Few of my columns have resulted in more feedback than last week‘s entitled “Entanglement: Faith and Politics.” In it I recognized my heroes of the Christian faith: Fredrick Douglas, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, William Wilberforce and Martin Luther King. In each case these leaders took aggressive and unyielding actions against the institutions of slavery, fascism and racial discrimination—their actions were unerringly aimed at inhumanity.
The column led to several interesting conversations, with one person reflecting on Christianity’s inhumanity. Fair enough. There have certainly been numerous instances when religious institutions or rhetoric have been subordinated to the ego—the power needs—of their leaders. And while especially painful to recall, there were church leaders who justified slavery and at a later time chose to avert their eyes from the unfolding holocaust.
It is, of course, impossible to find any institution of long-standing that has not attracted and elevated exploitative leaders. America has had its noble and ignoble moments. Fortunately we are never far from the next election and are blessed with a constitution that assures checks and balances.
Religion, appropriately, is held or should be held to the ultimate standard. Love thy neighbor is unambiguous and maddeningly difficult.
Hillel, the Hebrew elder, said: “What is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor. That is the whole Torah; the rest is the explanation of this—go study it.”
Jesus urged his followers to love their neighbor while warning them of pretenders and contenders who would deceive them. Most tellingly, Paul in his letter to the Corinthians stated: “I may be able to speak the languages of human beings and even of angels, but if I have no love, my speech is no more than a noisy gong or a clanging bell.”
We need to look beyond the preening opportunists who conceal their motives in religious or political rhetoric, and at any given moment there are plenty of them. Media today amplify those noisy gongs and clanging bells. Each day there is a flood tide of indignities. We turn to the videos. We choose to pay attention—the news on any given day is mostly about indignities.
There is also a flood tide of humanity. We don’t have to test our memories; Hurricane Matthew reminded us that devastation is always paired with the Red Cross. Likewise, the YMCA with youth opportunity and Habitat for Humanity with care—people of faith reaching out and going well beyond their own self-interest. Divine stirrings.
Just as we don’t find the truest expression of patriotism in Washington, we won’t find the truest expression of faithfulness among the self-anointed. If a person, parading under the banner of his/her faith is principally known for their work in politics, some version of Caesar has already prevailed.
Short Take on a Big Proposal
Each year seems to feature at least one blockbuster acquisition or merger in the communication’s industry. Since at one time I had regulatory power over deals of this sort, I still get questions. Let me provide a very fast and quick take on AT&T’s acquisition of Time-Warner which must receive government approval.
Acquisitions must at least theoretically improve return on investment. In this case, AT&T’s most certain path to better returns will be through greater pricing power or the use its network to its competitive advantage. It’s hard to see much public interest in either result.
I say this because bringing together engineers and artists rarely results in synergies. Those who engineer networks or devices or financial statements don’t, for the most part, appreciate the artistic impulse. They, understandably, want theories to be tested through measurement and modeling. Artists don’t do that.
There was a story in this morning’s New York Times about artists and exhibitors mounting exhibitions in small and counterintuitive spaces because the owners of large galleries wanted more and then more. The title of the article was Art Dealers Move Out of the Gallery and Into a Taco Bell. If you own a large gallery in a popular location you have a significant investment and need each artist’s work to sell at significant prices. If you are an artist trying to break through, that doesn’t work.
Time Warner has significant content brands; Warner Brothers film studio, HBO, CNN, and on and on. AT&T would use network leverage to get more return from those brands but the company would not be a fertile place for new ideas, just as big galleries are not fertile venues for new artists. So let me leave it there, the next administration needs to do a thorough going scrub of the proposed acquisition and look for creation, not more consolidation.
Al Sikes is the former Chair of the Federal Communications Commission under George H.W. Bush. Al recently published Culture Leads Leaders Follow published by Koehler Books.
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