We keep hearing about how divided we are. That we’re more polarized and uncivil than ever. That we hate each other more. But this isn’t the whole truth. Our division doesn’t come from a common rejection of the common ground. It stems from fundamentalism, which is a fundamentally divisive ideology.
Because fundamentalism has to be right, its great fear is to be wrong. And we’re scared to say it: that fundamentalism’s our problem.
In a world divided, when a chaplain to Congress can get fired for praying something akin to “give us today our daily bread,” (or apparently not?) it is hard to find common ground.
Even when the common ground is beneath our feet.
We’re literally standing on it already. It isn’t lost. We don’t need to seek it out like it’s hiding from us. The common ground is right where it has always been.
The problem isn’t the common ground. It hasn’t moved. The soil is as permanent as the plastics we’re tossing in the ocean.
The common ground hasn’t left, nor is it the unicorn we’re hoping is out there somewhere, always beyond our reach.
It’s way more simple than that. We just don’t want to admit it.
We aren’t the same.
Some of us are being jerks.
Some of us think we need to be nice.
And sometimes those jerks take advantage of that.
This isn’t equal. We’re not all paying the same dues into this pot. Some are putting money in and some are stealing from the kiddy.
The best example I could come up with was an experience I wrote about last week. I was a first-year in college when some campus crusaders gaslit me for Jesus. You might read that for context.
When those teenage evangelists were attacking a friend behind his back and peppering me with scripture, they were trying to win. But did they listen to me? Did they go back to their dorm rooms and look up classic theologians or research queer theology? Did they revisit the scripture of love or the parables of Jesus?
In other words, did they hold up their end of the bargain? No. How do I know? They told me they wouldn’t.
And to further the point, did I gaslight them? Did I instigate or retaliate? Were we both doing this?
Of course not.
But in the same breath that we blame “both sides” we find ourselves holding them to different standards.
We’re Not All Required to Be Nice
The false equivalence in American Christianity is that Progressive Christians have to be nice and Fundamentalists don’t.
Of course, some are pretty universally loathed, like Westboro Baptist Church, but the wider Christian community holds Progressive Christians to a different standard than fundamentalists.
A standard which allows passive aggressive excuses for disunity.
Sometimes it’s explicit. Like the ultimatum these Christian crusaders gave me to condemn my gay friend or go to hell.
And sometimes it’s blaming the prophet for sharing the word of God.
We allow excuses for retaliation against an act which was never aggressive. We see it in the church and in our personal relationships with cover:
as they leave the church.
The Common Ground
The common ground is already beneath our feet. Our common humanity is shared in our DNA. The common experience is shared in our neighborhoods and communities. A common faith is shared in churches and missional communities all over the world.
We’re already there.
Our divisions are fictions we treat as histories. We aren’t really divided over matters of deep and permanent faith. Not divided irreconcilably, anyway.
We do have a small fraction of people who despise the very nature of the common ground. Why? How can anyone hate the common ground?
Well, they hate it because the common ground is built by compromise and community building. It is built, not on unity as a concept, but as a practice. It comes alive around dinner tables and community gatherings of praise or mourning.
We rediscover the common ground beneath our feet when we are open to the mere possibility that common ground means we both can win.
Our real division is caused by fundamentalism
We act like we’re divided because we’re divided; like “division” is the cause and the effect. So the obvious answer is to stop being divided. Because if we stop being divided, then that means we’ll stop being divided. This is, of course, nonsense.
The division comes from somewhere. And the increasing division comes from somewhere specific.
Fundamentalism and its zero-sum mindset is the true enemy of unity.
The rigidness of fundamentalism (found in all parts of the political spectrum) demands winners and losers in a zero-sum game. It creates a scenario which always divides us because it mandates winners and losers. And fundamentalists demand the right to win in part because they’re afraid to lose.
Fundamentalism is afraid to be wrong. But it can’t conceive of a situation in which it can survive ever being wrong. Or that we can both be right. Or even that it can be right but for the wrong reasons. It refuses to entertain anything but “we win and you lose.”
In other words, they have to win. And to do so, we have to lose.
And the more we tolerate this narrow outlook the more divided we become. Because we aren’t merely tolerating someone’s idea hypothetically. We’re tolerating their refusal to honor our ideas. This is the same dilemma we find when debating the limits of free speech. Especially when we’re talking about Nazis and religious freedom.
The zero-sum mindset breeds fundamentalism and exclusivity, making unity impossible.
So when we tolerate, not just the speech, but the goals and mindset of fundamentalism in all its forms, we assist the enemy of unity. Because tolerating it is tolerating the very source of our division. Therefore, to seek unity, we mustn’t tolerate it.
An Analogy
Imagine you and a partner are given a math problem with five different ways of solving it. These solutions are lettered A, B, C, D, and E. You have to work with your partner to figure out which one you want to use to solve the equation and defend to the class why you picked that solution.
Now imagine you go about testing all five methods. A is the classic method, but it’s slow and cumbersome. B is a bit weird and takes some thinking, but is really fast. C is novel, but prone to error. D is popular, but really slow. And E is fast and simple, but requires understanding both A and B.
You’re weighing all the options.
You’re deciding what the priority needs to be: is it speed? Accuracy? Ease?
So you engage your partner and he keeps saying. “D. Only D. It’s the best.” You keep trying to talk with him about the other options or talk through how you’re going to defend your choice and to be honest, D is probably last on your list.
But he doesn’t care. For him, it’s D or it’s nothing.
What are you supposed to do with that? This win/lose mindset isn’t about reason or building consensus. And actually, it’s worse than that. He’s refusing to do the assignment because he isn’t partnering with you to decide. The very assignment is to work together and he is refusing to even try. He’s abusing the relationship and demanding his way or else.
This isn’t division. It’s a hostage situation.
Your giving into him wouldn’t be a sign of teamwork. And if you don’t give in, you’ll probably fail. You’re stuck and it has nothing to do with your teamwork.
And the kicker is this: if you do fail, he’ll blame you for it.
But if he does blame you for it, it isn’t an opinion. It’s gaslighting.
Unity Beyond Fundamentalism
Yes, we’re divided. But…
Unity is the unicorn we’re chasing to avoid the experience we’re falsely calling division.
The problem isn’t division or a lack of unity. It is the entrenchment of a mindset that will never lead to unity. Zero-sum thinking is divisive by its very nature. It creates an “us” and “them” to fight over the things the “us” wants. And the more we cover our common ground with a win/lose mindset, the more ignorant we are to the ground beneath our feet.
Now, I’m addicted to the win/lose mindset. I like to see the other side lose as much as I like to see my own side win. But I also dabble a bit in the lose/lose, so if I’m losing, chances are pretty good that I’ll take you down with me. Because I’m petty. And human.
But when I open my mind to compromise, I can see the common ground. I can see the ground you’re standing on looks strangely similar to the ground I’m on!
Seeking compromise is like putting on magic glasses which help us see the humanity of other people. But for a good portion of the population, compromise is a four-letter word.
Building unity might require compromise, but it isn’t our only goal. It doesn’t stop there.
What happens when we actually want to see the other side win?
It isn’t just a matter of determining what we’re all losing like a checklist: what can I give up and what can I make them give up so we can both feel the pain of this deal? What if we move past our losses and focus instead on our wins? What if we actively hope they succeed and we succeed? We get what we should all want: the win/win.
The pernicious problem of zero-sum thinking when applied to social communities is that it doesn’t just restrict our ability to compromise with one another. It restricts our ability to even see the purpose of our community.
Our goal isn’t winning or sacrifice, it’s building a more just world. It’s finding the common ground beneath our feet is ours to share and transform together. The whole point of community isn’t about having our way or eliminating divisions, its to make our common ground a beautiful park, a fine performance hall, or an exceptional school.
And many of our friends and neighbors are mistaking fundamentalism for the very definition of faith and politics. A fundamentalism which will necessarily divide us.
This is the true problem of fundamentalism. It isn’t built for unity. Fundamentalism struggles to honor any neighbors and any other voices. It won’t share the spotlight or the common ground clearly beneath our feet. And it demands its way or it takes the highway.
The only hope for unity is in recognizing we all have dibs on the common ground. Which means all of this creation, all its beauty and blame is ours to share equally.
And right now, nothing is equal.