Forebearance is hard. It feels unnatural at first, insulting to our sense of justice. Over time, with disciplined use, it becomes, not primarily natural, but a kind of second nature, like ironic laughter at the ridiculous smallness of infuriating events. It's a wry grin, with grief playing around the edges.
But, like anything, forebearance can be weaponized. There's a name for that cold dish: Loganimity.
Our hearts cry out for immediate justice, for resolution, for closure, for redemption. I like action movies because in them, justice is always served steaming. Forebearance takes the long veiw, smiles softly and lays down its big stick - despite those hot, urgent desires - oftentimes smiling straight to the grave. It can easily be misunderstood as weakness and spark a violent reaction but, whose holiday do we celebrate - MLK or Malcolm X? Atticus Finch pushed up his glasses and taught us forebearance without clear resolution. John Ross wept his way to Oklahoma with forebearance. Human history is littered with corpses of the forebearing populace massacred by rabid hot-heads.
So we succor the dark underbelly of forebearance: patient revenge - loganimity. We turn to religion to ease the pain of injustice, but we secretly believe that Jesus knew, as He meekly bore the whip, that one day He'd get His. Since He's the only one who can really take revenge for all of us meek sheep who've been harrassed by the wolves, we'll have to wait for Him and His army of angels and natural disasters and that horrifying Lake of Fire to balance the scales. That, I confess, is my loganimity. I'm joined by the legions who've humbly bowed their heads when cut off in traffic or beat up at school or rejected for the prom or, let's see, I guess I'll have to add enslaved, butchered, maimed, raped, displaced, or imprisoned unjustly - and nurtured the simmering hope that one day the offenders will be thoroughly and profoundly punished while we, who patiently forebore their self-absorbed wretchedness, will dance with glee on streets of gold.
There is that annoying passage about all having sinned and fallen short of the glorious golden streets, and none being righteous, no, not one - but that's why Jesus died, right? To save me? That, and to trick the truly wicked into thinking He was gone forever so they could get good and deep in sin thus earning a molten spot in what must be, from all available evidence, a really big burning lake.
On our first day of school at the Oregon Extension we (32 caucasian, middle-class, Christian-evengelical 20-somethings) were asked what we'd say if we ran into Hitler in Heaven. The whole group tittered at the suggestion but the professor was stone-faced. It dawned on us that he was serious! The idea cratered our loganimity, our bedrock belief that wicked people ultimately got what was coming to them and we, with humble goodness transmuted into our genes by our heritage and social status, were to receive an eternal reward. We humbly nodded that yes, Jesus certainly died for Hitler too, but inside we achingly hoped we wouldn't bump into Hitler in heaven because that would nauseatingly disrupt the natural order of things. I, for one, having not gassed 4 million people, felt I deserved a better reward than Hitler - a better house, better view of the seraphim, better seat at the table, shinier street of gold - something. We needed loganimity - it soothed us with seductive promises of everything turning out all right in the end - good patiently suffers abuses but ultimately triumphs over evil, evil is crushed. Hitler hadn't even done anything to us personally - still, he must be crushed, especially in the afterlife! Any alternate ending would absolutely tear the lids off our neat worldviews. The professors dedicated the next four months to tearing off lids.
I'm still drawn toward loganimity rather than true forebearance when I perceive myself slighted. I want the other person to think they got away with doing me wrong; they carry on with their lives la la la la la then WHAM, the hammer drops! I want them to suffer terribly, but I don't want to be the one to drop the hammer - I'll let Jesus do that.
What's that? What do you mean that's not how it works?
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