Now and then I come across items or subcultures that I did not know existed and, after discovering them, kind of wished that it had stayed that way. The most recent of these discoveries is that Vladimir Putin puts out a yearly calendar, which naturally enough gives you twelve months of pictures of the Russian potentate. In the 2019 edition, one picture is of him petting a leopard while in another he is working out. There is also a subgenre in this collection of photos of him shirtless – in one he is holding a fish and in another he is taking a dip in a frozen lake under the watchful eye of three Orthodox priests, who incidentally are holding icons. For a moment it made me ponder what I would do if there were a demand for a 12 months of Phil calendar. And all I really concluded was that it would definitely feature marmots. But here is the point I really want to make and it is one about humanity in general and that has to do with the inverse relationship between our perceptions of us being awesome and the reality of that awesomeness. I am not privy to the inner workings of Vladimir Putin’s brain but I assume at some point when he was posing shirtless with a fish he thought, “Look on my Siberian Sturgeon, ye Mighty, and despair!” or some such sentiment. But for any of you that have had the unfortunate experience of seeing the photo I am guessing that this was not the first thought that entered your head. Mine was, “For the love of God put a shirt on, maybe two just to be safe.”
And while making fun of Vladimir Putin is something God encourages us to do (I am kidding so please don’t write me letters) I think many of our problems and indeed the world’s problems happen when we are doing things that seem really great at the time. There was a very minor singer years ago, who may still be around for all I know, but in one of her songs she stated something to the effect that she had never done anything that she did not think was right at the time. Now when I was eighteen, I found this lyric deep and exciting and I wholeheartedly agreed with them, using the refrain to inflate my own view of myself. I was a moral giant because I thought I was doing the right thing at the time. But as I grew older I realized that this was not really a brilliant insight and was in fact something that Ted Bundy or Pol Pot could have just of easily have said. Most of the stupid things that I have done in my life I did think were pretty sweet at the time. Some of these things were harmless enough like fashion choices I made in the 70’s involving satin but others caused real damage to individuals. The question that we all need to work on discerning is when are we doing things that are glorifying to God and enhancing of humanity and when are we just being idiots. Or as David St. Hubbins reminds us - it's such a fine line between stupid and clever.
And this is a rather obvious point, but one I think we all need reminding is that while our conscience has the imprint of God upon it; it is also subject to corruptibility and self-justification. Stalin’s ruthless secret police chief Lavrentiy Beria, once bragged that he could prove criminal conduct on anyone stating, “Show me the man and I’ll show you the crime.” While I am not comparing anyone to that standard I think in many ways when we want something we are susceptible to coming up with the justification for our behaviors afterwards. We do what we feel like and then shoehorn in some moral justification after the fact. Because of this we need an outside set of criteria. We often need a group of trusted friends or spiritual guides who help cut through the cesspool of our self-justification. In many ways this is harder in our day and age because of the Internet. In an Internet infused world it is pretty easy to find an online community that agrees with whatever we do. And so all I really want to remind people of today is that when left to our own devices or when surrounded by a bunch of sycophants it is rather easy to put out our own cringe inducing versions of 365 days of Putin (figuratively and not literally). But we are obviously called to something higher, something eternal and not fleeting; something that ultimately is beautiful, wonderful and pure.