A while back (Feb. 4), I was thinking about what psychologists call CREDs, credibility enhancing displays.
We all know that children pay attention to what their parents do, rather than what they say. But children sometimes pay profound attention when an adult takes a moral stand that costs something. We remember stories of people whose principles cost them a job, a beating, even a life.
Maybe I’m a child at heart. I’m still fascinated by people who stand on principle.
A.J. Muste — most people pronounce his name “musty” — was such a person. He was a boy when his family left the Netherlands, seeking opportunity. Muste was working in a furniture plant in Michigan when he was 11. He became a minister, but his views about what was required of a person cost him his career.
Muste became convinced that a Christian is by definition a pacifist. Jesus of Nazareth was clear about violence.
Muste gave up a comfortable pulpit when the United States entered World War I.
Muste’s life took a turn. He was increasingly interested in social justice. He’s probably better known today as a labor organizer than as a minister.
In later years, he protested the nuclear arms race and the Vietnam War. He would light a candle and stand, often alone, outside the White House.
One evening, a reporter asked him if he really believed he would change anything by doing that.
Muste replied: “Oh I don’t do this to change the country. I do this so the country won’t change me.”
I think that children have a sense of self, which is at the root of a sense of integrity. That sense of self can be lost when we give up our own principles and go along with the crowd.
I think children pay attention in these cases because they have a sense of the real danger. Sadly, some adults lose that sense along the way.
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