Dear Friends,
In ‘The History Man’, by Malcolm Bradbury, a man comes out with the classic complaint, ‘The problem is that my wife doesn’t understand me’. The woman he is attempting to impress responds by saying, ‘No, your problem is that your wife does understand you, only too well!’
Claiming either to be misunderstood or to be unable to understand others are both ways of getting out of tricky positions and challenges. Saying something is ‘complicated’ is a way of avoiding the reality of the situation. If the truth is not something we want to hear or accept, one way of avoiding facing it is to make it sound too complicated to deal with, and therefore better put to one side and ignored.
I sometimes think that this is what is happening in the Gospels, where the Pharisees deliberately misrepresent Jesus’ actions and teaching. They are wise and learned and have the capability of understanding exactly what Jesus means only too well, but they don’t want to. Like the man in Bradbury’s novel, who makes excuses to avoid facing the unpleasant and unpalatable truths about himself, the Pharisees avoid facing the challenge of Jesus’ message by pretending they don’t understand what he stands for or requires of them.
Sometimes we can be guilty of doing the same, of making excuses to avoid considering the really big questions in life, whether moral, spiritual, or theological. Such questions are often puzzling and there may be no easy answers: God’s ways can be hard to fathom. Often thinking about these questions can challenge us in ways we don’t like, because they make us reassess our own values and actions, and that can be uncomfortable. But we shouldn’t make lack of understanding an excuse for failing to try to explore the truth of situations, or for failing to examine the way we live and the impact we have on others – including our loved ones, who often understand us far better than we think or might wish.
There is a saying used in therapeutic circles that ‘The facts are friendly’. What that means is that the facts are our friends. We need to gather information and understand all that we can, because the more we know about situations and ourselves, the better prepared we are to face the challenges thrown at us. It is always good to make the effort to try to understand the world, ourselves, and others as well as we can.
With every good wish,
Lissa Scott