Connection, Trust and Truth

On this July 4th, questions abound whether America can heal our divide and together go forth under the flag of our forefathers. Maybe there is a way if we want it badly enough.

One of the things I learned as a young engineer who was just entering industry as organized problem solving, statistics and predictive quality techniques were becoming standard (what eventually became Six Sigma), was that the time-tested proposition that you can’t solve a problem until you can define it was always the first and most important process.

In my opinion, the last two weeks of the 2021 Supreme Court term was the most significant of any term in almost eighty years, perhaps the entire term will be recorded in history as a turning point, a course correction if you will, of the leftward drift of America’s jurisprudence and the culture it changed.

I picked eighty years for a reason. When I think back over consequential periods during my lifetime, I think the period from about 1962 culminating with the Roe v. Wade decision in 1973, give or take a few years on either side, produced the greatest cultural changes that people of my generation have experienced.

Of course, the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 created new avenues within the judicial system, leading to school desegregation, forced bussing and the school systems of entire states operating under the direct orders and watchful eyes of the judiciary but one decision sticks in my mind as the most divisive action that still resonates today.

It was the June 25th, 1962 6-1 holding (Justices Frankfurter and White did not participate in the consideration or decision in this case) in the matter of?Engel v. Vitale?that “state officials may not compose an official state prayer and require that it be recited in the public schools of the state at the beginning of each school day — even if the prayer is denominationally neutral and pupils who wish to do so may remain silent or be excused from the room.”

In plain terms,?Engel?in and of itself did not ban ban prayer in schools – only prayer organized and mandated by agents of the state was prohibited; however, it did provide a foot in the door for prayer to be effectively banned through cases like?Wallace v. Jaffree?(1985), where the Supreme Court ruled Alabama's law permitting one minute for prayer or meditation was unconstitutional,?Lee v. Weisman?(1992), where the court prohibited clergy-led prayer at middle school graduation ceremonies, and?Santa Fe ISD v. Doe?(2000), in which the Court extended the ban to school-organized?student-led prayer at high school football games even though a majority of students voted in favor of the prayer - all of which cascaded from?Engel.

It has been said that the Supreme Court’s ruling in Engel protected the students, but also tore the country apart. Steven Smith, law professor and co-executive director of the institute for Law and Religion at the University of San Diego said, A lot of our cultural division dates back that that time.”

Much of that is true, and of course, there are many other examples of other issues that are just as divisive, abortion being one of them, but in the lives of 99.7% of Americans, abortion is a hypothetical, not a reality (1,000,000 abortions a year divided by 330,000,000 people).

Religion, whether you are observant, agnostic, or atheistic, it touches everyone and is mutually exclusive - what is non-sectarian to one, is most certainly sectarian to another. It really doesn’t matter what if you believe something or nothing, you will be forced to make a decision about it because this rift exposes conflicting ideas about how religious this nation should be.

After all this, it is legitimate to ask if America can be healed of our division.

Maybe – but it will require three things: connection, trust, and truth. If we can find our way back to these three things, we have a shot.

The first critical component in healing America is connection. Most people would say it is communication, but this is a need that goes far deeper. There is a need for us as a population to be able to bond over common wants, needs and desires even if there are only a few. Absent of that kind of kinship, there can be no path to any common good, any shared sense of purpose.

In yet another example of something thought to connect us has done exactly the opposite. The Internet has created an untold number of pathways between people only to see them become even more isolated than ever. We don’t interact personally with nearly as many people face to face as we did before Al Gore invented the world wide web and that has severed personal connections at the individual, family and community levels. It is as if we all live in a huge house but lock ourselves in rooms and yell at each other through the walls.

The second critical component in the process of healing is trust.

Referencing the?Engel?decision and its aftermath, Stephen K. Green, a law professor and director of the Center for Religion, Law, and Democracy at Willamette University, noted the lack of trust in the Supreme Court because “The fear was that the court was adopting a model of secularism over religious pluralism.”

In short, people just didn’t trust that open door – and they have been proven right not to do so because time and time again, people have been burned by others who say one thing and do another.

Trust is the currency people deposit in the bank – it is the currency in which they trade. It is ultimately earned, rather than given. People value those who trust them and place special value on those in whom they have invested their trust.

I don’t know about most people, but I am lacking trust when it comes to almost anything political or governmental. I trust nothing said by the Democrats, as a matter of fact, I trust nothing Joe Biden, any of his spokespeople, Chuck Schumer, or Nancy Pelosi says and damn little of what Kevin McCarthy and Mitch McConnell say.

The final, and perhaps the most important, is truth because no principle or value can exist without truth as a foundation. Only upon objective truth can connections and trust exist.

Can bridge our divide?

It is an open question, but I would say that we can - if we want it badly enough.