, this passage from Luke 18 has begun to shape me:
Then Jesus told them a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart. He said, “In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor had respect for people. In that city there was a widow who kept coming to him and saying, ‘Grant me justice against my opponent.’ For a while he refused; but later he said to himself, ‘Though I have no fear of God and no respect for anyone, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming.’” And the Lord said, “Listen to what the unjust judge says. And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them. And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?”
What a strange brand of justice Jesus imagines. In this vision, justice comes to those who advocate relentlessly on behalf of their interests, who refuse rejection and failure no matter how many times it comes. Justice is not about who is “right”. Justice is about who works harder for it. Justice comes to the one who is willing to offer their whole selves in the interest of their justice. It does not depend on the judge. It depends on all of us.
I can’t help but think about our own political moment in light of this passage. What has happened to the health care debate in this country? Did advocates for real reform think that the “rightness” of their cause would prevail, simply because it is right? Did advocates of the status quo advocate more strongly and more passionately for their cause? Sadly, this kind of justice (perhaps the only kind?) is always brokered on the backs of the poor and the marginalized. The widow in Jesus’s story represents such people. Yet more and more their voices are excluded from our public discourse. Those of us who express a concern for the poor out of our Christian commitments will have to keep bothering the powers that be if we wish to see real change. Bothering them endlessly. Bothering them relentlessly. Bothering them with passion, commitment, energy. Things won’t change just because they should. Someone has to start bothering the comfortable people in power.
Hmm. I guess some of that liberation theology stuff still stuck after all.