Health care is a moral issue. True.
The government handling of health care is the only solution. False.
Walking around the Jefferson Memorial last spring, I was struck by the words of The Declaration of Independence:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.
How often I've glossed over the Declaration. Yet at that April morning I had an insight. Jefferson states that the Creator has endowed men (a specific class of men; foreshadowing the limited scope of freedom the Congress at that time was willing to bestow) with rights due to the equality of their being. Here he implies that without proper government these unalienable rights cannot be upheld, which is false if they are indeed absolute. The next assertion, which says governments exist because the people allow themselves to be ruled, is a tautology. He continues saying that when governments fail the people have the right to revolt. Furthermore, says Jefferson, the means of revolution is only possible through the bloodshed of tyrants and patriots. Yet historically violent revolts have only established different systems injustice. This statement of positive violence must be rejected if we desire true peace and justice for all.
Jefferson appears to worship humanity in the Declaration, he claims governments are founded by the people and that the people can change them. Yet while the first part of the statement is true, the second part is not so simple. We easily build our prisons, but we cannot escape them unaided. Over time more and more authority is given to the government by the people. In the history of the US, power has become more and more centralized into one person, into one office -the executive branch or the war branch. The President is not called Commander in Chief without reason.
I find it contradictory that Jefferson who so openly loved humanity, as a citizen and President, engaged and promoted warfare himself. War is the destruction of the best of humanity. The battlefield dead can no longer pursue their unalienable rights. And the surviving soldiers return home knowing they have ended the lives of many; that they have on some level killed their mirror images. Can these veterans sleep knowing they have made sons and daughters into orphans? Can they ever again return to the pursuit of happiness? Who is the victor, who is more noble, the dead or the dying? Only the State can claim victory during times of war.
John Adams, the second US President, summed up the low order of war pragmatically when writing to his wife, Abigail: "I must study Politicks and War that my sons may have liberty to study Mathematicks and Philosophy. My sons ought to study Mathematicks and Philosophy, Geography, natural History, Naval Architecture, navigation, Commerce and Agriculture, in order to give their Children a right to study Painting, Poetry, Musick, Architecture, Statuary, Tapestry and Porcelaine." (Unsurprisingly, his son John Quincy Adams, became neither a scientist nor an artist, but followed in his father's footsteps and became a politician and President.)
What if no one studied war or politics, but pursued everything else? What if everyone could joyfully sing the spiritual?
I’m going to lay down my heavy load
Down by the riverside
Down by the riverside
Down by the riverside
Going to lay down my heavy load
Down by the riverside
Ain’t going to study war no more
So what does all of this have to do with health care? Simply that governments justify their existence with the gun and jailhouse. Hear me out: Governments exist to enforce their own laws. They use violence or the threat of violence to maintain the rule of law.
For example, the teachings of many faiths say, 'It is wrong to kill, do not do it.' In contrast, the government says anyone who kills must be thrown in jail or put to death. Unless that person is a soldier, then the law is reversed and the more a soldier kills the more he is praised. For the government nothing can be above its laws, even if they are illogical. Yet for the community of faith the law was made to serve the people, the people were not made to serve the law.
Governments are legal institutions, but they are not moral agencies. Do not put your faith in them. Don't abdicate your moral responsibilities to the State because it seems like the only solution. It is the easier solution but it is not the ethical one.
Again, governments believe that the proper use of evil can overcome evil; that war can create peace; that killing can save lives; that in order to save a village it has to be destroyed. But understand that the use of violence only breeds more violence; indeed evil can only be overcome with good; that only the blood of martyrs dulls the executioner's axe.
The community of faith is in danger of losing its soul when it is no longer willing to bear the burdens of social justice and relinquishes its conscience to the whims of the government. Those who believe in a greater authority are called to care for their neighbor in sickness or in health. Health care must be carried out on a relational level, face to face. The sick are healed by our compassionate presence, not by legislation.
If you think I am being naive then I point to the mission of the Catholic Worker, which has been caring for the least of these without State assistance since the Great Depression (the Catholic Worker houses generally do not operate as a 501c3, and therefore are not tax exempt, but as such they are free from coercion by government). If you think I am being too critical of the President and the connection to war then I ask: Does it makes any sense to fall farther into national debt when not one politician is willing to consider re-allocating funds from a bloated military budget? Does it make sense that the poor might be fined for being unable to afford health care? Rather I pray you believe that by even the smallest act of compassion the world is changed more dramatically than the grandest of laws.
Do not be convinced that the government can do what we, God's children, are made for... the government cannot give much thought to the poor, it cannot truly care for the sick, the broken, the veteran, the weak... it is too busy enforcing its laws and waging its wars.
Believe that you and I are made to care for each other, to love each other. Believe that the truest response to someone in need is not in the petition to your congressperson but to stretch out your own hand. The moral issue depends on whether or not we open our own wallets and accept the responsibility of caring for our neighbor as ourselves. I tell you the poor and the sick will not be greatly helped if we let the government assume this duty.
Governments cannot truly change, despite high minded rhetoric. The new boss is the same as the old boss... Only we, the people, are agents of change. Even President Obama and the founding fathers concede that much.
If I eat it is because you fed me,
If I sleep it is because you sheltered me,
If I am warm it is because you covered me,
If I laugh it is because you comforted me,
And if I stand it is because you supported me.
