The Gift of Recognition

More than 20 years ago, I was part of a small group of well-meaning people who wanted to help at least a few of the thousands of people in our area who were homeless. Our intentions were wonderful: We wanted to do God’s work for people who obviously needed help. Our planning was flawed, though. We assumed that all homeless people were pretty much alike, and we thought we knew what they needed: food, clothes, a place to live, maybe even some motivation to “pull themselves up by their own bootstraps” as the saying goes. We even accepted the inevitability of their existence, a misuse of Jesus’ word that “you will always have the poor with you” (Matthew 26:11, Mark 14:7, John 12:8), and so we limited our goals to the provision of immediate relief.

Here’s what we learned: First of all, homeless people are not all alike. “The homeless” incorporates at least those suffering from mental illness, including war-induced post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD); many who suffer from various physical disabilities; people who are healthy but unemployed, including a surprising number of talented but untrained artists; illegal immigrants and ex-offenders who bear the extra burden of being automatically suspect; and far more than we expected who are illiterate. We learned that each one has a name, each one has unique needs, each one comes with his or her own special, holy story. “The homeless” is an empty descrip tion of hundreds of thousands of real people.

Secondly, in their remarkable diversity, all these people share two things: They are marginalized by our society and they feel excluded from it by our laws, both written and unwritten. None of them feels recognized as an individual person; too often negative labels have become their identity. Even they tend to believe they are only “the homeless,” objectified, depersonalized, and of minimal value. The needs of the people who came to us were much deeper than we had naively expected.

And then came God’s little surprise. I was returning from a clergy conference. Often such gatherings are uplifting and mutually supportive, but not this one. This time, the focus was on our frustrations as ordained ministers. Our jobs were too stressful, our ministries seemed somehow futile, the world was definitely not on our side. Although it seems obvious now, I do not think I realized then how similar our complaints were to the frustrations of our homeless guests at the chapel.

God took advantage of my vulnerability in the moment. As I returned to work, I saw many of our guests gathered at the doorway, waiting to come inside. And just like that, God said to me, “These people are the outward and visible sign of the inward and spiritual yearning of all of you. They are sacrament.” In effect, God used the victims of our societal brokenness as an awakening moment for me. I think God does that, takes our mistakes and uses them for good. What God said was that we all are on the same journey toward full “at-homeness” with God. The people who are homeless, the clergy that day, all of us. Then and now.

Recognition
What we share, of course, is the universal need to be recognized for who we really are. Too often, we objectify and depersonalize people who differ from us, or who do not share our goals and expectations, or who seem to have accomplished less or more than we have. Our disrespect can be much more subtle than through social policy or legal exclusion. It can be in our daily behavior, very often in the briefest encounters.

We need to think and pray about that, because at the personal level each one of us disregards others differently. We need to pray about how we respond to members of the opposite sex, even our spouses. We need to pray about how we relate with co-workers, others in our congregations, others of different political affiliations, others of different sexual orientation, race, creed, ethnicity, nationality. Others of different economic status. Too often, we treat those who are differ ent, unknown to us, or somehow threatening, as less; we can look right through them as if they are not there. The question becomes, how do I treat my neighbor?

Webster defines “recognition” as “formal acknowledgment…acceptance of an individual as being entitled to consideration or attention.” I would add, “because every single one is in the image of God.” Being recognized as truly created in the image of God, and then recognizing all others in the same way, is an invitation of our journey.

In the image of God
So what does it mean to be created in the image of God? A lawyer who already knew to love God, neighbor, and self but wanted a better understanding asked Jesus, “Who is my neighbor?” In response, Jesus told him the story of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25–37). To be in the image of God is to truly love without limits.

Here’s the problem for us: We are always inadequate in our own ability to love so freely, and we often encounter others who will take advantage of our apparent naiveté when we attempt it. They are not perfect either. And so, we are afraid of those who differ, and we write laws and develop personal habits to protect ourselves. And then we find our commitment to love others as in the image of God in conflict with our own rules and boundaries. What then?

Recognizing others
We have to begin where we are and, like our little group 20 years ago, do what we see to do, remaining open to the possibility that we have much to learn. I would suggest some guidelines: first, we need not “do unto” people, but instead, be with people. Give and receive. Teach and learn. Recognize everyone we encounter as created and loved by God, even the ones who are clearly incomplete! (That would be all of us.)

Even something as simple as honest conversation with those who are different from us can be risky. We can be misused or rejected or ignored. Or even feared. Scarier yet, we can be changed. I just finished reading Madeleine Albright’s The Mighty and The Almighty; she applies this reality at the international level. I’m no foreign relations specialist, but I think we can learn at the personal level what she discovered at the international negotiation level: When we categorize and judge others, we often err and we deafen ourselves not only to our similarities but also to the real issues between us. We need at every level to listen and learn.

Being recognized
Sometimes, we do not recognize others because we are insufficiently recognized ourselves. We are always looking for reassurance of our own value. So we need to be aware of our own unmet needs; when we are not, we project our frustrations, hurts, fears, anxieties, even expectations, goals, dreams, and joys on others. Such projection is counterproductive at best and damages others in the process. What might be very good for us may not be good for someone else. Instead, self-care as a priority reflects a God-given love of self. We need to take care of ourselves not only physically but also emotionally, psychologically, and spiritually. Our national tendency is to prioritize the first to the detriment of all the others. God desires our wholeness, and our responsibility is total, not partial, self-nurture.

In April, Randy Pausch, a professor at Carnegie Mellon University, wrote a little book called The Last Lecture. It’s a revealing witness of how to live, and it has dramatic impact, because he was a young man, married with three children, and he was dying of pancreatic cancer. His story is an intensification of everyone’s; we are all going to die, and he knew he had only a few months to live. In fact he died in July. He was born wise, I think, because his way of living didn’t change, just his willingness to share it with all of us. He tells us: Enjoy every moment you are given. Have fun! Don’t sweat the small things.

Make sure your choices reflect what is of ultimate value to you, be willing to take risks and even to fail, learn to work together, live for your dreams. His stories are courageous, fun, and full of life, even in his dying. He honors himself, and so he can honor others.

Borrowing the “head fake”
Pausch was a gifted teacher. Sometimes he used a technique called the “head fake.” He said: “There are two kinds of head fakes. The first is literal. On a football field, a player will move his head one way so you’ll think he’s going in that direction. Then he goes the opposite way. . . .

“The second kind of head fake is the really important one—the one that teaches people things they don’t realize they’re learning until well into the process. If you’re a headfake specialist, your hidden objective is to get them to learn something you want them to learn.”

I think that’s what this effort of mine is attempting. I’ve been talking about how we relate with other people and therefore how we treat ourselves. But this is also about how we relate with God. We can only move into the “love neighbor/love self” place when we recognize God and realize that we are always being recognized by God.

Just as in our relationship with others, we need to begin where we are with God, and do what we see to do, all the while open to the possibility that we have much to learn.

The interpersonal guidelines also are relevant: First, let’s not limit God by labeling God instead of being with, receiving, and learning from God. Recognize God for who God is: love, limitless, bigger, better, more than we can imagine. Recognize God as the source of our being, ourselves as God’s creatures by virtue of the creative power of love.

And second, don’t let our limitations in communication, whether too much talking and not enough listening or the other way around, deafen us to God’s continual loving word for us. We need to allow ourselves the time to know that we are recognized, known, seen, heard by God. It’s amazing how allowing ourselves to notice that we are loved by God and that God is, in fact, guiding us, meets our yearning to be known. Then we don’t have to look everywhere else for what only God can give. And when we learn to recognize God’s voice, we hear it everywhere, even in the words of other people. And there, in that mutuality, we discover that all of us are, indeed, created in the image of God. Wow!

Lynn C. Ramshaw is a retired Episcopal priest in the Diocese of Chicago, a Benedictine oblate, and an experienced retreat leader. She has three married children and seven grandchildren.

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