Tuesday marked the one-year anniversary of my dad\u2019s passing. It was a sacred, impossible, hilarious, formational eight-month journey of liver cancer. I was privileged to accompany him all the way to the river then watched as he took the most difficult step that we take in life\u2019s journey: from this life to the life beyond.<\/p>\n
My dad and I had a unique friendship. He was raised to be conservative, politically and theologically.\u00a0 For the most part, he lived his life committed to an ethic that pours out of that particular paradigm. He was wise, cautious, safe, and certain. I, on the other hand, have lived an unconventional life oriented around a Jesus that has invited me into some of the most beautifully bizarre corners of our global village and into uncommon friendships that have expanded my theology, deepened my faith, and shaped the trajectory of my life.\u00a0 To be clear, he wasn\u2019t always comfortable, nor did he always agree with the path that I was walking. It is not safe; it appeared to him unwise; it awakened wonder rather than reinforced preexisting ideas; it was never familiar to him. It\u2019s fair to say that, while we were both decent people, we were quite divided theologically and politically.<\/p>\n
Yet, what I learned near the end of his life is that the journey that I\u2019ve taken had propelled my dad beyond safety and convention. It was a journey that he never expected<\/em> that he\u2019d take but was willing to embark upon because he loved his son.\u00a0 Throughout his final decade, this journey began to renovate his theology, open his mind to more gracious and generous possibilities, and expose him to relationships with people who were far different than he was.<\/p>\n But the transformation wasn\u2019t just for him. Over the years, I watched in awe as we both went from threatened, critical, and defensive to more thoughtful, curious, and eager to know and experience more. We were both being found and formed by Jesus by immersing into and seeking to understand each other\u2019s perspectives. As we journeyed with one another toward his death, both of our appetites grew for the kind of transformation we were experiencing. This journey that he and I had found ourselves navigating together was, in fact, a pilgrimage that reshaped his and continues to reshape my life. We were growing to see God, ourselves, each other, and our world more spaciously\u2026more generously.<\/p>\n In The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion<\/em>, moral psychologist Jonathon Haidt helps us understand why decent people choose to believe what they believe and how said beliefs bind and blind us.[1]<\/a> Pointing to the supremacy of intuition over reason, Haidt invites us to consider how our mind is like an elephant and a rider.\u00a0 The elephant is our intuition that has become conditioned to intuit information and experiences and respond in a particular way. Humans, Haidt writes, “are constantly reacting intuitively to everything they perceive and basing their responses on those reactions. Within the first second of seeing, hearing, or meeting another person, the elephant has already begun to lean toward or away, and that lean influences what you think and do next. Intuitions come first.”[2]<\/a><\/p>\n The second component of our mind is the rider, or, reason. Rather than a \u201cscientist searching for truth,\u201d Haidt identifies the rider as a \u201cpolitician searching for votes.\u201d[3]<\/a> Haidt suggests that all of us are \u201ctrapped in a moral matrix where our \u2018elephants\u2019 only look for what confirms its moral intuitions while our \u2018riders\u2019 play the role of the lawyer; we team up with people who share similar matrices and become close-minded; and we forget that morality is diverse.\u201d[4]<\/a> Put another way, the elephant drives our behavior and the rider functions as the \u201cpress secretary\u201d[5]<\/a> who works to justify our preferred argument.<\/p>\n The rider does not control the elephant. Rather, Haidt suggests that she can only respond\u2026and hold on.<\/p>\n So how do we change someone\u2019s mind? Haidt writes:<\/p>\n If you really want to change someone\u2019s mind on a moral or political matter, you\u2019ll need to see things from that person\u2019s angle as well as your own. And if you do truly see it the other person\u2019s way \u2014 deeply and intuitively \u2014 you might even find your own mind opening in response. Empathy is an antidote to righteousness<\/em><\/strong>….[6]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Changing someone\u2019s mind requires that we interact with their elephant (intuition) rather than their rider (reason).<\/p>\n Haidt highlights what my dad and I did poorly as well as what we learned to do well.\u00a0 That is, when my dad and I tried to convert each other\u2019s riders (reason) through evidence and our preferred talking points, we failed hopelessly. Our elephants veered in opposite directions and the gap between us grew.\u00a0 Yet, when we approached each other\u2019s elephants (intuition) with handfuls of proverbial circus peanuts (genuine questions rooted in the desire to understand the other), our elephants would lean in and begin to walk in stride with each other.<\/p>\n Haidt puts it this way:<\/p>\n The main way that we change our minds on moral issues is by interacting with other people. We are terrible at seeking evidence that challenges our own beliefs, but other people do us this favor, just as we are quite good at finding errors in other people\u2019s beliefs. When discussions are hostile, the odds of change are slight. The elephant leans away from the opponent, and the rider works frantically to rebut the opponent\u2019s charges. But if there is affection, admiration, or a desire to please the other person, then the elephant leans toward<\/em> that person and the rider tries to find the truth in the other person\u2019s arguments.[7]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Perhaps Haidt would agree with Hunter\u2019s suggestion that change occurs not by building power and conquering others, but through faithful presence. That is, in the context of disagreement, the practices of proximity, curiosity, and long listening communicate an important commitment: \u201cI\u2019m here regardless of if we agree.\u201d What I discovered in my journey with my dad is that as we made intentional decisions to live that truth, we grew certain of each other\u2019s affection. That certainty, in turn, caused us to think more generously of one another. What\u2019s more, it opened the pores of our souls and we found ourselves being transformed. Rather than committing to converting each other’s riders, we were learning to tame our own elephants.<\/p>\n ~~<\/p>\n [1]<\/a> Haidt, Jonathon. \u201cThe Righteous Mind: Why Liberals and Conservatives Can\u2019t Get Along.\u201d Filmed July 1, 2013. YouTube video, 26:46. https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=qN42ZLwNFBY<\/a><\/p>\n [2]<\/a> Haidt, Jonathan. The Righteous Mind: Why Good People are Divided by Politics and Religion<\/em>. New York: Random House, 2012. 59.<\/p>\n [3]<\/a> Ibid, 76.<\/p>\n [4]<\/a> McNerny, Samuel. \u201cJonathon Haidt and the Moral Matrix: Breaking Out of Our Righteous Minds,\u201d ScientificAmerica.com.https:\/\/blogs.scientificamerican.com\/guest-blog\/jonathan-haidt-the-moral-matrix-breaking-out-of-our-righteous-minds\/<\/a><\/u> (Accessed February 25, 2020).<\/p>\n [5]<\/a> Haidt, Jonathon. \u201cThe Righteous Mind: Why Liberals and Conservatives Can\u2019t Get Along.\u201d Filmed July 1, 2013. YouTube video, 26:46. https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=qN42ZLwNFBY<\/a><\/p>\n