I grew up in a Baltimore Catechism kind of world. Just about any Catholic from a practicing family in my generation will know exactly what I mean by that (for the rest of you, just be glad you didn't). I had no idea what 'Original Sin' meant, except that there was some unexplained tenuous connection between what a couple did many thousands of generations ago, and me. It didn't seem all that bad (being disobedient and eating some fruit) but, I was assured, it had some very nasty consequences. Asking, 'Why do I have to suffer for what they did?" didn't get me very far. It was 'God's will' and that was that. It left a curiously bad taste in my mouth that God was that kind of a Meanie.
Fast forward a whole bunch of years into post-graduate theology. Somebody finally shares the understanding that 'Original Sin' is a Biblical metaphor for the human condition. At long last, the light came on! "Aha!" There's a theological name for our common boundless capacity for self-delusion: Original Sin! Who knew? 'Original Sin' identifies that little piece of insanity in each one of us that refuses to accept reality, that denies responsibility, that indulges in wishful thinking, that jumps to conclusions, believes unfounded rumors and always imagines the worst. Call it what you will: 'Original Sin', the 'human condition', our 'tragic flaw' — whatever — this weakness at the core of our human being-ness turns any Utopian dream into a nightmare.
That's not enough to stop people from pretending that they're still in a Utopian Garden of Eden. It doesn't prevent alcoholics from believing that they can take just one drink (in spite of overwhelming evidence to the contrary); id doesn't keep people from joining cults and communes; and it certainly doesn't discourage people from believing in 'free market capitalism'. Libertarians won't stop believing that government is the enemy. People will continue to promote deregulation as the cure for all the ills facing any industry. Leaders will still loudly proclaim the benefits of 'trickle-down economics' and 'faith-based initiatives' to combat our social ills. All of these approaches rely completely on a faith in the fundamental soundness of human behavior: a soundness that contradicts both Biblical and historical evidence.
For those of us who believe in Original Sin, we understand that greed and self-interest will trump mercy and justice every time. We accept as a fact of human nature that the powerful will become wealthy at the expense of the disenfranchised. Those who are poor, uneducated, jobless, addicted, aged, sick, and needy are not drains on our wealth; they are our sacred responsibility. We have ample evidence that, without the intervention of a principled governing authority, Original Sin will make sure that these people remain marginalized and victimized. "But," the Utopians argue, "these people are not deserving of handouts — they're illegal aliens, they're ex-cons, they're disease-carriers, the chronically unemployed."
That makes for a very interesting Utopian definition of democracy, paraphrasing Lincoln's words: "Government of the deserving, by the deserving, for the deserving." And what, I ask you, makes some people more deserving than others? "All animals are equal," read the commandments in George Orwell's Animal Farm. It was the Utopians — the pigs — who added ". . . but some are more equal than others." What we've been watching in this great Utopian experiment that's been going on in the US for over a decade (since 1994) has manifested itself in a massive redistribution of wealth, the degradation of health care and the planet's environment, a resurgence of xenophobia, the meltdown of global markets and an unprecedented self-absorption. Look around you at the world created for us by the Utopians. Now, which is easier to believe, that this Eden, or that we suffer from Original Sin?
H. Les Brown, MA, FCC
Copyright © 2008 H. Les Brown
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