Increasingly, news organizations have been composing exposes on how we have entered the age of the "self." Living in a world where technology permits us to talk about ourselves and our opinions endlessly has definitely given rise to a kind of public conversation that is as diverse as it is subjective.
American philosopher and psychologist, William James, used to worry about what would happen to the human personality if the mirror became more important than the telescope. He believed that the human mind and spirit had to somehow continually break out if they were to function effectively and matter to the larger world. And so he concluded in his A Pluralistic Universe: "Our intelligence cannot wall itself up alive, like a pupa in a chrysalis. It must at any cost keep on speaking terms with the universe that engendered it."
But what if it can't ... or won't. What if all this focus on ourselves and our own particular environment actually isolates us from the realities of life itself? What if some of the most vital things in existence no longer affect us because we are too occupied with things in which we find a personal interest? The world seems more manageable when it is smaller and revolves around our own private pursuits. Maybe this is part of the reason why the reality of impending ecological disaster barely moves us - we shy away from what threatens us.
Consider what is happening in Syria even as we read these words. Aid agencies have become so desperate for help that they repeatedly call upon the affluent West to step up and assist the 9.3 million people living at risk, and the 3.5 million Syrians living under siege. Surely these people matter to us, right?
To the larger global players these agencies are calling for new measures to create safe passage and corridors for humanitarian aid to reach the desperate. Hospitals have been obliterated and clean water is increasingly difficult to locate. In all of this the government of Syria itself is the main culprit, effectively blocking people from the essential services they require.
But to us, the citizens of the West, aid groups are asking that we put aside our mirrors for the moment and look through the telescope to the larger picture. If Syria continues down this course, eventually millions just like us will be destroyed. While we may claim that things seem so hopeless in Syria itself, remarkable opportunities for assistance lie in places like Lebanon, where UNICEF and the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) are working with organizations like Save the Children to assist the 400,000 Syrian refugee children in Lebanon itself. The kids can be assisted in education and the basic necessities right now simply because they are a border away from Syria. The agencies helping these children at risk are diverse and effective. They include the United Muslim Relief, Catholic Relief Services, and the Syrian American Medical Society. The opportunity to donate effectively within a safer environment is open to us and few excuses remain that can keep us from making a difference.
Many years ago I assisted Mother Teresa in her hospital in Calcutta and I recall her saying once in the small chapel, "If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other." In a world growing increasingly restless in collective insecurity, focusing on a mirror hardly prepares us for the challenges ahead. As great a challenge as rebellious leaders are to the world, our growing inability as citizens to "belong to each other" represents the greater danger. Healing will come by understanding, not merely by the undertaking of military action. A good place to start is with the people of Syria and their children now desperately seeking some semblance of life in a maddening world.
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