Let’s look at civility as simply a starting point

We live in very contentious times.

Political candidates and their supporters are so often vitriolic in their dismissal of the “other candidate.”

Letters to the editors in our newspapers seem to increasingly be platforms for venomous attacks on people.

In our workplaces, homes and churches, unbridled anger has become far too commonplace.

A lot of folks are understandably upset by the anger-without-limits mentality. We have heard and read calls for people to be more “civil” to each other.

I welcome those pleas for treating people in civil ways. But if we don’t push ourselves to be so much more than just civil to one another, we waste our time, our breath and our spirits.

“Civility” is shorthand for being a good citizen. It also assumes a public politeness, one that too often hides a private anger that lurks beneath the mask of nice manners.

If you expect civility to be the end result of a relationship, you have doomed that relationship to fail. Civility is not the end goal, but a starting point toward reconciliation.

While Jesus encouraged people to obey civil authority, I don’t see anywhere that he talks about civility being a new Christian virtue. In Luke 20:20-26, we read of his famous encounter with the taxes of Caesar. Yes, pay Caesar what is due him. But also give to God what is due God.

The not-so-often-asked question, then: What is due God? One place to start is Micah 6:8, where God requires us to do justice, love kindness and walk humbly with our God. Can that be done merely with civility?

It may be a nice start, even a strategic start, that can encourage another person to let you into his life. But justice, kindness and humble meanderings with God won’t get too far by people simply being “nice.”

These goals require much, much more of us than civility. All three depend on reconciliation as the foundation upon which they stand, move and come alive.

Reconciliation is the very ministry to which God calls each and every Christian. (I believe reconciliation is a desired goal in most faith traditions, but I speak today solely from my Christian tradition.)

II Corinthians 5:16-18 is St. Paul’s most commendable call to reconciliation. He wrote his first letter to a church torn nearly apart by jealousies, arguments with one another and animosity toward him. This letter was written more in gratitude for a change of attitude toward him and toward each other in the Corinthian church.

He reminded them he and they could no longer view each other, or others, merely from a human point of view. Because of Christ, they must now look back at people from God’s view.

“To look back” is what R-E-S-P-E-C-T really means. To look again at something or someone, to see in a different way, is what respect is about.

If civility is a polite knock of the door on another person’s life, respect is the invitation to enter into his home. The discerning host can easily spot surface politeness. He or she may not want to invite mere civility into the home.

There are civil ways to say, “No thank you, I don’t want anything more to do with you.” We’re often good at those, too.

We can keep others at a distance without deeply offending them. We will better keep from that unnecessary offense if we have basic respect for all persons, just because they are persons.

Yet even that respect can wear thin if it isn’t really based on a desire for some kind of reconciliation. If respect is the invitation to enter a person’s home, reconciliation is the ever-present possibility that once you are in another person’s life-home, tensions can be resolved.

Just for fun, I found some words that together remind me something of what R-E-S-P-E-C-T is all about:

“ R: Revere each person as a child of God.

“ E: Embrace that person as God’s child even if you can’t embrace his idea or action.

“ S: Serve that person with as much grace and hope as you can muster.

“ P: Be present to that person in that moment, listening very carefully to both what is said and not said.

“ E: Ease your own anxiety by remembering the other person may be just as anxious as you are.

“ C: Confess to yourself (at the least) that you are not filled with absolute truth and perfection.

“ T: Tolerate the other person’s imperfections even as you tolerate your own.

Civility may not be a uniquely Christian trait.

Respect is not the sole property of Christianity by any means. But it is an essential characteristic that we must practice.

When we do it well, respect will lead us to do justice, love kindness, walk humbly with God and engage in the ministry of reconciliation.

What more can we ask while on our spirit journeys?